[Peace-discuss] [sf-core] The AWARE S.O.A.P. Box

[C. G. Estabrook]

Q: ... What have you changed in the past 45 years?

Chomsky: I personally did not change anything. I was part of a  
movement and this movement accomplished many things. The world today  
is fundamentally different from the world 45 years ago. The actions  
for civil rights, human rights, women’s rights and environmental  
protection, resistance against oppression and violence have  
substantially influenced the world. I cannot understand how you can  
argue nothing has changed.

Q: Do you believe the world is better today than 40 or 50 years ago?

Chomsky: Obviously! Walk along the open fields here at the  
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Half of the students are women;  
a third belongs to an ethnic minority. People are dressed more  
casually and are engaged for all possible things. This place was very  
different when I came here 50 years ago. Then you saw white men,  
formally dressed and only interested in their own work. You could see  
the same development in Germany and all over the world.

Q: But are students more political? Today’s generation is often  
reproached for being disinterested in the world.

Chomsky: I think that reproach is false. The period of high  
politization at the universities was very short -- from 1968 to 1970.  
Before that, students were apolitical. Consider the Vietnam War, one  
of the greatest crimes since the Second World War. Four or five years  
went by until some form of visible protest stirred in the US. That  
quickly ebbed away in the 1970s. The mood was very different before  
the Iraq war. To my knowledge, the Iraq war was the first war in  
history where there were demonstrations before it began. My students  
missed the lectures to demonstrate. That would never have happened 50  
years ago. The protests did not prevent the war but limited it. The US  
was never able to do in Iraq a fraction of what it had done in Vietnam.

Q: Were those protests only a straw fire?

Chomsky: No. The politization today is much greater than in the 1950s.  
Forms of lasting activism developed that enabled many of our battles  
to be won. For example, there was a continuous progress in women’s  
rights. If I had asked my grandmother whether she was oppressed, she  
wouldn’t have known what I was talking about. My mother said: "I am  
oppressed but I don’t know what to do!" My daughter would shout to me  
after such a question: Our world is more human!

Q: Do you believe in historical progress?

Chomsky: Progress is slow but dramatic over long time horizons. Think  
of the abolition of slavery or the development of freedom of  
expression. Rights are not simply bestowed. People who joined forces  
and banded together realized them. Still progress is not a linear  
development. There are also times of backward steps.

Q: If there are times of progress and times of backward steps, will  
the world be better in 50 years than today?

Chomsky: What will be in 50 years depends strongly on what the young  
generation does today. Two great dangers threaten the existence of the  
world: our relation to the environment and the danger that starts from  
nuclear weapons. If we do not champion environmental protection more  
vigorously today, we could be mired in a grave environmental crisis in  
50 years, let alone the risks of nuclear weapons. The terrible  
catastrophe of Fukushima reminds us that the non-military use of  
nuclear power is fraught with extreme risks. We cannot ignore this  
under any circumstances!

Q: In 60 years students of today will be as old as you. What must they  
do to look back on their life with satisfaction?

Chomsky: Naturally they could say they lived contentedly with friends,  
children and fun. But to really lead a fulfilled and satisfying life,  
they should recognize problems and contribute to solving them. If they  
cannot look back at 80 and say "I have accomplished something!," then  
their life will not have succeeded.

Q: At 82, are you satisfied with what you achieved?

Chomsky: Being satisfied is impossible. My life has too many  
dimensions, family, profession, politics and several others. In some  
areas I am satisfied but not in others. The problems of this world are  
quite great. Inequality in the US is at the level of the 1920s and the  
economy still has tremendous influence in our society. I cannot be  
satisfied!

Q: Political engagement like yours is rare among scholars. Are you  
sometimes furious at the "servants of power" as you say or at  
professor colleagues who only concentrate on their academic work?

Chomsky: I consider it immoral to be a supporter of a power system.  
However that does not mean that I am furious at anyone. Scholars per  
se do not have deeper political insights than other persons and are  
not morally superior to others. But they are obligated to help  
politicians seek and find the truth.

Q: That sounds like you are becoming mild in old age.

Chomsky: No. My views and attitudes have not changed in the course of  
the decades. I still believe what I believed as a teenager.

Q: Is that good -- to still believe what you believed almost 70 years  
ago?

Chomsky: Yes, when fundamental principles are involved. Obviously I  
have changed my opinions in many questions -- but my ideals are the  
same!

Q: You often say you are an anarchist. What do you mean by that?

Chomsky: Anarchists try to identify power structures. They urge those  
exercising power to justify themselves. This justification does not  
succeed most of the time. Then anarchists work at unmasking and  
mastering the structures, whether they involve patriarchal families, a  
Mafia international system or the private tyrannies of the economy,  
the corporation.

Q: What was the key experience that made you an anarchist?

Chomsky: There was none. When I was twelve years old, I began to go to  
secondhand bookshops. Many of them were run by anarchists who came  
from Spain. Therefore it seemed very natural to me to be an anarchist.

Q: Should all students become anarchists?

Chomsky: Yes. Students should challenge authorities and join a long  
anarchist tradition.

Q: "Challenge authorities" -- a liberal or a moderate leftist could  
accept that invitation.

Chomsky: As soon as one identifies, challenges and overcomes  
illegitimate power, he or she is an anarchist. Most people are  
anarchists. What they call themselves doesn’t matter to me.

Q: Who or what must challenge today’s student generation?

Chomsky: This world is full of suffering, distress, violence and  
catastrophes. Students must decide: does something concern you or not?  
I say: look around, analyze the problems, ask yourself what you can do  
and set out on the work!

[From <http://chomsky.info/interviews/20110614_en.htm>]


On May 17, 2012, at 5:06 PM, Morton K. Brussel wrote:

> Chomsky offers us insightful reflections, but one thing which I find  
> troubling in his discourse, and I wonder if he does this  
> purposefully and knowingly, it's that despite the apparent decline  
> in our society in so many ways, he always ultimately says that it is  
> better now than it was in the past. I think he is wrong here, but  
> perhaps that is not a good message for activists.
>
> --mkb