Cruel Indifference

Cruel Indifference, Book Review of "Hegemony or Survival," A Masa'il
Disquisition

By John Taylor; 12 December, 2005

Today let us review a fairly recent book called:

Noam Chomsky, Hegemony or Survival, America's Quest for Global
Dominance, Henry Holt and Company, New York, 2003

This as far as I know is the latest book of a series lasting decades
by the world's greatest linguist reviewing the sinister power politics
lurking behind recent history and events still unfolding. Why does a
linguist need to do an historian's work? Because, it seems, historians
are easily fooled by the language that power mongers use. Sly words
fool them, throw them off the track and they miss the whole discourse
behind world events. For example, historians probably read the
following comment of President Truman and laughed heartily. A
linguist, on the other hand, can see beyond the cleverness and
deconstruct an imperial president's bigotry:

"Truman was outraged by India's disobedience. His reaction, no less
elegant than the current reaction to disobedience of Old Europe and
Turkey, was that India must have "consulted Uncle Joe and Mousie Dung
of China." The white man got a name, not just a vulgar epithet. Partly
that may be ordinary racism, or perhaps it is because Truman genuinely
liked and admired "Old Joe," who reminded him of the Missouri boss who
had launched his political career. In the late 1940's, Truman found
Old Joe to be a "decent fellow," though "a prisoner of the politburo"
who "can't do what he wants to." Mousie Dung, however, was a yellow
devil." (Hegemony, 153)

What historian even knows the difference between a name and an
epithet? I sure did not. That is why no historian can touch Chomsky,
even though he is trampling on their home ground.

The thesis of "Hegemony or Survival" is simple and clear. The world
has two choices, the current American Empire or survival. Unlike past
tyrannies, the American Empire has the entire planet by the throat. It
is not a question of mere massive injustice or extermination of
millions as it was in the past, the very survival of the human race is
at stake. Billions, not millions of victims, total destruction of the
environment, suicidal wars whenever it suits a cabal of ignoramuses.

Interestingly, Chomsky holds that though most people think that there
is only one superpower at large in the world, they are wrong. There
are in effect two rival superpowers, the American Regime and world
opinion. And since world opinion does not have on its side the One
Percent Who Own Just About Everything (the OPWOJAE --my term, not
Chomsky's), not to mention the massive military machine that the
OPWOJAE's huge resources fund, the only role of the second superpower
is to act as a sort of Greek chorus. It can impotently comment on what
is happening, and deplore the onrushing end of the human race. The
only way the chorus can hope do its job of saving the world is to sing
very loudly and on cue. And it does.

"You are killing us. We are all in the same boat. If the boat sinks
you will go down too, no matter how rich and protected you think you
are."

So as the OPWOJAE and its puppet, the American Empire, were preparing
to invade Iraq, world opinion did something unprecedented in world
history, it engaged in massive peace demonstrations before the war had
actually begun! Good move, but it was a cantor's tactic, utterly
non-violent and ineffectual. No matter how loud and prompt their
voices, you cannot send a choir against tanks and guns and the OPWOJAE
know it well.

Chomsky's linguistic ability is needed to inject satire where a
professional satirist would throw up his hands in despair. You cannot
satirize these paid mouthpieces of power any more than you can mock a
ventriloquist's dummy. Anything you say about the dummy is directed
off stage, it bounces off the dummy and goes nowhere. That does not
daunt Chomsky. As a trained linguist, he does not let a sentence go
by, or even a clause or sub clause, subjunctive or not, without
refuting the OPWOJAE and their minions. Here, though, is a fairly rare
example where he resorts to satire.

"Eliminating social programs has goals that go well beyond
concentration of wealth and power. Social security, public schools,
and other such deviations from the "right way" that US military power
is to impose upon the world, as frankly declared, are based on evil
doctrines, among them the pernicious belief that we should care, as a
community, whether the disabled widow on the other side of town can
make it through the day, or the child next door should have a chance
for a decent future. These evil doctrines derive from the principle of
sympathy that was taken to be the core of human nature by Adam Smith
and David Hume, a principle that must be driven from the mind."
(Hegemony, 119-120)

This, Baha'is will recall, is the principle we call the oneness of
humanity, the core principle of everything we know and hold divine. I
note that a professor of religious studies in the States specializing
in Christian fundamentalism is in very hot water right now for calling
them on his website "moral retards." His mistake was not expressing
what is not obvious to all observers, it was saying it of those with
their fingers on the pulse of power. You cannot do that and not suffer
consequences. But think about it. Chomsky mentions Smith and Hume, but
before them was a guy called Jesus Christ and all His talk about being
a Good Samaritan. Who but a moral retard would cast aside the
substance of the teachings of Christianity and implicate themselves in
the most brutal, heartless regime in the history of the world?

Chomsky continues this passage, solving a little mystery that I
mentioned a few essays ago. "Why is it," I wondered, "That investors
are intentionally flooded by the media with data about the stock
market when increased data flow actually leads to decisions that lose
money, that never improves a portfolio?" Here is why.

"Privatization has other benefits. If working people depend upon the
stock market for their pensions, health care, and other means of
survival, they have a stake in undermining their own interests:
opposing wage increases, health and safety regulations, and other
measures that might cut into profits that flow to the benefactors on
whom they must rely, in a manner reminiscent of feudalism." (Hegemony,
120)

This is one of the few moments in Chomsky where you get an explanation
of what is going on in the heads of the OPWOJAE. Most of the time,
though, he is an unrelenting recorder of every one of the thousands of
lies, evil deeds and dirty tricks that these power mongers come up
with to rationalize doing what they please. Since mostly the American
Empire is concerned with intimidation and state terror, that is what
you get from Chomsky's record. You are in clear and present danger,
that is, of getting depressed if you do not take Chomsky in small
doses.

What I do sometimes to get a writer out of my system to check out his
opponents on Google. But if you do that with Chomsky you do not come
up with much. The most substantive criticism you will find is that
enemies read him carefully and make use of his points to undermine
American foreign policy goals. In other words, they do not challenge
what he says, only the uses to which it is put. Nobody can deny that
he documents everything that he says very carefully. If the pile of
footnotes at the back of this book are not enough for you, you can go
to the author's website and read even more. Um. No thanks.

In interviews Chomsky is often asked why it is that he is allowed to
go about impervious when other critics, such as certain Black Panthers
leaders, get wasted with extreme prejudice by establishment stooges,
as he himself documents. He always answers, "Because I am a member of
the elite that I am attacking." In other words, being the world's
greatest linguist has its privileges. Wait a minute! I am not the
world's greatest linguist. There is nothing to protect me if I agree
with Chomsky. Maybe I had better shut up or I will be exterminated
too.

These and other depressing thoughts were running through my head just
before the Feast of Questions last night. At the last minute I
remembered that the LSA, in view of the Master's admonition to teach
children to give public talks from an early age, had asked that 11
year old Silvie give a short talk during the business portion of the
Feast. Thinking fast, I rifled through Paris Talks to find the
shortest disquisition in there for her to read aloud. I picked what
seemed the briefest and read it aloud to her beforehand to sort out
the pronunciation of the hard words. When we were there she
reluctantly agreed, lamely protesting: "I should memorize it
beforehand, then I will be able to do the proper hand motions." I
replied, "Next time, my dear, for now just read it. We will practice
more next time." Then as I listened to her, and she did read it very
well in clarion tones once she got going, I heard the Master's words
in a new light. God chose that talk for me, just then, to answer my
questions. I felt `Abdu'l-Baha's anger with the cynical way of the
world, and how similar his anger is to Chomsky's bitterness.

Before, I had taken this talk to be about the local bias that the
press must have in order to attract local readers. But no, that was
not it at all. He was talking about the Italo-Turkish war, one of the
invisible, contained conflicts that go on when the mainstream press
pronounces the world at peace. But `Abdu'l-Baha could not have been
indifferent to this smoldering conflict, especially since He had been
refused entry into several hotels during His recent time in America on
the suspicion that his party of exotically dressed non-whites were
Turkish. Even when it was explained that He had been a prisoner of the
Turks for four decades, they were not swerved in segregating their
superiority away. This is especially amazing since Italy was a
barefaced aggressor in this war. Surely a just person would sympathize
with the Turks on principle, but no, since the Italians' skin was
lighter and they followed the Christian faith, they had the
unqualified sympathy of most Americans at the time. Now of course race
and religion do not enter in, if you exclude the Iraq conflicts,
Kosovo, East Timor, Chechnya, Afghanistan, Palestine, and thousands of
other "limited" (read "not between Christian, white nations")
conflicts. The question I asked myself was, "How many of these bloody
wars by proxy would the American Empire have been able to sponsor if
it were not for the cruel indifference of most people?" Not bloody
many you can bet on it. So the reality behind Chomsky's reality is a
spirituality gap of huge proportions.

Anyway, without further ranting, here is the full text of the Master's
talk that Silvie read for the Feast of Questions.

THE CRUEL INDIFFERENCE OF PEOPLE TOWARDS THE SUFFERING OF FOREIGN RACES
November 24th (1913)

'Abdu'l-Baha said:

I have just been told that there has been a terrible accident in this
country. A train has fallen into the river and at least twenty people
have been killed. This is going to be a matter for discussion in the
French Parliament today, and the Director of the State Railway will be
called upon to speak. He will be cross-examined as to the condition of
the railroad and as to what caused the accident, and there will be a
heated argument. I am filled with wonder and surprise to notice what
interest and excitement has been aroused throughout the whole country
on account of the death of twenty people, while they remain cold and
indifferent to the fact that thousands of Italians, Turks, 115 and
Arabs are killed in Tripoli! The horror of this wholesale slaughter
has not disturbed the Government at all! Yet these unfortunate people
are human beings too.

Why is there so much interest and eager sympathy shown towards these
twenty individuals, while for five thousand persons there is none?
They are all men, they all belong to the family of mankind, but they
are of other lands and races. It is no concern of the disinterested
countries if these men are cut to pieces, this wholesale slaughter
does not affect them! How unjust, how cruel is this, how utterly
devoid of any good and true feeling! The people of these other lands
have children and wives, mothers, daughters, and little sons! In these
countries today there is hardly a house free from the sound of bitter
weeping, scarcely can one find a home untouched by the cruel hand of
war.

Alas! we see on all sides how cruel, prejudiced and unjust is man, and
how slow he is to believe in God and follow His commandments.

If these people would love and help one another instead of being so
eager to destroy with sword and cannon, how much nobler would it be!
How much better if they would live like a flock of doves in peace and
harmony, instead of being like wolves and tearing each other to
pieces.

Why is man so hard of heart? It is because he does not yet know God.
If he had knowledge of God he could not act in direct opposition to
His laws; if he were spiritually minded such a line of conduct would
be impossible to him. If only the laws and precepts of 116 the
prophets of God had been believed, understood and followed, wars would
no longer darken the face of the earth.

If man had even the rudiments of justice, such a state of things would
be impossible.

Therefore, I say unto you pray -- pray and turn your faces to God,
that He, in His infinite compassion and mercy, may help and succour
these misguided ones. Pray that He will grant them spiritual
understanding and teach them tolerance and mercy, that the eyes of
their minds may be opened and that they may be endued with the gift of
the spirit. Then would peace and love walk hand in hand through the
lands, and these poor unhappy people might have rest.

Let us all strive night and day to help in the bringing about of
better conditions. My heart is broken by these terrible things and
cries aloud -- may this cry reach other hearts!

Then will the blind see, the dead will be raised, and Justice will
come and reign upon the earth.

I beseech you all to pray with heart and soul that this may be accomplished.

(Abdu'l-Baha, Paris Talks, p. 113)

--
John Taylor

badijet@gmail.com