CHOMSKY Archives

The philosophy, work & influences of Noam Chomsky

CHOMSKY@LISTSERV.ICORS.ORG

Options: Use Forum View

Use Monospaced Font
Show Text Part by Default
Show All Mail Headers

Message: [<< First] [< Prev] [Next >] [Last >>]
Topic: [<< First] [< Prev] [Next >] [Last >>]
Author: [<< First] [< Prev] [Next >] [Last >>]

Print Reply
Subject:
From:
Tony Abdo <[log in to unmask]>
Reply To:
The philosophy, work & influences of Noam Chomsky
Date:
Sat, 8 Jan 2000 23:13:14 -0600
Content-Type:
Multipart/Mixed
Parts/Attachments:
Text/Plain (6 kB) , Text/Plain (6 kB)
For those who are looking for still more coverage and opinion of the
Seattle WTO events,  here is some fine coverage from the editor of The
American Partisan,  a "libertarian " site.     Buchanan is currently a
rising star in these circles.        Let's see how they talk amongst
themselves.       Enjoy................Tony


Oppress Us Now or We'll Destroy the City
by Dave Munger

Some of you might have thought I had nothing to say about the recent WTO
disruption. After all, all of the other Partisan columnists got theirs
in when it was current, and the readers' thirst for other peoples
opinions on these events must have been slaked way back then. Well I'm
not letting it go. Until the Munger has spoken, the matter remains
open.  It is my contention that the rioters are all treasonous
sub-humans and that the Seattle police ought to have beaten at least a
few of them to death.
To say the least, the self-righteous throwbacks in their non-conformist
uniforms have profoundly misunderstood the WTO, democracy, freedom,
themselves, and reality itself on a pretty basic level. This horde of
slack-jawed barristas entered the proceedings with a collective paranoid
fantasy of martyrdom that would not be denied. If the authorities
committed the outrage of failing to play along with the shared delusion
then, damn it, they'd be forced into the role that they must play in
order for these insects to be able to pretend to be the type of dramatic
characters that they must believe themselves to be in order to keep from
killing themselves.
The most important thing to remember about big groups of idiots is that
they always get their way eventually. This is why the government
exists.  Live local TV coverage showed deeply confused protesters
chaining themselves down to stuff in eager anticipation of having their
rights brutally violated by The Man. As the day wore on, they were
pathetically dismayed by the mellow attitude of the latte sipping cops
of Seattle (motto: "I'm more tolerant than you, fascist"), as they
ambled about like Bobbies inquiring as to why Rage Against The Machine's
lice-ridden pawns were making themselves so uncomfortable. Finding that
they were actually going to be allowed to exercise their right to free
speech, they were left with an awkward silence to fill with chanting,
drums, and incoherent indignity. It was clear they were going to have to
come up with something else.
Throughout the day, our shaggy would-be saviours escalated their
painfully obvious attempts to bait the fuzz. Their pique at literally
not being able to get arrested was alternately amusing and sad as they
intensified their infringements on the rights of the WTO delegates
(freedom of speech and assembly don't extend to people who wear ties
or  express coherent thoughts. They're The Man).
The delegates' routes were blocked more and more aggressively, until
anyone with a real job in Seattle had a hard time getting where they
belonged. This was not done by a mere handful of Oregonian "Anarchists",
but was participated in by very large numbers of pious activists. Now if
that's not time to start hurting people, then why are cops armed?
Self-defense?
Nevertheless, the police did not attempt to arrest anyone at this point.
They concentrated on protecting the delegates by escorting them,
blocking off paths for them to follow, and misdirecting the hipster
thugs. Imagine the frustration of the dreadlocked drama-queens at being
handed everything they could admit to wanting, plus control over other
people's lives, yet denied the victimhood they so desperately needed? 
When night fell, and all hope of unprovoked Vietnam era police
aggression was lost, the rioting started.
Concerning what happened then, the local media has uncritically parroted
the propaganda of the rioters. For example: there was "indiscriminate
use of tear-gas". Tear gas is... gaseous. You do not aim it at a person,
you aim it in the general direction of a disorderly crowd. All use of
tear gas is indiscriminate, that is why it is used to disperse crowds,
not to apprehend individuals.
One of the main reasons that riots are undesirable is that they require
indiscriminate police action (curfew, marshal law, water cannons).  We
can be treated as individuals only when we act as individuals. If you
want a police state (which many ostensible "Anarchists" seem to), then
the best means to this end is rioting.
It was also immediately and insistently asserted that all of the
destruction was perpetrated by a violent minority of out-of-towners.
Numerically, the violent are always a minority. In war, the majority of
the population of each country does not wield arms. This did not make
Iraq or imperial Japan "non-violent".  In any riot, there are more
people running around acting like it's a big street party than there are
active looters, and a pretty small percentage actually sets fires and
throws stuff at cops. The non-violent" rioters obstruct justice by
refusing to disperse, and making it physically impossible to simply
single out and arrest looters as they would common burglars. They are
the ones who make it a riot rather than a simple outburst of assaults
and vandalism.
I've gotten some insight into the "minds" of the rabidly compassionate
brick hurling pacifists by subscribing to an EcoFeminist e-mail
discussion list. A typical example of the capitalist monstrosities they
"oppose" is the stories that have been circulating about Nestle (or
sometimes Gerber) that, if true, would make certain executives guilty of
mass homicide at least, and possibly crimes against humanity. It is
alleged that in the third world, the myth that formula is healthier than
breast milk has been very effectively promulgated by advertising,
resulting in outrageous increases in infant mortality.
Where the WTO comes in is that it is said to oppose laws that El
Salvador passed that would regulate milk advertising.  Apparently, for
beaded posers, the ability of national government to restrict commercial
speech is more important than enforcing existing international laws. It
is never hinted that any individuals should be held responsible for
these alleged corporate crimes, put on trial, proven guilty, and
executed, which would be absolutely necessary if the charges are
true.  It is only used as a reason to justify statism and one's own
crimes.
You may notice that I have avoided terms such as "protester" and
"demonstrator" with regard to the objects of my scorn. That is because
these terms indicate opposition to government coercion, the status-quo,
and related injustices, whereas these witless Maoists promote these
things and oppose free enterprise, private property, personal
responsibility, and rational thought. The objection to the WTO that the
aforementioned quisling media passes off as reasonable common sense is
that it is not democratic enough. What that means is that a
non-coercive, private, consensus based, free market institution should
have to take orders from them; that is, the mobile vulgus, the
proletarian masses, The People, the power that has backed every form of
tyranny, for which dictators only serve as fronts, and bureaucrats as
puppets.
www.americanpartisan.com




http://www.americanpartisan.com/cols/munger/010600.htm

ATOM RSS1 RSS2