From: Arlo J. Bensinger (ajb102@psu.edu)
Date: Sun Apr 24 2005 - 05:18:47 BST
Good to hear from you Mark,
> Just want to say I appreciate your recent posts in response to Platt.
> I believe your analysis is right on, and would add only that when we
> focus on the left-right, lib-con, theist-atheist splits as the cause
> of social problems, we are playing into the hands of entrenched
> power.
Which is what baffles me. Normally, the only people who support power with such
zealotry are the ones who reap immediate personal rewards. If Platt was a
corporate CEO, or a defense contractor, I could see his ongoing deceptive use
of language to encourage fear and mispairings of concepts. There are many, of
course, manipulated by xenophobia or secondary rewards (cheap oil), but these
tend to be people not used to employing critical thinking towards their social
situation (which is why I am such an adovate of this), or who have not been
exposed to "others" to form a basis for questioning xenophobic tendencies.
Platt seems to be none of these, and yet he is one of the most vocal, zealots
of capitalist power structures I have come across.. to the point where any
questioning of modern capitalist practice becomes immediately "communist" (see
my recent example of communcal snowblower ownership, which immediately became
my "opposition to private property").
> As you've suggested, real power wielded by elite minorities
> feeds the flames of these red-herring dichotomies. The reason is
> obvious: Every second we spend focused on false causes is time taken
> from useful analysis and action against the real problem.
Yep. We agree completely... which may be one reason our dialogue do not intesect
that often. :-)
Arlo
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