At issue, I’m sure, is the fact that I challenge their world view. The simple reality is that OF COURSE the demographics of this election show that Democrats have created a de facto coalition that is likely to continue to win them the White House. They have promised stupid people stuff, and delivered enough of it to get them to the polls.
But this does not affect the TRUTH that we are accruing some $5 trillion in added debt annually, right now. That is $42,000 PER HOUSEHOLD, PER YEAR, RIGHT NOW. Now, Democrats are exultant. They are happy. They see themselves winning forever, and are ecstatic that the Republicans might make a turn to the right. That will get them even more votes.
But it won’t prevent an economic catastrophe. The truth is the truth.
And to the point, I would submit that totalitarianism STARTS with simple but meaningful lies. It starts with people like Arianna Huffington–intelligent, educated, capable of rational thought–LYING about the future. She could put up stories about our debt. She could deal responsibly with it if she wanted to.
But she doesn’t want to. She doesn’t want to hear it. She wants to flush me down a memory hole. She wants to make me an unperson. I’m like the person on The Truman Show shouting out “it’s not read, Truman”, and being grabbed and removed.
Now, OF COURSE this is not how she thinks. I don’t know how she rationalizes it–likely simply by labeling what I say fabrication without doing even rudimentary investigation–but the reality is that if we get something like 1984–and that appears the way we are headed–it will be because people like her claimed rhetorically that they feared totalitarian rule, that they feared Big Brother, that they wanted what was best for America, but DID THE OPPOSITE.
Is government getting bigger or smaller? This is a simple question. If it is getting bigger, then we are getting closer to Big Brother.
More importantly: are the LIES getting bigger or smaller? Will Benghazi be successfully flushed down a memory hole? Will Ambassador Stevens, Sean Smith, Glenn Doherty, and Tyrone Woods be made unpersons? Will we lie in our public propaganda forums about the true extent of our problems until our only option is a plan like mine, and one which will likely not be proposed?
1984 is an ascent of the demonic. It is demons ruling the world. And the first step, the very first one, is when you CHOOSE to lie to yourself. The cruelist sadist on the face of the planet had at some point to deny to him or herself that she felt emotional pain, and that it mattered.
The reelection of Barack Obama is in many respects symptomatic of the triumph of the lie. America has told itself its first big lie. That cannot be good.
I will add that, embarrassingly, I have never read 1984. I am reasonably erudite, so this is a large gap. I just read the summary this morning, and realized that Orwell, also, concluded that sadism is the dominant element in totalitarianism. Believe it or not, I had reached my conclusions without familiarity with his work. I have only read his essay on the English language.
I do wonder sometimes what it would be like to be tortured. In a totalitarian regime, the only honorable response is to be killed (although in some cases suicide might be acceptable). Everyone has a breaking point in torture. I don’t doubt that. Where it is will vary, but once you exceed it, where it was becomes irrelevant. And of course mind control techniques will have improved since Orwell’s time.
My feeling is that minds are machines. They can be broken. But spirits do not inhere fully in our bodies. I believe we are duplicates of something much more perfect up above, and as long as in our free will we adhere to good principles, what we are forced to do does no permanent harm. That is my hope. It is what we do with our whole being that is wrong that permanently harms us.
And even permanence is an invalid concept. I posted some time ago a vision, a myth, of what would happen if the Fascists took over the earth, and implemented their sadistic regime. It would be awful for 100, 200, 1,000, or perhaps 10,000 years. But it would wane. The world of the Hunger Games was destined for perhaps 200 years of existence (note: I have no idea what happens in the second two books, but let’s assume there was only one book), because the people of Panem had nothing to live for, other than their cruelty and sybaritic pursuits. Some other social order would have taken over, that may have been as bad or worse; or better.
But man’s life has been brutish and short for most of our millions of years here, and brutish and short for most of recorded history, in ways related to famines, wars, pestilence, and the like.
It is courage that matters, heart (coeur). We cannot directly control the future.
But FUCK YOU Arianna.
2 replies on “1984”
You were censored for THAT?
One of the most disturbing aspects of this whole election, for me, was the realization that there is in our society a huge hunger for Untruth; that reason and logic no longer form a cultural glue, but are proudly smashed into the dirt while the Big Lies are trumpeted.
I had always assumed that Winston Smith was kind of an everyman, representing humanity's yearning for freedom and willingness to struggle against darkness; but I've come to realize, in the last few days, that the Winston Smiths of this world have become (always were?) a small minority. Most people evidently welcome our insect overlords with open arms 😉
I'm now trying to figure out whether I even want to be engaged anymore with a society that regards the very worst humanity has to offer, as something to boast about on Twitter.
I have been censored repeatedly for less than that. They just don't want to know.
A scene that pops in my mind is when Meatloaf comes blazing out on his motorcycle in "The Rocky Horror Picture Show", and he is killed with an axe then eaten. There are certain energies large segments of our society have been taught to dread and shun, and among them are true sincerity, true innocence, and true love.
This is disguised, of course, rhetorically, but was there any doubt as to who the hero of that movie was? In that world, you simply destroy everything, then time warp back to do it again.
My code helps me. Step one: don't feel sorry for yourself. Step two: quitting is not an option. Step three: what to do?
Today I was thinking it's probably time to build and test a machine to help facilitate Electronic Voice Phenomena: what I call my ghost machine. Now, I have no idea what your metaphysics are, but in my view we plainly survive physical death, and there are clearly many, many pieces of evidence pointing to this. But the evidence has not reached the point where the determined cannot lie about it. The situation is quite analogous, actually, to our political climate.
Why so many choose death over life is an open question. I have tried to answer it many times, but other than "cowardice" I have no real answer.
To the point, if we could talk with spirits more easily–it is in my view not just being done now, but OBVIOUSLY being done now–that might be the sort of game changer we need. It's a hope, at any rate, a start, a direction.
It will consist in a box with two compartments. I will put a white noise machine on one side, some holes in the barrier, and a sound recorder in the second compartment, likely with some sort of sound absorbing material. My thought is that spirits need some sort of ambient noise to work with, but not much.
If I could get voices on a recorder, it would not be due to other sounds in the environment, since it will be a closed box.
I have many projects. I have decided not to write my piece on Ayn Rand for the time being, even though I feel I had some useful things to say, and will instead focus on this and my on-going work on reforming our financial system.
There are many good people out there. Romney got nearly as many votes as Obama.
Never quit. Never, never, never, never. Churchill said that. You may not know it, but Winston Smith was named after him.
Churchill said he was going to spend his first 1,000 years in heaven painting. I feel that is where he is today.