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POPSNineteen Eighty-Four As literary science fiction, 1984 is a classic novel of the social science fiction sub-genre, thus, since its publication in 1949, the terms and concepts of Big Brother, doublethink, thoughtcrime, Newspeak, et cetera, became contemporary vernacular, including the adjective Orwellian, denoting George Orwell's writings and totalitarianism as exposited in Nineteen Eighty-Four and Animal Farm (1945).
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POPSVintage Moonbattery: Copenhagen's A Battle To Humble And "Redefine Humanity" So this isn't the place for rationality. It's the place to reverse the Industrial Revolution. You do have to read this entire self-caricature, though, because there's just so much I couldn't include. There's an entire section on how the people who disagree with him - the bullies who call him bad names - are angry because he's just too decent. Then there was a part about how we have to reign in "adventurers," which a cynical person might read as a pointed version of banal Blue State nannyism. "I'm too priggish to have fun so you're not allowed to have any either." The Guardian (http://bit.ly/691nUu)
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POPSThe Great Wall of Israel Ever heard of it? Neither have I. Makes for interesting, if depressing reading. Probably makes the anti-immigrationists jealous in this country, though. What a waste!
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POPSFunny stereotype essay on our visiting German market
You know those dystopian films that speculate about what England would have been like if the Germans had won the war? Well, they’d have made it into a theme park. Winter Wonderland, in London’s Hyde Park, is precisely what occupied Britain would have felt like if the EU had turned out to be the Volksunion. They try to tell you it’s a traditional Bavarian winter market transported to London with fraternal greetings for our edification and jollity, but oh, ho, ho, ho, it’s not. It’s the Santa has landed. It’s Blitz Noel. From a distance, it all looks like a regular fair: the carousels and Ferris wheels and a V-2 launch pad, the flashing lights and the colours, the familiar screams, the perennial Chrimbo game of spot the paedo with his festive sack and gaffer tape. But it’s not what it seems. I don’t like it, sergeant. The shifty young gypsies working the rides are just too blonde. Too disciplined and polite. They don’t smirk or stick their hands up your girlfriend’s frock on the dodgems.
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POPSBrave New World Shakespeare: Quotes Brave New World Shakespeare: To say about Aldous Huxley's Brave New World, characters migrate (Eco), is fact. To say about Brave New World, that the characters migrated from Shakespeare would be debatable. Huxley's dystopian tale is an excellent character piece ... brave new world shakespeare, oregon trail, brave new world, brave new world quotes, a moveable feast, the son of man
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POPSThe Politics of Lying When lying and deceit become normalized in a culture, they not only serve as an index of how low we have fallen as a literate society, but also demonstrate the degree to which language and education have become corrupted, tied to corporate and political power and sabotaged by rigid ideologies as part of a growing authoritarianism that uses the educational force of the culture, the means of communication and the sites in which information circulate to mobilize ignorance among a misinformed citizenry, all the while supporting reactionary policies. Especially since the horrible events of 9/11, Americans have been encouraged to identify with a militaristic way of life, to suspend their ability to read the word and world critically, to treat corporate and government power in almost religious terms and to view a culture of questioning as something alien and poisonous to American society.
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POPSUp is Down, Peace is War, Love is Hate - Huh? When you look at how we have made being at war seem nothing more than a video game, is it any wonder that people think the war in Iraq is over, that we are not really at war in Somalia, that Afghanistan is a "good war" like WWII was? I am not sure anymore what it will take for people to wake up to the facts that our economy depends on war, climate suicide and agriculture-based cancers (our steady diet of pesticides and fertilizers in food and water - what do you think is driving pancreatic cancer epidemic?). I do hope that sharing via Amplify helps to dirve real change in not just hand wringing.
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POPSHomo Sapiens, Get Lost Huxley believed we would evolve into a society steeped in radical hedonism — where drugs would be used to erase every negative emotion and promiscuity would be not just common but the norm. He also saw us as becoming profoundly utilitarian and eugenic, depicted in his novel by genetically engineered babies being decanted through a cloning-type process rather than being born, and then propagandized rather than educated, so as never to question the existing order. Huxley’s Brave New World is a society without families, without the old and sick — who are done away with rather than cared for — and without real purpose other than experiencing transitory pleasure.
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POPSGlobal Warming is NOT TRUE???!!!! SO Why Floods Are Expected Soon? Wall Street, a few meters above sea level, will also be swallowed, along with much of New York City, as ocean circulation winds down in the Atlantic, subjecting the Northeast to hyperviolent storms and surges. (Of course, given its role in our current "econopocalypse," few might not consider that such a bad thing.) Another world away, southern Africa has been swamped by floods worse than anything the region has experienced in decades, which has killed over 100 and made 100,000 homeless.
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POPSObama Survival Kit Dogs provide security when away from the car and if you run out of food, you haven’t quite run out of food– if you know what I mean. Name him after your last boss before profitable jobs were made illegal by the United Globe of Governments. Pick your criminal underworld gang carefully. You can choose between the PompaDodds, the Lispy Franks and the Pelosidactyls. If offered a brand or a facial tattoo to show gang loyalty, it’s a good sign. Buy lots of dog food from Costco or Walmart. If you get it by the case, and it’s made in China you can get it cheap. Plus lead poisoning has been known to aid night-vision. This food is not for the dog. This is for human consumption only. The dog has to eat from the new McDonald’s all-organic menu. Since the Freedom Of Speech Act made talk radio illegal, only National Socialist Public Radio is available. Don’t listen to NSPR without the aid of caffeine, amphetamines or else sleep-driving will occur.
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POPSEVOLUTION AND HUMANS FUTURE We are evolving. The question is now: into what form? Will the intellect increase with technology? Will our body appear significantly different?
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POPSEscape From New York (1981) In a dystopian 1997, the Soviet Union still exists, and is at war against the United States in the ongoing World War III. Manhattan has been turned into a maximum security prison in 1988 due to a nationwide crime increase of 400% in the United States. Surrounded by a 50-foot (15 m) containment wall, all inmates are sentenced to life imprisonment, and have formed gangs which control the crumbling, garbage-strewn city. Travelling to a three-way summit between the United States, the Soviet Union and China, Air Force One, the plane of the President of the United States, is hijacked by a member of a revolutionary organization opposed to the government.
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POPSThe Future of Man--How Will Evolution Change Humans? "Contrary to popular belief, humans continue to evolve. Our bodies and brains are not the same as our ancestors' were—or as our descendants' will be Not only has Homo sapiens been doing some major genetic reshuffling since our species formed, but the rate of human evolution may, if anything, have increased"
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POPSOrwell's Children Too many of us... have become just like the denizens of Jonestown: Orwell's children -- enraged into constant militancy against eternal enemies, oblivious to the notion of a Blessed Creator, melded into the consciousness of the party hive, divorced from history, hypnotized by images, inoculated against reason, stripped of family, and existing only to serve the cause. There were specific elements necessary for nations with a heritage of freedom to slide intoabject slavery..... What are the characteristics of the Orwellian state? 1. Start with God. He must go. 2. Truth must go too. 3. Language must be brought to heel. Marxism foisted upon us words like "capitalism," which means nothing at all but which has so infected our minds that we reflexively use this silly nonsense word instead of freedom. Politically correct language is rampant. Image and symbols replace words.
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POPSHave We Already Tipped Over The Edge? By 2012, it will be more than half on the dole, and this will be an electorate where the majority of the electorate will be able to vote itself more lollipops from the minority of their compatriots still dumb enough to prioritize self-reliance, dynamism and innovation over the sedating cocoon of the Nanny State. That is the death of the American idea – which, after all, began as an economic argument: "No taxation without representation" is a great rallying cry. "No representation without taxation" has less mass appeal. For how do you tell an electorate living high off the entitlement hog that it's unsustainable, and you've got to give some of it back?
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POPSMichigan Left Storms Church The church's response? After things settled down, the blasphemy ended, the lewd props removed and the families safe from fear of additional men and women running into and past them the pastor took the stage and led the congregation in one more prayer... not for retribution, or divine justice or a celestial comeuppance (that's what I'd have prayed for) but instead that the troubled individuals who'd just defiled the Lord's house, so full of anger and hate, would know Jesus' love in their lives and God's peace that exceeds human understanding. Yesterday morning defined the difference between a church of believers and Michigan liberals. It also illustrated in shocking, painful detail precisely what we're up against.
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POPSLeft Step Henceforth, elections are fought over which party is proposing the shiniest government bauble: If you think President-elect Obama's promise of federally subsidized day care was a relatively peripheral part of his platform, in Canada in the election before last it was the dominant issue. Yet America may be approaching its tipping point even more directly. In political terms, the message of the gazillion-dollar bipartisan bailout was a simple one: “Individual responsibility” and “self-reliance” are for chumps. If Goldman Sachs and AIG and Bear Stearns are getting government checks to “stay in their homes” (and boardrooms, and luxury corporate retreats), why shouldn't Peggy Joseph?
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POPSWelcome to Gilead, Governor Palin More: Women who find themselves drawn to Palin because they think she epitomizes the classic "woman who has it all" might want to take a closer look. Sarah Palin was picked for the ticket solely because of - not despite - the fact that she is female. By keeping her sequestered from the media, McCain has confirmed he does not have faith in an unscripted Palin's ability to represent the campaign to the world. By going along with it, Palin is telling us that she's perfectly fine with being controlled by her male superiors. And by portraying herself as the candidate of the empowered woman (while simultaneously promoting policy that is openly hostile to the interests of working and middle-class American women), she reveals the sad truth about how little progress we've actually made.
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POPSSenate to Consider another Bill Hacking at our Rights of Free Speech
The most pressing liberty Ron Paul, the ACLU, Dennis Kucinich and pretty much most left- and right-leaning organizations fear outright is a restriction on the right of internet access, since the House Subcommittee hearings and text of the resolution seized upon it with almost draconian intent. "The Web as a Weapon?" The question begs another: How do you disarm that weapon? "I agree that focusing a commission to study how Americans 'adopt' belief systems is problematic," said German, "but focusing the Commission on the Internet as an aid to, or facilitator of violent radicalization, will likely result in a recommendation to censor the internet in some manner, which would obviously be a violation of the First Amendment." Kucinich, who was one of the scant few to vote against the resolution, was equally suspicious. But as usual, he's a bit more dystopian about such measures in his outlook, calling it the "thought crime bill" during a speech to supporters in December. "If you unde
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