"There is no such thing as a neutral education process. Education either functions as an instrument that is used to facilitate the integration of the younger generation into the logic of the present system and bring about conformity to it, or it becomes 'the practice of freedom,' the means by which men and women deal critically and creatively with reality and discover how to participate in the transformation of their world."
—Richard Schaull, from the foreward for Pedagogy of the Oppressed by Paulo Freire
And how will we know when all our voices have been counted? What will it look like when all our people are protected? How will each one of us know we have done our part? America is so much more than our borders. We, the people.
With America's first black president-elect comes a wave of optimism, it seems: things will be okay. But even as the public breathes this collective sigh of relief, it turns a wary eye to Barack Obama and wonders, if quietly, will things really be okay? Because the Bush administration has done real damage to America's democratic structure by limiting civil liberties, creating undemocratic "justice" systems, and otherwise desecrating our constitution. This damage is frightenly cataloged by Naomi Wolf in her 2007 book The End of America: Letter of Warning to a Young Patriot.
Wolf's basic premise is simple and hard to dispute: when studying dictators throughout the world's history, there are ten patterns of behavior that emerge that contribute to their rise to power, and George W. Bush and his administration has pursued each of these steps. While never outright calling Bush and his posse a fascist dictatorship, Wolf certainly connects many dots and sounds a clear warning. Paper coups are still coups.
The Ten Steps Towards Fascist Dictatorship
Invoke an external and internal threat. Example: Terrorism
Establish secret prisons. Example: Guantánamo
Develop a paramilitary force. Example: Blackwater
Surveil ordinary citizens. Example: USA Patriot Act and TIPS
Infiltrate citizen's groups. Example: Talon and multiple state-level incidents
Arbitrarily detain and release citizens. Example: The TSA no-fly list, specific individual arrests
Target key individuals. Example: Direct Congressional pressure on academia, attorney firings
Restrict the press. Example: The outing of Valerie Plame, detainment of reporters, deliberate withholding of information
Cast criticism as "espionage" and dissent as "treason." Example: Revived use of the Espionage Act
Subvert the rule of law. Example: Military Commissions Act of 2006 (the suspension of habeous corpus), Fiscal Year 2007 Defense Authorization Bill (the gutting of posse comitatus law)
Wolf's arguments and examples in most cases are incredibly strong and well documented (including 14 pages of reference notes and a full bibliography). Unfortunately, there are stretches that undermine her message. She too often conflates the media (particularly the right-leaning outlets and blogosphere) with the administration itself, as when she hammers Ann Coulter for her book Treason. But these leaps become a little easier to swallow when we remember that much of Hitler's power lay in his use of ordinary citizens, as well as organized media, to further his message. Just because one's finger is not on the trigger doesn't mean they aren't responsible for the death.
That said, the book is by no means a simple comparison of Bush and Hitler. That would be too simplistic, and could be easily brushed off as left-wing rhetoric. Wolf's arguments transcend this, referencing more than just the obvious Nazi regime (who, after all, were simply better at such tactics than anyone else). Mussolini, Pinochet, Stalin and others all appear frequently to bolster her points. In fact, there are suprisingly few histrionics; Wolf spends much of her writing merely cataloging events and listing actions from different regimes side by side for the reader to compare.
While the book's premise is strongly supported by facts, it's the epistolary format and sheer number of wrongdoings that makes the book a little heavy-handed. Of course, this is the author's intention, but it would have been nice to see a few practical suggestions other than be aware, be vigilant offered to the reader. I suspect this omission is deliberate, though. Wolf's aim is to awaken, not necessarily to direct. She is asking her reader to consider the true meaning of patriot, someone who actively participates in and engages with one's civic society. And to do so, one must first pay attention.
And with chilling examples, Wolf demands our attention. In the end, it's extremely difficult to write off such examples as merely rhetoric, or such warnings as unlikely to occur. Small events become significant when placed against the backdrop of government, as when she describes a TSA agent forcing a mother to prove the substance in her baby's bottle is really breastmilk by drinking it herself: "In Benito Mussolini's era, one intimidation tactic was to force citizens to drink emetics and other liquids...Of course, baby formula is not an emetic. But a state agent—some agents are armed—forcing a citizen to ingest a liquid is a new scene in America."
When the scenes play out, and the layers are peeled back, and the dots begin to connect, what remains are nagging questions: how far does the administration have to go it before its citizens refuse to cooperate? How many democratic protections must be suspended before the public demands its rights back? How many secret armies, Blackwaters, must be formed? How many innocent citizens must be harrassed, jailed, persecuted before their peers step up in their defense? On Tuesday, we heard one answer to these questions.
So, perhaps the recent election signalled The End of America over before it began. What sense is there in rehashing the last eight years, after all, when we all want to move forward? The truth is, it would be dangerous to sit back and rest easy. The Bush administration did a lot of damage; it took an extended series of measured, deliberate steps to maintain and grow its power at the expense of the U.S. Constitution. Those changes will still be operable under the new presidency—we need to know them, to study them, to be able to roll them back.
Wolf's book is, if no longer a warning of imminent danger, at the very least a guide to serious legal issues that need to be addressed by the still-forming Obama administration. So much of the Bush administration's activities were carried out in the shadows of a disinterested, and therefore uninformed, electorate, that one can only hope that Tuesday's engagement was the mark of an extended era, and not merely an emotional hiccup. The end of America may have been delayed, but this book remains a damning documentation of how close we were, and are.
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Whether you read the book or not, I highly recommend watching the following presentation, in which Wolf outlines her premise and presents incredible evidence to support it. A more polished version (with commercials) is also available from SnagFilms.
I am a huge proponent of equality under the law (except for corporations), and California's upcoming election is an important one. In a couple of weeks, Californians will be able to vote down proposition 8, which changes the state constitution to define marriage as between a man and woman only.
While I understand that a certain portion of the population are morally opposed to gay marriage (me, not so much), I simply don't agree that it's okay to write inequality into the law. I see this as a civil rights issue, plain and simple. The problem is that Prop 8 has some pretty big-money backers, and they've taken some pretty underhanded approaches to pushing Prop 8 on the people, including claiming that by not redefining marriage, it will somehow mean California schools will start teaching kids to be gay. It's a pretty big reach, but anything goes in politics these days. So sad.
Anyway, I went ahead and created a flyer you can download and distribute—hang it in your store front, give it out at rallies, wheat paste it across your town (whatever you do, make sure it's legal).
(New) Instructions for Download: 1. Click once on the image below to open it in a new window. 2. Right-click (or option-click) on the new image. 3. Select "Save Image As" and choose your folder. 4. Select "Save."
The image above is a small, low-res version. For the full 8.5 x 11 image, click on the thumbnail above.
Rights and Permissions! You may reproduce, distribute and display this poster anywhere and everywhere. You may not sell it, or alter it in anyway. If you distribute it, I'd love to see photos of your event or action.
Admit it: you only kinda sorta understand the mortgage crisis and how it's managed to eff up everything in its path. You might get that greedy lenders loaned money silly homeowners could never pay back, and you might get that it's all coming tumbling down, but could they all really be that dumb? You bet!
Here's the thing: we (we = you + I + the public at large) have been submissively nodding our heads and pretending to understand how America's financial system works. We kinda sorta get it. We know there's a lot that we don't know, too, but we smile and let the eggheads in charge figure it all out and worry about the details. That's what they're paid (and, occasionally, elected) to do, right?
Problem with this approach is that without the public nipping at their heels and demanding transparency—and, better still, explanations that people can wrap their heads around—these folks in charge get greedy and lazy.And then they pick your pocket. We need to get back involved as Americans. We need to express our patriotism by being informed, by demanding a real system of checks and balances from the top down, and by refusing to allow corporate America to suck at our collective teat.
Imagine a camera that doesn't passively take pictures, but instead creates something that isn't actually there. The Image Fulgurator surreptitiously projects an image onto a photographic subject when tripped by a nearby camera flash or other light. The photographer, the subject, and any passersby are completely unaware of the projected image - until the image is processed. It's a fascinating, creepy and ingenious device created by Julius von Bismark - and though he provides footage of the Image Fulgurator in action, it's hard to believe this thing really works as described:
"...An exposed and developed roll of slide film is loaded into the camera and behind it, a flash. When the flash goes off, the image is projected from the film via the lens onto the object...the Fulgurator looks like a conventional reflex camera. As soon as the built-in sensor registers a flash somewhere nearby, the flash projection is triggered. Hence the projection can be synchronized to the exact moment of exposure of all other cameras in its immediate vicinity. Via a screen (ground glass), it is possible to focus the projection and to position it on the targeted object."
Von Bismark created the Image Fulgurator as an exploration into the photographic reproduction of reality, and his examples focus on politically-charged subjects like Checkpoint Charlie and the Reichstag. It's an experiment that seems to owe heavily to the Situationists, and it does beg a few philosophical questions. Although creating a public intervention, the Image Fulgurator interacts on a more personal level, as it makes itself known only after the event - and only to the camera's owner at that. In von Bismark's examples, the projected images draw connections from past to present, across international borders, and between actor and acted-upon. The fact that the device is clearly reminiscent of a gun is not lost, either.
WorldChanging is arguably one of the more popular blogs tackling the trinity of green, sustainability, and social issues on the internet. As a nonprofit organization working to build "a bright green future," it's done well to establish itself as a magazine of integrity and thoughtfulness. So it's interesting to note yesterday's post by executive editor Alex Steffen, in which he not only vows to ban all comments denying climate change, but plays the Nazi card, comparing climate skeptics to Holocaust deniers:
"We will delete comments which deny the absolutely overwhelming scientific consensus on climate change, just as we would delete comments which questioned the reality of the Holocaust or the equal mental capacities and worth of human beings of different ethnic groups. Such 'debates' are merely the morally indefensible trying to cover itself in the cloth of intellectual tolerance."
As most of the posters to date acknowledge, the WorldChanging staff is perfectly within its rights to moderate and even delete comments on its site. Yet the way in which Steffen has chosen to word the announcement is so anathema to the stated objectives of the site that it begs the question: what the hell are you thinking? If the producers of WorldChanging are truly interested in "how best to collaborate, how to build coalitions and movements, how to grow communities, how to make our businesses live up to their highest potential and how to make the promise of democracy into a reality," then isn't it a little disingenuous to prohibit open discussion about a scientific theory?
Maybe, and then again, maybe not. According to yesterday's post, WorldChanging's decision to delete such comments is based on the premise that climate change is a scientific fact and, as such, to deny it is "morally indefensible." This is, of course, absurd. It's no different than Christians calling non-Christians sinners and damning them to hell - it makes for a dramatic stance, but casting aspersions isn't really solving a damn thing. Nor is it trying to solve anything. And just to drive the point home, it's not even true.
Let's just say that climate change is a scientific truth and the debate is, in fact, over (you don't hear me arguing). Steffen's position (or is it WorldChanging's? It's not entirely clear, but I suspect we'll get a clarification soon enough) is that denying this physical phenomenon is morally equivalent to denying human equality. But this is an apples-to-oranges comparison; physical science and philosophical constructs are observed and measured on different scales. We could, I suppose, get into an argument about whether or not human equality really is a philosophical construct, but that would lead us to the whole "God-given right" thing, and I would argue that God is himself a philosophical construct. So let's just skip that (or not, you tell me).
Steffen would be much better off simply accusing climate change deniers of being raving lunatics who don't share the same reality as the majority of the population, and prohibit such comments on those grounds. But he didn't take a scientific stand, he took a moral stand. He hopped up on that soapbox and blasted away. Sure, WorldChanging has every right to moderate comments on its own blog. But at some point, an editorial staff needs to decide whether or not such decisions undermine its own credibility. Especially when that credibility hinges on bringing people together using innovative thinking and design models.
The sustainable design model by its very nature must consider all stakeholders when problem solving. And climate skeptics are certainly stakeholders in this environment, whether Steffen and his staff wish them to be or not. That means that if we're going to solve environmental problems - climate change problems - then we need to consider the skeptics as well. By denouncing them as moral sinners and driving them from the fold, we fail to truly address the very issues in which they are so deeply involved.
So if WorldChanging wishes to plug its ears and ignore the skeptics, then as they themselves state, "you're certainly welcome to your opinion." But doing so completely undermines their otherwise important attempts at bridging gaps, deepening understanding, and solving universal problems. And dammit, it gives the rest of us believers a really bad rep.
"We got great reactions from the folks who encountered us. Strangers started talking to each other, trying to figure out what was going on. With wireless microphones hidden in our shirts, a few agents and I struck up conversations with folks. I convinced one guy to grab a cell phone from a frozen woman’s hand. He did it, laughing uncontrollably as he gently put it back in her hand. My favorite reaction was from a female cop who witnessed the whole thing from behind her NYPD recruitment booth:
Me: Do you know what that was? Cop: I have no idea! That is the craziest shit I’ve ever seen in my life, AND I’M A COP! Me: Ha. Yeah, it was weird. Cop: You wanna sign up to be in the NYPD? Me: No thanks."
So why would you do this? Practically speaking, it accomplishes nothing. But isn't the idea of making people stop in their tracks, wonder about their surroundings, and really think about what they are seeing and experiencing worth something in and of itself?
Think Apple controls the world? You might have reason to believe so, given the ubiquity of the iPod and those little white earbuds. But you'd be wrong.
A little girl who recently received an iPod purchased at a local Wal*Mart got a ransom note, instead:
"Reclaim your mind from the media's shackles. Read a book and resurrect yourself. To claim your capitalistic garbage, go to your nearest Apple store."
This little act of rebellion seems to be taking shopdropping (a.k.a. droplifting) to a new level. Whereas shopdropping involves sneaking customized "merchandise" (usually, some form of art) onto store shelves to make a statement about consumerism and value, this incident actually replaces an item outright (otherwise known as theft).
So, just what is the value of awakening one's loving-kindness (along with the ransom note was Pema Chodron's Awakening Loving-Kindness, a Buddhist self-help book)? Is it worth exchanging for an iPod? Is there a lesson to be learned here other than "it's bad to make someone buy a philosophical text when they thought they were buying electronics"?
Of course there is: the supply chain cannot be trusted. Someone, somewhere, switched out the iPod with a diatribe against capitalism; so what did they do with the iPod?
"The Metropolitan Police is looking into technology which can automatically identify branded logos on clothing...The concept is being considered by Detective Chief Inspector Mick Neville of Operation Javelin, who project manages the Visual Images, Identifications and Detections Office roll-out programme: a pioneering effort to turn the analysis of CCTV into a forensic discipline like fingerprint or DNA analysis...'What they do is they tend to go out in a kind of uniform, if you see a kid in a brand of 'hoodie' you can be pretty sure he'll be wearing that same brand of 'hoodie' the next time he commits an offence.'"
I guess when they say the clothes make the man, they really mean it.
Programs like these raise some pretty big issues: is spying on an innocent citizenry inherently bad? Even if used for good? How do we keep the technology and/or access to the already established systems out of the hands of those who would 1) do us harm, or 2) use the information against our will to achieve any number of ends (including marketing to us)?
I am by default opposed to systems—particularly government-sponsored systems—that collect information about my person without my explicit permission in order to advance their own cause. I'd like to just be left alone. But, of course, that's now impossible in this day and age. So how do we come to terms with a program like the Visual Images, Identifications and Detections Office?
I'm not sure what the answer is, but I know the whole thing creeps me out.
At the risk of sounding like a screaming conspiracy theorist...
Held at the New York Public Library, Here We Go Again: Orwell Comes to America was a recent conference focusing on propaganda in today's America—right here, right now—and how it hogties our public freedoms.
Another riveting lecture (no, seriously), is Naomi Wolf's discussion of American fascism and our current administration's echoes of previous dictatorships. It's quite well-reasoned and frighteningly enlightening. Instead of watching the latest episode of Lost or 24, watch this:
"...those of us that actually are dedicated to ethical, sustainable, and autonomous cultural production—is really tiny, and kinda lonely, and we’re rapidly running out of beer. And all we can do when we run into each other is sigh deeply."
Read the whole interview with her on Murketing; it's worth it.
When designers get all wordy and start saying things like, "you see how this line draws the eye to the main message, while that gentle curve prevents it from being too aggressive..." don't roll your eyes so quickly. Because each design element, when assembled correctly, does impact the viewer/user/visitor/audience.
The Architecture of Authority, by UCSB professor Richard Ross, catalogs and explores "spaces built to communicate with others." The collection of photographs is thought provoking and occasionally disturbing. You really should check out excerpts from The Architecture of Authority and read the interview with Ross.
Right on the heels of my recent post about internet censorship comes what might very well be a solution. Picidae is an project created to bypass governmental spying and censorship via the internet. The project has seen a mildflurryofpublicity across the internet as it nears release, and now as I try to load the site once again, I get an internal server error. Uh-oh.
The program (which, I believe, was developed by someone in Germany) is based on the technique used by governments like China in which a user's internet habits are tracked as they enter information online. Typically, censoring governments log search engine entries and URL entries, and if the offending site is restricted the user either is denied access to the site or gets their internet connection shut down completely. So, for example, Googling "Tiananmen democracy movement" might either return very few results, or shut down your internet connection.
Picidae allows you to enter an URL via their servers, and returns an image map of the target URL, as opposed to an html page. The links remain clickable and simple forms can still be filled out (so you could search Google all day long).
It's a brilliant concept, a potentially revolutionary system. I can only hope that the inability to access picidae.net at this moment is due more to some kind of access overload than to something more insidious.
[Edit: The Picidae site appears to be up and running now.]
Technology has broken down global barrier after global barrier, bringing the outside world into some of the most geographically obscure localities. American TV shows are exported to countries still jonesing for our brand of "culture" and products cross oceans both ways, scratching that consumerist itch that continues to spread like a rash over the earth's surface (the number of Chinese products, for example, imported to the U.S. more than tripled in the last twenty years1). China would seem to be reciprocating the favor, opening the mainland to U.S. imports as well.2 But some borders will not be breached no matter the price paid by the country's citizens.
China has the dubious distinction of joining a dozen other countries in enforcing an internet "black hole." The above map, produced by Reporters Without Borders, shows us who is not allowed to freely surf the net throughout the world. Some of these countries filter out sites that disagree with the ruling government, some monitor and log users' internet activity, others ban private service providers and still others go as far as to imprison those who use the internet to freely express themselves.
While it strikes me as unforgivably unjust that our global economy continues to support such political oppression, maps like the one above remind me how deeply graphic depictions of this kind of injustice can strike a chord. With so much visual clutter bouncing off our retinas, it's nice to see some meaningful messages being sent through the airwaves and internet tubes, too.
Although the idea of an art show at a San Francisco nightclub featuring propaganda posters from around the world freaks me out to no end (honey, let's get our politics on while sipping cosmos by the pool, shall we?), I am truly fascinated by this collection of propoganda posters pulled together by the organizers of Propaganda III. You can check out the growing collection of posters on Flickr but remember: these are propaganda posters and are full of anger, hate and resentment.
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