Posted on 10/23/2011 10:03:15 AM PDT by A_perfect_lady
Watching the OWS protestors, I realize that everything I need to know about their mentality, I learned from a Marxist anthropology professor ten years ago. I’ll call him Chomsky (it’s not the real Chomsky. Just a knock-off version. Probably made in China.)
My Chomsky believed in what he called “equality of outcome.” Like the protestors, he was very upset that some people made “too much” and others had “not enough.” He wanted everyone to have food, shelter, and clothing. That’s understandable. But it wasn’t all. He wanted them to have education and health care, job counseling, and transportation. Dental. Vision. But there’s more, there’s entertainment, and gifts at Christmas for the children. Yes, he wanted to make absolutely sure everyone had such things. Of course, the rich were to subsidize this.
What exactly did he mean by “the rich”? Well, the line of demarcation between “the rich” and the rest of us was drawn, coincidentally, just above the top salary he could ever expect to attain. Thus, he ensured that he and his family would never be categorized as “rich,” and taxed punitively. He felt this was quite just, that he could identify instinctively what was “enough” for anyone. And it was closely but comfortably above his own satiety level.
This was my first lesson about liberals: they usually manage to land safely in the blameless zone. If they earn $50,000, then $80,000 is rich. If they earn $80,000, then $130,000 is crass. The few who are honest enough (in their own way) to admit they are part of that top 1% have simply identified “enough” as that which satisfies THEM. If it satisfies them, it’s enough for anyone.
My second lesson was that my Chomsky had ideas about those below him as well. Our university professors went on strike that year, protesting their low wages. My Chomsky fumed out loud that they weren’t being paid much more than the university’s landscaping crew. I actually had the satisfaction of asking him – very politely – why he SHOULD be paid more. After all, what happened to equity? He was quite affronted. Did I not know how hard he’d worked for years to attain that Ph.D. in anthropology? Did I not understand that his intellect merited more compensation than a mere gardener? Really!
Finally came the third lesson that transformed me from naïve to enlightened: flustered by my questions, my own little Chomsky went to my graduate advisor and let it be known that I was “too political” for the department. My professors had pictures on their office doors of Che, and caricatures of President Bush. They were not “political,” however; I was. He was very nice about it, I understand. He didn’t want to get me into trouble, he said. But someone really needed to … “have a talk” with me.
And I was talked to.
I watch the OWS protestors now, ten years after this experience, and I see in most of them the same three attitudes as My Chomsky: They should decide how much is enough. They should decide the appropriate compensation. You should agree or be quiet.
There’s a Depeche Mode song parody in that title.....
You understand exactly how they think. Someone should pay for this equality they preach, but it’s never them. They deserve what they get and even more. And they cannot deal with people who don’t agree with them. Those people must be silenced.
From Ogilvy: “Dear old John Burns, the father of the Labor movement in England, used to say that the tragedy of the working class was the poverty of their desires...”
Money for nothing and chicks for free.
Social Justice would have professors working at minimum wage and teaching 8 hr/day.
The narcissism of self, masquerading as empathy for others...
True self sacrifice would be "giving the shirt off your own back" not taking the shirt off others back to give
But I bet he expected students to attend class and participate in order to get a passing grade.
And this would not even strike him as a conflict.
The main thing I have always noticed about leftists is a child-like ignorance of how the world really works. Stamping their feet and yelling “It’s not fair!” is something you expect from a 4 yr old.
Communism is harder to kill than dracula.
Several studies have found that when people are asked to define “rich,” by far the most common response, regardless of personal income level, is twice what they are currently earning.
When my DIL first started college (long story), I helped her with most of her homework. She had this commie, hippie professor for philoshophy. We wrote papers that were so extreme and satirical, and so out there that we giggled the whole time and he fell for them, hook, line and sinker. They were so extreme, Lenin would have hired us for his regime.
My DIL tried reasoning in the beginning but it did no good, the whole class was an inculturation of Communism so we decided to go overboard to see if it phased him and it did but in a good way to him.
I said, "They stop and look back because deer don't understand what a GUN is!" But oh, no, we have to give credence to the Native American interpretation of why deer stop running when they think they are a safe distance away. By this point, I was so exasperated, it was the beginning of the end for me.
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