Against Ignorance

I saw the movie "Avatar" tonight. I went with my wife and a friend. All of us were delighted and extremely impressed. At the end of the movie, the audience responsed with prolonged applause -- something that almost never happens in American theaters.

I applauded both the artistry and the courage of the film-makers. The film makes a huge statement -- both artistic and political. To begin with, "Avatar" is obviously one of the greatest movies of all time.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avatar_(2009_film)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Cameron
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0499549/ -- "Avatar"

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The beautiful movie I reviewed on Sunday featured Russian folk and art songs.

http://my.opera.com/NonZionist/blog/2009/12/20/white-countess-one-of-the-best-movies-ever

These songs brought back fond memories of my 1982 visit to the Soviet Union.

Fond? How is that possible? The Soviet Union was the Enemy, the Godless Demon that was about to Gobble Us Up and Take Over the World -- so we Americans believed. We knew nothing of the unprecedented Soviet losses in World War II, nothing of the struggle on the Eastern Front, nothing of the country that saved the world from the Nazi evil, nothing of the deep and universal devotion to peace, nothing of the Soviet peace proposals, and nothing of the policies of our own government. Our government needed to justify its own lucrative war-making and its domination of the world, and so the "Soviet Threat" was invented.

Today, we are all supposed to fear the presence of religion, but in 1982 it was the opposite: Our rulers wanted us to fear the absence of religion. And what could be more frightening than a whole country without religion?! Today, millions of superstitious people are hoping and praying for an apocalyptic battle between the U.S. and Islam; Thirty years ago, these same people were hoping and praying for an apocalyptic war between the U.S. and the Soviet Union, "Pure Good versus Pure Evil", "Gog versus Magog". My aim, both then and now, is to prevent such madness from spreading.

In 1982, then, I set out to meet the "Soviet Threat" head on. I sought to demonstrate to my friends and co-workers that it was not necessary to live in fear. I would go there, to the heart of the "Evil Empire", and come back alive, and in this way I would provide living proof that the hundreds of billions of dollars being funneled to the war industry might be better spent elsewhere.

My visit to the Soviet Union turned out to be my greatest adventure. It happened in the summer of 1982. What follows is a little of what I saw. I will add to this essay as I recall more.

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How we view a conflict determines whether or not the conflict can be resolved. Take the conflict in Israel-Palestine. What are the "sides"? Is it an intractable conflict between Jews and non-Jews, as the "International Community" of banksters and war profiteers wants us to believe? Or is it a conflict between the peaceable native people and a gang of colonizing ideologues from Europe?

If it is the former, then the conflict cannot end in anything but genocide, the "Good Guys" exterminating the "Bad Guys".

If it is the latter, then the conflict will end as soon as peaceable Jews and non-Jews discover that their devotion to peace and justice transcends the kind of ethnic attachment that the "International Community" promotes as part of its "divide and conquer" strategy.

Here is how Palestine looks when we secede from the war-based regime of the "International Community" and look at things from the perspective of the peaceable victims.

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So much of what happens in this world, happens unseen. The sun rises, half of the planet warms, billions of people are affected, but a person who goes only by the tv news shows will know nothing of this world-wide event: The rising of the sun changes the world, but it just isn't "newsworthy".

Other events go unreported because they are seen by some people and not by "the right people". In a crime, the victim sees one thing and the criminal sees another, and if the news is reported by the criminals, no one will know of the victim's story. Does this mean that the rape "never happened"? Similarly, when military aggression occurs, the victims see one thing and the aggressors or victors, another.

Unfortunately, most of our "mainstream" history books are written by the victors. Many of the victims are dead, and those who survive do not have the resources to publish their story and make it available to a wide audience. In addition, the victor dominates the media and can easily make sure that the voice of the victims gets drowned out.

Why should it matter? Who cares about history, anyway, these days? Why should we care?

We should care because our indifference to history is one of the causes of our political paralysis. If we have no past, we have no future. We are like a deer in the headlights, unable to move out of the way of the oncoming truck, because it cannot remember or understand how it got where it is. Better, perhaps, we are like the adopted child, plunked into the middle of a family the child knows nothing about: How does that child feel? Is that any way to live?

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When I grew up, long long ago, talking about sex was taboo, but talking about politics was allowed. Then, about twenty years ago, the situation reversed. Everyone now talks about sex in the most explicit terms -- everyone except me -- and talking about politics has now become taboo. Where sex once had the "allure of the forbidden", now that allure belongs to politics.

Let's be naughty together! Let's violate that taboo! Let's connect, let's talk, let's think -- and see what happens! Oooh! AaaH! Ideas come! Questions arise!

First question: If politics brings people together, as I believe it does, then what is it that stops us from doing politics more often? What prevents us from finding the common ground we share as citizens? What prevents us from celebrating and defending and developing and exploring that common ground? Why do we hide within our private little worlds when we could be changing the larger world together? Where is our courage? our defiance? our desire to do mischief on a larger scale? What has turned us off? What frightens us?

Well, for one thing, politics has become dirty. It's not something that nice people care to do. The big parties have taken over, the professionals have moved in. These days, politics is all tied up with money and spin and lies. It's all about evasion of responsibility and cowardice and cliche. It's a form of prostitution -- selling your soul to the big banks and the insurance companies and the pharmaceutical pushers and the merchants of death. It's about getting people hooked on war and fear.

It's not like it was in the 'sixties! Back then, we thought the world was ours to shape; we thought we could do anything. All we had to do was imagine something to make it real. The sky was the limit. Today -- we can do nothing.

No, wait, that's not true at all. The world is still what we make of it. If our dreams have died, it is because we have let them die. None of this had to be. If the big guys have taken over, it's because the little guys have fallen asleep. What happens if we suddenly wake up? The world becomes ours again! -- and this time, let's keep it!

We sleep because we've been poisoned -- with cynicism, timidity, resignation. We've been entertained to death. But it's not too late to undo the damage. With self-awareness, we can get at the poisons and purge them from our system. If we want to change the world, we must change ourselves first. A rotten body does not make for good sex, and a weak soul does not make for good politics. We must become stronger, wiser, more playful, less inhibited, less fixated, more flexible. Politics is life-and-death, but the minute we take it seriously, we're dead. We play the game because it's fun -- there is joy in struggle, there is pleasure in connection.

Is it possible to break the stranglehold of the big parties, the big corporations and the big media? Can we carve out a place for the human being in this process? Actually, we can. However big the system may be, it's nothing more than a machine. And there are limits to what a machine can do. The big media can run on fumes for only so long. Eventually, they run out of illusions to sell; eventually, the need for content becomes obvious. It is the independent human being that gives life to the system.

Of course, most human beings serve the system; they are part of the machine. Independence means seceding from the system, recovering an independent moral sensibility. It means thinking one's own thoughts, feeling one's own feelings, dreaming one's own dreams, living one's own life. It means finding the courage to disagree with the system. It means refusing to drink the kool-ade when the system tells us that "war is Good", that "torture is Necessary", etc.. To break our servitude to the system, we must learn to serve something larger. That something is our humanity, and, larger still, that something is truth.

What's the worst that can happen to us? The system can accuse us of heresy and burn us at the stake -- or send us to the gulag, or censor us and confine us to the Fringe. Wow, this struggle could become exciting! Sex seems almost tame, in comparison.

What will happen if we refuse to participate in the sport of politics? I fear that a far more vicious sport will take its place. If we disdain civic opportunities for communication, then the void will be filled by religious or ideological fanaticism. Instead of harmless group sex, we get S&M. Instead of pleasant conversations and rallies, we get inquisitions and lynchings and mass terror. One way or another, people will come together. When we compare politics with the alternatives, it does not seem so bad.