Racism and Animals

Few people got the chance to look at a social media effort by someone at the White House that included a depiction of a former US president and his wife with their heads pasted on the necks of lesser primates. (Isn't the term "social media" kind of redundant, all media being social, after all?) None the less, even though few people saw the insult, if such it was, most of the observant population has been made aware of it by the asocial media.

Other individuals had their heads attached to different animals, the current president for instance, on the body of a lion. This isn't racism. Gorillas or monkeys aren't a different race than any humans, they're a different species. What does this all mean?

It means that among at least some humans, other animals are ranked on a scale of merit and value. Due to supposed virtues the maned male lion has had a generally positive position for many centuries.                                                                                    mythologyworldwide.com 

On the other hand, the brown rat seems to be viewed negatively in almost every culture. In reality it and almost every animal will defend its home and family ferociously, just as the lion does. How foolish it is for humans to rank the rest of the animal kingdom according to their own warped evaluations.

  

The Battle Against ICE

It must be pretty obvious that the most effective way to confront a tyrannical national government is both personal and graphic protest. Here we see some examples of graphic rebellion: 

 

 It seems somewhat illogical to deface private property, just as illegal as entering the US without official permission, in order to demonstrate the tyranny of the national government on another matter, although it is required by legislative action. Perhaps the illegals could form an organization to restore offended buildings to their normal state. City authorities will soon be on site to demand that the owner do so. 

Democracy

I see that we are in for a sermon on democracy. Pray let me remind you that in 1932 the nation of Holderlin and Rilke voted, by perfectly democratic means, Adolf Hitler into power. Democracy is too serious a matter to be left to the electorate.

 

Arthur Koestler, "The Call Girls" Random House, New York, 1973, pg149    

Jimmy Kimmel vs Charlie Kirk

While Charlie Kirk may have been a well-known figure in his  particular arena, he didn't have access to the 1.04 million or more viewers that wise guy Jimmy Kimmel lured in nightly. The frat boys that once tuned in to Kimmel, Stephen Colbert and  Jimmy Fallon made it a point to end their pizza and beer-fueled pre-bed time with an economy sized dose of fraternity humor.

Those circumstances didn't seem to make the TV stars particularly effective in a political sense. Regurgitating jokes written earlier that afternoon might be funny in a post-modern sense but don't seem to have a serious effect on the audience. When is the last time someone attempted to turn off the lights forever on an over-paid bozo that needs a shave?

In a somewhat different circumstance, what if someone like the recently departed Robert Redford or Gene Hackman or David Lynch would have been the subject of criticism or humor on the basis of their perceived failings? 

Empowered Changemakers

 It's university admissions time. The flack people at Hamline University have apparently given up on convincing prospective students that attendance at their school will result in an increase in knowledge or the desired future income. But they can point out that becoming part of this particular student body will give them the tools to effect change. 

As is a familiar tactic in political campaigns, they know that everyone wants changes in something but enumerating examples will enthuse some and repel others. It's one of the most cynical of all propaganda techniques. Any high school graduate that takes the pseudo-message of this billboard seriously needs more than a liberal arts education.  

What Herbert Spencer Would Say

What Herbert Spencer Would Say About The Federal Reserve Reconstruction Fiasco

 

The restoration of two buildings used by the Federal Reserve Bank in Washington, D.C. has ballooned from an initial cost of $1.8 billion to $2.5 billion, according to the Financial Times. People in the media are so unsurprised by this that they attribute it to POTUS Trump's antipathy for the current head of the Federal Reserve, Jerome Powell.

A different viewpoint from the past doesn't address this situation directly but was expressed by a thinker unique in his time or any other, Herbert Spencer, (1820-1903) , who was very critical of the machinations of any form of government. His ideas about situations like the Federal Reserve  follow:

 

                               Herbert Spencer

 If people at large tolerate the extravagance, the stupidity, the carelessness, the obstructiveness, daily exemplified in the military, naval, and legal administrations, much more will they tolerate them when exemplified in departments which are neither so vitally important nor occupy so large a space in the public mind. The vices of officialism must exist throughout public organizations of every kind, 

 

 

                         

Said By Ike

 “Akin to, and largely responsible for, the sweeping changes in our industrial and military posture; has been the technological revolution during recent decades. In this revolution; research has become central; and it also becomes more formalized, complex, and costly. A steadily increasing share is conducted by, for, or at the direction of, the Federal government. The prospect of domination of the nation’s scholars by Federal employment, project allocation, and the power of money, is ever present and gravely to be regarded. In holding scientific discovery in respect, as we should, we must also be alert to the equal and opposite danger that public policy could itself become the captive of a scientific and technological elite.”
 

-President Dwight Eisenhower, in his farewell address