BNW

First off, this author is weird. I mean sure, with all of the medical advances being made in the world today things tend to get a little wacky. But controlling human reproduction and raising of children by the govt? Its just a little to messed up for me.

Do people really go around thinking up of weird scenarios to write books about how effed up the future could possibly be?

The critique is something that you really have to look carefully at. The author is showing the dangers of what could happen when humanity gets caught up in the notion of perfection. The funky part is that this notion of perfection is clouded by the idea proposed by inherent disabilities. The alpha are "bred" to be the elite, and to know that they are elite. Walking around with a swagger because they have the knowledge of being the ruling class.

What I do not understand is why the author decided to go beyond just having an alpha and beta class. The five class institution seems to be excessive and not necessary to the brave new world.

The fascist system of control is used to knock down the current attitude of using scientific advances to their fullest. The author warns that science may have a much larger impact on the scheme of human life than you may expect, and in the end could end up controlling our lives.

V

So watching the movie in class today made me think a little about what was going on in the movie and how closely related real life can be. Obviously a masked swordsman jumping from roof to roof blowing up buildings and assassinating people is something a little far from the real world. The brutal British dictatorship however is something people might have an easier time putting into a real world scenario.

Firstly the surveillance is growing by leaps and bounds. Already in place throughout many developed nations to keep an eye out over the vast majority of its businesses, government buildings, etc, are cameras linked to computers. These computers could be forcibly or covertly hacked by the government to attain access to video footage in order to keep a closer watch on citizens and non-citizens alike.

Second, the world is a scary place. Many people do feel as if chaos is just around the corner, and a terror attack is simply seconds away. Fear is the greatest mobilizer of the human race. Scared and uncertain people may look beyond the scope of what is normalcy for protection from fear.

The movie is pretty sweet and I look forward to the rest of it on Wednesday.

Italians have sweet names

I wish I had an Italian name. Seriously the dudes name is Benito. Sounds pretty cool to me.

Anyway I digress. So when Prof. Dietz said that Fascism is ultra-conservative, she was dead on the money. The whole emphasis on the State being the epitome of life seems to be the central idea Mussolini is proposing as the "ideology of the future". The denial of the other prominent state driven ideologies of the time is essential to why the Fascism gained steam in the early twentieth century. Growing nationalist spirit combined with the economic depression led people to this idea that if you put all of your faith in the State you will be rewarded with a prosperous time for your nation.

Capitalism is still a central idea of the fascists. The exception that makes it fit into the system is that you are not producing for personal gain, rather for that of the goodwill of the State. Hard work for the State is emphasized as a goal that every Italian should strive to achieve.

This ideology might have found prominence if the leaders of the revolutions behind the ideas did not use excessive force and underground activities to usurp power of the state and thus alienating themselves from a broad portion of the mainstream populous.

The Muss should have thought about that before he had his blackshirts march on Rome.

Seattle Superprotest

Soo people are taking to the streets to protest against capitalism and those evil corporations who are trying to take over the world. Respeck. Nobody thinks that the protestors were in the wrong? Those individuals who were attending the WTO conference were simply trying to do their jobs. If a bunch of people stood up in front of where i worked and refused to let me through, I would be pretty pissed off, and I would definately call the police. If they broke the windows of my store I would expect reembursment, and I would hope they were arrested for vandalism.

The po-nine definately did use excesive force to remove the protesters from downtown Seattle, but seriously, protest a little better next time. Don't break the law when you do it.

Next, I didn't see the anarchist message throughout the protest. Not once did I hear the protestors mention anti-government, simply anti capitalism. Whats up wit dat?

dis be anarchism

Emma Goldman sure loved advocating popular ideas didn't she? A feminist, socialist, and anarchist in the early 20th century. The girl has brass buttons.

She speaks as if removing these three things will lead to the perfection of the human race: government, religion, and property. For some reason I think this lady was crazy. I agree on the point that religion is a little whacked out. The idea of fighting wars over a "God" which may, or may not exist is a little out there. The crusades created a rift between Christians and Muslims for centuries. The Hindus hate Sheiks and Muslims. Thank god the Buddhists are around to like everybody or every religion would have conflicting interests. But religion does serve good in the fact that it creates a system of morals for children to be raised on and adults to follow. So religion is not a complete debacle.

Gov't does restrict persons ability to freely do, well a lot of things. But without these restrictions think about what life would be like. No law against killing, you walk into a store, rob the cash register, kill the clerk, and make off with the dough. Without any pigs or laws, you are very likely to get away. Who is going to stop you? A civilian that had no stake in the store?

Finally property. Same scenario as above. You go to sleep at night in your home and wake up in the morning with five homeless people sleeping all over your house. There are no definitions of property so those homeless peeps are not in the wrong.


Anarchism is a far flung idea that would not work unless everyone in the world thought and felt the same way about...... basically everything. (Kinda like communism.)

Hahnel

So socialism is gearing up for a comeback..... alrighty, i'll believe it when I see it. Socialist Democrarts as they so label themselves, are so optimistic. Hahnel says that they need to stop regressing and move forward with positive changes to the current capitalist system. The notion is put forth that once everyone comes to the light and realizes the glory of saving the environment and contributing their wages to the greater good then socialism will take root.

A focal point in the article is that capitalism spawns greed. I disagree. Some people are really nice and would be happy to give away half their paycheck to help support the homeless, working poor, etc. I'm sorry but I am not one of those people. I work forty hours a week in constrution during the summer. I am not about to see the cash I work hard for to be just thrown at someone that may not even be working at all. Its not greed, its just life.

Bernstien Face off

So comes the inevitable clash of social theory. The argument is proposed that capitalism's abillity to adapt, combined with incresingly democratic societies will lead to the death of Marx' and Engels' social theory that the Proletariat will rise up, usurp the power of government, and create a classless society. I have to agree with Bernstien (history is on his side). As things continue to move forward the revolutions may have happened in several countries, but the key thing is that they did not suscribe to the core ideals of socialism. Marx did not like the things people were doing with his ideas. Somewhere along the line socialism got turned into an ecogovernology. An ideaology, a system of economics, and a form of government. This gave the Manifesto social theory a bad name. In the end you have to look at how these things did indeed impact for good. Social institutions have been placed more and more in current democratic countries improving conditions for the empoverished. Marx and Engels helped as well as hurt many nations with their idea.