Americans have a bizarre quality now.
The vast majority of them readily acknowledge that their government is corrupt and run by corporations. They know this. Don't you?
However, when they start to think about the actual specifics of it, they switch off this understanding and enter into a fine balance between hopeless limpness and casual optimism. "That's the only way we can get things done." "That's just how the system is." "Well, I think [current politician] will still do a pretty good job." People will actually fight to defend the system and think in the direction of conspiracy theories even when faced with facts like the things I am linking in this post.
The stance, for example, that Hillary Clinton or Donald Trump would try to end government support of war, fossil fuels, or disenfranchisement of the American people directly contradicts American resentment of the 1% and all of the information available about both candidates. More importantly, to pretend that the current system blanketing the United States could be burned away simply by picking the right establishment candidate in a presidential election is childlike. The concept that Hillary Clinton or Donald Trump are diseases rather than symptoms is below average human reasoning.
It is not ignorance. As you can see in the above graph, Americans are well aware that both their government as a whole and both of these wealthy candidates are not trustworthy. And yet people feel incredibly strongly about putting all their hopes into voting against a single lesser evil candidate, as if they forgot that they know factually the entire system is rotten.
They also try to avoid learning new horrors, and to file into the past the worst things they've been forced to hear, like the government's lies for entering the Iraq War, the torture of Guantanamo prisoners, the deliberate US airstrike on Doctors Without Borders, the NSA leaks, the DNC election bias, etc. Americans try to somehow explain away and downplay any proof of serious wrongdoing by their government. This is quite the opposite of the rational reaction, which would be to assume that what we have not found out about government wrongdoings exceeds what we have found -- especially since the government lied in every one of these circumstances.
But then ask them another time, is the government corrupt? "Hell yeah." Is America, which has nearly 800 military bases in 70+ countries, which is the only country in history that has ever dropped nuclear bombs, which has 3x the military budget of any country on earth, indisputably a warlike nation? Are Vietnam and Iraq alone not enough to prove that our government drags us into war for corrupt reasons and commits human rights abuses?
Everything I have referenced is known fact.
How can we explain this contradiction in American thinking?
It's doublethink.
"Doublethink" is a term invented by George Orwell in his famous dystopian book 1984:
"To know and not to know, to be conscious of complete truthfulness while telling carefully constructed lies, to hold simultaneously two opinions which canceled out, knowing them to be contradictory and believing in both of them, to use logic against logic, to repudiate morality while laying claim to it, to believe that democracy was impossible and that the Party was the guardian of democracy, to forget, whatever it was necessary to forget, then to draw it back into memory again at the moment when it was needed, and then promptly to forget it again, and above all, to apply the same process to the process itself -- that was the ultimate subtlety; consciously to induce unconsciousness, and then, once again, to become unconscious of the act of hypnosis you had just performed."
The majority of the American public is fully engaging in doublethink.
To know and not know that their government is bombing civilians while providing weapons to their targets to supposedly necessitate the bombing; to be conscious of extensive corporate corruption in their government while insisting individual pawns and players central to that corruption could somehow make everything OK; you can imagine your own take on the rest. Americans know, and the fact that they already know may actually make it more difficult for them to do anything about knowing. 15% of Americans are in poverty and many more are close. 43 million Americans owe a total of 1.3 trillion in student loan debt -- the interest of which mainly goes to fund the federal government, who spends near 600 billion of its budget on further military armaments and endeavors.
"I don't have to tell you things are bad. Everybody knows things are bad. . . We know the air is unfit to breathe and our food is unfit to eat, and we sit watching our TVs while some local newscaster tells us that today we had fifteen homicides and sixty-three violent crimes, as if that's the way it's supposed to be.
We know things are bad — worse than bad. They're crazy. It's like everything everywhere is going crazy, so we don't go out anymore. We sit in the house, and slowly the world we are living in is getting smaller, and all we say is: 'Please, at least leave us alone in our living rooms. Let me have my toaster and my TV and my steel-belted radials and I won't say anything. Just leave us alone.'
Well, I'm not going to leave you alone." - part of the speech from The Network
So after a while, for example like after learning about the DNC corruption, we just shrug and say, "Well, we have to defeat Trump," and go to vote for the "lesser evil" like good obedient citizens. Occupy Wall Street failed, so we write the whole opposition off. We have to stop ISIS, so we buy the notion that more war will do so, rather than ceasing to be the region's major arms supplier for all sides. And then next time, if there's some leak about Democratic or Republican party bias or agenda, the outcry will be even quieter. They know they can get away with it. The corruption is already on full display at websites like opensecrets.org and we've become acclimated to it the same way we've become acclimated to images of bloodied children and reports of beheadings in the Middle East.
Recently, journalist and activist Chris Hedges debated Robert Reich on Democracy Now, saying, "Fear. That is all the Democrats have to offer now and all the Republicans have to offer now." Indeed there cannot possibly be any good argument for continuing to support the exact kind of candidates who are symptoms of a system we openly acknowledge to be opposed to its people's best interests other than some kind of tactic of terrifying people. And that is why our two major party candidates are both incredibly hateful, polarizing humans who require one another to draw in votes. People will not only vote for Trump/Clinton -- they will fight vehemently to convince others that they must do the same to more or less save the nation/world. Hedges responds to a question of which he would vote for were he not supporting Green Party candidate Jill Stein, "I don’t think it makes any difference. The TPP is going to go through, whether it’s Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton. Endless war is going to be continued, whether it’s Trump or Clinton. We’re not going to get our privacy back, whether it’s under Clinton or Trump. The idea that, at this point, the figure in the executive branch exercises that much power, given the power of the war industry and Wall Street, is a myth."
I don't remind you of all of this to depress you. On the contrary, I think there is great hope, but it has to be made clear to people in this country that they already know our government has been seized by corporate powers, and that this is the sort of scenario in which citizens are supposed to fight. I don't know why, but protesting and fighting for your country has become devalued. We are at a point now where journalism is so suppressed that hackers are our best journalists; the Obama administration has prosecuted more whistleblowers than all previous administrations combined.
In this kind of environment, someone like Chelsea Manning ought to be a hero just like Edward Snowden is considered by many people to be. She exposed US army targeting of civilians, support of child abuse and trafficking, and more horrors (this is hard to read, but please look at this one). Yet the sensitive and courageous 28-year-old was sentenced to 35 years in prison and currently languishes in solitary confinement as punishment for a recent suicide attempt. Worst of all, most Americans did not actually look at the information she sacrificed her life to provide. More Americans are concerned with whether Manning was a traitor than the information she revealed about their entire government. This is a common diversion tactic that ought to be transparent if people weren't engaging in doublethink with such determination: in the aforementioned interview Hedges says, "I mean, this whole debate over the WikiLeaks is insane. 'Did Russia?'--I’ve printed classified material that was given to me by the Mossad. But I never exposed that Mossad gave it to me. Is what was published true or untrue?"
Chelsea Manning's fate is a mere blip on the radar of a vast government system that has caused countless deaths and horrors, which I hope is becoming clearer and clearer. I am not a conspiracy theorist. I am not linking you to bunk websites. If you take two seconds to clear your mind, it should be obvious that although a lifetime of patriotic propaganda has settled into some parts of you and you don't want to accept all this, you already know it's true that the United States government is evil. Now, "evil" may seem like a strong, melodramatic word. Go look at that link I gave about what Chelsea Manning revealed. That is enough, but you have much, much more information than that.
You know your candidates this year are handpicked elites who will represent the 1% and do the bare minimum required to try to keep you silent. You know your government is a terrible military presence all over the world who supports dictators, bombs innocents, and creates terrorists. You know that almost nothing is being done to try to alleviate the suffering of everyday American people, simultaneously as billions are given to banks and Israel. You know it is a bald-faced lie that doing any better than this for peace, people, and the environment is "unrealistic." It's mentally unsound to think you could possibly fix a system you know is corrupt by picking an insider of that system to represent a portion of that system. You know what this government has become.
Are you going to do a damn thing about it?
Don't tell me it's impossible. If it were impossible, I wouldn't be able to find the information I linked and you wouldn't be able to read this article. More than that -- "impossible" is something human beings only say when they don't care enough to try regardless. If a parent's beloved child is deathly ill or in great danger, the parent doesn't give up just because the odds are poor. "Impossible" is not in the vocabulary then. So if you're thinking it's impossible, what you're really thinking is "what a hassle." If you have a conscience, you can't think "what a hassle" knowing what you know. With climate change alone, even your own way of life is not going to continue smoothly forever. Catastrophes and major wars are not just for history books; they happen continually, soon and in the distant future as well.
"All machines have their friction; and possibly this does enough good to counterbalance the evil. At any rate, it is a great evil to make a stir about it. But when the friction comes to have its machine, and oppression and robbery are organized, I say, let us not have such a machine any longer. . . when. . .a whole country is unjustly overrun and conquered by a foreign army, and subjected to military law, I think that it is not too soon for honest men to rebel and revolutionize. What makes this duty the more urgent is the fact that the country so overrun is not our own, but ours is the invading army." - Henry David Thoreau, Civil Disobedience
Thoreau published those words in 1849. Funny how true they remain today.
Activist Mario Savio built on Thoreau's words in 1964 when he said (and I recommend listening to it as that is very different), "There is a time when the operation of the machine becomes so odious, makes you so sick at heart, that you can't take part. You can't even passively take part! And you've got to put your bodies upon the gears and upon the wheels, upon the levers, upon all the apparatus, and you've got to make it stop! And you've got to indicate to the people who run it, to the people who own it — that unless you're free, the machine will be prevented from working at all!"
There is a lot of light, spirit, and beauty to be found in rebellion and the freedom of knowing you've opened yourself to accept reality, even if that reality is hard as hell to swallow. I didn't realize this until very recently. I always had trouble with fully acknowledging the reality of my government, just like most of my fellow Americans. I was only able to start waking up recently because I saw a way of doing it that involves joy and love.
This is the 2016 Green Party candidate Dr. Jill Stein spray painting a piece of construction equipment graffiti'd by Dakota Access Pipeline protestors, "I approve this message."
I have tried to find anything to criticize about this candidate and come up short. So have the major two parties and people who think it is possible to "spoil" candidates who represent a rotten-to-the-core system: the only smear campaign managed has been a readily debunked claim that Harvard graduate and 25-year medical practitioner Jill Stein is "anti-vaccine." Every time a news channel tries to make her look bad in an interview, she demolishes them with a polite smile. (I wrote more about this candidate and the third party spoiler myth here.)
But I link the above video not to get Dr. Stein and the Green Party more exposure, but mainly for the moment where the interviewer asks her how she could handle the scrutiny and physical exertion of being president, and she replies, "It's a 22 hour a day job. It's--In my view it's a wonderful opportunity. You know, I'm a medical doctor and I came to see that if we're going to fix the things that are literally killing us, we have to address our sick political system above all. And I began this process really about 15 years ago, when I was recruited to start running for office by the Green Party, which, lo and behold, I didn't know anything about. It was actually a party that was advancing the same agenda that I was, for people, for an environment, for jobs, for an economy that works for all of us. So, you know, since I've begun this--To me it's a very wonderful, exciting, very healing process by which we get to have a real conversation -- through the Green Party, because we're not funded by the usual predators."
I can tell through her interviews and deep knowledge of the world and US that she is perfectly well aware of everything I wrote here, and much more. She has said she would not only pardon whistleblowers like Snowden and Manning, but put Snowden in her cabinet. She knows all of these horrors. She knows how badly the system is stacked against peace and everyday people. And yet, she can playfully graffiti construction equipment alongside Native American protestors, pluckily protest outside the debates for being disallowed to enter amidst 1,000 armed policemen (after being handcuffed to a chair for eight hours the last time she did so), and make playful jabs like this:
After so much time battling uphill, she remains determined and optimistic. I would say she is a glowing example of how to be an activist without letting the things you are fighting get you down. You can have fun fighting corruption, murder, torture, greed, etc. In fact, I think you must. I think activism is best done with high spirits and joy. You can be horrified by the things you fight and still fight them with a smile.
As you know, America needs a revolution very badly. At the very least, I hope this shakes some people out of their delusional doublethink and encourages them to seek out more hard truths on their own.
But if you can do even a tiny thing to help us get there, please do. That's how it happens. Slavery didn't end with a single movement. Major social movements and protests are not just for history books or foreign countries; they are a vital part of being a good citizen and yes, you, too, might have to end up on the street with a sign in your hands. I have a life, too; I have a job, friends, hobbies, etc. I know these things take effort and/or money. But if you refuse to let your mind dismiss and forget the reality of what you are supporting with your inaction, tax dollars, and purchases, then you will be unable to remain inactive. Remember what you know and don't let yourself hide any longer from the fact that your government has been taken over by corporate powers and is an international terror.
Thoreau also wrote, "How does it become a man to behave toward this American government to-day? I answer, that he cannot without disgrace be associated with it."
Information
Yes, this is a hassle, too. I know Americans are accustomed to the concept that their government will just chug on and everything will be fine if they ignore it and the world, but being informed is part of being a responsible human being on planet Earth. So find a variety of sources and work on rooting out the truth instead of taking one source or multiple similar sources (i.e., only American/British sources) at their word.
What Can I Do Though??
After becoming more informed, you can seek out groups that have noble goals in mind. For me right now, one of these groups is the Green Party. I strongly urge you to focus on groups that are looking at the real root of our problems: our warmongering government that is robbing us blind. I actually want to get a revolution started, and I think this could even crop out of Black Lives Matter. But I'm focusing on the Green Party just now because they have goals like ranked choice voting, which is one way we could get much closer to fixing things. I'm not really sure how we kick this thing off, but I know we have to try and figure it out. Important goals include campaign finance reform and altering the voting process/system. To quote Hedges again, "We have to remember that 10 years ago, Syriza, which controls the Greek government, was polling at exactly the same spot that the Green Party is polling now—about 4 percent. We’ve got to break out of this idea that we can create systematic change within a particular election cycle. We’ve got to be willing to step out into the political wilderness, perhaps for a decade. "
Also, community interaction matters. When people get together and start talking, things happen. Maybe even right here on Steemit. When people feel like they're doing good, they're less afraid to look in the mirror or the real state of the world. So for example, volunteering for a charity like Habitat for Humanity could also be useful.
I'm new to all this; I just woke up. So think about it and comment, give me your suggestions. We're allies. We're not enemies. Race relations, for example, have LONG been a way to keep people from fighting corrupt government. The more we work toward a common cause, the stronger we are. We outnumber them.
