"It says that what is meant by "human rights" is usually the moral code of intellect-vs. -society, the moral right of intellect to be free of social control. Freedom of speech; freedom of assembly, of travel; trial by jury; habeas corpus; government by consent-these "human rights" are all intellect-vs.-society issues. According to the Metaphysics of Quality these "human rights" have not just a sentimental basis, but a rational, metaphysical basis. They are essential to the evolution of a higher level of life from a lower level of life. They are for real." (Lila, 24)
The other day, when I asked woods to watch Naomi Wolf's lecture at the University of Washington and then tell me whether or not she was making a case for the intellectual control of society, this is what I had in mind. If you watch it, dear MOQer, I think you'll see that the current administration has been violating these principles in various ways. There is another Naomi that makes a similar case, one that is more specifically about economics and the so-called free-market ideology. Noami KLEIN's book links the Chicago School with U.S. economic policies and a whole range of "third world" dictators like Pinochet. It's called "The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism". You can easily find her on Youtube as well. Despite what many conservatives take to be the essence of freedom, the so-called free market doesn't necessarily have anything to do with democracy or human rights. Just ask the 3,000 murdered victims of Pinochet or the tens of thousands he jailed for their d issent. Ironically, he did these things in the name of freedom. But you are way too smart to be fooled by that sort of talk, right? Right? (Sound FX: crickets chirping) RIGHT?! (Sound FX: wind howling) Hello? Anybody home? If you're waiting for grainy black and white pictures of goose-stepping soldiers in the streets or to see smoke billowing from gas chambers, then you'll never see what fascism looks like these days. But still, it's pretty damn obvious when either Noami lays out her case. And I think all this fits perfectly with Pirsig's explanations, which is to say we're watching the assertion of social level values at the expense of intellectual values. Mostly because of fear, we're quickly slipping backwards. You might want to grab a flashlight too because that shining city on the hill is about to go dark. I'd also add that this slippage will only worsen all the things Gav has been complaining about. I mean, the so-called free market doctrine is pretty much just a license to continue raping the planet. It's not just a co-incidence that they were chanting "drill baby drill" at the Republican convention. How Freudian is that? _________________________________________________________________ Stay organized with simple drag and drop from Windows Live Hotmail. http://windowslive.com/Explore/hotmail?ocid=TXT_TAGLM_WL_hotmail_102008 Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org.uk/pipermail/moq_discuss_archive/
