Revolutions And The People

It is rare today that I read something that sparks a large question mark in my mind, but consider this, no revolution has ever helped the people in need of change. Our own founding included slavery, and while in principle it was egalitarian, our history has shown another side. Did women even exist then. The French revolution soon deteriorated into a mass killing of the very people it was supposed to help. Jesus died before he could create a heaven on earth, while he talked a good game, his heaven had to wait, his followers were quickly busy killing each other. The Russian revolution soon deteriorated into Stalinist paranoid communism. Mao's people's revolution killed millions and hardly changed the lives of the common people. Even material or technological revolutions only create problems of alienation, slave labor conditions, and societal disruptions. The Industrial revolution destroyed farming, created cities full of lives of misery, polluted the environment, and may today finally destroy the earth. Out of our contemporary world of such vast promise, autism figures grow, one in eight women encounter breast cancer, and poverty figures increase. Free market Capitalism creates large trails of misery and regularly collapses as the Great Depression and the recent recession testify. Think also of the Katrina failure. Communism failed, Socialism is an interesting concept but like Christianity never tried. And so it goes....

Why is this, are not revolutions the means to create a society that supports the people. Wasn't the enlightenment about Reason and wasn't Reason the answer to injustice and violence? Wars of the 19th and 20th century show how far reason has gotten humanity. Look only at the wars of the moment. It is always the other side that is unreasonable. Look today at the fact most people on earth live on less than two dollars a day. A child dies every few seconds in the world from preventable causes. Revolutions in Africa become killing fields. One hundred and fifty million children in the world work in sweatshops. Even in America the poor grow poorer, this in a wealthy nation that cannot even provide healthcare for all its citizens. British youth rebel. Egyptians have had enough. Maybe revolutions of all sizes have goals of not a better world, maybe they are for some other purpose. Anyone know?

Will humanity ever advance to a state of nature, a state of peace, that only small tribal groups have ever approached or possessed.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Conservative Apologist

If one thing is clear from the Arizona shooting, it is the inability of those on the right side of the political spectrum in America to face the reality that their words have power. The barrage of excuses and finger pointing is the consistent reaction of a political ideology that dominates much of the air waves today. One would need to believe that Jared Loughner's anger materialized out of thin air and his selection of victim had nothing to do with the political climate in America. This is just another example of an inability of most on the right to face the real world with eyes open. Today there is a bustling business in revising history, and there is conservative money to recreate the past in any number of ways. Examine only the conservative and corporate sponsored think tanks, bloggers, or the so called grass root movements that get lots of press but are corporate sponsored. To be clear, it is money that comes from ideologues who have done well under American capitalism, but ...
Read more

JM's favorite, mostly short, quotes in alphabetical order.

JM's favorite, mostly short, quotes in alphabetical order. Posted blog 02/2019  last edit 04/15/22 List is getting too long but have fun just read the ones that start with a word. ie If or ? "A belief is an uneducated guess." Mokokoma Mokhonoana "A book is a mirror: When a monkey looks in, no apostle can look out."  "A bookstore is one of the only pieces of evidence we have that people are still thinking." Jerry Seinfeld "A brilliant liar; he has total recall." Witold Gombrowicz "A common mistake that people make when trying to design something completely foolproof is to underestimate the ingenuity of complete fools." Douglas Adams "A compromise is an agreement between two men to do what both agree is wrong." Lord Edward Cecil "A conservative believes nothing should be done for the first time." Thomas Fuller "A day without laughter is a day wasted." Charlie Chaplin "A daydreamer is prepared for mos...
Read more

America, The Stupid

The other day a fake commencement address by a right wing talking head, Neal Boortz was praised as the best ever online. Since I know many teachers, and the work they do, and the difficulties they face in a society in which only money and sports are worshiped, I took umbrage with such nonsense. My solution to the buffoon's 'libelous'* speech - I am not sure what word to use when someone who earns their living talking shit all day criticizes people who actually contribute to society - was the old fashioned one, a good punch in the mouth followed by a toss off the stage. How else could you rationally debate a total jackass. I was raised in a world in which the teacher was in charge in the classroom and the student listened. Today in America every moron, with equally moronic parents, is not only right, but the teachers wrong. And then when asked why our students do so poorly, the teachers are blamed. Imagine if little Joanie studied instead of texting and kicking a ball al...
Read more