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But they’re our sons-a-bitches”
Supposedly attributed to FDR or one of his cabinet members when referring to the South American dictators we were supporting. Primarily Samosa.
I bring this up because it’s very representative of the the kind of thinking that goes on even today. A kind of primitive tribal/herd/clan mentality. That one is to support one of their own regardless of their current and/or past transgressions simply because they are one of their own. Usually but not always based on some ethnic/racial/cultural sameness. Combined with religious and financial classes as well.
It’s what brought Hitler to power and enabled Germans to rally around him, all the while ignoring his monstrosities. It’s what what pushed the Russians on to defeat Hitler’s armies. And what broke apart and empowered those involved with the war in the former Yugoslavia after the fall of Tito.
As well as what is behind all the problems in the Middle east. It’s also why there are those who will support policies and people who would not be in there best interest, since their support is not based on anything logical or even practical Their support is based on and emotional them vs us.
Why there are those who vilified the policies of Bush and support the same policies and actions by Obama. Obama is one of US and not one of Them. And Obama takes care of his own. The upper crust, well healed professional Bourgeois with their expensive houses and expensive cars and 401Ks with a tonne of money invested.
There is no amount of logical, practical, fact based arguments that will convince these people otherwise. One can rail against them – if that gives you comfort. But it will not change their thinking because it has little to do with thought. Just remember what it took to change Germany – who still has neo-Nazi followers. Two world wars and 40 years of cold war as two separate countries. And they still look down on some non-Germans with disgust.
We like to think with all our advanced technology and science that we as humans have risen above such things. The sad reality is we have not.
15 Comments
Ha; okay, I won’t rail against those who hated what Bush did, but tacitly or actively approve of Obomba does X3 in so many cases, but I will join you in asking them the same question you do.
But I’m scratching my head on your ‘We like to think with all our advanced technology and science that we as humans have risen above such things’ and tribalism. Clearly those advances didn’t make us wiser, or more prone to critical thinking.
But Wendy it’s not about thinking. If it was, we would not need so many psychoanalysts or therapists or law enforcement.
Nah, ya just take BigPharma’s Blue Pill. Talk therapy takes to much time, reflection, yada, yada…
Me, I’ll take the Blue Dream any ole time, and stay herbal.
I think you may be missing the point or I’m not being sufficiently clear. The point being that you cannot reason with people who are not using reason to begin with.
It may sound like they are, but what you are hearing is rationalizations and arguments to justify that which is irrational. Which is why it comes off as cognitive dissonance.
They are not speaking the truth for if they were they would say something to the effect of “We will not pay taxes that that go to help poor {insert racial/tribal/ethnic group here___} because they are nothing but {stupid, lazy, good for nothing….} and not US“.
Er…I totally got the point; can’t see why you think I missed it, but then…we sorta have a history of talking past each other (the Barbarian’s crazy dating service aside, lol). It’s that cognitive dissonance (I really think it’s personal perception reality, myself) wee bit of discomfort (if any) that is tamed by the Blue Pill…is all.
Cognitive dissonance is an *effect* of bullshit rationalizations that are illogical enough that a semi-reasonable mind squirms at them here and there. At least that’s how I remember the definition. I almost wrote a post about it, but the subsets and tangential er…models, for lack of a better term got pretty involved, not to mention theoretical as hell.
The tribalism comes aspect comes in when we allow group-think to create our own reality even before we think. As in even: I wonder what Rachel Maddow is saying about this? or hell, Articleman? LOL!
” It’s also why there are those who will support policies and people who would not be in there best interest, since their support is not based on anything logical or even piratical.”
I know you meant to type “practical” instead of “piratical,” but I’ll make hay because you gave me the chance. In the 17th Century, the most democratic institutions in the Western world were pirate ships. If a captain didn’t deliver, he’d be deposed post-haste. By the same token, some of our most basic concepts of democracy come from(drum roll, please)…the Vikings.
Talk about piratical. And democratic.
You’re right, of course, about changing the thinking of the comfortable. But you CAN do other things to them when the opportunity arises.
Like pillaging.
As in “two opposing notions or beliefs/knowledge: ‘Social Security is for deadbeats’, say, that create tension/discomfort. Some stuff will sound like it should create discomfort, and doesn’t; sometimes if it does, convincing others of your opinion in a louder voice can ease the niggles. ‘See? Joe Doakes believes me, ergo: I’m right!’
” I wonder what Rachel Maddow is saying about this? or hell, Articleman? LOL!”
I really, REALLY don’t care what that latte’ liberal hypocritical D-bot has to say about anything. But who is Articleman? (Using the Google) Oh.
Well, he was no more accurate than I was in his electoral predictions. So he can read polls like I can. So I don’t get the LOL.
” Comforting the comfortable. ” If that means making their stupidity, when the facts are against them, happytalk: I say ” screw ‘em. ” We are bombarded with incongruous ” realities “. No technology frees us from that which is comfortable, but on it’s face, wrong. My bet, and yours, is most people like privilege over the hard facts. When we lost ” incongruous realities ” over the Dead Kennedys’, MLK,Jr., the Vietnam War or a hundred other historical insults, some part of the seam of propaganda broke, and leaked. Hence, our troubled and oft’ times discomforting, political history. Here’s to hoping it continues.
Well, fire first, then aim, Barbarian. Cmaukonen may explain *both* references, I reckon.
Actually it’s pillage THEN burn…..
That was probably meant for the Barbarian. But my tribalist example ‘See what Maddow says!’ was in reference, say to Ramona, and specifically, Articleman at Dagblog, a self-identified ‘Liberal’ website. Plenty of angry conflicts of the sort you named in your original post.
I just visited a diary here; one asshole NOM-er had said some creepy shit, and most all the comments talked about ‘these people’, which multiple inclusions to the one…can also twist my knickers.
signed,
Twisted Kickers Galore
Just don’t button them below the knee.
Thank you for calling attention to the evils of drone
assassinations in some ways even more dangerous when
carried out by “one of ours.” Really, my lesson in
this came in early 1965, when President Lyndon Johnson
started the regular bombing of North Vietnam after
having campaigned on the slogan of “No Wider War.”
As Art Buckwald wrote at the time: “Just think, if
Barry Goldwater had been elected, we might be …
maybe actually bombing North Vietnam!”
While the false consensus of “bipartisan foreign
policy” is not new, it becomes especially dangerous
when the “new normal” of Presidentially decreed
assassinations is associated with “liberalism.”
As the DKOS folks might observe, Obama’s killings
may tend to shift the “Overton window” or universe
of credible discourse on this subject toward more
assassination. The “left-wing” position might become
“assassinations only when approved by the President.”
The “centrist” position: “discretion by the CIA
abroad, but drone assassinations at home only with
the approval of the President.” And the “right-wing”
position: “Support your local police by giving them
the power to use drones to bring lawlessness under
control with these powerful drones, and finally
solve the problem of all this criminal-coddling
`Due Process’ nonsense.”
So Obama does harm both by being a “liberal” supporter
of the killings, and by not being an opponent. As
Noam Chomsky has said, the necessary illusions of
the Empire include an implicitly restricted field
of discourse where official policies are sometimes
debated as wise or unwise, but rarely as immoral
and inhuman regardless of the pragmatic niceties.
Chomsky was addressing Central America in the
period around 1984, but almost 30 years later it
equally applies to assassinations by drone or
otherwise.
Having a discussion with my oldest daughter about politics just prior to the last “election,” I told her I wasn’t going to vote because we don’t have a democracy. She said what we have may not be perfect, but it’s pretty close to being a democracy.
I told her no, what we have is a facade of democracy where everyone thinks their vote counts but the real policy is made by money and that voting only enables an illusion and placates the general population into willful submission. The president’s job is really not much more than selling America the idea that we’ll just have to settle for what the PTB will let us have and incremental change that always leaves us two steps behind the opportunists is all we’ll ever be able to achieve.
She’s a very smart kid and understands exactly what I mean, but she has a hard time letting herself be that cynical and realizing how stacked the deck is.
Metaphorically, the East India Tea company is still in business.