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The guy is truly inspirational, have you seen Requiem for the American Dream?
No I haven't, but sounds like I ought to.
On a similar theme of wealth, power and control, I was a bit miffed to have missed Shadow World when it was shown at the taliesin Theatre recently. All about the tentacles of the arms trade. http://www.theshadowworldbook.com/the-film/
I haven't seen that one, you should really watch Requiem for an American Dream, its on Netflix I've watched it several times, could listen to this guy talk all day!
Does he think we should play 3 at the back against Man U ?
If you can fill the unforgiving minute.
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And - which is more - you'll be a Man, my son!
Writing Chomsky off as Descartes' tribute act says more about your lack of perception than anything else.
Talking of writing people and their ideas off; a little story (I know you all love them so much!)
At University I did a module on War. It started in Ancient Greece and ended with the present day. The final essay concerned Samuel Huntington's 'Clash of Civilizations' and Francis Fukuyama's 'end of History'. The question asked us to consider both and conclude whether Huntington's argument was a sound one or not.
It was clear from the lectures that my lecturer regarded Huntington as a war mongering, right-wing nutter. It was clear that my fellow students were of a like mind. I read the book and decided to make a start on the essay.
At first I came at it from the point of view that I had been taught in the lectures BUT during the course of writing it, specifically it was the research I did to back my arguments up, I did a complete 180 and had to start again. Based on what I had read (mainly political history concerning Arab countries, but also wider...the different beliefs held by people of different cultures that so obviously contradicted the beliefs of each other, which had caused and would inevitably cause friction into the future...and, in microcosm, the evidence I had found for cultural friction within our Liberal Democracies; e.g. British Muslims having a very different World view on International politics compared to the view of their average fellow citizens, which in my opinion could/can not be reconciled with the logical positions the UK government would/will take) I couldn't in all consciousness dismiss his arguments.
It seemed to me that what Huntington was saying was pretty sensible and that his argument should be heeded by the West.
In the tutorial group of around 8/9 students where we discussed with our lecturer where we were going with the essay, asked him questions and debated the different arguments with our fellow students I was the only student concluding that Huntington's arguments had merit. THE ONLY ONE(!).
It struck me at the time that this was not entirely healthy. That educating does not equal brainwashing and that a qroup of intelligent, young, free thinking, students should not all be coming to the same conclusion on any given subject (I guess Fukuyama's book is a true reflection of what most young people thought at that time).
I got a mark equivalent to a 1st for my essay (so at least whomever marked it judged my arguments on their merits rather than whether they agreed) and I believe Huntington has been proved correct in the long run.
I can see that and consider Chomsky to be a good read too. Can you?
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