Mickey Z
Cool Observer
Monday, April 24, 2006
15 Minutes of Radical Fame
Welcome home, Mickey. Everyone missed you. Great article today. I am honored to be mentioned along with the biggies. Thanks.
About Oprah, last week while doing a program about “economic and social class” in the USA, she made the statement that luck plays NO part in achieving wealth (easy for her to say). I strongly disagree with that view. My life is a perfect example of lots of luck, both good and bad. Someone needs to debate her on that and many other issues. It would be wonderful if Churchill, Blum, Zinn, etc would be regulars on her program or ANY other main stream program. One of the reasons why the peace and justice movement is going nowhere is because they spend too much time talking to each other. It seems to me that it is helpful to seek out the most outrageous of the right wing and talk to them. Oprah and the rest of them do not know, what they do not know. It is our job to educate them.
The real answer is to have regular programming of our views, not just a one shot deal. There was one program that did give an opposing view to that of the government but it was taken off air as soon as Shock and Awe bombing started. Anyone remember Phil Donahue? Anyone remember Phil Donahue and Vladimir Posner?Posted by RMJ on from Churchill 4 Prez Hdqts 04/24 at 08:43 AMGreat article, great topic, Mick. I loved watching its path of creation and hearing about the responses you received.
I like Zinn’s answer...the effect is subtle and impossible to predict. I figure I owe my final awakening to a hollywood movie...as it mentioned Zinn’s “People’s History” and in turn the book was used in my then teenage brother’s high school history class and ended up on a bookshelf at my parent’s apartment. I read it from cover to cover in a few short days and have built everything I now know using it as a strong foundation.
Posted by JOS on from Chicago 04/24 at 09:30 AMI have a funny story about Oprah, RMJ...being in Chicago, her home town, she is often the subject of conversation. This weekend, at a dinner party with friends, a woman said to me that she didn’t like here, because “Oprah is a communist!” I laughed and said, “she the richest damn communist I’ve ever heard of...” And went on to explain my opinion of Oprah’s capitalist nature...all in good fun of course.
Posted by JOS on from Chicago 04/24 at 09:35 AMGreat Oprah story, JOS. Oprah is a Super Capitalist! She flaunts her wealth in high capitalistic style.
About Zinn in the classroom...I have tried for a long time to get the book used in many schools. Many teachers are afraid of the consequences if they use it. Your brother must have had a good teacher.
Posted by RMJ on from Churchill 4 Prez Hdqts 04/24 at 11:20 AMHello RMJ and Big Country JOS. Thanks for the feedback. As you both state, this is a much more complex topic than it appears.
It’s been awfully rainy here so I’ve gotta get out now while there’s a hint of sun. I’ll see everyone later.
Posted by Mickey Z. on from Astoria 04/24 at 11:24 AMI can’t speak about america of course, but I do know that the effect of seeing crazy american evangelists (political and religious) and political hacks saying what they say to americans courtesy of me, rather than our dear Washington corresponsent’s filtered version, scared the living shit out of my open-minded but not particularly radical family.
As far as they were concerned it was the old saw of “give them enough rope and they’ll hang themselves” (was that Lenin or Stalin?) But my family, whilst not radical, has been exposed to radical left ideas (through myself and my maternal grandfather) and possibly importantly is atheistic, not a god-botherer amongst us. Where I know people who have unexpectedly come across wholly new political or social ideas the response is pure A-level psychology - annoyance, aggression and denial. Where there is a bond of trust with the person who is raising the questions, it might be a matter of persuasion and good reasoning, but otherwise I suspect Mr Elich is correct.
As is our very own Rosemarie, the schools are where the “culture warriors” of the right have taken their fight, no? Mr M Moore did point out one thing that rang true, how relatively easy it is to gain influential elected positions at a local level.“minutes”, 15 of ‘em.
Posted by mew on from tory central 04/24 at 12:10 PMHi, I saw the article over on commondreams, and wanted to comment on it. That alone gets a THANKS! from me ... you are making me think and write!
Two quick comments. Lets say that Blum and Churchill do reach 1 in 1000 viewers and listeners. If you take the overall audience at 50,000,000, that might be 50,000 people they reach. I think I’d like to see 50,000 more people at the next anti-war demo.
Even if its not that large, then it is people they’ve reached. If they are people who are outside the normal “choir” that is usually preached to, then you’ve reached a new group of people who can talk to co-workers, friends, family etc. Ie, even if this is relatively few people that are reached, it can have a ripple effect as some of those are likely to be outside the normal people the left reaches.
Last, it seems like progressive media needs to consciously try to follow up on this sort of thing. Like Noam Chomsky talks about being on NPR, when someone like this is on corporate media they tend to be on the defensive, and they tend to come across as if they are from Mars. That’s because the overall background we have doesn’t match the corporate media background.
We can take advantage of that by simultaneously doing more leftist media with the same people that gives them more of a chance to explain themselves and give more background. This takes advantage of the nature of the internet. So lets say someone see William Blum talk, and they don’t get what he’s saying, but he triggers enough interest that a viewer wants more info. So when they go out on the internet for that additional info, we need to consciously try to make sure there are current articles in leftist pubs/websites that are there to be found.
Sometimes I think the left wants a magic-automatic-victory to come from one event. That won’t happen, but we need to realize that every little bit helps ... and to help that process along where we can.
We gone from around 30% against the war to 60% against the war. We are winning ... just quietly in conversations around the country.
Posted by Patrick Henry on from 04/24 at 12:53 PMHello to Patrick Henry. I am not as optimistic as you are. Yes, the number of people against the war is increasing but not because these people understand the important issues. Most converts that I hear are now against the war only because it is costing us too much in money and lives. On Saturday there will be large protests in New York and elsewhere. I don’t think that they will do much good.
Mew...Yes, the culture warriors are in the schools to some degree but again, I think that is an optimistic view. There is not really any “war” there because in most schools, that I see, there is NOT much opposition to the pro-war view.
One of the big issues is that there is not any airing of opposition. Too many in the anti-war movement consider the Democratic Party to be an opposition party to the Republicans. The result is that often when 2 opposing views are supposedly being given equal time, there is no real opposition. It has just been announced in my town that there will be an event to discuss Chavez and Venezuela. The panel consists of a Democrat and a Republican. Where’s the balance and opposing view there? Maybe one of the important things that we can do now is start demanding that the presidential debates be open. And then convince Nader, Churchill and others to participate.
Posted by RMJ on from Churchill 4 Prez Hdqts 04/24 at 01:33 PMOf course. We LEFT behinds will then surge ahead of the right BEHINDS!
Posted by Vic Anderson on from 04/24 at 03:10 PMThis article is provoking some new voices here...glad to see it. Plus, I’ve gotten some interesting e-mails, too, e.g. Joe from Maine:
As you know people gravitate toward interests...the people who need to be informed do not seek out or are receptive to needed information. Activists go to meetings with other activists. For the most part activists don’t need to be reminded things suck.
People who need this information don’t seek out alternatives to what they want to believe is true.
Myself for example...I don’t seek out recipes calling for octopus
livers. Now some chefs might need this information but I have never considered whether this information is helpful to my insane life.So, my life as a wretched bore is limited to looking at and riding
bicycles...politically, few people want to accompany me into the
future...most content repeating the same stupidity offered by the wealthy elite to maintain the system for the wealthy and by the wealthy....sometimes there is little difference between right and left wings...we need zero wings and more people holding hands, supportively, with compassion and a real yearning to transcend the social conditioning of a sick culture…Posted by Mickey Z. on from Astoria 04/24 at 04:17 PMAnd a warm ‘welcome home’ from me as well, Mickey!
Hi, Rosemarie, JOS, Mew, Patrick Henry and Vic Anderson. Re Oprah: would she ever have Blum, Churchill, Zinn et al. on her program? Not in a million years IMHO!
An absolute orgy of militarism on display today in Australia - it is ANZAC (Australian and New Zealand Army Corps) Day, i.e. the anniversary of the ill-fated invasion of Turkey on 25 April 1915. Gets worse each year, as one Australian cartoonist said a few years ago.
Posted by Helga Fremlin on from Daylesford, Australia 04/24 at 07:09 PMMickey: I think Josh is right about that. Ward and Bill were on the defensive. Ward had to defend his “little Eichmann” comment and Blum had to defend being an author in Osama’s Book Club. Blum’s comment seems reminiscent of chaos theory’s Butterfly Effect:
“Who’s to say what the long-term effect of that will be? ... It’s only the total effect that may have significant meaning.”
And I think that’s a point. It’s not just about “getting a message out.” It’s also about using whatever opportunities available to one to not only reach teevee viewers, but to slightly, if significantly, alter the spin of the sphere of media discourse.
Maybe I am talking about media judo or taijiquan here.
See what I mean. If one’s “under attack” by the media and called out to “defend oneself,” one can use that to one’s advantage. Let them attack and turn it around on it to make one’s points. Obviously, this will require a calm, clear mind and understanding exactly where and when the media has given one an opportunity to drive one’s point home. Inserting a few uncomfortable facts or just a different POV might actually force someone somewhere elese in media-land to respond (if they do not simply ignore it, but, if viewers ask about it, they might eventually deal with those kinds of questions, facts, etc.)
Given that each such 15-minute allotments are fame are single, small events, just a few more teevee blips in all this fluxing history that’s happening, nobody can really know the outcome.
Posted by Theo on from Greece 04/24 at 08:00 PMANZAC, Helga? Sounds like an anxiety medicine.
Theo, I agree with Josh that Blum and Ward were on the defensive but I disagree that it would be much different with Nader in the debates. In a deeply indoctrinated society, anyone who doesn’t conform is made to defend his/her position. Nader in the debates would be fun to watch but I’m not convinced he would end up changing minds.
G’night, all. Make sure you stop by tomorrow for a ton o’ links.
Posted by Mickey Z. on from Astoria 04/24 at 08:45 PMG’night. I see what you mean. The media was pretty good about sanatizings bombings in “real-time,” so I guess turning Nader into Perot would be a snap.
Posted by Theo on from Greece 04/24 at 10:41 PMJust read your article. Part of the problem is that you/your interviewees approached the problem--and it IS a problem!--from the reasonable, intellectual road and people don’t do nothing for reasonable reasons. No intellectualism, even of a moderate sort. What matters is what happens in their backyards. But even more telling is that the approach--via the media, mostly TV--is via a perceived authority, as if to say change comes from authority; this is patently incorrect. It never has, it never will. Whatever changes have occurred have occurred from the bottom up: what touches lives, “mine” in particular. This approach also shows how reliant we have become on high tech when whatis needed is a low tech approach. . .perhaps leaflets/flyers out in the streets? Short, “personal” messages requiring little thought (because the average American is averse to thinking in more than slogans and rallying cries). Authority uses (owns) high tech (TV, radio, print) and “our” approach is to meet them on their own ground. As Bageant (I think it was) said, we miss out on volume because authority owns it. Guerrilla warfare approaches are needed. Low tech, where the authority is wanting. However. . .here we run into a gross American problem: no immediate effect = no effect at all. We are an immediate gratification society. The long haul meets with what might be called defections, people just can’t stay with it for long periods of time. They give up. It’s not worth the hassle. Rosemarie could have such a comfortable, victim life if she’d just given up years ago when it became obvious the gov’ts were out to screw her, no matter what. (Look at how much they’ve spent to get rid of her, to abuse her, to “defend” themselves when if they’d just done the just thing to begin with it would have cost them much, much less!)
Isn’t it interesting that Americans don’t read. . .since phonics stopped being taught in schools? However did I (we?) get past the villains of literature who demanded, of novels stories poems, “what does this mean?”?! The Japanese have the highest literacy rate but the older folks complain about what it is the kids are reading (manga); there is also a much longer history of reading/writing in Japan. So, too, in China. In both places, the populace is flooded with propaganda; most especially China. But here, in China, the people know it’s propaganda; they know their gov’t is not interested in their well-being. People don’t talk politics here, not only because it’s dangerous but because it amounts to nothing. They will, however, talk about Bush, considered a crazy man. They love his visits here, for they get quite a laugh out of his idiocy, his ignorance. I got a sardonic laugh out of a recent article I saw from the States that went on and on about Hu Jintao’s conservatism and bent for more authoritarianism. . .because the Chinese knew this when the man came to power. What takes so long to get to Americans, even the “left”? Indeed, most of what I read about China is written by people who don’t know China, who have never been beyond the Atlantic seaboard and who are, perhaps unwittingly, immured in the gov’t China bashing (we bashed Japan, too, for pretty much the same things post WWII). I wrote an article on this, The Rabid Dog Syndrome, for MWCnews. A follow-up was Of Sheep and Other Sacrificial Animals, which al Jazeera apparently picked up (mostly, I think, because of the ties between MWC and AJ). The least was the HFCS article that recently appeared at dissidentvoice (at MWC first).
When I read articles from the Nation, I am saddened that they’ve missed the boat, for they are of the top down authority/gov’t first striping. That is, in their writing they push the agenda that the gov’t will take care of you, all good things come from the gov’t. Just a different kind of nationalism, if you ask me. I agree with Katherine Anne Porter: there’s no such thing as a good gov’t. Gov’ts are interested in themselves and the perpetuation of themselves (autopoiesis), not realizing that nothing lasts forever; you know, the Second Law of Thermodynamics is ONLY a theory for physicists, it’s not practical. Duh!
jimsecorPosted by James Secor on from China 04/25 at 04:29 AMI read the article. Well written. I used to be on the Eugene city council and when I was people would frequently stop me on the street to say things like, ‘I watch all the council meetings on cable access TV just to see you tell it like it is. I can’t believe you get away with it.. Keep representing me!’ I’m a Marxist (in part from reading Parenti) and I would always explain the working class position on an issue (social services, land-use planning, budget, housing, etc). So I got to see local effect of sustained exposure to radicalism. The ruling elite severly targeted me because they knew people were listening. There are so many ways to subvert what little democracy we have left. One way is to flatter liberal politicians. Their egos always lead them astray from the class that works.
Posted by Kevin Hornbuckle on from Eugene, Oregon 04/25 at 11:02 PM
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