Turn Turn Turn Turn

169 thoughts on “Turn Turn Turn Turn”

1. The permanent revolution is against imperfection. Since nothing’s perfect, it will go on forever, always striving for the impossibility of heaven on earth.

   1. So, revolution is an imperfect solution?

      1. EVERYTHING is an imperfect solution.

         1. Well, isn’t that just a perfect pain in the patoot.

         2. KD. Out of bounds. There is revolution and revolution.

         3. Kitteh-Dragon,

            I’m glad that our founding fathers did hold to this Revolution just isn’t worth it. Something are worth fight and dying for, Sam Gamgee said so.

            1. indeed.

               1. Of course, in many ways the American Revolution was an atypical revolution. The Powers That Be in the Colonies supported (in the main) the revolution because they saw their rights being threatened by Britain. Thus when the fighting was over, they didn’t have to build a new governmental structure in the individual colonies. While it was a glorious thing, it was also not the usual sort of revolution.

                  1. True. In some ways, the Glorious Revolution in 1688 laid the corner stone, when Parliament said once and for all “Ain’t no divine right of kings, and political power comes from below or beside. We’ll take Dutch over French, thanks.” Between the House of Orange and the Hanoverians, I’m not sure if you could have found a duller, more stolid royal family.

                  2. If you haven’t read Churchill’s “History of the English Speaking Peoples” you’re missing out. It lays out how the American Revolution’s foundational ideas trace back to the Saxons, and how the Constitution was written, not to prevent another George III, but to prevent another Cromwell.

         4. So what your saying is everything is only imperfectly soluble?

            1. There will always be dregs. The problem is that, right here and right now, the dregs are in charge.

            2. If you aren’t part of the solution, you’re part of the precipitate

               1. You’re encouraging this lot again.

                  1. Who needs encouragement?

2. It was pointed out to me a long time ago that very often the most conservative elements in a society are the working poor and lower middle-class, who are just barely hanging on by their fingertips to whatever nice things they have been able to gain in life. Any upsetting of the societal applecart puts all those hard-won gains at risk. And the most liable to be revolutionaries of a sort are those of the upper classes who have (in their view) slipped to a lower status, materially. They have lost ground, remember better times and want it back. Then of course, there are the well-to-do who dabble in social revolution, assuming that it will never, ever affect them personally.

   1. During the height of the Occupy idiocy, I saw several people point out that the primary conflict going on there was not between the common and elite classes, but between the upper and lower echelons of the elite. Us working schlubs? We just want to be left alone to do our thing. The ones screaming and shouting the most are the lesser aristocrats, the would-be powerful.

   2. Behind a paywall, I think, but I read this excerpted at a blog and offer up a relevant sample:

      What Would Socrates Do?
      In “The Art of Freedom,” Earl Shorris describes his efforts to establish a set of courses that would teach the core texts of Western civilization to people living in poverty, whose school experience had scanted the canon or skipped it entirely.
      By NAOMI SCHAEFER RILEY
      Almost two decades ago, Earl Shorris, a novelist and journalist, told the editor at his publishing house that he wanted to write a book about poverty in America. The editor, to his credit, said that he didn’t want just another book describing the problem. He wanted a solution. So Shorris, who had attended the University of Chicago on a scholarship many years before and who was greatly influenced by its Great Books curriculum, hit upon the idea of teaching the core texts of Western civilization to people living in poverty, whose school experience had scanted the canon or skipped it entirely. His Eureka moment came when he was visiting a prison and conducting interviews for another book he was planning to write.

      He asked one of the women at New York’s Bedford Hills maximum-security prison why she thought the poor were poor. “Because they don’t have the moral life of downtown,” she replied. “What do you mean by the moral life?” Shorris asked. “You got to begin with the children . . . ,” she said. “You’ve got to teach the moral life of downtown to the children. And the way you do that, Earl, is by taking them downtown to plays, museums, concerts, lectures.” He asked whether she meant the humanities. Looking at him as if he were, as he puts it, “the stupidest man on earth,” she replied: “Yes, Earl, the humanities.”

      Poverty, Shorris concluded, was a condition that required more than jobs or money to put right. So he set out to offer the “moral life” as well. Beginning with a class of 25 or so students found through a social-service agency in New York, Shorris—along with a few professors he had recruited—taught literature, art history and philosophy. The first classes included readings in Plato, Aristotle, Thucydides and Sophocles.

      Thus was born the Clemente Course in the Humanities, which is now the recipient of broad philanthropic support.

      [SNIP]

      The idea of the Clemente Course—named for Roberto Clemente, the baseball player who gave his name to the Manhattan community center where the course debuted—was to “educate a self-selected group of adults living in poverty,” in classes taught by professors from nearby colleges and universities. The spirit of the Great Brooks program was a key part of the idea: There would be no chasing after trendy reading lists or narrow relevance. When Shorris went to recruit students in the South Bronx, in New York City, a white social worker asked him if he were going to teach African history. “No,” he said. “We will teach American history. Of course the history of black people is very important in the development of the United States.”

      Over time, Shorris began to add texts from the various cultures where the course was being offered—Native American myths, South Korean novels. But his focus on the Western classics was refreshingly relentless. He was accused “cultural imperialism,” but the charge didn’t seem to faze him. The Clemente Course now taught in Darfur, in the Sudan, teaches John Stuart Mill’s “On Liberty.”
      [MORE: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323701904578276400317744968.html#printMode ]
      A version of this article appeared April 17, 2013, on page A13 in the U.S. edition of The Wall Street Journal, with the headline: What Would Socrates Do?

      1. “The Clemente Course now taught in Darfur, in the Sudan, teaches John Stuart Mill’s “On Liberty.””

         And why wouldn’t it? Only a racist would think Mill has no application to the lives of Africans.

      2. I recall reading about Shorris’ class – I don’t think in the WSJ, maybe in Atlantic – and it sounded to me as if he had hit on a fascinating way to help people who were otherwise mired in dead-end lives but strongly motivated to get themselves out of it on an intellectual basis. The studies gave them the mind-tools to deal with it all. IIRC, in the same article, he pointed out that the inner-city gang-banger ‘youts’ had a much deeper appreciation for the Iliad, and the stories of the medieval knights. They lived with the same sort of violence, sense of touchy honor, and loyalties as did the Greek warriors and medieval knights.

3. Shenanigans like Chicago in 68 in other nations in the world would have cost most of the “brave rioters” their lives. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tlatelolco_massacre

   1. If memory serves (I know, I know, good luck with that), the 1970 shootings at Kent State stopped the Great Boomer Tantrum cold. By the time I got to grad school in mid-1970, the shutdowns and mass demonstrations were a thing of the past.

      One, two, many Vietnams. The Thoughts of Chairman Mao. World revolution. The acting out stopped just like that.

      2. A Hillary Presidency would be the Tantrum Boomers’ last chance to exact revenge for their inadequacy to the Great Generation. (Maybe those Americans who are zealous to tear down the country are driven, in part, by the knowledge that they lack what it took to build it.)

      1. Oh, yeah. And a woman I know online who goes about bragging that she helped unleash the horror of Communism on Vietnam — something like a million dead — also declares she will never forgive them for Kent State.

         Dearie, the protesters were throwing rocks. Throwing rocks at people has been used as a means of execution. . . .

         Though I did shut her up in one venue, where she was pompously declaring that Christian persecution of Jews in the middle ages justified being wary of anything any Christian said and finally offered to tell about some persecution or other — and I offered to tell her about the persecution of Christians in Vietnam, and pointed out that every Christian there was not personally guilty of helping, even in their own little way, the persecutions she complained of.

         1. Yes, they were throwing rocks. The part you’re leaving out is that the NG screwed up. As someone who does have a small amount of riot control training (Fort McClellan, 1995) I can assure you of that. They did the one thing riot control police MUST NEVER DO. They pushed the crowd into a contained area. When one wants a crowd to SCATTER one must push it into an area with multiple escape routes so that rioters will flee every which way. I’m sure the NG didn’t want to push them into a pen but they did. Some better local recon may have prevented all of that.

            1. Why in blue blazes would I include it? “They were stupid” is not one of those things that justifies the use of lethal force.

               1. My point is that lethal force would not have been necessary had the Guard followed procedure beforehand.

                  1. There are indications — and if you search you’ll probably find it — that the first shot wasn’t fired by the guard. The crowd was full of agent provocateurs.

                     One of the things that fascinates me is the way nations misunderstand each other. The USSR actually thought it could turn the US young into a PHYSICAL army, internally against the US. They were thinking of their own desperate youth, not the pampered US darlings.

                     BTW, their strategy might have worked long after they died and in a way they didn’t expect. It wasn’t a physical army, but an intellectually subversive one that was the answer. And that still marches on. Zombie invasion, indeed.

                  2. It would also not have been necessary if the protesters hadn’t resorted to it when it was unnecessary.

                     Attacking stupid people with lethal force is attacking people with lethal force. Harping on the stupidity is merely attempting to distract from who committed the evil.

                     1. Who escalated up to leathal force first? If you don’t want leathal force used against yourself, don’t escalate up to the point were the otherside feels it’s justified to do so.

                        1. “Don’t throw rocks at guys with guns. Don’t stand next to guys who throw rocks at guys with guns.”

                           Rules to live by.

                           1. Also, they weren’t just throwing rocks. There had been bombings, firebombings, and arson in town and in outlying buildings in the area during all the previous week, which is why the National Guard were called in. But all that just goes down the memory hole.

                           2. My husband, who lived near there, (family moved from CT) and who grew up hearing from the merchants, et al, has ZERO sympathy for the students. He once got in an argument with Eric Flint without meaning to, because for Dan facts are facts (mathematician, you know?) and he wasn’t even aware of the whole myth around this…

                           3. Fair enough

                        2. First, as I said, analysis of the tapes of the event indicates the guard DID NOT fire the first shot. Second stones ARE lethal force.

                           1. Yes, I know. Was agreeing with you in my own words.

                           2. If you agree that they were responding to lethal force, why did you complain that I left out something irrelevant?

            2. As your experience came some twenty years after the events of Kent State, the possibility exists that the doctrine you learned was informed by the events at Kent State, nicht wahr?

               Still, what the heck. Some AP photographer got a really great photo out of that, and Neil Young got a song that made him a buncha money, so all’s well, right?

               1. And it gave Harlan Ellison another opportunity to rant and rave against “the Man”. (After all, you can’t spend too much time blaming Art Linkletter for the drug culture before your readers get bored.)

            3. My brother-in-law was at Kent State. He was 19 years old and in the national guard.

               1. Yes. Dan was only eight or nine, but he grew up hearing from local merchants AND National guard people. Start talking to him about brave and innocent demonstrators and he forgets where he is and to whom he’s talking and gets heated.

      2. Tantrum Boomers’ last chance to exact revenge for their inadequacy

         This kind of sums it all up, doesn’t it

   2. I was in Mexico 1957-1969. I was 19 when I worked at the 1968 Olympics as an Edecán (Mexican version of Aide-de-camp). And they suppressed the media so well that I never heard about it until a few years ago.

      Most Mexican middle-class families were so afraid of the Communists (with good reason – we were invaded by middle-class and well-to-do Cuban refugees from Castro’s paradise) that they let the government do whatever it wanted.

   3. My father was a National Guardsman during the Detroit Riots. You know what those awful soldiers did? Collected money, then replaced a refrigerator for a (black owned) restaurant, and stuck around to make sure the hooligans did not raid the only place where working stiffs could buy food.

      Yes. Those old stories are about REAL THINGS (ie. Natural Law)– whereas the “After School Specials” we spoon feed children are about fuzzy things like being nice and explaining in a namby pamby way that the things that keep them alive are all wrong. Evil things, such as violence, bravery and anger. No one of these stories tells kids how to control anger, what being strong but fair looks like, or any of that, so of course they think Civilization is garbage. We’ve gutted it and removed all the things that mean something in the real world. They don’t care about pleasing Papa Powermonger or getting a cookie from Welfare. That’s what junkies do.

      They want to know how to live in the real world and still manage to have some self-respect– and what things like Justice actually mean. These street kids actually are making the kinds of life or death decisions that Mama Leftie would faint at. Kids making adult decisions will get that more from The Three Musketeers– or the Iliad, than you will from this formalistic ethical mush. It is the Funyuns of moral guidance. It tastes good (maybe), but has no value. They need meat, and they know it.

4. Meanwhile, on another part of the Internet, someone’s quote of the day is:

   Bad people in power WILL NOT STOP. They will continue to do bad things to us until we stop them…. and stopping them will require the use of force. All other discussion on the matter is window dressing.

   And, as Celia has correctly observed, the most conservative elements have the most proportionally to lose, and the greatest incentive to resist.

   1. “It cannot be bargained with. It cannot be reasoned with. It does not understand Pity, or Mercy, or Remorse; and it absolutely *will* *not* *stop* — *EVER* — until you are dead.”
      [Reese, _The Terminator_]

5. Something to be careful of: the hard-fought (or scientific breakthrough – pick your version) contraceptive war is being lost again. I know of two babies, to be grandchildren of two close friends, who are supposedly the result of ‘contraceptive failure.’ One of my friends assured me that the new pills are such low-dose that they have to be taken every day at the same time – or they don’t work.

   I don’t think that’s it at all – just my opinion. In each case (and a third I have first-hand knowledge of) the very young people involved went on to have the baby – the families are not happy, but ‘what can you do?’ And I say this while being personally opposed to abortion (but don’t make choices for other people). I think they’re choosing to ‘become adults’ this way – and that it is a very poor choice – for the kid. And not particularly stress-free for the young ‘couple.’

   In all societies where women are allowed to become educated and there is enough medical care that most babies survive, the birthrate drops – and the children grow up with more parental resources each.

   1. I wouldn’t be so sure of this. I know of two girls that I went to high school with that were both conceived while using multiple types of BC. It’s not necessarily a (new) problem with BC. It could just be bad luck.

      1. Also, tons of things cause the pill to fail, including decongestants.
         Of course, these things are very badly distributed. I didn’t use ANYTHING for seventeen years. Sigh.

   2. Evolution in action. It’s selecting for the desire to have children, biological problems that prevent the contraception from working properly, and/or incompetence in using contraception. Because those are the people who will appear in the next generation.

   3. That is not losing the contraceptive war. That’s instinct over learning — it will win in the end.

      For the record, the new pills ARE very low dose. There’s a reason for that — the old ones caused horrible stuff. OTOH there’s Norplant.

      But I think it’s mostly rebellion against the prolonged childhood we’re holding kids in.

   4. I’m skeptical of the number of “contraceptive failures” anyway. Being that I’m in the thick of the young family cohort and most of my good friends are young moms, I’ve heard more than once the “official” story that the pregnancy was because the contraception “didn’t work” and then heard the private confession that actually, they just weren’t being very careful or using it properly– but the women I knew definitely didn’t want to say “Hey, I’m an idiot who keeps forgetting to take the pill!” Also, it helps diffuse some of the the criticism against daring to bring another child into this supposedly overcrowded world when you can defend yourself by saying it wasn’t your fault.

      1. That makes sense– I had one sister to drink the cool-aid and she had five children. She kept saying that the birth control didn’t work.

         I have a reaction to the pill so didn’t use it after the first try. No children here.

   5. My sister has a friend whose mother is a midwife. She’s religious about her birth control.

      She’s got three kids under the age of five; first was conceived on the Pill, second on the Depo shot, third with a plastic IUD….

      1. While I believe most ‘failed’ birth control babies are due to either neglect or intentional misuse of birth control, birth control is a pharmaceutical, like any other pharmaceutical, different people react differently. Some overreact to very low doses, while others can statiscally overdose without having any reaction; including the desired one.

         1. I have the devil’s own time getting folks to understand “failure rates.”

            Funny thing is, the “in practice” numbers for condoms is actually higher than for trained natural family planning….

6. Yep on all this. Random thoughts below.

   I figured out a while back that the purpose of most public protests is to allow the participants to feel smug and self-righteous (I make an exception for the Tea Party, which was about letting the world know that middle America is ticked off, or the peaceful Civil Rights protests of the 50s and early 60s, and similar – protests by mature reasonable adults, not the temper tantrums of children). Out of all of these kiddies “protesting injustice” and “raising awareness,” how many are doing something that involves real work and might actually help, like volunteering in a soup kitchen?

   The only real battle was civil rights and that, while taking place at that time was not exactly like the others, since it was a fight against government regulation, not INTRINSICALLY against the rules of culture or tradition, and since the seeds for it were already in our constitution.

   It also wasn’t fought by the baby boomers; civil rights, and women’s rights, too, were brought about by the previous generation, the so-called Silent Generation (my parents come from this), people who were children during the Depression and WWII, and came of age in the 50s. The anti-war kids didn’t show up for either of these, but they were all there for the anti-war movement and the sexual revolution (where the motives were a lot more selfish).

   And THOSE people were taking over mass media even in the 30s, under FDR, and even more so during WWII.

   This may be my inner curmudgeon talking, but did things go seriously downhill once we no longer required the majority of our young men to do military service? I’m getting so I would make it mandatory for all kids. If nothing else, it would teach some self-reliance (and self defense, and the use of guns), and it might knock some sense into a lot of sheltered heads.

   1. On the military service, NO. If you look at US history, we rarely had a large military and rarely drafted young men. I believe that the US draft was during the Civil War. There was one during both WWI and WWII, but even then most who served joined without being drafted.

      1. There was a draft at least from WWII until after Viet Nam – I remember getting rid of the draft being a big deal when I was a teen-ager in the 70s.

         1. Correct but that sort of draft was new to the US.

            1. I know first hand that there was a draft, because I got my notice in 1967. I ended up volunteering to go into the Air Force. The draft was in force from 1948 until 1973.

         2. The first military draft was instituted during the Civil War – on both the Confederate and Union sides – once the armies had burned through all the eager volunteers. The draft was resented very much – there were riots over it, not just in New York, and a lot of resistance. By the last years of the war, the Confederates had basically drafted all able-bodied white males between 17 and 50, unless employed in transport, civil service or a couple of other fields.

            1. Men who owned enough slaves were exempt, in order that they could keep control. . .

               But one reason why New York rioted was that the way the neighborhoods were allocated, a poor man stood a much higher chance of being drafted than a rich one, even before you get to paying to be let off or hiring a substitute.

               1. Yep – that slave-owners of more than 20 slaves were exept, and so were elected officials – excited furious resentment, especially when everyone else was liable for service.

               2. “I volunteered for the Army on my birthday / They draft the white trash first round here anyway”

               3. Specifically, the phrase was “there goes a $300 man” — $300 was the fee to commute one’s draft sentence.

                  Hiring substitutes was variable in cost — usually it started at $350 (for obvious reasons), unless one could grab an immigrant fresh off the boat (who didn’t speak English, and had no idea what “money” was).

                  The Southern practice of exemption for large numbers of slaves led to that most-natural form of draft-dodging: As the number was set at 20 slaves, a family would buy enough slaves such that there were 20 for each male; then the family’s property would be “divided” such that “each of our males is overseeing 20 slaves”. Now, given hoe expensive slaves were, guess who got the most mileage out of this? Yup — the same rich plantation owners who dominated Southern politics, and made slavery such a big deal in the first place.

            2. There is a story, passed down in my mother’s family, about how the family hid the youngest son in the waning days of the war when everyone knew it was over and they saw no sense in him going. One of the older brothers, who survived his service, was evidently very angry about this…

         3. Yes, there was a draft during the Vietnam War. I got my draft notice in July, 1965 — when I was in basic training for the Air Force.

            Actually, the draft continued after WWII, as the United States needed millions of men to serve in Germany and Japan on Occupation duty, and during the Korean War. Eisenhower continued it to ensure we had the armed forces necessary to deal with a Soviet invasion of Europe, and to contain the Chinese expansionist policies. The thing to remember here, though, is that less than 20% of men were actually called to serve, and the service time was two years from date of induction. At least a third of that time was taken up in getting the draftees up to speed to actually do something.

            One of the things that the Left complained about during Vietnam was that a disproportionate number of blacks were serving in combat units in Vietnam. This was true. However, one thing they Left kept a deep dark secret was that whites had a greater chance of going to college and being deferred, forcing a larger number of blacks to be drafted to fill the slots the whites managed to be deferred from. Also, no unit, anywhere in the US military, was composed of more than 50% draftees, and usually the number was closer to 30%. There were enough volunteers (some to “escape” the draft???) to fill the rest of the ranks.

            I do believe the Left has managed to create the trope that those who select military service as a career are of lesser intelligence than the “enlightened masses”, and destroyed one of the most beneficial means by which low-income people could climb out of poverty. The destruction of secondary education, especially among low-income people, makes this option less available, as well. I would like to see the statistics on test scores for the ASVAB battery of tests track since they were “re-normed” in 1980 (because too many people were failing!).

            1. My grandfather tried to get out of registering for selective service during Korea. He and a bunch of his med school buddies did so by joining the National Guard because everybody knows the National Guard never gets sent anywhere. Well, what do you know, his unit gets called up and suddenly they have a bunch of medics.

               I will say, he took some beautiful pictures while he was in Japan but never became a doctor.

            2. Also, no unit, anywhere in the US military, was composed of more than 50% draftees, and usually the number was closer to 30%. There were enough volunteers (some to “escape” the draft???) to fill the rest of the ranks.

               You volunteer, you get some say in what job you get.

               All my uncles on mom’s side were that kind of volunteer, except maybe the crazy one. (Good luck getting any straight story out of him– he was a stereotypical “Vietnam Vet” before he went to war, although he’s gotten better lately.)
               Resulted in them all having good training from the Navy by the time they got out.

               1. Unless you are like my dad, who volunteered at the end of med school, was told pick a branch, and decided that since Navy doesn’t march and the food goes where you do, he’d do that. Showed at Camp Pendleton and discovered who provides medical care for the Marines. 🙂

                  1. LOL

                  2. ROLF —

                     1. I am rolling on the laughing floor again— Navy strong– 😉

                        1. No, Army strong, Army has tanks. Navy smart, we bring the coffee maker with us. And on submarines it’s wired into the same power supply that runs the pumps for the nuclear reactor.

                           1. Navy balance 😉 we do have to walk on heaving decks. lol

                           2. And if you’re on a small boy you have to walk on heaving walls.

                           3. lol

                  3. My dad tells me that when he was in line at the recruiting office during WWII, the guy behind the desk (folding table, whatever), was asking the volunteers what branch they wanted, then would write down something else.

                     He said there was a pattern to it, though, so when he got to the front of the line and the guy asked what branch he wanted, he said, “MARINES!”, and the guy put down Navy.

                     Don’t know if this is true or not, of course.

               2. Yes, I had several uncles who did this. One who joined the coast guard, one National Guard, and one Navy, the rest went army or marines with the hope of having some choice in their job, because draftees seldom got much choice.

            3. I’m not sure that the trope of lesser intelligence has gone away

               1. http://politicalhumor.about.com/library/images/blpic-kerrystuckiniraq.htm

                  The funny thing is that, since the military only takes the top 2/3 of ASVAB scorers, the military is actually smarter than the general population.

                  1. My brother-in-law tried to get into the Army three or four times and finally went into the National Guard instead. He had a diploma. I did not have a diploma and passed the ASVAB in the low 90s. 😉

                     1. I’m the only member of my immediate family without a degree, but thanks to the Navy I’m also the only one whose job can support their lifestyle.

                        1. 🙂 I did get my degree after I left the Navy, but before I could make it support us, I became ill. Sadly. Oh well, more time to write. If I would just stop rotating the kitties.

                           1. I figure I’ll get a degree eventually. I did earn the GI Bill, and it’s probably easier than waiting for the rest of the world to catch up to the uselessness of most degrees. Plus I’ll be able to make idiot liberals’ (BIRM) heads explode.

                           2. My mom is waiting for me to get my doctorate. I don’t want to, but part of me says I should do it just to make her happy…

                           3. The GI bill was really helped– I was the first one in my family since my great-great-grandfather that had an education above high school. My youngest brothers have degrees in accounting and business. They realized that they could get a degree w/o breaking their banks. They paid as they went and didn’t get into debt for it. Yea, I am proud.

                           4. My grandmother said G-d writes straight through crooked lines. I’ve said before to my son that if he’s having doubts about medicine, don’t hold too tightly to it. Sometimes He knows better where we’re meant to be. I’ve read some of your work. I’d say you’re doing what you were born to, Cyn.

                           5. TY Sarah– I shouldn’t doubt– and yes, my life has been extremely twisty (I could use my life as a novel actually lol) so thank you very much.

                           6. Sarah, my dad wanted me to get my doctorate. I sent him the application forms with a note reminding him it was never too late…. 😎

                           7. lol– I got my BA at 40 😉

                           8. 🙂

                  2. Because the military is very results oriented, they know how smart they ain’t, unlike the general population which, for example, performs abysmally on international tests of mathematics capability but is very confident in their ignorance.

                     1. “The rods are up? The shafts are spinning? Nothing is on fire? Then I’m doing my job. Leave me alone.” -Me, to various officers.

                        Meanwhile my sister is complaining about people “jumping to conclusions” about the Boston bombers and congratulating herself on her “intelligence” for being unable to draw logical conclusions from the facts available.

      2. You forgot Vietnam–

   2. Military service for – theoretically at least – all men is still mandatory in Finland, although the military version of service is fairly easy to avoid (but if one does not have something like health reasons and also refuses the nonmilitary version which consists of 1 month of training about things like civil defense and 11 months of working, which can be something like helping in a nursing home, those people can occasionally get sentenced to jail – there are very few acceptable excuses, I think being a member of Jehovah’s Witnesses is one, but then that person needs to produce some certification, every year, until he turns 28).

      Bad points – lots of people who’d rather not serve and are just trying to get by with minimum effort until they get out, lots of people who are just barely fit enough to serve, lowered standards so they can still accept as many as possible… kind of makes sense considering how few Finns there are, and if we had to fight again, since the most likely attacker still is Russia, we’d need everybody we can possibly get, but I don’t think it would make much sense for a country as big as United States, not if you want to keep your armed forces in top condition.

7. “(Yes, I can conceive of a society of people created and force grown in labs so la revolution can be sustained. What a grim idea. And anyone want to bet it would find a market?)”

   There is err.,… a story to be told here and uh..

   Well…

   You’ve talked about cross pollination before and umm..

   Ya know, the whole borrowing thing?

   Oh, to hell with it….

   Sarah, may I please blatantly steal this idea and try to turn it into something publication worthy? Something along the lines of Huxley’s Brave New World but even grimmer I’m thinking.

   1. Of course you may. You might actually be able to sell it to Asimov’s or Analog.

      1. Thanks!

         1. Imagine that every day, the five minute hate ends with the execution of an actual Emmanuel Goldstein…

            1. I’m SO glad that my married name isn’t Jewish.

               1. I’ve had people think mine is. Though possibly the fact that husband’s name is Daniel and that younger son looks like he just escaped from yeshiva doesn’t help…

                  1. Since my husband is a hi-tech redneck, I might’ve jumped from the fire into the kettle. You may have noticed that Southern White Males often incur liberals’ ire.

                     1. Just tryin’ to do our bit to help out, Ma’am.

      2. Ooh, something for later addition to the Human Wave Reads site (when I ever get it ready for testing, dammit! Life happened, as per usual. Based on the difficulties I’m having, it should do well). ANY way, a page for “Pollination on the Wind” – where people can post ideas for stories that either don’t fit their style, or they don’t have time for, or perhaps they aren’t writers, but had an idea that they think sounds good, and want to make it available to be written.

   2. You do know that if everyone commenting, or lurking, here ran with that idea, we’d all end up with different stories?

      1. I thought the same but didn’t say it. I’m also half-tempted (to get myself working more than anything) to start a challenge page on this site, where we give each other challenge ideas every weekend, with critique a choice.

         1. I think that’s a fantastic idea! The first anthology I ever bought was the classic Carmen Miranda’s Ghost is Haunting Space Station 3. I found it fascinating to see the many different directions that the authors took the same root concept.

            1. PARTICULARLY a rather crazy root concept. Not the first one I took, but close…

               1. A) for challange are you talking about a paragraph or something longer. Clearly I need motivation to write. Hence why I’d asked about the writing series in my first post.

                  B) Are there still sci-fi or fantasy magazines?

                  1. A) no. I meant a story.
                     B) yep.

                  2. B) sort of, the short answer is yes, the long answer is none that I am aware of that are worth reading. (with the possible exception of some ezines. Is Jim Baen’s Universe still being published?)

         2. I’d suggest a Yahoo group, or maybe a bulletin board.

            Anytime someone has a nifty plot idea, they can donate it….

            1. I need to learn to read further down nested comments before replying near the top. 😛

         3. In a way you did, back a month or so ago, with the idea of a free-market romance or adventure story – how do you lure people into thinking about economics? Hide the lesson. I’m trying to write that one, but, yeah, a research project and the WIP sandbagged me. Really.

   3. Jim – may I suggest you rent Kurt Russell’s “Soldier”? It’s actually one of my favorite movies. Definitely Human Wave. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soldier_(1998_American_film)

      1. Esp. as it’s in the same universe as _Blade Runner_ (according to Word Of God). Certainly deals with the same themes.

         1. The film or the Alan E. Nourse book? 0:)

8. I suspect a large chunk of the problem is that having set out to deal with a finite problem, and done it, people face the horrible possibility of having to return to a quotidian life, and such humdrum quotidian virtues as being nice to your neighbor and family, and donating food to the food bank, and telling the truth. Not only does this mean a lack of fame and power, it means reverting to those simple virtues that, very likely, they gave up because they were getting a moral charge out of their revolution. (Been produced in a lab. Give people a chance to buy “green” products, and they are more likely to cheat and lie for money in a subsequent test.) Obviously a new problem — preferably vaguer — is needed to fight against to avert that evil prospect.

   1. Jonah Goldberg has addressed this many times, most significantly in his Liberal Fascism. Revolutions give the thrill of working together in a common cause and an illusion of significance that is lost to the secular world.

      We would all be mush better off if they restrained themselves to staging theatricals and athletic events: all the excitement of sublimation of self to a group effort, a tenth the mess.

      1. Famous final scene of Redford movie The Candidate has him turning to his campaign manager to say: We’ve won! Now what do we do?

   2. “Moral Equivalent of War” is a liberal thing Goldberg has pointed out, too; think it was in Tyranny of Cliches, but may have been Liberal Fascism.

9. >> All we have to do this is our keyboards, but fortunately we no longer need to get our words past the gatekeepers.

   Sarah has put out this sort of call many times the past while. She has this strange doctrine that people can change the world for the better just by writing stories. Strangely, we don’t even have to be intentionally political– just quietly forge a narrative that it out of step with whatever it is that “they” tend to serve up.

   So who’s giving it a shot? Anyone that’s not already been published through the usual channels…?

   1. A few of my friends — but mind you news blogging does this too, and is also needed.

   2. I am, most definitly, although I am more historical than science fiction. About seven or eight years ago I began to feel this very strong conviction that we had to know our American history, really know it – we had to know that our actual and metaphorical ancestors were decent, honorable and well-meaning people (for the most part), that the American experiment was a unique and wonderful experiment. And the best way to teach people it was to make ripping good yarns out of it – but historically accurate yarns. It was a really powerful conviction, almost like a religious conversion.
      So I’ve been scribbling away ever since. Oh, and I went around a couple of times trying to get an agent and be published the traditional way, for my first two HF adventures. No luck, of course – so I went indy, and have been indy ever since.
      (more here – http://celiahayes.wordpress.com/ )

   3. So who’s giving it a shot? Anyone that’s not already been published through the usual channels…?

      Unlike many in this august company, I’ve never published anything either indy or traditional, and I have not written a lot (outside of TechPubs or marketing stuff for work – Why, yes, such work-writing does corrode one’s mind – why, are my ears smoking again?) in a long time, but the urgings of our gracious and lovely hostess have convinced me to finally get writing. I’ve got two distinct bigger stories in mind, one of which I have gone ahead and plotted out. I’m a bit over 6,000 words into that one, though I just had an insight that may lead me to trash pretty much all that in order to get the actual story I want to tell started with more momentum.

      And yes, both the stories I have in mind are enthusiastically HW, in specific response to the concerns Sarah posts about. Basically, I’m trying to write what I’d like to read. If they turn out publishable I’ll likely plonk them up on Amazon so the other twenty folks worldwide who also think so can find and read them.

      1. What does HW mean?

         1. HW= Human Wave

         2. “Human Wave”, Sarah’s new movement. (Mostly to write good sf where the protagonists’ actions matter and which are worth caring about.

            1. This is the blog post that started it:
               https://accordingtohoyt.com/2012/03/21/what-is-human-wave-science-fiction-3/

   4. I am, too. One of my most popular flash fictions (the novels are in pre-production) was a near future one called Teenagers: 2035. I got more than one email (nobody comments!) about how scary it was. My only reply was “Been watching the news lately?”

   5. Strangely, we don’t even have to be intentionally political– just quietly forge a narrative that it out of step with whatever it is that “they” tend to serve up.

      It’s working; Get Religion managed to shame several folks into actually reporting on Gosnell.

   6. I am, both my fiction and as possible my non-fiction.

      FYI, the ePub version of “Justice and Juniors” is out at Kobo (at LAST!). The theme, such as it is, among the stories is about the proper use of power. http://www.kobobooks.com/ebook/Justice-and-Juniors/book-xnt0IIUNBEmW5wPUpWKY5A/page1.html?s=LzPTBvdAAUqMNtMaH1VJuQ&r=1

      1. Got it TXRed and reading– I enjoyed Cat among Dragons too–

         1. Thank you! Glad you like them. 😀

            1. I liked how you handled the sex question 😉 It made my day.

   7. I am. I’m working on (struggling with at the moment) a series of science fantasy stories with decidedly libertarian themes and characters.
      M

      1. Simply commenting on the news stories where it is possible on the stories of the old media can make a dent too, especially if you can leave links to those parts of the news they have left out (or distorted). The more people start to doubt the official version the better. I was, for years back when the old media was the biggest available source of news, a fence sitter simply because while I doubted the leftist narrative I still also could not completely not believe them either since the facts could be so hard to find. It’s a lot easier to be a contrarian if you know there are actual experts who think that way (whatever the subject, and even when those experts may seem to be a minority in their fields).

10. “I present you with a choice, Malachi Stinnet, the choice eventually faced by all: You may lie upon the shores of Babylon and weep, or you may take up arms against the [faux]!” Simon & Schuster: The Monstrumologist
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Monstrumologist

    1. How the heck is that a young adult novel? I mean, sure, it’s the kind of book teenagers will read, but why on earth would you market it as a book for teenagers??? Ew, ew, ew.

11. I remember reading somewhere that the founer of the AFL-CIO supported Hitler until he turned around and invaded the Soviet Union, at which time he suddenly changed his mind. Can’t find the reference, but it supports your theory, i I’m remebering right.

    1. nvm, time period is off for him, have to be thinking of someone else in the labor movement

    2. The American Communist Party (a fully owned subsidiary of the Soviet Union) instructed its membership to support Hitler, right up unto the time Germany violated the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact.

       Not sayin’ the AFL-CIO head was taking orders … just sayin’ some didn’t so much change their minds as had their minds changed for ’em.

       1. See Fred Pohl on the subject of CP support for what was after all a socialist invasion of France (The Way the Future Was?). On the rest of it CIO was a union of industrial workers AF of L was a guild of skilled workers – over time different groups have merged and separated under different umbrella groups – and IWW was what it was see Leslie Fish.

       2. must have been it. I thouht there was a specific name in the story I read, though.

12. The full quote for context.

    “God forbid we should ever be twenty years without such a rebellion. The people cannot be all, and always, well informed. The part which is wrong will be discontented, in proportion to the importance of the facts they misconceive. If they remain quiet under such misconceptions, it is lethargy, the forerunner of death to the public liberty…. And what country can preserve its liberties, if its rulers are not warned from time to time, that this people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms. The remedy is to set them right as to the facts, pardon and pacify them. What signify a few lives lost in a century or two? The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time, with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is its natural manure.”

    – Thomas Jefferson

13. “…because hey, at least their kids don’t hate their system.”

    The green movement that was rioting in the streets of Iran was all 20 somethings college kids.

    1. Yes. Of course it was. But how many Muslim countries broadcast THAT?

       1. None- Mainstream. But their story still got out. The sheeple will buyinto anything, but those that look the truth will come out, that is the power of of the internet.

          1. Yes, of course, but you’ll find there are fewer people ABLE to do that in Muslim countries and the people who WANT truth are always a minority– though, btw, interestingly there are whisper-reports of falling birth rates in Muslim countries. How? Well… apparently a whisper went off from the internet on the … RHYTHM method. Women talk to women, and even that ineffective method is having a disproportionate impact. Why? Well, when you’re a slave you don’t wish to bring more slaves into the world.

             1. I would guess that someone got a NFP site through to the ladies; it’s much more effective than simply the Rhythm Method, and if I remember right women during their “time” are ritually unclean, so it would be relatively simple to watch one’s mucus and claim to be having your time of month a bit off….
                Advances in Natural Family Planning have been coming hard and fast, to give a straightline that should be the size of a barn.

          2. Iran isn’t exactly your typical Muslim country. First of all, it’s Shi’ite, of course. Second, the Persian cultural background is very different from that of Arab or other Muslim areas. Because Persia was an empire far older than anything in Arabia (except maybe the frankincense areas, and they’re a lot smaller) and because they had a whole different caliphate structure and different ways of prospering, there’s a strong counterweight to a lot of the bad parts of Islam in the culture, language, and history.

             Obviously this didn’t stop Khomeini and doesn’t stop Iran’s government from being very very bad and spreading its badness; but it’s definitely there. Which is why a lot of the revolts are centered around old Persian holidays celebrated by all the various religions in the land (like the spring’s Persian New Year, Nouruz).

             1. Yes, I know and the youth is quite pissed at us/US. They feel abandoned, that we’ll toppel the Libyan government, but would even give the moral support by denousing the Iran governments use/crackdown of/with the Iranian Republican Guard.

                1. Ah, the world that might have been if, one night during the Green Revolution, every Revolutionary Guard headquarters, barracks, and facility were to suffer catastrophic “spontaneous” entropic increase.

          3. One irony is that living in a free society with a free press we are far more credulous about what is reported than are the folks in an oppressive society who know the media can’t be trusted.

             It reminds me of the story about Russian cinemas showing newsreels of how bad things were in America, showing pictures of things like the Okie migration only to have the Russian people say “they have cars?They can go where they want?”

             1. 🙂

                When you don’t trust the government as far as you can spit, and when it’s the government doing the spitting you make sure to use a ruler that you provided.

             2. Thing is, our press might be free, but it’s still run by and for the benefit of a single political party. Most people I know don’t trust journalists as far as they can be thrown.

                1. Given time to set up a trebuchet or similar device you can throw journalists a fair distance, so I certainly wouldn’t trust them that far.

                   As one friend is wont to proclaim, I trust them about as far as I could piss into a 50mph wind. Align me with General William T. Sherman: “If I had my choice I would kill every reporter in the world, but I am sure we would be getting reports from Hell before breakfast.”

14. had the pill not come about, the “women libbers” would have remained like the suffragettes a small and nutty minority, because biology militated against them. They were, in fact, in a fight against reality.

    They still are. It’s just a longer term one, as the women who do not listen to them are exactly the ones most likely to be genetically represented in the next generation.

    I still remember the public service ads about how fertility declines for women, and even though the fertility doctors ran them because they were getting so many patients blindsided by it, feminists were in a rage because “women knew it already.”

15. So, what we’re describing is a way for young men to come together (because young men are in much greater danger of alienation in our current society than young women), in voluntary association, in a way that creates civic good, is done on a local level, and provides a way not only for civic good, but learning, exercise, and, even possibly, for a way for men new to town (as they migrate for employment to a place away from the nest) to have safe living quarters in good company. At the risk of sounding as though I am one of those people from the village, has anyone looked at the original mission and charters of the YMCA?
    Quite seriously. It filled an absolutely necessary niche then. And could fill one now, if only it still existed. Now, the YMCAs that offer any residential space at all are very dodgy spaces.

    1. That’s why the Boy Scouts had to be changed: because nobody male is to be allowed to have a space to interact with other males (unless they’re having sex or playing a videogame, preferably long distance).

       1. I almost pointed out the BSA, but I believe TXRed was talking about a place primarily for those over 18.

    2. Male-only places and groups are assumed to be hotbeds of The Conspiracy To Oppress Women, and must be eliminated.

16. Thomas Jefferson said that every generation needs a new revolution. Since he was not a sociopath like Robespierre, I very much doubt what he meant was that a sort of terror should go on forever, with the heads of non-conforming lopped off.

    Murruphahm? o.0

    I think that wins a prize for the most attention-grabbing opening line in quite some time.

17. Socialism is not a monolithic belief system. Each successive wave of Socialism had its own distinguishing features and built upon the previous versions:
    First Wave or “Classical” socialists identified the entirety of human society as either “oppressors” or “oppressed”. Eternal and irresolvable class warfare became a permanent fixture of all future waves of socialism. An apocalyptic revolution was deemed inevitable, so the First Wave Socialists concentrated on being on the “right side of history” by identifying with the underdog, and assuming this would put them in key positions after the Revolution. They were mostly talk, except for a few Bomb Throwing Anarchists, who were major failures as well. WWI pretty much ended any serious expectation that the Revolution would just happen by itself.
    Second Wave or “Vanguard” Socialists stung by the “treason” of the underclass who joined the middle class in droves (and Germany, France, and England . . .) decided that a small, disciplined cadre would be needed to lead the masses to the Revolution, under the guidance of a Great Leader. Mussolini (the first), Hitler, Mao, Pol Pot, Castro and Chavez are prime examples of this wave and their violent tactics caused about 200 million casualties among their own populations: many “eggs were broken” with no sign of the promised “omelet”.
    Third Wave or “Justice-driven” Socialists seized upon every legitimate grievance with any mass appeal and turned it into fuel for their political engines, which were directed toward gradual, yet sweeping political change. Th original leaders of the various social justice movement were shunted aside or conveniently martyred and a new political elite took over. Despite a purported dedication to “justice” none of the very real injustices they are supposedly opposed to are ever really resolved. It is too useful to keep on driving the political machine with endless, irresolvable grievances (an echo if the irresolvable class conflict found in the first wave).
    Fourth Wave or “Act Up” Socialism focuses the delights of revolution in Western societies: the thrill of empowerment, the total immersion in a set of beliefs, and the sense of community of the like-minded. There is no danger in faux rebellion in Portland, OR and lots of fun because nothing bad really happens to you (and colleges hire you afterwards). Try this against the Sith Lords or Vladimir Putin and see what happens to you.
    Each Wave of Socialism also has its defining motivation and is underpinned intense oikophobia (they all stack BTW):
    1) The intellectual superiority of being able to seeing through all of the illusions.
    2) The physical superiority of being bold enough to take decisive action
    3) The moral superiority of caring more about the downtrodden than anybody else
    4) The sheer joy of eternal, yet safe rebellion
    This explains all of the variances wee see on the Other Side.

    1. You call them waves, I call them nausea. They all make me sick.

18. There are other factors. America was populated by English dissidents (Puritans & Cavaliers), Scots who had been brutally suppressed, Germans fleeing war and others who wanted to start over. Also there was a tradition of over 100 years of self rule. Add to the mixture the philosophy od John Locke ( all men have a right to Life, Liberty and Property) and there you go.

19. “The Warden”

    https://sanjacintocountyoutlaw.wordpress.com/2013/04/22/the-warden/

    An interesting read, on how to look at the statists in both parties. I’ve always thought of them as shepherds, but I think Wardens fits better.

    Hmmm…

20. Not to mention that Locke read Belarmine, a Jesuit who was the first to kick over the “Divine right of Kings.” I believe he published a couple of widely read political treatises that contain hauntingly familiar language.
    Here is an article explaining it better than I can.

    http://catholiceducation.org/articles/politics/pg0003.html

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