[Peace-discuss] No one is immune from criticism, not even Chomsky

Sun May 2 19:12:34 CDT 2004

I too find Chomsky’s lack of a plan (for lack of a better word,) disconcerting. But then I think that for those of us on the far left there is really nothing that we can do except try to band together and make a little (or lot,) of noise; as he suggests. I hate to say this, but realistically speaking, without a great deal of money, our cause is 90+% hopeless. Outside of the university community the local population is overwhelmingly conservative. Period. Ditto the media. 

Indeed, IMO, the vast majority of the country has bought into the government’s lies, which the media only embellishes. Fears, which IMO are generally egregiously overstated, have been instilled in almost everyone, even members of this group. The government promotes them and the media thrives on them; the result being that we are a nation of mostly willing, horrendously over-armed aggressors. This is extremely profitable to business and also provides a gusher of money for research at almost every institution of higher learning. The result is, through fear and self-interest (greed?), nobody wants to rock the boat, at least not enough to ripple the water. I doubt that the Democrats would rock it if they could, but they know that they can’t and still get any votes. Rule One appears to be to suck up to the voter, and why not? So we get Kerry, a Bush clone of a hopefully less malignant nature. 

I did some campaigning with Kucinich in Iowa. I love his ideas, but to be against both the war and the WTO, and to be for Universal Health Care put him so far out in left field that nobody paid any attention to him. As we traveled through Iowa his retinue outnumbered the locals at almost every stop. And the media, possibly for reasons that Chomsky makes clear, ignored him. He had little financial support. We were a pathetic bunch. (I might add, that as outspoken as DK was, he would not touch the Palestine question with a ten-foot pole. I don’t know what he really thought, but I suspected that he realized that the Israeli Army were basically thugs, and was sympathetic to the Palestinians. However, he knew that saying so was political suicide and said almost nothing. It is my guess that he might have felt that he would get drummed out of the Democratic Party if he said anything. This is all speculation on my part.)  

Back to Chomsky’s “dilemma” regarding what to do. I felt that I could do nothing more that was both positive and practical than to work for Kucinich. From the practical standpoint it was a joke (he is still running, BTW.) He never had a chance, the main reason being, IMO, was that the media did not anoint him as a possibility or even as a story. Dean was the selected story – end of story. So what can we do? Regrettably, damn little, really damn little. Given that fact, Chomsky says about all he can.

Probably the most effective thing we can do is protest. And hope the media does not ignore it. The next most important thing, IMO, is vote AGAINST the worst option. To me the worst option is BUSH and the only way to vote against him is to vote for KERRY. To those of you who say Kerry is a jerk or worse, I agree. But think about the future of the Patriot Act and judicial appointments, do you want Bush or Democrats making those decisions? Politicians lie, its their field of expertise, perhaps Kerry knows he has no chance of getting elected if he does not support our present actions in Iraq, so he does, but maybe he’s lying a little. Maybe (just maybe) he would reverse course (albeit slowly) if he got elected. Maybe there’s a chance of that. OTOH where do you think Bush is headed?

If you think you are going to be courageously principled and vote for a third choice or stay home, IMO you are just plain wrong. Only two candidates have a chance to win. Not voting, or voting for a third choice, just helps the one you hate the most. How can you feel good about that? Chomsky is just being realistic when he fumbles around for a plan, but I bet he doesn’t endorse throwing your vote away and thereby helping the worst candidate. My 2¢.     

Phil Stinard <pstinard at hotmail.com> wrote:I agree with this criticism of Chomsky. I have a video of a speech he gave 
at MIT, and when someone asked him what they could do as individuals, he 
ducked the question. I noticed that, and it bothered me. Perhaps Chomsky 
is just trying to be modest and not force his views on anyone, but he does 
give a blank check to those who want to continue running around and being 
complacent. For that reason, I view him more as an ivory tower 
philosopher--very intelligent and very correct in what he says, but not 
particularly inspirational.

My other criticism of him is that he seems to be tacitly supporting John 
Kerry as the "lesser of two evils." That's just WRONG, especially coming 
from someone of such high principles as Chomsky. I'm waiting to see if 
Chomsky recants, but I haven't seen signs of it yet.

--Phil

>Date: Sat, 1 May 2004 21:06:45 -0500
>From: Morton K.Brussel 

>Subject: [Peace-discuss] Criticism of Chomsky?!
>To: peace-discuss at lists.cu.groogroo.com
>Message-ID: <5CD3C8A4-9BDD-11D8-A4E5-000502314E22 at insightbb.com>
>Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
>
>Take a look at ZNET for an interesting criticism of Chomsky: I append
>only a bit of it, the beginning and the end.
>
>April 27, 2004
>
> Talking Back to Chomsky
>
> By Cynthia Peters
>
> Our social change movements have benefited enormously from the work of
>Noam Chomsky. The incredible energy he brings to his speaking and
>writing means that millions have been exposed to his analysis of U.S.
>foreign and domestic policy. But he has one favorite rhetorical device
>that always makes me nervous. He'll suggest that something is obvious.
>Maybe he doesn't realize how much this puts people on the defensive.
>One can't help but wonder, "But what if it's not obvious to me?"
>
> If Chomsky considers something to be obvious, and yet I puzzle over
>it, does that mean I'm stupid? Take, for example, the question he gets
>asked at the end of every talk. He says he gets letters about it every
>day. When I worked at South End Press in the 1980s, we used to ask him
>to include something about it at the end of his lengthy denunciations
>of U.S. imperial policy in Central America and the Middle East. If you
>go to these books, you'll find, after 600 pages of analysis, a short
>paragraph about what I am talking about.
>
> It's the question of what individuals can do.
>
> And Chomsky thinks it's obvious. In an interview with David Barsamian
>in the May 2004 issue of the Progressive, he says, "The fact is, we can
>do just about anything. There is no difficulty, wherever you are, in
>finding groups that are working hard on things that concern you."
>
> On the one hand, he is right of course. There is no alternative to
>joining groups, which I take to mean organizing. And on my more hopeful
>days, I think that indeed the problem is that too many people just
>don't understand this obvious fact. They think that teaching kids to
>share and depriving their sons of toy guns is political work. They
>think that volunteering at the shelter and practicing "random acts of
>kindness" is going to bring about social change. They think that
>wearing hemp and riding their bikes to the food co-op can help build a
>better world.
>
> If lots and lots of people think this, and we can reach them and
>convince them that social change is not going to come about via random
>and individual gestures -- if that's the piece that's holding them back
>from real organizing -- then we're in luck. Our mission is
>straightforward. We just have to be like Chomsky and go around telling
>people to get busy, the path is clear, the array of organizations to
>join or create is obvious.
>
> But it strikes me that that is not what is holding people back. It
>strikes me that it is not at all obvious what we should do, and that by
>implying that it is, we risk making people feel stupid, when in fact
>they are quite right to ask the question, "What should I do?"
>....
>And to conclude, she writes:
>
>In a Boston Globe book review (April 25, 2004), George Scialabba called
>Chomsky "America's most useful citizen." I don't disagree. He has laid
>bare the workings of the beast and explained its functioning --
>critical components of any social change activist's toolbox. But I wish
>he would stop implying that how an individual responds to this beast is
>so obvious. If we think it's so obvious, we won't prepare ourselves for
>the problems, especially the three biggest ones explained above. We
>will not be effective. And we won't begin to build the kind of
>movements that will be a match for the beast unless we take these
>problems seriously and address them.

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