Sections
Introduction
1. Propaganda
and Control:
Brezezinski
1968
2. My eye problems
Introduction:
This is about propaganda and control, with a quite amazing quotation
from 1968: As the Dutch saying has it:
In het heden ligt het
verleden, In the present is the past
In het nu wat worden
zal
In the now what will be
Judge for yourself:
1. Propaganda
and Control: Brezezinski
The
best book
I've read about the French student revolt of May 1968, that I have seen
myself in Paris, is by Stephen Spender:
"The Year of The Young Rebels". MY copy is from May 1969, in Vintage
Books., Library of Congtress Card Nr. 78-78801.
It is interesting for many reasons, and one is the following
rather amazing quotation, especially in view of what has been happening
lately with civil liberties.
Note that the following was published in 1969 - and I copy with line
breaks and all:
----------------------------------------------------------
p.
153
The
idea of the
technotronic society seems to be under the
auspices
of Zbigniev
Brezezinski, until recently a member of
the
Policy
Planning
Staff of the State Department, and now
Director
of the
Research Institute of Communist Affairs at
Columbia
University.
The 'technotronic society' seems to be the
exact
opposite
of the
society of 'spontaneity' demanded by
revolutionary
students, who Mr Brezezinskin evidently regards
as
pathetic
throw-backs, survivors of Romantic days, forlornly
playing
out
anachronistic roles: (1)
Our society is
leaving the phase of spontaneity and is entering a
more self-conscious state;
ceasing to be an industrial society, its is being shaped to an
ever-increasing extent by technology and electronics,
(1) New Republic, 13 December 1967
p.154
and thus becoming the first technotronic society.
This is at least in part the cause for much of
the current tensions and violence, and largely the reason why events
in America today do not fit established categories
of analysis.
Mr
Brzezinski
realises
that the technotronic society fills some
people
with
uneasiness
(in this respect the reactionaries and the
revolutionaries
are as
one).
(...)
However
Mr Brezezinski does not expect that the Luddite
lovers
of
freedom and
anarchy will seriously obstruct the new
order.
For one
thing,
'it will soon be possible to assert almost
continuous
surveillance over every citizen and maintain up-to-
date,
complete
files,
containing even personal information
about
the
health and
personal behaviour of the citizen, in
addition
to the
more
customary data.' Moreover it will be
possible
to
anticipate
and plan to meet any uprisings in the
future.
The
police
will even be able to forecast crises before the
rioters
themselves are
conscious of wanting them.
-----------------------------------------------------------
See e.g. my Crisis:
Big Brother is watching you written 44 years later. And
note that Mr Brezezinski
is still alive, and may still be advising the powers that be. The
Wikipedia article on him is quite interesting and long, and also
contains this quote:
"The
technetronic era
involves the gradual appearance of a more controlled society. Such a
society would be dominated by an elite, unrestrained by traditional
values. Soon it will be possible to assert almost continuous
surveillance over every citizen and maintain up-to-date complete files
containing even the most personal information about the citizen. These
files will be subject to instantaneous retrieval by the authorities." –
Between Two Ages: America’s Role in the Technetronic Era, 1970
I quote from my Crisis:
Big Brother is watching you written in May 2012. The video link
that follows
is well worth watching:
Let
me take up the the theme of Crisis
again,
of which the last in the series, that runs on my site since September
2008, was on April 4 2012, with the not so optimistic title
Crisis: The age
of ignorance
and degeneracy - but then that's what the
times are like, and the
foundations for that were laid one or two generations ago, and we
are now living in the times these have come to fruition.
And there is more cause for
serious worries:
In the United States the outlines of a police-state seem to be in the
making. Here are The
Young Turks (<-Wikipedia link):
Is
The Government Spying On You? FISA continues
(Youtube 6.15 min)
The brief answer is: Yes, and
it
is quite
frightening. I quote from the website of The Young Turks:
"The
Senate
Intelligence Committee on Tuesday approved the extension of legislation
that authorized a sweeping warrantless wiretapping program started
under the Bush Administration. The FISA Amendments Act of 2008 gave the
government broad powers to monitor international phone calls and
emails, and granted legal immunity to telecommunication companies that
had participated in the wiretapping program before 2008. The law was
set to expire in 2012, but the Senate bill — passed by a 13-2 vote in
the committee — would extend the law for another five years...Sens. Ron
Wyden (D-OR) and Mark Udall (D-CO) both opposed the extension of the
law. The two senators had asked James Clapper, the Director of National
Intelligence, to disclose the number of people whose communications
were reviewed by government agents, and whether or not the law had been
used to collect communications of law abiding Americans...".
What
is even more frightening is that so few
find this frightening, which also motivated my Machiavellian quote.
You'll find The
Prince on my site, with
my remarks, and there is also
the often downloaded Introduction
to Politics, which is an annotated
booklist of fine texts on the subject.
Then
again, I wouldn want to leave you without some good cheer to the effect
that, realistically considered, it has almost never been better:
"Presque toute l'Histoire n'est qu'une suite d'horreurs."
(Chamfort)
2. My
eye
problems
My eye
problems
are again a
bit less, as I am very glad to be able to remark, even if my
eyes still
are far from well - and I mention this because it is like having
abrasions for eyes: "ogen als schaafwonden" in Dutch - and because
that's why I use the present color scheme in my NOTEBOOK, and indeed
started that item.
---
Maarten
Maartensz
P.S. My eye
problems
PS: Any
necessary corrections have to be made later.
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