We Don't Need Them

[Dover]

We Don’t Need Them
by Joe Carpenter
www.dissidentvoice.org
November 2, 2005

But the proles, if only they could somehow become conscious of their own strength, would have no reason to conspire. They needed only to rise up and shake themselves, like a horse shaking off flies. If they chose, they could blow the party to pieces tomorrow morning. Surely, sooner or later, it must occur to them to do it? And yet --

-- George Orwell, 1984


I’ve never understood the idea of speaking truth to power. The truth, surely, is that in almost all countries of the world, political and economic systems are designed to benefit only the rich and powerful, at the expense of those with less money and power. This is how the world works, and I see no reason to think that the powerful don’t already understand that. After all, they designed it; they maintain it.

They steal our money, sacrifice our children in their wars, send the poorest and most victimized among us off to jail for petty mistakes, and crush those of us who might present a real threat to the arrangement. They know we don’t like it. They don’t care. They don’t need to care. They also control most of our avenues of dissent. It’s a very simple, very elegant design.

Meanwhile, we get angry and toddle off to tell the truth to the powerful. We have been telling them the truth for centuries. We travel to their great palaces by the hundreds of thousands, to express our anger and despair. We shout and sing and stomp and whine. We threaten. We plead. Sometimes we’re beaten up, or sent to jail. It’s a tradition of great courage and personal sacrifice, no doubt.

We go to tell them to stop using our money and our children and our energy and intelligence to further rob and rape and murder us. We tell them to be more respectful and compassionate. We’re like angry but terrorized children, anxiously scolding our stern, all-powerful parents. And, in the end, we look to the Democrats or to some congressional panel or to the Supreme Court and demand that they come to our aid. As my friend Harry puts it: “We’re left in the terrible position of trying to decide which elite group will be less likely to prey on us.”

Well, the government and their pals are not going to stop using and abusing us. They’re not going to stop preying on us. They cannot stop! Republican or Democrat, they are rich and powerful precisely because they prey on us. They are rich because they rob us. They’re robbing us right this minute. They are powerful because they dominate every aspect of our lives, because they’ve taken control of all the major social, political, economic, and communication systems in the world. These systems were designed to increase their wealth and power by taking both from all the rest of us...cont'd

http://www.dissidentvoice.org/Nov05/Carpenter1102.htm

[drb]

1. As previously posted, it's high time to buy guns and ammo.

Now, I've never owned a gun, and my dad never owned a gun.

But I'm in the market now.

[Dover]

2. Either you didn't READ the article, or you have determined the solutions

it proposes are ineffective. But no where in the article were GUNS mentioned as part of the solution.

[firefox]

3. We have representation without representation nt

Oh yeah, and the wealthy have representation without taxation.

[Zodiak]

4. I'll bite

I read the article in its entirety, and I agree that we need to tell all of our friends and neighbors as much of the truth as we can. Look at Bush's poll numbers. He is tanking hard, but there goes the government once again passing unpopular policies that are enforced on our population under the threat of force, loss of livelihood, etc. We watched with our own eyes as the government killed many people in NO by wanton neglect.

There is no stopping it, and the party in power does not care who they damage or how unpopular they are any more. People are waking up...in fact, many have, but there is nowhere to go from there.

So you know Bush is corrupt and a criminal and that his cronies need to be gone. So what? What can we DO about it? I ask this because many of us no longer have faith in our electoral system (the machines, the skewed media, the partisan Secretaries of State, the ID requirements, absentee voting purges, etc.), and frankly, our government seems to believe they are immune from electoral politics, as well. We aren't going to get rid of these people by talking about them or voting against them. Someone is going to have to do something one day.

Suppose we do. Tell me how are we going to get rid of them peacefully? General strikes?...good idea, but often these strikes result in violence or quasi-violence (sonic tanks, tasers, rubber bulets, etc). Violence will befall those who oppose the power structures in this country, make no mistake. Violence is uncontrollable, having a tendency to spread and cross battle-lines. It is for that uncertainty that I think the above poster is referring when he says he is getting a gun.

We honestly don't know if we can do this peacefully. We can believe it, but we should still plan for the worst. I applaud the author's idea of spreading the word in our communities, but I do not think that his suggestions are going to end this nightmare, only make more aware of it to make ending it a possibility.

[Dover]

5. I think the point is that WE can't have any effect unless there is a

real grasp of just who WE are and how big WE is...to recognize our true power. The most damaging achievement of all the propaganda games has been to exploit divisions and make the vast majority feel as though they were a minority.

It may or may not be a peaceful transition once people are aware of their true power in numbers, but violence is NOT necessary. If the corporation's greatest fear is the bottom line and control, then that can be easily responded to without violence so long as the majority is working together. So the question should be, perhaps, how do WE recognize our own power and then how do WE cooperate and coordinate our efforts to undermine the elite few's attempts to stay in power? It's really surprising how subtle the effort can be once everyone's on board, in order to have a big effect.