From: teliok@hotmail.com   
      
   A philosophy that was popular in the 50s and 60s and fell out of vogue with   
   the scions of popular culture was called "Situationism".  This philosophy,   
   based on man's relationship to his envoronment, and the media as a basis for   
   creating and regulating one's perception of reality, tended to view   
   communism as capitalism.   
      
   it worked on this basis.   
      
   Situationists were concerned with various "lies" that were being 'pitched"   
   at the populations of the world.  one of them was that if they stuck to   
   their dull job, and were "productive" there is a chance that they might   
   escape the drudgery, and have many objects which would make them happy.   
      
   Theycompared this to communism, which said that if people would only just   
   work hard in the factories and be productive, they would have the happiness   
   associated with owning their own labour, and they could obtain and consume   
   objects of their work, to the greater good of everyone.   
      
      
   In these analyses they reasoned that communism and capitalism differed only   
   on the nature of the "pitch".  A person's day to day life was essentially,   
   get up, go to work, do a repetative task, and then for one reason or   
   another, consume produced goods for either personal or societal   
   happiness/status.   
      
   They were different modes of the same system.  "Few should own the system!"   
   "no no, many should own the system!"..   
      
   regardless, the situationists saw the left and right as being rather like   
   one side of a long rectangle.  THere is a left and right extreme to that   
   side, but they both share a single extreme when compared with the opposite   
   side of the rectangle... they were variations on a single theme.   
      
   Situationists tended to reject a series of what they saw as myths.  one   
   being that "productivity' is a route to happiness.  They argued that   
   "Creativity" was more important than productivity.  Also, they reasoned that   
   happiness could be achieved by genuine life, and interaction with reality.   
   It's not surprising that times we find ourselves, in retrospct, to have been   
   very happy, are times when we forget our "Function" or "purpose" and are   
   merely interacting with our friends, some strangers, sharing a story,   
   enjoying a walk, playing with a baby.  That type of thing.  These were   
   situations that created an earnest conversatoin with reality.   
      
   Most people, they said, live in total denial of reality.  instead, they   
   preferred to watch TV, and have reality dictated to them.  Or, they went to   
   the cinema, and observed false realities, and alternate histories (consider   
   the recent movie Pearl Harbour, compare it to the actual events... ) which   
   were all designed to constantly and totally and relentlessly pitch the false   
   goals of the system, be they happiness through the consumption of goods, or   
   happiness through the genereal benefit of society...   
      
   A system that offers genuine life needs no sales pitch.  A system that   
   provides happiness needs no marketing.   
      
   Anyhow.. Marshal MacLuhan who had the polar opposite view, it is interesting   
   to note, later in his life recanted, when he realized that the mass media   
   which he had once praised as a possible great liberator of minds and   
   educator of the masses, was nothing more than a cheap and successful method   
   for those in power to espouse their own views while silencing sedition by   
   eliminating it from the reality experienced by people (who experience their   
   reality stricktly through TV, not through the ancient means of being   
   creative and engaging in genuine situations)...   
      
      
   When it comes to Left and Right being blurred, Orwell I think picked up on   
   it perfectly, and indeed, much of what the situationists conclude and   
   discuss is extant in 1984 and Animal Farm.  The use of the every nebulous   
   past, the constant rewriting of history, the everpresent TV screen, the   
   concept that "if you repeat it enough, it will be true, because people   
   forget easily."  If you enjoy 1984, and believe that the mass media does   
   have the potential to misinform or even downright lie to achieve the ends of   
   the wealthy, then i suggest reading the works of Raoul vageneim and Guy   
   Debord.   
      
   A good follow up would be some mcluhan, since he held the opposite viewpoint   
   for a long time, it is interesting to compare their ideas.  Also, some   
   Boudrillard to top it off.. Boudrillard is famous for having said that the   
   "Gulf War Never Happened"...   
      
   a curious and murcurial french intellectual...   
      
   so to recap.. left and right never were different to begin with.   
      
   I remember a good example of the type of difference they had, and it's   
   instructive too to consider it when watching TV news.   
      
   Left and Right are like two roommates arguing over which kind of brush to   
   paint their room with.   
      
   What is left unsaid there is that they have on argument about the final   
   colour or appearance of the room, they also both agree that the room SHOULD   
   be painted.  THese are too foregone and unmentioned conclusions.   
      
   Situationists tended to see themselves as the roommate who not only refused   
   to have the room be painted, but who denied the existence of all colours   
   anyway, and assumed the paintbrushes wouldn't work ...   
      
   alot of TV news has that.. two people debating the method of solving a   
   particular problem, like, should we attack this place by march, or by june.   
   Both people agree it should be attacked, they just differ on when..   
      
   Alot of people allow their view of the "problems to be solved" to be set by   
   TV... problems they didn't even know they had, suddenly they are aware of,   
   and aware of 2 competing solutions!  Then people line up on either side of   
   the debate, whehter they believe they need solution 1, or 2!  But they both   
   just accept that whatever the problem was, it must be real, and it must be   
   solved!  and anyone who doesn't like the solution THEY picked is crazy!  but   
   people who deny that there was even a problem in the first place/  They're   
   TOTALLY INSANE!  people who dare to mention that there might be more   
   impoirtant or material problems?  They get totally ignored.. and so no one   
   hears them...   
      
      
   i'm rambling..   
      
   please read thea bove mentioned authors..   
      
      
   "Black Minorca Pullets"  wrote in message   
   news:bbd13306.0412021437.7aa9302f@posting.google.com...   
   > It is very prescient that Orwell had the commies and the capitalists   
   > sitting at the same table and "nobody could tell which was which".   
   > Now we have the Russian oligarchs ham handing their way through Europe   
      
   [continued in next message]   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)