RE: Chomsky Arguments / Redefinitions
From: James Donald But Chomsky defines peoples free choice to say one thing rather than another thing, to listen to one source rather than another source, to be "extreme coercion and control". With this definition, it obviously follows that exterminating those who engage in "extreme coercion and control" is an act of self defence. . . . . . . In the same way, when Chomsky argues that speech is coercion, and choice is submission, I know that he and his pals in the government are planning to enhance our civil liberties by protecting us from that speech, and to enhance our lives by rescuing us from that submission. ...................................................................... .......... I haven't read Chomsky and have limited acquaintance with the labor theory of value, but I can appreciate the games people can play with torturing definitions to mean other than what is usually understood, until it isn't possible to recognize them. I can't know if what you are saying about him is true, but I must say, you indicate well the things which it is important to pay attention to when someone prepares an intellectual pathway by means of the re-definition of the meanings of acts. If that is what he does, I would be suspicious, too. Blanc
Blanc Weber writes
I haven't read Chomsky and have limited acquaintance with the labor theory of value, but I can appreciate the games people can play with torturing definitions to mean other than what is usually understood, until it isn't possible to recognize them.
Thank you for your kind words. By the way when I called this thread "more tedious Chomsky stuff" I was perfectly serious - This thread has been beaten to death time and time again, and many people have a kill file that automatically kills anything with Chomsky in the header. Chomsky correctly points out all sort of lies and bias in the mass media. Since some the evils he points to are indeed real and indeed wrong, people automatically sympathize with what he says. (He pulled terrible clangers on Pol Pot and Idi Amin, but this is irrelevant to the argument. Even when the misleading statements that he complains about are real and evil, the language he uses still implies that coercive solutions to the problem are just, necessary, and will make us more free.) The problem is that if you call it media bias, you imply one class of solutions. If you call it a coercive system of power and control, you get a different class of solutions. The language that Chomsky uses suggests to me he very much favors that other class of solutions. But it is absolutely true, as the supporters of Chomsky claim, that Chomsky has never said explicitly in so many words, that coercive solutions to the problem of political untruths, are good. On the other hand he has never said that they are bad either, and the language he uses would` tend to make a reasonable person feel that coercive solutions to this problem are good. Obviously the problems that Chomsky justly complains about are largely solved when everyone owns their own printing press, or its network equivalent. But for some strange reason I do not hear him saying "Hurrah, the cavalry have arrived." -- --------------------------------------------------------------------- We have the right to defend ourselves and our property, because of the kind of animals that we James A. Donald are. True law derives from this right, not from the arbitrary power of the omnipotent state. jamesd@netcom.com
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