old-hermit Posted February 1, 2008 Posted February 1, 2008 harrypri said: "The Federal government has juristiction over ALL states, north and South" US Constitution amendment 10 The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to the states respectively, or to the people. harrypri said: were at odds with the northern states, whose economy was industrially based, and where slavery wasn't practiced. Excuse me Harry, Abe Lincoln owned slaves as did most wealthy Northeners. Emancipation Proclamation Main articles: Abraham Lincoln on slavery and Emancipation Proclamation Lincoln met with his cabinet for the first reading of the Emancipation Proclamation draft on July 22, 1862. L-R: Edwin M. Stanton, Salmon P. Chase, Abraham Lincoln, Gideon Welles, Caleb B. Smith, William H. Seward, Montgomery Blair and Edward BatesIn July 1862, Congress moved to free the slaves by passing the Second Confiscation Act. The goal was to weaken the rebellion, which was led and controlled by slave owners. While it did not abolish the legal institution of slavery (the Thirteenth Amendment did that), the Act showed that Lincoln had the support of Congress in liberating slaves owned by rebels. This new law was implemented with Lincoln's "Emancipation Proclamation." Lincoln is well known for ending slavery in the United States. In 1861 – 1862, however, he made it clear that the North was fighting the war to preserve the Union, not to abolish slavery. Freeing the slaves became, in late 1862, a war measure to weaken the rebellion by destroying the economic base of its leadership class. Abolitionists criticized Lincoln for his sluggishness over slavery per se, but on August 22, 1862, Lincoln explained: “ I would save the Union. I would save it the shortest way under the Constitution. The sooner the national authority can be restored; the nearer the Union will be "the Union as it was." ... My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or to destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone I would also do that.[22] †The Emancipation Proclamation, announced on September 22 and put into effect on January 1, 1863, freed slaves in territories not under Union control. As Union armies advanced south, more slaves were liberated until all of them in Confederate hands (over three million) were freed. Lincoln later said: "I never, in my life, felt more certain that I was doing right, than I do in signing this paper." The proclamation made the abolition of slavery in the rebel states an official war goal. Lincoln then threw his energies into passage of the Thirteenth Amendment to permanently abolish slavery throughout the nation.[23] In September 1862, thirteen northern governors met in Altoona, Pennsylvania, at the Loyal War Governors' Conference to discuss the Proclamation and Union war effort. In the end, the state executives fully supported the president's Proclamation and also suggested the removal of General George B. McClellan as commander of the Union's Army of the Potomac.[24] For some time, Lincoln continued earlier plans to set up colonies for the newly freed slaves. He commented favorably on colonization in the Emancipation Proclamation, but all attempts at such a massive undertaking failed. As Frederick Douglass observed, Lincoln was, "The first great man that I talked with in the United States freely who in no single instance reminded me of the difference between himself and myself, of the difference of color."[25] Y'all will be glad to hear that this is my last post on the subject. Arguing is like wrestling with a pig in the mud. Sooner or later you realise the pig enjoys it.
camaroman Posted February 1, 2008 Posted February 1, 2008 I think it's time to put this one out of our misery!!! But we have given Jaffa something to read all day long!!!
jbwelda Posted February 1, 2008 Posted February 1, 2008 (edited) i dont understand why anyone would characterize this conversation as "arguing". move it to rants and raves would be maybe appropriate but to tell you the truth its exactly the string of thoughts that enter my mind every time i see that general lee car. i wouldnt want to see a ban on it or anything like that but i do think it communicates a certain lack of sophistication in everyday life. then again i live in california where its all about fruits nuts and vegetables (and i hear the vegetables are winning). Quote Edited February 1, 2008 by jbwelda
lordairgtar Posted February 1, 2008 Posted February 1, 2008 old-hermit said: US Constitution amendment 10 The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to the states respectively, or to the people. Excuse me Harry, Abe Lincoln owned slaves as did most wealthy Northeners. Emancipation Proclamation Actually, Lincoln never owned slaves. He came up poor and travelled way to much to have need for slaves. His wife, however came from a wealthy slave holding family, in fact, her brothers fought for the Confederacy.
lordairgtar Posted February 1, 2008 Posted February 1, 2008 I knew a black guy around here who drove a General Lee charger clone and brought it to car shows, battle flag and all. Says he was just a fan of the show.
Billy Kingsley Posted February 1, 2008 Posted February 1, 2008 Mark, you may well be right. Much of my knowlegde of History came from 1990s school text books...about the most slanted, PC books in history...Only recently I have really started to try and educate myself more about history, both World and US, and it's a long, probably never ending process that still is just scratching the surface.
JAFFA Posted February 1, 2008 Author Posted February 1, 2008 jbwelda said: ps: this belongs in rants if you ask me. Yeah... now that ya say it i guess so... Nick F40 said: History in this section has been shoved to the side, that's ######, it's history. I'm sick of people looking at this as a racist flag. It's a southern flag, it's like if we flew our flag up north. It is a part of history, and we need to learn from it, we can't change it, but the main thing, get over it, the south will not rise again. Now people abuse the flag. The Confederate flag is a BATTLE flag and a southern flag. I couldn't even mention or fly it up here because we'd be automatic rednecks or racists. Now thats about what i want to agree on, allthough i do think that the flag in a way also stnads for being a proud redneck as well, wasnt the war much between the northern cityfolks and the southern farmers? Bluesman Mark said: Yo Jaffa!!! I'll bet you didn't expect this level of responses when you asked your question! This thread does point up one thing I really love about this forum. We are able to discuss a very controversial subject, even disagree with each other on certain aspects of said subject, & do so with maturity, civility, courtesy, & respect for each others thoughts & opinions, (for the most part, there have & always will be some exceptions in some threads, no matter how civilized we try to be). Still, the very fact that we have had such an enlightening discussion about a topic that is a "hot button" issue & easy to get upset over speaks volumes for this forum & it's members. I for one, couldn't be more pleased to be part of such a group! Well, i knew it was a bit of a hot subject, and i was as a matter of fact a little afraid what i would stur up when i opened this thread, but as ya say, were all pretty mature guys and can have a sophisticated debate about it. PPBPPBTBPTPBTBBBT!!!!! What the flag symbolizes to me is a kind of a rebelic freedom, the confederates were freedomfighters for all i know, so THATS what i think their flag really symbolizes, and if KKK and the nazi scumbags read this ya can all come here and try to kiss my ***, ill wait on my porch with the flag on my shoulders and a shotgun on my lap. Just a humble oppinion of a foreigner.
Modelmartin Posted February 1, 2008 Posted February 1, 2008 History is fascinating when it isn't selectively used to prove any points. Today everyone believes that Jaffa's country Sweden is a haven for enlightened peaceful people but Sweden's history was incredibly bloody at one time. Here in the US, there were lynchings in the north, not just the south. There was a lynching of black circus workers in Duluth, Minnesota in the 1920s. That is pretty far north! There were race riots in New York City during the Civil War when whites were marauding around the city killing any black people they found. They resented the fact that they were being drafted to go and fight and die for the purpose of ending slavery. Slavery is a fascinating topic too. The slaves were sold by Black Africans to the slave traders. The traders came from all of the seafaring European nations. The slaves were typically captives from enemy tribes or lower class or caste. Slaves are still kept today in some parts of Africa. Slavery has been around forever and been a part of most nation's history at some point. My belief is that people everywhere in the world are basically the same and given equal opportunity would commit as heinous or as peaceful things as anyone else. I am also a liberal and progressive and get into strident discussions with PC liberals about dropping the nuclear bombs on Japan. Does anyone think for even one nano-second that Japan would not have dropped one on Washington, L.A., Chicago, Detroit and New York City if they had the means to do that! They certainly would have. At least we didn't drop one on Tokyo....OOOPS! ...I forgot! We firebombed that city. I guess we both had "issues" about what happened during that war. I like to tease Gregg about being a Hawaiian wanna-be. Us terrible Americans stole Hawaii and treated the Hawaiians like ######. True. But they have their own bloody history of conquering each other in an incredibly bloody way. Basically in any war there is a victor and the vanquished but there are no winners. Heinous acts are committed by both sides. It is a human problem and not a national problem. It is the story of mankind. Wave after wave of humans moving across this planet and conquering and being conquered, back and forth. Bloody and tedious. I see some hope in institutions like the European Union and the United Nations. To quote that great humanitarian Rodney King " Can't we all just get along?" I do have one prejudice. I dislike Southern culture. I find the words "Southern Culture" to be oxymoronic. The Confederate battle flag is typically displayed by people who range from ignorant and harmless to the opposite. The North doesn't always have a lot to be proud of but the South has a lot of bad Karma from the last 150 years. President Grant had to send the Army back into Louisiana because white "citizens" were rounding up and slaughtering all the black people they could find. It was an outburst of Southern ethnic cleansing. The army had to be sent in to enforce desegregation in the 50s. We all know the famous cases of civil rights workers and blacks trying to vote who were killed but there were thousands of the less famous killed over the years to enforce white privilege in the South. I have a hard time with the idea that the battle flag is "just" a symbol of southern culture. Get a better symbol like Kudzu or Waffle House or Richard Petty! An interesting "what if" is what history would have looked like if the Ol Abe had said Ciao to Y'all! The history books don't talk much about the slave rebellions and the despair of the poor whites. The Klan was started to divide the poor whites and the blacks from forming a common cause to better their lives so the wealthy landowners could maintain control and privilege. Before y'all southerners get a rope with my name on it I will say I recently attended the Southern NNL and had a great time. I enjoyed meeting a lot of Southerners. I think there is hope for y'all!!!!
Nick F40 Posted February 1, 2008 Posted February 1, 2008 (edited) JAFFA said: Yeah... now that ya say it i guess so... Now thats about what i want to agree on, allthough i do think that the flag in a way also stnads for being a proud redneck as well, wasnt the war much between the northern cityfolks and the southern farmers? Well, i knew it was a bit of a hot subject, and i was as a matter of fact a little afraid what i would stur up when i opened this thread, but as ya say, were all pretty mature guys and can have a sophisticated debate about it. PPBPPBTBPTPBTBBBT!!!!! What the flag symbolizes to me is a kind of a rebelic freedom, the confederates were freedomfighters for all i know, so THATS what i think their flag really symbolizes, and if KKK and the nazi scumbags read this ya can all come here and try to kiss my ***, ill wait on my porch with the flag on my shoulders and a shotgun on my lap. Just a humble oppinion of a foreigner. WOOHOO coming from you, thank you. We didn't really have big city's back then but yeas, it was between the city like northerners and the hard working farmers of the south. "If this flag offends you, you need a history lesson" "I'd rather be historicaly accurated than politically correct" Edited February 1, 2008 by Nick F40
CAL Posted February 1, 2008 Posted February 1, 2008 Nick F40 said: WOOHOO coming from you, thank you. We didn't really have big city's back then but yeas, it was between the city like northerners and the hard working farmers of the south. "If this flag offends you, you need a history lesson" "I'd rather be historicaly accurated than politically correct" Exactly. Anyway Politcally Correctness is a communist idea... It was a Russian who first came up with the idea, which really means that Thou shall not speak words that insults, harms or goes against the state and it's principle ideas.
Modelmartin Posted February 2, 2008 Posted February 2, 2008 Nick F40 said: WOOHOO coming from you, thank you. We didn't really have big city's back then but yeas, it was between the city like northerners and the hard working farmers of the south. "If this flag offends you, you need a history lesson" "I'd rather be historicaly accurated than politically correct" CAL said: Exactly. Anyway Politcally Correctness is a communist idea... It was a Russian who first came up with the idea, which really means that Thou shall not speak words that insults, harms or goes against the state and it's principle ideas. ????????????? I don't even understand what you guys are saying!!!!!!! "historicaly accurated?" What is that? Politically correct is Communist or Russian! What a laugh. If you think any one group of people has a lock on PC you are quite badly mistaken. PC is present in every group of humans that ever were able to communicate with each other. It is called orthodoxy. Liberals and conservatives, communist and capitalist, democratic or totalitarian, on and on: each group has a politically correct set of views. There are also people who think somewhat independently. Most people have a varying mix of orthodox and free thoughts.
CAL Posted February 2, 2008 Posted February 2, 2008 Modelmartin said: ????????????? I don't even understand what you guys are saying!!!!!!! "historicaly accurated?" What is that? Politically correct is Communist or Russian! What a laugh. If you think any one group of people has a lock on PC you are quite badly mistaken. PC is present in every group of humans that ever were able to communicate with each other. It is called orthodoxy. Liberals and conservatives, communist and capitalist, democratic or totalitarian, on and on: each group has a politically correct set of views. There are also people who think somewhat independently. Most people have a varying mix of orthodox and free thoughts. "The term "political correctness" is derived from Marxist-Leninist vocabulary, and was used to describe the appropriate "party line" </ref>, commonly referred to as the "correct line" [6]Those people who opposed (or were seen as opposing) the "correct line" were often punished.[7]. A similar term has been used in Communist nation as the People's Republic of China. [2]"
CAL Posted February 2, 2008 Posted February 2, 2008 Modelmartin said: ????????????? I don't even understand what you guys are saying!!!!!!! "historicaly accurated?" What is that? Politically correct is Communist or Russian! What a laugh. If you think any one group of people has a lock on PC you are quite badly mistaken. PC is present in every group of humans that ever were able to communicate with each other. It is called orthodoxy. Liberals and conservatives, communist and capitalist, democratic or totalitarian, on and on: each group has a politically correct set of views. There are also people who think somewhat independently. Most people have a varying mix of orthodox and free thoughts. "The term "political correctness" is derived from Marxist-Leninist vocabulary, and was used to describe the appropriate "party line" </ref>, commonly referred to as the "correct line" [6]Those people who opposed (or were seen as opposing) the "correct line" were often punished.[7]. A similar term has been used in Communist nation as the People's Republic of China. [2]"
Darin Bastedo Posted February 2, 2008 Posted February 2, 2008 (edited) CAL said: "The term "political correctness" is derived from Marxist-Leninist vocabulary, and was used to describe the appropriate "party line" </ref>, commonly referred to as the "correct line" [6]Those people who opposed (or were seen as opposing) the "correct line" were often punished.[7]. A similar term has been used in Communist nation as the People's Republic of China. [2]" Do you really think that the soviets invented punishing dissenters? go back as far as you want into written history, and you will find people who are punished for saying or doing things that went against the policies of those in power. Read your bible and you will find that this is what jesus was killed for. He was causing a threat to the power structure of the Jewish authority, so they brought him up on charges and had the romans arrest him. The romans in the interest of keeping the peace the put him to death even though they couldn't find him guilty of crime against rome. Political correctness as a concept is not bad. Asking people to speak in such a way so as not to offend others is simply polite. Where it goes wrong when you go to extremes and the inoffensive substitute becomes more offensive than what it's replacing. I'm short. being short is ok. I stopped growing at 5'6" it was a natural process, and is no worse than being taller than most. I'm not "vertically challenged". being short never caused me a bit of grief and anyone who knows me, knows it doesn't affect my self esteem in the least. But to avoid the word short, is to make short seem like a dirty word. a symbol is just a symbol. The Confederate flag, or the Nazi swastika never did anything to anybody. It is the people who used those symbols that caused the harm. Those who want to believe that the confederate flag is a positive symbol, have to make an effort to disassociate it from those who have used it as a symbol of intolerance. Groups like the KKK and other white supremisist groups adopted the flag long after the confederacy ceased to exist. The original meaning of the flag has been replaced by the actions of these groups. To some the flag may be innocent, but to others it isn't. feel free to display the flag as you see fit, but also expect to have to defend your choice when someone gets offended. Around the world the American flag has taken a hit reputation wise, to the point the US state department has actually suggested that traveling Americans shouldn't wear it for fear of kidknapping or worse. Go a head and be "historically accurate, but include recent history too. the origins of the Swastika are innocent, But it lost it's innocence in WWII. One could wear the Swastika and claim they are simply being historcally accurate, But that still doesn't change the fact most people will assume you are a Nazi. Edited February 2, 2008 by Darin Bastedo
Modelmartin Posted February 2, 2008 Posted February 2, 2008 CAL said: "The term "political correctness" is derived from Marxist-Leninist vocabulary, and was used to describe the appropriate "party line" </ref>, commonly referred to as the "correct line" [6]Those people who opposed (or were seen as opposing) the "correct line" were often punished.[7]. A similar term has been used in Communist nation as the People's Republic of China. [2]" I will be quite willing to grant you that the Marxist/Leninist/Trotskyist/ Socialist/Communist/Maoist/Daffy-Duckist thinkers introduced the words "Politically Correct" but as Darin very eloquently stated they did not invent the thinking that was labeled that way by them. I recollect a headline in the newspaper in 1992 (IIRC) that the Vatican was just getting around to forgiving Galileo for thinking that the earth was not at the center of the universe. I think that is good example of PC thinking for its day. It would be fascinating if we had a real-life Dr. Who and we could send him back in time to find out what was politically correct for cavemen.
CAL Posted February 2, 2008 Posted February 2, 2008 Modelmartin said: I will be quite willing to grant you that the Marxist/Leninist/Trotskyist/ Socialist/Communist/Maoist/Daffy-Duckist thinkers introduced the words "Politically Correct" but as Darin very eloquently stated they did not invent the thinking that was labeled that way by them. I recollect a headline in the newspaper in 1992 (IIRC) that the Vatican was just getting around to forgiving Galileo for thinking that the earth was not at the center of the universe. I think that is good example of PC thinking for its day. It would be fascinating if we had a real-life Dr. Who and we could send him back in time to find out what was politically correct for cavemen. The reality of PC. Where does all this stuff that you’ve heard about this morning – the victim feminism, the gay rights movement, the invented statistics, the rewritten history, the lies, the demands, all the rest of it – where does it come from? For the first time in our history, Americans have to be fearful of what they say, of what they write, and of what they think. They have to be afraid of using the wrong word, a word denounced as offensive or insensitive, or racist, sexist, or homophobic. We have seen other countries, particularly in this century, where this has been the case. And we have always regarded them with a mixture of pity, and to be truthful, some amusement, because it has struck us as so strange that people would allow a situation to develop where they would be afraid of what words they used. But we now have this situation in this country. We have it primarily on college campuses, but it is spreading throughout the whole society. Were does it come from? What is it? We call it "Political Correctness." The name originated as something of a joke, literally in a comic strip, and we tend still to think of it as only half-serious. In fact, it’s deadly serious. It is the great disease of our century, the disease that has left tens of millions of people dead in Europe, in Russia, in China, indeed around the world. It is the disease of ideology. PC is not funny. PC is deadly serious. If we look at it analytically, if we look at it historically, we quickly find out exactly what it is. Political Correctness is cultural Marxism. It is Marxism translated from economic into cultural terms. It is an effort that goes back not to the 1960s and the hippies and the peace movement, but back to World War I. If we compare the basic tenets of Political Correctness with classical Marxism the parallels are very obvious. First of all, both are totalitarian ideologies. The totalitarian nature of Political Correctness is revealed nowhere more clearly than on college campuses, many of which at this point are small ivy covered North Koreas, where the student or faculty member who dares to cross any of the lines set up by the gender feminist or the homosexual-rights activists, or the local black or Hispanic group, or any of the other sainted "victims" groups that PC revolves around, quickly find themselves in judicial trouble. Within the small legal system of the college, they face formal charges – some star-chamber proceeding – and punishment. That is a little look into the future that Political Correctness intends for the nation as a whole. Indeed, all ideologies are totalitarian because the essence of an ideology (I would note that conservatism correctly understood is not an ideology) is to take some philosophy and say on the basis of this philosophy certain things must be true – such as the whole of the history of our culture is the history of the oppression of women. Since reality contradicts that, reality must be forbidden. It must become forbidden to acknowledge the reality of our history. People must be forced to live a lie, and since people are naturally reluctant to live a lie, they naturally use their ears and eyes to look out and say, "Wait a minute. This isn’t true. I can see it isn’t true," the power of the state must be put behind the demand to live a lie. That is why ideology invariably creates a totalitarian state. Second, the cultural Marxism of Political Correctness, like economic Marxism, has a single factor explanation of history. Economic Marxism says that all of history is determined by ownership of means of production. Cultural Marxism, or Political Correctness, says that all history is determined by power, by which groups defined in terms of race, sex, etc., have power over which other groups. Nothing else matters. All literature, indeed, is about that. Everything in the past is about that one thing. Third, just as in classical economic Marxism certain groups, i.e. workers and peasants, are a priori good, and other groups, i.e., the bourgeoisie and capital owners, are evil. In the cultural Marxism of Political Correctness certain groups are good – feminist women, (only feminist women, non-feminist women are deemed not to exist) blacks, Hispanics, homosexuals. These groups are determined to be "victims," and therefore automatically good regardless of what any of them do. Similarly, white males are determined automatically to be evil, thereby becoming the equivalent of the bourgeoisie in economic Marxism. Fourth, both economic and cultural Marxism rely on expropriation. When the classical Marxists, the communists, took over a country like Russia, they expropriated the bourgeoisie, they took away their property. Similarly, when the cultural Marxists take over a university campus, they expropriate through things like quotas for admissions. When a white student with superior qualifications is denied admittance to a college in favor of a black or Hispanic who isn’t as well qualified, the white student is expropriated. And indeed, affirmative action, in our whole society today, is a system of expropriation. White owned companies don’t get a contract because the contract is reserved for a company owned by, say, Hispanics or women. So expropriation is a principle tool for both forms of Marxism. And finally, both have a method of analysis that automatically gives the answers they want. For the classical Marxist, it’s Marxist economics. For the cultural Marxist, it’s deconstruction. Deconstruction essentially takes any text, removes all meaning from it and re-inserts any meaning desired. So we find, for example, that all of Shakespeare is about the suppression of women, or the Bible is really about race and gender. All of these texts simply become grist for the mill, which proves that "all history is about which groups have power over which other groups." So the parallels are very evident between the classical Marxism that we’re familiar with in the old Soviet Union and the cultural Marxism that we see today as Political Correctness. But the parallels are not accidents. The parallels did not come from nothing. The fact of the matter is that Political Correctness has a history, a history that is much longer than many people are aware of outside a small group of academics who have studied this. And the history goes back, as I said, to World War I, as do so many of the pathologies that are today bringing our society, and indeed our culture, down. Marxist theory said that when the general European war came (as it did come in Europe in 1914), the working class throughout Europe would rise up and overthrow their governments – the bourgeois governments – because the workers had more in common with each other across the national boundaries than they had in common with the bourgeoisie and the ruling class in their own country. Well, 1914 came and it didn’t happen. Throughout Europe, workers rallied to their flag and happily marched off to fight each other. The Kaiser shook hands with the leaders of the Marxist Social Democratic Party in Germany and said there are no parties now, there are only Germans. And this happened in every country in Europe. So something was wrong. Marxists knew by definition it couldn’t be the theory. In 1917, they finally got a Marxist coup in Russia and it looked like the theory was working, but it stalled again. It didn’t spread and when attempts were made to spread immediately after the war, with the Spartacist uprising in Berlin, with the Bela Kun government in Hungary, with the Munich Soviet, the workers didn’t support them. So the Marxists’ had a problem. And two Marxist theorists went to work on it: Antonio Gramsci in Italy and Georg Lukacs in Hungary. Gramsci said the workers will never see their true class interests, as defined by Marxism, until they are freed from Western culture, and particularly from the Christian religion – that they are blinded by culture and religion to their true class interests. Lukacs, who was considered the most brilliant Marxist theorist since Marx himself, said in 1919, "Who will save us from Western Civilization?" He also theorized that the great obstacle to the creation of a Marxist paradise was the culture: Western civilization itself. Lukacs gets a chance to put his ideas into practice, because when the home grown Bolshevik Bela Kun government is established in Hungary in 1919, he becomes deputy commissar for culture, and the first thing he did was introduce sex education into the Hungarian schools. This ensured that the workers would not support the Bela Kun government, because the Hungarian people looked at this aghast, workers as well as everyone else. But he had already made the connection that today many of us are still surprised by, that we would consider the "latest thing." In 1923 in Germany, a think-tank is established that takes on the role of translating Marxism from economic into cultural terms, that creates Political Correctness as we know it today, and essentially it has created the basis for it by the end of the 1930s. This comes about because the very wealthy young son of a millionaire German trader by the name of Felix Weil has become a Marxist and has lots of money to spend. He is disturbed by the divisions among the Marxists, so he sponsors something called the First Marxist Work Week, where he brings Lukacs and many of the key German thinkers together for a week, working on the differences of Marxism. And he says, "What we need is a think-tank." Washington is full of think tanks and we think of them as very modern. In fact they go back quite a ways. He endows an institute, associated with Frankfurt University, established in 1923, that was originally supposed to be known as the Institute for Marxism. But the people behind it decided at the beginning that it was not to their advantage to be openly identified as Marxist. The last thing Political Correctness wants is for people to figure out it’s a form of Marxism. So instead they decide to name it the Institute for Social Research. Weil is very clear about his goals. In 1971, he wrote to Martin Jay the author of a principle book on the Frankfurt School, as the Institute for Social Research soon becomes known informally, and he said, "I wanted the institute to become known, perhaps famous, due to its contributions to Marxism." Well, he was successful. The first director of the Institute, Carl Grunberg, an Austrian economist, concluded his opening address, according to Martin Jay, "by clearly stating his personal allegiance to Marxism as a scientific methodology." Marxism, he said, would be the ruling principle at the Institute, and that never changed. The initial work at the Institute was rather conventional, but in 1930 it acquired a new director named Max Horkheimer, and Horkheimer’s views were very different. He was very much a Marxist renegade. The people who create and form the Frankfurt School are renegade Marxists. They’re still very much Marxist in their thinking, but they’re effectively run out of the party. Moscow looks at what they are doing and says, "Hey, this isn’t us, and we’re not going to bless this." Horkheimer’s initial heresy is that he is very interested in Freud, and the key to making the translation of Marxism from economic into cultural terms is essentially that he combined it with Freudism. Again, Martin Jay writes, "If it can be said that in the early years of its history, the Institute concerned itself primarily with an analysis of bourgeois society’s socio-economic sub-structure," – and I point out that Jay is very sympathetic to the Frankfurt School, I’m not reading from a critic here – "in the years after 1930 its primary interests lay in its cultural superstructure. Indeed the traditional Marxist formula regarding the relationship between the two was brought into question by Critical Theory." The stuff we’ve been hearing about this morning – the radical feminism, the women’s studies departments, the gay studies departments, the black studies departments – all these things are branches of Critical Theory. What the Frankfurt School essentially does is draw on both Marx and Freud in the 1930s to create this theory called Critical Theory. The term is ingenious because you’re tempted to ask, "What is the theory?" The theory is to criticize. The theory is that the way to bring down Western culture and the capitalist order is not to lay down an alternative. They explicitly refuse to do that. They say it can’t be done, that we can’t imagine what a free society would look like (their definition of a free society). As long as we’re living under repression – the repression of a capitalistic economic order which creates (in their theory) the Freudian condition, the conditions that Freud describes in individuals of repression – we can’t even imagine it. What Critical Theory is about is simply criticizing. It calls for the most destructive criticism possible, in every possible way, designed to bring the current order down. And, of course, when we hear from the feminists that the whole of society is just out to get women and so on, that kind of criticism is a derivative of Critical Theory. It is all coming from the 1930s, not the 1960s. Other key members who join up around this time are Theodore Adorno, and, most importantly, Erich Fromm and Herbert Marcuse. Fromm and Marcuse introduce an element which is central to Political Correctness, and that’s the sexual element. And particularly Marcuse, who in his own writings calls for a society of "polymorphous perversity," that is his definition of the future of the world that they want to create. Marcuse in particular by the 1930s is writing some very extreme stuff on the need for sexual liberation, but this runs through the whole Institute. So do most of the themes we see in Political Correctness, again in the early 30s. In Fromm’s view, masculinity and femininity were not reflections of ‘essential’ sexual differences, as the Romantics had thought. They were derived instead from differences in life functions, which were in part socially determined." Sex is a construct; sexual differences are a construct. Another example is the emphasis we now see on environmentalism. "Materialism as far back as Hobbes had led to a manipulative dominating attitude toward nature." That was Horkhemier writing in 1933 in Materialismus und Moral. "The theme of man’s domination of nature," according to Jay, " was to become a central concern of the Frankfurt School in subsequent years." "Horkheimer’s antagonism to the fetishization of labor, (here’s were they’re obviously departing from Marxist orthodoxy) expressed another dimension of his materialism, the demand for human, sensual happiness." In one of his most trenchant essays, Egoism and the Movement for Emancipation, written in 1936, Horkeimer "discussed the hostility to personal gratification inherent in bourgeois culture." And he specifically referred to the Marquis de Sade, favorably, for his "protest…against asceticism in the name of a higher morality." How does all of this stuff flood in here? How does it flood into our universities, and indeed into our lives today? The members of the Frankfurt School are Marxist, they are also, to a man, Jewish. In 1933 the Nazis came to power in Germany, and not surprisingly they shut down the Institute for Social Research. And its members fled. They fled to New York City, and the Institute was reestablished there in 1933 with help from Columbia University. And the members of the Institute, gradually through the 1930s, though many of them remained writing in German, shift their focus from Critical Theory about German society, destructive criticism about every aspect of that society, to Critical Theory directed toward American society. There is another very important transition when the war comes. Some of them go to work for the government, including Herbert Marcuse, who became a key figure in the OSS (the predecessor to the CIA), and some, including Horkheimer and Adorno, move to Hollywood. These origins of Political Correctness would probably not mean too much to us today except for two subsequent events. The first was the student rebellion in the mid-1960s, which was driven largely by resistance to the draft and the Vietnam War. But the student rebels needed theory of some sort. They couldn’t just get out there and say, "Hell no we won’t go," they had to have some theoretical explanation behind it. Very few of them were interested in wading through Das Kapital. Classical, economic Marxism is not light, and most of the radicals of the 60s were not deep. Fortunately for them, and unfortunately for our country today, and not just in the university, Herbert Marcuse remained in America when the Frankfurt School relocated back to Frankfurt after the war. And whereas Mr. Adorno in Germany is appalled by the student rebellion when it breaks out there – when the student rebels come into Adorno’s classroom, he calls the police and has them arrested – Herbert Marcuse, who remained here, saw the 60s student rebellion as the great chance. He saw the opportunity to take the work of the Frankfurt School and make it the theory of the New Left in the United States. One of Marcuse’s books was the key book. It virtually became the bible of the SDS and the student rebels of the 60s. That book was Eros and Civilization. Marcuse argues that under a capitalistic order (he downplays the Marxism very strongly here, it is subtitled, A Philosophical Inquiry into Freud, but the framework is Marxist), repression is the essence of that order and that gives us the person Freud describes – the person with all the hang-ups, the neuroses, because his sexual instincts are repressed. We can envision a future, if we can only destroy this existing oppressive order, in which we liberate eros, we liberate libido, in which we have a world of "polymorphous perversity," in which you can "do you own thing." And by the way, in that world there will no longer be work, only play. What a wonderful message for the radicals of the mid-60s! They’re students, they’re baby-boomers, and they’ve grown up never having to worry about anything except eventually having to get a job. And here is a guy writing in a way they can easily follow. He doesn’t require them to read a lot of heavy Marxism and tells them everything they want to hear which is essentially, "Do your own thing," "If it feels good do it," and "You never have to go to work." By the way, Marcuse is also the man who creates the phrase, "Make love, not war." Coming back to the situation people face on campus, Marcuse defines "liberating tolerance" as intolerance for anything coming from the Right and tolerance for anything coming from the Left. Marcuse joined the Frankfurt School, in 1932 (if I remember right). So, all of this goes back to the 1930s. In conclusion, America today is in the throws of the greatest and direst transformation in its history. We are becoming an ideological state, a country with an official state ideology enforced by the power of the state. In "hate crimes" we now have people serving jail sentences for political thoughts. And the Congress is now moving to expand that category ever further. Affirmative action is part of it. The terror against anyone who dissents from Political Correctness on campus is part of it. It’s exactly what we have seen happen in Russia, in Germany, in Italy, in China, and now it’s coming here. And we don’t recognize it because we call it Political Correctness and laugh it off. My message today is that it’s not funny, it’s here, it’s growing and it will eventually destroy, as it seeks to destroy, everything that we have ever defined as our freedom and our culture. - Bill Lind
Darin Bastedo Posted February 2, 2008 Posted February 2, 2008 CAL said: The reality of PC. Where does all this stuff that you’ve heard about this morning – the victim feminism, the gay rights movement, the invented statistics, the rewritten history, the lies, the demands, all the rest of it – where does it come from? For the first time in our history, Americans have to be fearful of what they say, of what they write, and of what they think. They have to be afraid of using the wrong word, a word denounced as offensive or insensitive, or racist, sexist, or homophobic. - Bill Lind First of all I tend to discount anyone who feels he must use someone elses thoughts to make his own point., but I doubt you really know who Bill Lind is. I've met the man, and talked with at great length over the period of two days. I met him at an Anti-Iraq War rally, and aside from his opposition of the war, and his incredible knowledge of military tactics, he and I have few areas of agreement. He actually belives that the slaves would have faired better, had the south won the civil war, and is only an admission away from being a segregationist. He believes that there is actually a difference between his theory of "Cultural Independance" and racism. un wittingly you have made my point about people allowing extremists gain control. If you don't want to be denounced as offensive or insensitive, or racist, sexist, or homophobic, Be sensitive, and polite. I have never been accused of any ofthis even though I freely speak my mind on almost any subject. That is because no matter what the Race, sexual Orientation, or political leaning of the person I'm talking to, I treat them with respect, and listen to what they have to say, with out judging them. As Much as Bill and I disagree on just about every social issue, we still managed to have a few laughs, and get along. If people were willing to work toward unity, rather than let differences divide them, political correctness would be un-nessesary. While I don't believe in censorship, I do believe there should be consequences for using obviosly offensive language. When you go to model show and meet the builder of an incredible model, does it matter to you whether the modeler is Black, Gay, Hispanic, or jewish? I hope not. My hope is that you value the builder as the craftsman, he or she is with out letting predjudice affect you. I'm not asking people to be politically correct, I only ask they be polite.
Darin Bastedo Posted February 2, 2008 Posted February 2, 2008 More from Bill lind the so-callled expert on "Political Correctness" "Until recently, the objective of cultural conservatives, those Americans who still adhere to our ancient, Western, Judeo-Christian culture, was to retake existing cultural institutions - the public schools, the universities, the media, the entertainment industry and the arts - from those hostile to our culture and make them once again forces for goodness, truth and beauty. We sought to do so primarily through politics, by electing fellow cultural conservatives to high office and expecting them, once elected, to use politics to help restore our traditional culture. Unfortunately, we must acknowledge that this strategy has not been successful. Despite some political successes, the culture has continued to deteriorate. In part, this is because some of the people we elected abandoned their principles once they were in office. But the larger reason is that culture is more powerful than politics. The tide of cultural degradation and decay is simply too strong for any political barrier to stem." - Bill Lind In other words "we're sick of other people telling us how to live. That's our job"
CAL Posted February 2, 2008 Posted February 2, 2008 Darin Bastedo said: More from Bill lind the so-callled expert on "Political Correctness" "Until recently, the objective of cultural conservatives, those Americans who still adhere to our ancient, Western, Judeo-Christian culture, was to retake existing cultural institutions - the public schools, the universities, the media, the entertainment industry and the arts - from those hostile to our culture and make them once again forces for goodness, truth and beauty. We sought to do so primarily through politics, by electing fellow cultural conservatives to high office and expecting them, once elected, to use politics to help restore our traditional culture. Unfortunately, we must acknowledge that this strategy has not been successful. Despite some political successes, the culture has continued to deteriorate. In part, this is because some of the people we elected abandoned their principles once they were in office. But the larger reason is that culture is more powerful than politics. The tide of cultural degradation and decay is simply too strong for any political barrier to stem." - Bill Lind In other words "we're sick of other people telling us how to live. That's our job" I am not sure what your point is. My only point was the origins of PC and the dangerous line it walks and most people are oblivious to its true nature. And I already made my point. The only thing that you wrote made good sense was and or added anything meaningful to this discussion is “I'm not asking people to be politically correct, I only ask they be polite.†That’s all I ask. And consider the subject closed.
Darin Bastedo Posted February 3, 2008 Posted February 3, 2008 (edited) CAL said: I am not sure what your point is. My only point was the origins of PC and the dangerous line it walks and most people are oblivious to its true nature. And I already made my point. The only thing that you wrote made good sense was and or added anything meaningful to this discussion is “I'm not asking people to be politically correct, I only ask they be polite.†That’s all I ask. And consider the subject closed. My point is what one side calls political correctness is considered reform by the other side. The punishing of dissenters in russia has nothing to do with the social pressure here to use less offensive speach. The man who you quoted just happened to favor censorship and the limiting of peoples expression just as much as the political correctness crowd, he just has a different party line invoving "traditional values". so I guess my point is one should either express their opinions in their own words or be more careful in researching the source of their quotes. I don't consider this subject closed, as others may want to express their opinions, but if you no longer wish to participate in the debate, that is your perogative. Edited February 3, 2008 by Darin Bastedo
Modelmartin Posted February 3, 2008 Posted February 3, 2008 I never heard of this Bill Lind character before but from what I see posted here I don't agree with his backward and mistaken..... I mean conservative..... view of our culture. Society has been going to hell in a handbasket since it began! The ancient Greeks talked about the decline of their society!!! How can this be? Life on this planet has never been this good for so many people in the history of man. It doesn't mean that it's great for everyone or that everyone likes it! Our perspective is just distorted. Culture is highly dynamic and a lot of people do not like change. They need to blame someone for it. Nostalgia is mistaken for reality. Get used to change because there is nothing BUT change ahead of us and it will continue to change at an even faster rate. It is going to get really scary for those who resist it and long for the mythical "good old days". The good old days were actually NOT. Look at the misery that the Islamic radicals are spreading to their own people in quest of the "good old days" of the Caliphate. What foolishness that is. We are just as human and potentially foolish as they are if we allow a similar thing to happen here. By similar thing I mean a backward looking theocratic government to take over. It's fascinating how this thread has morphed from poor Jaffa asking an innocent question about a flag and all of this spewing out! Peace and respect to all.
Joe Handley Posted February 3, 2008 Posted February 3, 2008 This has been a very informative and in some ways educational thread and has been handled in a mature way by all involved, especially the moderators! I can't think of too many forums I've been on where there wouldn't have been name calling, accusations, and the like for "lesser" topics (usually Democrate basing ), let alone something this "loaded". You guys need to be given a huge thumbs up for this thread!
Nick F40 Posted February 3, 2008 Posted February 3, 2008 Joe Handley said: This has been a very informative and in some ways educational thread and has been handled in a mature way by all involved, especially the moderators! I can't think of too many forums I've been on where there wouldn't have been name calling, accusations, and the like for "lesser" topics (usually Democrate basing ), let alone something this "loaded". You guys need to be given a huge thumbs up for this thread! Yeah. I dunno, it's a symbol but there are self indulgent, ignorant, no good, good for nothin, rotten sob's out there that screw it up for the rest of us and abuse something. I hope nobody got offended or anything, really.
outsider Posted February 4, 2008 Posted February 4, 2008 suffice it to say the battle flag brings with it a ton of baggage. there are those who fly it or show it off out of respect to those who died for it or for historical purposes and yes there are those who show it off out of disrespect to others. and while its really easy and convenient to group everyone into one group and tout that they are all backwoods racists this is simply not the case.....not even close. there is two sides to every coin and a whole lot of gray in between. just how everyone swears southerners love nascar and budweiser its just not the case.
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