{"id":2101,"date":"2012-05-07T17:20:38","date_gmt":"2012-05-07T21:20:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.peoplevstate.com\/?p=2101"},"modified":"2012-05-07T17:20:38","modified_gmt":"2012-05-07T21:20:38","slug":"compare-and-contrast","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.peoplevstate.com\/?p=2101","title":{"rendered":"Compare and Contrast"},"content":{"rendered":"

Fear and Loathing: Manipulation of the Liberty Movement<\/a>, by Bruce Jay at the Daily Anarchist:<\/p>\n

Is there any reason to believe the end is coming soon?<\/strong><\/p>\n

In our lifetimes, the answer is no. It\u2019s all about time. The greatest of all empires, the Roman Empire<\/a>, collapsed over many centuries, not in a few days, years, or even decades.\u00a0 Most living in Rome were not aware of the decline in real-time.\u00a0 How could they?<\/p>\n

Twenty years ago, my roommate commented that we were living in the decline of the American Empire.\u00a0 She was most likely right, but twenty years later the change has been practically imperceptible. In terms of economic and political freedom, nothing has really changed. The most glaring exception is the TSA. In market driven areas (e.g., technology, communication, and medicine), things have vastly improved.<\/p>\n

Furthermore, the passing of generations adds to the loss of perspective. If you\u2019re four years old today, going to the airport and being molested\u00a0by the TSA <\/a>is nothing new to your life experience and hence, you have nothing to compare. God knows how many things I have taken for granted in my lifetime (e.g., income taxes) because I\u2019ve never known any different. Funny, we often laugh at the elderly for their ideas and experiences, yet they are true witnesses of change. Sadly, most have passed on before any of us are old enough to know the right questions to ask.<\/p>\n

The point is you can\u2019t plan for doomsday because the process is slow and it takes place in the form of erosion, not catastrophe.\u00a0 When the demise finally occurs, it has taken so many years to complete that those who might notice have died; others are acclimated from birth and have made the necessary economic and psychological adjustments. Of course, you can leave all your gold, guns, and gas masks to your great grandchildren.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The Policeman’s Your Friend — As Long As He Can Afford to Be<\/a>, by Kevin Carson at the Center for a Stateless Society:<\/p>\n

What we\u2019re witnessing is the reality behind that Officer Friendly mask. This is what happens when the state perceives the general population as a threat, and drops the pretense that The Policeman is Your Friend.<\/p>\n

People in predominantly black and Hispanic inner city neighborhoods \u2014 where police hardly bother to hide the fact that they see the local population as an occupied enemy that must be cowed by superior force \u2014 have seen this ugly face for decades. But in recent months, the radical upsurge in police violence at Occupy demonstrations, combined with ubiquitous cell phone video, have introduced the naked face of power to many in the white middle class public for the first time.<\/p>\n

Lt. Pike of the UC Davis police force, methodically directing pepper spray into the upturned faces of peaceful (and predominantly white) college students, was a revelation to many in the burbs. But while it was the first sight for many, it won\u2019t be the last. Because this is what the state looks like when it can no longer afford to maintain the facade of democracy. All that nasty stuff that used to happen to \u201cthose other people\u201d beyond that Thin Blue Line \u2014 \u201cIt\u2019s Giuliani time!\u201d \u2014 is coming soon to \u201cpeople like us.\u201d<\/p>\n

The American state has operated in a manner, if not lawful at least \u201cregular,\u201d toward most white middle-class folks most of the time, because it could afford to. It showed its nasty side to racial minorities and radicals, because they were less successfully socialized into consensus reality \u2014 and nobody \u201cwho counted\u201d would listen to them anyway. But most of the public absorbed its conditioning in a more-or-less satisfactory manner. They believed this was a \u201cfree enterprise society\u201d in which people with great wealth mostly earned it, giant corporations got that way through superior performance, the state represented all of us rather than some \u201cruling class,\u201d and if you didn\u2019t like the law you should work for change within the system \u2014 all that Pleasantville stuff. Constitutionalism and legality\u2019s comparatively no-muss no-fuss \u2014 but only so long as the cultural reproduction apparatus successfully manufactures consent.<\/p>\n

Now the conditioning\u2019s starting to wear off. A dangerously increasing number of people understand that the system\u2019s rigged in the interest of the 1%, and folks like us are playing in a crooked game. The state and the corporate ruling class that controls it have been stunned as measures that ten years ago would have gone through without a hitch, like SOPA and ACTA, suffered unexpected losses to networked movements. The system can\u2019t work when too many people notice the man behind the curtain.<\/p>\n

The state\u2019s functionaries are beginning to realize how high the stakes really are. In response, its shock troops are dropping the Officer Friendly masks. So get ready: The state, before it\u2019s over, will be as nasty as it has to be.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Fear and Loathing: Manipulation of the Liberty Movement, by Bruce Jay at the Daily Anarchist: Is there any reason to believe the end is coming soon? In our lifetimes, the answer is no. It\u2019s all about time. The greatest of all empires, the Roman Empire, collapsed over many centuries, not in a few days, years, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2101","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.peoplevstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2101","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.peoplevstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.peoplevstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.peoplevstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.peoplevstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2101"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.peoplevstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2101\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2102,"href":"https:\/\/www.peoplevstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2101\/revisions\/2102"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.peoplevstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2101"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.peoplevstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2101"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.peoplevstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2101"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}