Why The Revolution Must Start In America

[Cramulus]

Picture Unrelated:





Okay now the actual post:

from http://www.rawstory.com/rawreplay/2011/06/chris-hedges-global-revolution-must-begin-in-america/

Pulitzer-winning author and former New York Times reporter Chris Hedges has a revolutionary worldview. In the video below, his recent "Endgame Strategy" piece for AdBusters is read aloud by George Atherton.

His conclusions are chilling, but not entirely hopeless.

"We will have to take care of ourselves," he wrote. "We will have to rapidly create small, monastic communities where we can sustain and feed ourselves. It will be up to us to keep alive the intellectual, moral and cultural values the corporate state has attempted to snuff out. It is either that or become drones and serfs in a global corporate dystopia. It is not much of a choice. But at least we still have one."

youtube link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=ImSzACcQ368

[East Coast Hustle]

I tried really hard to hate that article just because it was on Adbusters.

but, I failed. Good read, though it's definitely planted hard in "preaching to the choir" territory.

I especially liked this part:

Our political vocabulary continues to sustain the illusion of participatory democracy. The Democrats and the Liberal Party in Canada offer minor palliatives and a feel-your-pain language to mask the cruelty and goals of the corporate state. Neofeudalism will be cemented into place whether it is delivered by Democrats and the Liberals, who are pushing us there at 60 miles an hour, or by Republicans and the Conservatives, who are barreling toward it at 100 miles an hour.

"By fostering an illusion among the powerless classes that it can make their interests a priority," Sheldon Wolin writes, "the Democratic Party pacifies and thereby defines the style of an opposition party in an inverted totalitarian system." The Democrats and the Liberals are always able to offer up a least-worst alternative while, in fact, doing little or nothing to thwart the march toward corporate collectivism.

[President Television]

The article itself is well-written, and it carries the ring of cold, hard, capital-T Truth.
Then I read the comments.

[East Coast Hustle]

Oh, I didn't make THAT mistake. I mean, it's fucking Adbusters. Kalle Lasn is like the Michael Jordan of douchbaggishness.

[Bu🤠ns]

Well that was depressing.  While parts of it rang true regarding corporations, lobbyists, the two man con...etc  the whole doomsday vibe can suck dick.  Im not bought into that reality as there is still much potential and possibility left within our species.  How do I know this? I look in the fuckin mirror.

[Cain]

My problem with Hedges is that his solution sucks.  Small, self-sustainable monastic communities sound great in theory...but you know who else tried that, in the 60s and 70s?  Yeah, exactly.  And look how that worked out.  They went off into the wilderness to live a life without coercion and ended up replicating the excesses and hierarchy-obsession of the societies they seeked to escape from.

I mean, this idea is nothing new, either.  A New Dark Age is coming, and in the old Dark Age, the monks kept the academic and literary traditions of the preceding society alive, so clearly we must emulate them.

Ever seen life in a monastery?  It ain't pretty.  The Abbot's word is law and you go to bed tired and aching every night, you get so little food it is surprising more monks don't have visions of God and the discipline is makes the army look sloppy.

Hedges' solution is hardly a revolution.  If anything, it seems like running away.

[Elder Iptuous]

well, he does say that it is a shitty choice...
i don't think he was trying to glorify it.

[Cain]

He doesn't even consider other options, though.  He spends 16 paragraphs on setting out the problem, and only one on giving a "solution".  One without assertion or support, or any time given to any other possibilities.  Given Adbuster's disdain for the tactics of marketing, that right there is a classic marketing tactic.

[Elder Iptuous]

although he doesn't use the term solution, i see what you are saying, and definitely agree.
smacks of defeatism, and perhaps dystopian fetishism(is that the right word?), which i have to moderate in myself, too.

[Cramulus]

What are some other solutions?  hiding inside communities of people which won't screw us is the only thing I can think of to insulate myself against the big machine... It's a form of surrender, for sure, but the horse which will carry us to revolution has been beaten to death long ago.

[trix]

What are some other solutions?  hiding inside communities of people which won't screw us is the only thing I can think of to insulate myself against the big machine... It's a form of surrender, for sure, but the horse which will carry us to revolution has been beaten to death long ago.

Complete household self-sustainability?  Maybe it's another form of running away, smaller than community style, but I believe it's possible, especially using technology and automation, to build a home that produces everything needed for survival, plus some luxury.  Automated food-growing systems, though I'd miss meat for sure, automated clean energy generation, etc etc.  Would take a somewhat involved survivalist skill set, and a good amount of money for preparation, but once built and running it could work out well.  I'm thinking houseboats, to facilitate travel and remove the necessity of buying land.  The idea would have to be fleshed out a lot more, but I think it could have merit.

Or maybe I'm just dreaming.

[Eartha-ly Delights]

What are some other solutions?  hiding inside communities of people which won't screw us is the only thing I can think of to insulate myself against the big machine... It's a form of surrender, for sure, but the horse which will carry us to revolution has been beaten to death long ago.

Complete household self-sustainability?  Maybe it's another form of running away, smaller than community style, but I believe it's possible, especially using technology and automation, to build a home that produces everything needed for survival, plus some luxury.  Automated food-growing systems, though I'd miss meat for sure, automated clean energy generation, etc etc.  Would take a somewhat involved survivalist skill set, and a good amount of money for preparation, but once built and running it could work out well.  I'm thinking houseboats, to facilitate travel and remove the necessity of buying land.  The idea would have to be fleshed out a lot more, but I think it could have merit.

Or maybe I'm just dreaming.

The problem with building sustainable homes is that clever technology requires the services of clever people.And clever people are expensive to employ.
I don't know about other places but in Australia to build a home like  this is quite possible. You can even recycle your own grey water onsite and reuse all your black water as dried fertiliser. You can negate the need for rubbish collection services and get enough solar power to not only keep you running but feed some back into the grid in the high sunshine periods of the year.But  in order to do it you need to invest probably $1M  in materials, labour, Planning Permits and Technical Services.

Until they give real incentives in terms of subsidising clean technology and penalising dirty ones not enough people will be able to invest in the clean ones.

Also with the Tyranny of Distance thing that operates here, all ot of the best materials and technology need to be sourced from overseas as we have no manufacturing industry left at all. So the emissions from getting my Italian, German, American and Brazillian bits and bobs over here have already kicked a fucking great hole in the ozone layer before I've turned my first sod.

[maphdet]

What are some other solutions?  hiding inside communities of people which won't screw us is the only thing I can think of to insulate myself against the big machine... It's a form of surrender, for sure, but the horse which will carry us to revolution has been beaten to death long ago.

This.
Unless I misunderstood the post.

Are you saying here that a revolution of any sorts is FUBAR?
If so-I sadly agree.

Some may ask-why then are you still around in these parts or similar parts. Well-Wishful thinking. Maybe. Or what you said a surrender of sorts.

Fuck --this is now depressing me.

[BabylonHoruv]

What are some other solutions?  hiding inside communities of people which won't screw us is the only thing I can think of to insulate myself against the big machine... It's a form of surrender, for sure, but the horse which will carry us to revolution has been beaten to death long ago.

Complete household self-sustainability?  Maybe it's another form of running away, smaller than community style, but I believe it's possible, especially using technology and automation, to build a home that produces everything needed for survival, plus some luxury.  Automated food-growing systems, though I'd miss meat for sure, automated clean energy generation, etc etc.  Would take a somewhat involved survivalist skill set, and a good amount of money for preparation, but once built and running it could work out well.  I'm thinking houseboats, to facilitate travel and remove the necessity of buying land.  The idea would have to be fleshed out a lot more, but I think it could have merit.

Or maybe I'm just dreaming.

It's not possible.  It's also not desirable, do you really want to withdraw from all interaction with other humans aside from your own household?

[BabylonHoruv]

I prefer the though of withdrawing into a resilient community to a revolution anyway.

A revolution involves a lot of fighting and killing, and dragging people into a lifestyle that they do not desire.  Plus it usually ends up with tyrants in control anyway.

I don't need the entire country to live the way I want to live.  I just need me and my friends to do so, along with some other communities that we can trade with.