Cross-posted at PoliticalFleshfeast.
I’ve recently come across two videos. Both interesting in their own right. I’ve also read a quote on this blog, not long ago. I can’t remember who posted it. May have been one of our conservative guests.
But taken together, I think you might find them interesting. And maybe they speak to the plan.
The only thing is — which one to start with?
I’ll go for entertainment value first I guess. As a kid, we used to watch Mutual of Omaha’s Wild Kingdom on Sunday nights. Or was that Saturday? Anyway. When someone sent me the video linked below, it reminded me of those good days. Sitting around with the entire family. Fucking scene right out of Leave It to Beaver, practically. Which was pretty damn good given the dysfunction level at my household.
The video is like eight minutes or more. But it is worth it — just for pure entertainment purposes — to say nothing of how it all links up for me in a political sense after the fact. Watch it if you have the time. I think you may enjoy it. But hang in for the bitter end. Here it is.
Okay. You’ve watched it? Was that fucking unbelievable? It is such a story on film, I don’t even want to write about it in these lines, because I’m afraid I’ll act as a spoiler for those whose eyes might take in the next paragraph before they watch. I don’t want to blow the end of the film. Great, wasn’t it? How in the heck did he — you know?
Anyway. The second clip I want to share was just one I came across on the Internets. It is a promo film for Naomi Klien’s new book, The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism. I have not yet read her new book, but No Logo was a helluva read. I think I always had a sense that global capitalism was a most fucked up system — just by smelling it on the wind — like say the way a wild African bull might smell something odd just before being ambushed by a hidden lion. But No Logo educated me about it. An absolutely great read. So I expect high things from The Shock Doctrine once I get it on my reading pile, and plow through it in 2012. But you can kind of get the sense of it in the promo video linked below.
The video was produced by Klien and Director Alfonso Cauron (my apologies to the European audience — I can’t make a tilde using this keyboard to save my life — but I would out of respect for Mr. Cauron if I was writing this out longhand in 1971). Cauron directed Children of Men last year. It was a chilling and hauntingly realistic look at a possible near future. If you haven’t seen it — run to the video store tonight — it is worthwhile, and a quicker fix than reading No Logo. Anyhow. That movie jumped to my personal top five list. Remarkable. And he helps summarize Klien’s take on neo-liberal global economic systems (economists forgive me if I’ve misclassified Milton Friedman — and by the way, when is PFF going to get its own resident economist, like Bondad or Jerome in Paris).
This one is going to take about six minutes of your life. But Cauron will help slide Klien’s ideas straight into your subconsious. You’ll dream about the thoughts — just like those of you who lived in the 60s and 70s sometimes dreamed about nuclear holocaust, because you were exposed to government guides on how to duck and cover. Enjoy: The Shock Doctrine — a short film.
Darkly entertaining? I mean, it is no feel good story — like the one about the baby African bull who got away. But I love her ideas, and his way of presenting all this in images.
Okay. How can any of this possibly be related? I didn’t know myself, until I sat down to write all this. But it came to me. As I remembered a quote I read here earlier today — or maybe a day ago.
I’ll paraphrase, because I don’t want to go back and search for it and cite the author of this thought. But it is a neat little quote. At least for my purposes. Here it is:
A democratic form of government can never endure. It can only last until a majority of the people get together and understand that they have the power to vote, and by their votes, to open the public coffers to pay themselves off.
Well, I don’t know that I would fall in line with that comment. Despite all that our country has been through in the last seven or eight years, I am still somewhat an idealist. I want to believe in the good in humankind. That we could govern ourselves democratically — without our only focus being greed, as is so often taught to us by rampant capitalism.
Here is how I would tie these various thoughts, images, and ideas together. We — all of us — Democrats. Republicans. Communists. Socialists. Anarchists. Libertarians. Capitalists. Independent Free Thinkers. Christians. Muslims. Jews. Atheists. People. All of us. We. We are like that herd of African bulls. And we are about to become prey to the greed and gluttonous desire of a very, very few. A select few. The extraordinarily rich. The privileged. Our world. It is not run by you or I. We type our words here. We are manipulated daily by a vast mass-media information machine. But at the end of the day — very few if any of us are or will ever be part of that elite that reaps the benefits of the global economic system that controls the entire planet. We are not the fortunate sons and daughters. Even those of us who have come to believe that it is good to follow these political and economic elites. We are not them. We will not share in their world. We are the bulls. We are prey.
Howard Zinn said it well. At least in terms of America. And I paraphrase his thought. The elite in the colonies, they walked a tight rope. They needed to break from the powerful interests in England — both commercial and political. But they also needed to install themselves as the new elite here. And in doing so, to also enlist the support of the common man to fight this revolution. One of their methods for doing so — and maintaining control over the years. Turn the common man and woman against themselves. White versus black. Free peasant versus indentured servant. Union versus right to work. Native versus immigrant. Republican versus Democrat.
I have come to believe that it is all bullshit. It is us. The herd. Against them. That small group who sucks our blood and enjoys the fruits of our common resources — and our labor.
But like the herd in that video. We are not defenseless. Together. We are an incredible force. We could rip them off our children. Drive them to the lake — and the waiting crocs. But we would have to walk shoulder to shoulder. Put aside the silly distractions that they throw at us — to seperate a few of us from the herd.
Blogs, I once believed, were a powerful force for democritization. For passing information without the control of the elite. For organizing. I lost faith in that. But seeing these silly videos. And reading that quote. Well, it has breathed a small breath into me.
I never could have imagined that baby bull rising. Chunks of flesh missing. Blood running out of how many wounds? I do not know if he survived. I want to know. Just like I want to know if we too will somehow survive. I believe we can. I don’t know the road. But I want to believe.
Anyway.
