Post #361,692
8/13/12 10:49:52 AM
|
I like to consider myself reasonably intelligent.
But for 30+ years I have never been able to figure why in the name of all that is holy people who make less than $50,000/year ever vote Republican. My brother-in-law, for instance. He was out of work for an extended period of time and over Republican protestations continued to receive unemployment checks. He's a gung-ho Romney supporter and Fox News junkie. How do they manage to do it? Did they all study Goebbels? I seriously don't understand it. You could show that article to my wife's family and they would refuse to believe it - they'd claim it's just another example of the librul bias of the mainstream media. These people refer to NPR as (and I quote) "National Propaganda Radio" - these same people get all of their information from Fox.
There's no fixing this that doesn't involve gunfire. :0(
|
Post #361,694
8/13/12 11:44:33 AM
|
I think I understand part of it...
Most people want to be treated fairly. And most people think that others like them are trying to play fairly as well. So, when you're brought up that hard work and going to church and being independent will be rewarded in this life, or certainly in the next, then you want a system that makes those things the rules.
When people are "given" things, they're not obeying the "hard work" rule.
When people are atheists or Muslim, they don't go to church, so they're not obeying the that rule.
When people aren't "independent" businesses, they're getting rewards or are too cowardly to be out on their own. They don't deserve as much from what should be a "fair" system.
When people are taxed above the level that the Founding Fathers ® intended (and they didn't have an income tax or inheritance tax, thankyouverymuch), then the system is taking from people who are playing by the "true" rules and giving to those who aren't.
So that's the mindset, I think. I bought into a lot of it (but by no means all of it) as a youngster. It is appealing if you like to see things without shades of gray or confuse a model of reality for actual reality....
Of course there are contradictions. "Keep your dirty hands off my Medicare!" "I'm on a fixed Social Security income! How dare you cut my COLA!" "I paid for my benefits! It's not welfare!"
As long as the mythos taught in school and in the media is that this country was founded by independent individual white men who were interested in nothing more than their Freedom ® and that they fought federal government Tyranny ® at every turn, then continuing or expanding sensible programs that "promote the general welfare to ourselves and our posterity" ® will be an uphill battle.
Myths are often much more powerful than reality.
My $0.02. FWIW.
Cheers,
Scott.
|
Post #361,695
8/13/12 1:04:12 PM
|
So, it's a consequence of accepting mythology?
That makes as much sense as anything. I was told once by a psychology prof that our "values" are pretty much locked in at age 10. He said they deviate a little, but core beliefs are pretty much ingrained by age 10. In my case, that explains much since I had my 10th birthday in Soviet Russia. ;0)
|
Post #361,696
8/13/12 1:07:30 PM
|
"Myths are often much more powerful than reality."
It goes beyond that. Way beyond.
We all live in the subjective. All of us, even the reality based, even people who follow science and make a real effort to be informed. I like to think I am one of those people.
The best we can do is to make our subjective world work and harmonize with whatever might be out there in the objective. But there is no objective evidence to suggest that the objective universe even exists, only some fairly convincing subjective experiences.
Myths are all we've got, really. Reality, if any, is not for the likes of us sensory beings.
That being said...
Science gives us an exquisite and detailed mythology that works really, really well and harmonizes in an ever more excellent way with most if not all data inputs.
Fox News gives us a mythology lacks emotional depth and fails catastrophically to harmonize with a great many data inputs.
---------------------------------------
In the dessert, you can't remember your name
|
Post #361,710
8/13/12 4:56:59 PM
|
Nicely summarized..
"The Power of Myth" -- the conversation 'twixt Joseph Campbell and Bill Moyers, eons ago--kinda DOES say it all.
As in the concluding hour, when Campbell interjects ... People die for metaphors every day.
As good an epitaph as any, for a failed experiment in Consciousness VS Unconsciousness on an unremarkable little planet which once looked pristine white/blue--seen that first time, from its moon.
Now the bloodstains of serial convenient-little-wars do not yet seem visible from space, but the children who microwave a kitten, 'for Fun', induce docile dogs to kill each other, 'for Fun'..
These-all demonstrate how that Freedom-thing has deteriorated into violent, despicable mind-sets.
Oh. Well.
.hr
Law above fear, justice above law, mercy above justice, love above all.
|
Post #361,719
8/14/12 8:11:29 AM
|
Yeahbut... See Benjamin Hale's essay in the NY Times.
Yes, none of us really know reality and we all construct models based on various levels of myths. But it's the kinds of myths and how they're constructed and tested that is where the main difference lies, I think.
See Benjamin Hale's essay in the NY Times for a much better example of what I was trying to get at.
http://iwt.mikevital....iwt?postid=64858
Thanks.
Cheers,
Scott.
|
Post #361,698
8/13/12 2:56:26 PM
|
I;m surprised.
Mt Motorcycle Tea Party members just said that the 0.82% number is a lie. Its just Propaganda.
So, I took them through the numbers... still... nobody believed it.
So, I guess, level of stupidity is something to reckon with.
|
Post #361,708
8/13/12 4:28:12 PM
|
My favorite political slogan is still . . .
. . "A working man voting Republican is like a chicken voting for Colonel Sanders".
|
Post #361,801
8/17/12 10:39:44 AM
|
I've been hoping to get this tagline out for you folks
us up here in Canuckistan too, actually:
'When they say "trickle-down economics", I hear "golden showers".'
|
Post #361,803
8/17/12 10:58:27 AM
|
s/hear/visualize/
|
Post #361,805
8/17/12 11:08:18 AM
|
Re: s/hear/see/
...would probably be more effective. Good point though... I'll test drive it on twitter and see how if flies.
|
Post #361,806
8/17/12 11:23:12 AM
|
What's your problem with trickle upon economics? :0)
|
Post #361,817
8/17/12 2:51:37 PM
|
Sentient LRPD: "don't piss in the pond"
|
