Noam Chomsky: On Power And Ideology

Even Chomsky has bad hair days.

The role of concentrated power in shaping the ideological framework that dominates perception, interpretation, discussion, choice of action, all of that is too familiar to require much comment. Tonight I’d like to discuss a critically important example, but first a couple of words on one of the most perceptive analysts of this process, George Orwell. 

Orwell is famous for his searching and sardonic critique of the way thought is controlled by force under totalitarian dystopia. But much less known is his discussion of how similar outcomes are achieved in free societies. He’s speaking, of course, of England. And he wrote that although the country is quite free, nevertheless unpopular ideas can be suppressed without the use of force. Gave a couple of examples, provided a few words of explanation, which were to the point. 

One particularly pertinent comment was his observation on a quality education in the best schools, where it is instilled into you that there are certain things that it simply wouldn’t do to say - or, we may add, even to think...

Lecture given to the New School, New York, Saturday. Via Democracy Now!

And here's a Jacobin interview on Jeremy Corbyn, Bernie Sanders, Syriza and the prospects for radical change.

PS Now seems a good time to revisit Fagburn and Uncle Noam on US/Cuba.

Noam Chomsky: Falling In Love Again

The 86-year-old progressive thinker is celebrating his first anniversary with his second wife, Valeria Wasserman Chomsky. “We shouldn’t overlook the fact that the world has some wonderful things in it, too,” the renowned activist and linguist told “Democracy Now!” host Amy Goodman after a long conversation about things that “range from unpleasant to horrific.”

Listen to Chomsky talk and Goodman talk about love with an outburst of giddy optimism that will have you smiling all day long.

TruthDig.

Awww...
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The apparent highlight of last week's Democracy Now! interview - he also talked about Black Lives Matter, Greece, Israel, ISIS, Snowden, Venezuela, Ukraine and shit like that.

PS Don't want to sound cynical, made-up for my Uncle Noam.

Chomsky: On Israel's War On Gaza

The incursion and bombardment of Gaza is not about destroying Hamas. It is not about stopping rocket fire into Israel, it is not about achieving peace.

The Israeli decision to rain death and destruction on Gaza, to use lethal weapons of the modern battlefield on a largely defenseless civilian population, is the final phase in a decades-long campaign to ethnically-cleanse Palestinians.

Israel uses sophisticated attack jets and naval vessels to bomb densely-crowded refugee camps, schools, apartment blocks, mosques, and slums to attack a population that has no air force, no air defense, no navy, no heavy weapons, no artillery units, no mechanized armor, no command in control, no army… and calls it a war. It is not a war, it is murder.

When Israelis in the occupied territories now claim that they have to defend themselves, they are defending themselves in the sense that any military occupier has to defend itself against the population they are crushing. You can't defend yourself when you're militarily occupying someone else's land. That's not defense. Call it what you like, it's not defense.

Noam Chomsky.
   
• Who is doing the killing in Gaza? - Joint statement signed by Chomsky.
 Video interview with Amy Goodman about Chomsky's recent visit to the Gaza Strip.
“You’re cross-dressers! You’re the Gay Pride March, that’s what you are!” - Israeli war supporters attack Tel Aviv peace demo.
For more on Israel/Palestine and the current attack on Gaza see Znet.

But remember, if Israel launches a genocidal invasion of Gaza soon, they must be forgiven anything and everything because Tel Aviv has a really nice gay beach.

Thought For The Day: Tony Kushner

"A handful of works in history have had a direct impact on social policy. One or two works of Dickens, some of Zola, Uncle Tom's Cabin and, in modern drama, Larry Kramer's The Normal Heart. But if I believed that Angels in America was important simply because it raised levels of sexual tolerance or encouraged people to be nicer to gays, I'd still be sitting at my laptop wondering what to do next. In fact, my new play is a big American family drama in the Eugene O'Neill tradition. I'm not a missionary. I'm primarily addressing progressive communities in the hope that we can go forward into the darkness trying to figure things out together."

Tony Kushner interviewed by Michael Billington in The Guardian.
The strapline; "When Tony Kushner's honorary degree was vetoed over allegations that he was anti-Israel, there was an outcry. Here he talks for the first time about the controversy"
Good stuff, but it's not the first time.
Here he is talking to Amy Goodman on Democracy Now! in May.

Tony Kushner: The Intelligent Homosexual's Guide to Zionism

"The trustees board of the City University of New York (CUNY) brought to an end an embarrassing row over freedom of expression by voting unanimously to award an honorary degree to the award-winning playwright Tony Kushner.
"A firestorm was ignited last week when a single trustee, Jeffrey Wiesenfeld, launched an attack on the Jewish playwright on the grounds that he was not sufficiently pro-Israel. The intervention blocked the award of the degree which would normally have been routine..." The Guardian.

Here's Tony Kushner's lengthy, impassioned, rational response to the original decision in The Jewish Week.
“This has been an incredibly ugly experience, that a great public university would make a decision based on slanderous mischaracterizations without giving the person in question a chance to be heard. I’m sickened that this is happening in New York City. Shocked, really.”
Kushner is not the only gay New Yorker to come under attack for daring to criticise Israel.
In March New York's LGBT Center cancelled a benefit gig organised by Israeli Apartheid Week after a row manufactured by gay Neo-Con cunt Michael Lucas.
Last year Queers Against Israeli Apartheid were banned from taking part in Pride Toronto.
Some things appear to be unsayable in north American Gayland.
Exhuming McCarthy...
And some things are unreportable in the UK - some gay journalists are too busy writing glowing reports about free holidays in Israel that were paid for by the Israeli government.
Just sayin'...

Tony Kushner's The Intelligent Homosexual's Guide to Capitalism and Socialism With a Key to the Scriptures has just opened off-Broadway to so-so reviews.
"Kushner’s talent for self-criticism is endearing, but what his wise, challenging and heartbroken play really needs is a tough editor" - LA Times

Here's Tony talking to Amy Goodman on Democracy Now today about CUNY and iHomo...


Transcript here.

Chomsky On Egypt: "This Is The Most Remarkable Uprising"

Noam Chomsky talks to Democracy Now about the Egyptian uprising and its implications for the Middle East and beyond.
On video and a partial transcript.
UPDATE See also; 'It's not radical Islam that worries the US – it's independence' - Noam Chomsky, The Guardian.

• 'The Riddle Of The Sphinx' photomontage from Private Eye.