This page is devoted to solving the problems oppressed people face *once and for all*! By looking for the "heart" of the problem and "unearthing" such, we all*** gain increased insight and understanding about what may be happening, not only to notably oppressed persons (Africans, women, Jews, Gays) but persons not yet viewed as being oppressed or otherwise destructively confined in our increasingly severe alienation from each other. In this way we may more carefully, and more meaningfully proceed towards valuable insights, understandings, and solutions to our challenges hopefully with less "spinning of wheels" and learning from the pitfalls and same old "dead-ends" which other groups have gone down!
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***NOTE: When i say "all" i mean all, across and beyond all of our artificial and fear-stuck boundaries and self-limiting categories. Including those hurting individuals and groups who may not even yet be aware of the roots of their pain--including the worst oppressors, as individuals (not as perpetually de-individualized groups). We're all human beings, and it's about time someone identify that and get to work on serious solutions! |
RE-EDITED and UPDATED 2002
Introduction
"...if we are afraid, we are almost always afraid of something, and the more clearly we can see what it is we are afraid of, the more likely we are to be able to cope with that fear."--John Holt in FREEDOM AND BEYOND p.32
Understanding
the depth and breadth of the challenge before us is vital not only to a
single-issue-oriented community seeking to orient itself to make serious
defenses in the face of increasingly authoritarian attack, but also to seeing
how alone we are not in the broader, or *macro* picture. In realizng that
many have been where we now are, and learning from their mistakes and
experiences we may thus find new inspiration and energy to continue our pursuit
of justice and sanity.
One
of the best ways i've found to understand that which is happening against the
single issue that brought me into this larger inquiry, has been my desire to
understand how the predicament could have happened in the first place. Thus i
sought insights into what has happened and what is happening to others
whom have been or continue to be in similar shoes. In this inquiry, i have found
that if the single-issue oriented can realize comparisons and find
underlying systematic patterns to the roots of these problems
which prove to be shared by many, the treasure from this can be very very
powerful for all involved!
Because
then we all start to see how many similarities we share as human beings, and as
well the import of building our numbers and our awareness in a kind of
solidarity which seeks, finally, to liberate *all*--not only those directly
suppressed and oppressed by the injustice, but those others whom we have
believed to be "evil" and "incapable" of caring.
So,
with all this in mind, i invite you to explore the limited study here, compare
it with your experiences and second-hand study, and then email me/visit with me for an on-going
conversation which could very well bear excellent fruit!
"Rulers have always conspired against their subjects, and
sought to keep them in [physical and psychological] bondage."--Thomas
Szasz
It starts in history... |
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QUESTION: Witches were known to be a "plaguing" European and American societies at one time. What other groups can you think of that have been treated similarly to us? How about South and North American Indian people? Consider the following quote: "...most Americans were not ready to listen. For four hundred years, the world had failed to understand Indian people, and the watchword of the day was change--change for Indian people, not understanding of them."-- from the introduction of FROM THE HEART, Voices of the American Indian; edited by Lee Miller; Knopf; NY; 1995; p.xiii Now take a look at a few instances in history of comparable treatment of weakly organized or unorganized groups by tyrannical power:
Okay, there's something to get you going a little. Now let's look at some ways in which these same patterns manifest in contemporary forms; take the way in which the pattern... |
...CONTINUES WITH "YOUR"KIDS... |
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No one likes the claim
that their young would be targeted for deceit and violation. But beyond
the public relations hype about officials having their interests first and
foremost, such managers and controllers of the masses' offspring are "just
doing their jobs" in quite curious ways. Most probably aren't even aware
of how the ideas and beliefs they've received in their training affect
those they "help." But that doesn't matter--as long as they "follow the
rules" or "play within the limits" of the game, they won't lose their
jobs. While
these middle-persons may not be aware of the possible political control
behind their work, I can show you that their bosses are; at least to the
extent that they follow a shared view about how such institutions
"must be run." The people who came up with these ideas in the first place
(and who are often well-known to well-trained people), publish their
beliefs in well-circulating journals, like "Public Opinion Quarterly."
People like Edward Bernays, Walter Lippmann, and Reinhold Niebuhr. They
"understood" the potential of independent thought going "too far" and
wanted to help "the more intelligent members of society" keep the "stupid"
masses on "the proper course." So
when, in the 1970's, "much too many" voices of the oppressed began to
become audible, those who didn't want such people to "cause trouble"
had to stop the "virus" at its roots. Is this really possible? Can it actually be true? Read more about what was called the "Crisis of Democracy" |
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Hopefully, with the following incomplete list to help you get started in conducting your own investigation into these contentions of mine, you'll realize what is going on much deeper than you have and have a much better basic understanding of the challenge facing us. With such knowledge, you will hopefully be more able to jump off into your own projects and find success where you may not have before!
(note: list of vital sources for your further inquiry into these potentials follow below)
EDUCATION CRITIQUES
§ THE TEENAGE LIBERATION HANDBOOK, How To Quit School and Get a Real Life and Education by Grace Llewellyn; Lowry House Publishers; Eugene, OR1991 (see excerpt here)(includes an excellent critique of history and interests in compulsory schooling) § School is dead; Learn in Freedom! (highly documented and excellent analysis of compulsory schooling) § THE UNDER-ACHIEVING SCHOOL by John Holt; Dell Publishing, NY; 1969 § MYTH OF THE HYPERACTIVE CHILD, And Other Means of Child Control by Peter Schrag and Diane Divoky; Pantheon 1975; § THE LEARNING MYSTIQUEby Gerald Coles (Excellent list of resources on "learning disabilities" and education) § "The I.Q.Ideology"by S.Bowles and H.Gintis; This Magazine is About Schools Vol.6 #4: Winter 1972-'73 § The Science and Politics of I.Q. by Kamin, L.J.; Wiley; NY, 1974 § For a history and contemporary documentation of high school and college student press problems with officials check the Student Press Law Center (active since early 1970s) |
JUVENILE "JUSTICE" CRITIQUES§ hype and politics of juvenile deviance by Ronald Boostrom §
"The child savers' rhetoric was about liberating
children...but the reality was tighter supervision and control by
adults"--in a review of "The Child
Savers: The Invention of Delinquency" by Anthony Platt, University of
Chicago Press, 1969; § see also "An Incriminating Expose of the Juvenile Justice Juggernaut" from FPS Magazine (link possibly forthcoming) |
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"A social control belief system ("social paradigm") blankets a society filling almost every intellectual niche. It is like air to land animals or water to a fish, one is totally immersed in it at all times."--from the Institute of Economic Democracy
ADULT CHAUVANISM CRITIQUES
§ Ann Arbor Youth Liberation (1970s youth-run liberation group, active for about 10 years!) § ESCAPE FROM CHILDHOOD, The Needs and Rights of Children (see excerpt via link at right) by John Holt 1974; § "Children's Rights: The Latest Crusade" TIME Magazine; December 25, 1972; p.41-42 § the INDIANNER KOMMUNE --argued against "adulto" (adult- centered) society for 20+ years in Germany § GROWING UP ABSURD by Paul Goodman § (aRE KIDS 'irresponsible and incompetent'? See "THE FINAL PREJUDICE"--a commentary on a Star Trek show and kids' treatment in an episode, by John Zerzan.)New Link!
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"If
the first half of the twentieth century was the era of the technical engineers,
the second half may wll be the era of the social engineers...To the question
'quis cusodiet custodes?'--Who will mount guard over our guardians...--the
answer is a bland denial that they need any supervision. There seems to be a
touching belief among certain PhD's...that [they] will never be corrupted by
power. ...their heart is pure because they are scientists and have taken six
thousand hours of...studies."--Aldous
Huxley p.34 of _Brave New World--REVISITED
MENTAL "HEALTH" CRITIQUES§ The Antipsychiatry Coalition § AND THEY CALL IT HELP by Louise Armstrong, 1993; § THE WAR AGAINST CHILDREN and TOXIC PSYCHIATRY: Why Empathy, Love, and Therapy Must Replace the Drugs, Electroshock, and Biochemical Theories of the New Psychiatry 1994 by Peter Breggin, MD; 1994. §
Article by Breggin challenging an upcoming
government conference §
A letter by Breggin to the New York Times: Whose
Attention
§ THEY SAY YOU'RE CRAZY by Paula Caplan, PhD; § ROUGH TIMES ("therapy means CHANGE not adjustment") edited by Jerome Agel Ballantine, 1973 Discusses and demystifies how social and psychological science has served state power by "convincing the individual [sufferer] to accommodate to the oppressive conditions", and points out more responsible alternatives like that which Franco Basaglia implemented in Italy. § R.D. LAING and the PATHS OF ANTI-PSYCHIATRY by Zbigniew Kotowicz; Routledge; 1997. An overview of Laing's ideas from this "radical" psychotherapist's perspective. One thing i enjoyed most was the detailed examination of his critics' views including Thomas Szasz. Quite interesting, but Kotowicz, it turns out, seems to be taking Szasz out of context in a way that sounds very under-handed. §
THOMAS SZASZ: Primary Values, Major Contentions by R.E.Vatz
and L.S.Weinberg, Prometheus 1983; and THE MYTH OF MENTAL ILLNESS
by Thomas Szasz, M.D.
(challenges all psychiatry including Breggin's
faith) § "mental health" critique resource listing § What you can do about aggressive "experts" authoritarian behavior if you have to go it alone. |
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"The powerful were, and still are, writing history to maintain control of the thoughts of the masses well into the future (the intention is forever). Unless the process is fully exposed, sincere researchers will forever be using these [thousands of surreptitiously] published accounts as sources to write history. In addition, intelligence agencies of most major nations were simultaneously producing supporting propaganda... The intelligence services of all empires... cooperate in misinforming their citizens to gain their backing supposedly for suppressing tyrants but in reality to maintain control of the world.
(...)
"To target the American people,
American intelligence services must simultaneously target those the masses look
up to for designing and interpreting our world, Congress and academics.[CIA
dissident Ralph] McGehee claimed that "He has never once seen a CIA official
tell the truth to Congress. Instead comes a steady stream of lies."(5) Even the
information going to those with security clearances is controlled."-The Institute for Economic
Democracy(new link 1-'01)
1635 Via
Sabroso, Santa Maria, CA 93454, USA, Ph & fax 805-928-7060
To join the
Institute, contact ied@slonet.org
In a talk (link forthcoming) given in Kentfield, CA in 1991, one of the more articulate analysts of the desire to control the American people (or "stupid masses"), had a few things to say about how policy makers (and their obedient implementers) think:
"We have to tame the bewildered herd [say famous PR
gurus--who weren't in this business for the fun of it--like Edward Bernays,
Walter Lippmann, Reinhold Niebuhr, Harold Lasswell, and others]. Not allow the
bewildered herd to rage and trample and destroy things. It's pretty much the
same logic that says that it would be improper to let a three-year-old run
across the street. You don't give a three-year-old that kind of freedom because
a three-year-old doesn't know how to handle that kind of freedom.
Correspondingly, you don't allow the bewildered herd to become participants [in
meaningful democracy because] they'll just cause trouble." (...)
--Noam
Chomsky
GENERAL CRITIQUES OF FORMALIZED and INFORMAL AGGRESSION
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GENERAL CRITICS OF DOMESTIC (and foreign) U.S. POLICY:read viewpoints by:
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"[The
people ask] 'How is this possible?'...I get that all the time. [They say:] 'Are
you telling us that people in Washington [D.C.] are evil?'...[Stockwell
responds:] And I kind of flared up; Americans are decent people; they are nice
people, and they're insulated in the world that we live in and they don't
understand, and we don't read our history..."--John
Stockwell, ex-CIA colonel in "The Other Americas" Radio Broadcast from Santa
Barbara California, 1980s
CRITIQUES OF MAINSTREAM MEDIA
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"...we look
back [in history] at these these simplistic reductionist explanations of a
problem and are appalled...and perhaps amused by the investigations,
conclusions, and statements made under the guise of 'scientific thought'. Yet,
in their time the theories were presented and received as credible and became
part of an acceptable social outlook."
--Gerald
Coles points out in The Learning Mystique (p.283, note
22)
SCIENCE CRITIQUES
Students of science learn to deal with the world around them in the context of the paradigm they are taught. Ideally, students then grapple with the issues left unresolved within their paradigm and thus continue what Kuhn calls the enterprise of "normal science"--"an attempt to force nature into the preformed and relatively inflexible box that the paradigm supplies"
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The f.b.i.'s* illegal "COunter INTELligence PROgram" (COINTELPRO)
Covert
action did not end in the 1970s
some groups who've
suffered from official covert attack:
Partial
bibliography from the Institute of Social
Economics: Angus
MacKenzie and David Weir, Secrets: The CIA's War at Home
(University of California Press, 1997)
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Now that you are hopefully becoming more aware of some of the extent upon which the public seems to be systematically disinformed and lied to, it is important to understand that probably no structure that serves the "stupid masses" should be exempt from our sober scrutiny. If you'd like to contribute to a further discussion of these and related topics, or if you have vital info that should be added to this list, please email me! (note: email may be down, keep trying other addresses posted on this site)
