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Thursday, September 22, 2005
Slogan Zeros: Predicted Silly Antiwar Demonstration Themes
On Saturday, large numbers of protestors will show up in D.C. and around the country to protest the Iraq War. (A few among them will throw in other wars to protest as well.) As to Iraq, my sympathies are there to the extent that I consider the Iraq Attack one our Greatest National Boo-Boos Ever. And some of the folks involved and participating in Saturday's events are those I know, respect, like, or love.
Still, with groups like ANSWER involved you know it’s going to get really silly. And fast. It’ll quickly devolve into an assemblage of largely militant secular leftists convinced with all their hearts that while there is no God, George W. Bush is nevertheless the Antichrist.
The way to tell the silliness is the slogans. I predict the need-to-be-retired-yesterday themes laid out below will be out and about. They will appear and be notable as chants, signs, and speech themes. (Can anyone suggest others to add? But I don’t want to hear from the pro-war folks for whom everything about the demonstration is bad.)
Silly slogans and themes:
No blood for oil. Retire this one please. Sure oil’s a central consideration in Mideast geopolitics (as it should be) but the stale Leninist/degraded Marxist view – rich people start wars to steal foreign wealth -- is sooooooooo early 20th Century. Discretionary wars actually serve to satiate popular revenge sentiment, economically serve to meet more immediate needs of a military-industrial complex and mass news media, and also help implement ideological visions of superiority. Greed is often central but the greed will be for the gainful employment of the glib political class and professional military suppliers, and may not be for local resources primarily. To assume so is actually bad Marxism, even. (As if it mattered.)
And sometimes a war can be necessary and forced upon one too, even if profitable to some. (Iraq isn’t necessary or forced on us, however).
X lied, Y died. Ok they rhyme. On aesthetic grounds this has to go.
Hey hey, ho ho, occupation’s got to go. Same thing: aesthetic grounds.
Anything with “corporate” in it. “Corporate” has become the softer progressive left’s euphemized garble for the old socialist-Communist epithet “capitalist” (which, folks, is actually kind of a good thing, capitalism). Yes evil “corporate” interests help drive wars, but guess what? Evil doesn’t become better if done by a limited liability partnership, or a sole proprietorship. Most important, it takes a government, not a capitalist, to make wars happen. And a thought: what or who is it that people bring up when they rave about “corporate” pro-war media? Well, Rupert Murdoch, mainly. But he as far as I can tell, is not a corporation but an individual. And who often brings up this corporate evil? Well, groups like Ramsey Clark’s International Action Center, to which ANSWER is associated, and which is apparently funded by a … corporation (and a tax deductible one too!)
Sharon = Hitler OR [Star of David] = [Swastika]. From the pro-Palestinian crowd. I recall an earlier antiwar demonstration in DC in 2003 where there were chants of “death to Sharon” in the middle of this antiwar(!) rally, not to mention Arabic chants about bombing Tel Aviv (few knew this if they weren't Arabic speakers or, in my case, around an Arabic speaker). Now, while I think the Israeli record is far worse than Israel’s knee-jerk fan club will concede, and worse than conventional wisdom appreciates, such noxious and counterproductive sloganeering is basically pro-Palestinians just getting their rhetorical rocks off by offensively and inarticulately trying to say “F.U. Jews and pro-Israelis for bringing up the Holocaust when we state our case.”
Free Mumia. Mumia Abu-Jamal, the apparent cop-killer who got convicted on possibly less-than-reasonable doubt evidence will be lionized. Good Lord, why?
NEW! A Chavez slogan. Something obscenely nice may be said about the Venezuelan generalissimo and Castro-to-be Hugo Chavez.
NEW! Something about Katrina being a sign of racism. I’m kind of sympathetic to the charge of government and Administration serious blundering in regard to the Katrina plans and even to how Iraq detracted from the resources of responsible protection. But the spirit of Kayne West will probably prevail and the whole mess will be blamed on a fantasy regarding George W. Bush’s alleged racism.
On Saturday, large numbers of protestors will show up in D.C. and around the country to protest the Iraq War. (A few among them will throw in other wars to protest as well.) As to Iraq, my sympathies are there to the extent that I consider the Iraq Attack one our Greatest National Boo-Boos Ever. And some of the folks involved and participating in Saturday's events are those I know, respect, like, or love.
Still, with groups like ANSWER involved you know it’s going to get really silly. And fast. It’ll quickly devolve into an assemblage of largely militant secular leftists convinced with all their hearts that while there is no God, George W. Bush is nevertheless the Antichrist.
The way to tell the silliness is the slogans. I predict the need-to-be-retired-yesterday themes laid out below will be out and about. They will appear and be notable as chants, signs, and speech themes. (Can anyone suggest others to add? But I don’t want to hear from the pro-war folks for whom everything about the demonstration is bad.)
Silly slogans and themes:
No blood for oil. Retire this one please. Sure oil’s a central consideration in Mideast geopolitics (as it should be) but the stale Leninist/degraded Marxist view – rich people start wars to steal foreign wealth -- is sooooooooo early 20th Century. Discretionary wars actually serve to satiate popular revenge sentiment, economically serve to meet more immediate needs of a military-industrial complex and mass news media, and also help implement ideological visions of superiority. Greed is often central but the greed will be for the gainful employment of the glib political class and professional military suppliers, and may not be for local resources primarily. To assume so is actually bad Marxism, even. (As if it mattered.)
And sometimes a war can be necessary and forced upon one too, even if profitable to some. (Iraq isn’t necessary or forced on us, however).
X lied, Y died. Ok they rhyme. On aesthetic grounds this has to go.
Hey hey, ho ho, occupation’s got to go. Same thing: aesthetic grounds.
Anything with “corporate” in it. “Corporate” has become the softer progressive left’s euphemized garble for the old socialist-Communist epithet “capitalist” (which, folks, is actually kind of a good thing, capitalism). Yes evil “corporate” interests help drive wars, but guess what? Evil doesn’t become better if done by a limited liability partnership, or a sole proprietorship. Most important, it takes a government, not a capitalist, to make wars happen. And a thought: what or who is it that people bring up when they rave about “corporate” pro-war media? Well, Rupert Murdoch, mainly. But he as far as I can tell, is not a corporation but an individual. And who often brings up this corporate evil? Well, groups like Ramsey Clark’s International Action Center, to which ANSWER is associated, and which is apparently funded by a … corporation (and a tax deductible one too!)
Sharon = Hitler OR [Star of David] = [Swastika]. From the pro-Palestinian crowd. I recall an earlier antiwar demonstration in DC in 2003 where there were chants of “death to Sharon” in the middle of this antiwar(!) rally, not to mention Arabic chants about bombing Tel Aviv (few knew this if they weren't Arabic speakers or, in my case, around an Arabic speaker). Now, while I think the Israeli record is far worse than Israel’s knee-jerk fan club will concede, and worse than conventional wisdom appreciates, such noxious and counterproductive sloganeering is basically pro-Palestinians just getting their rhetorical rocks off by offensively and inarticulately trying to say “F.U. Jews and pro-Israelis for bringing up the Holocaust when we state our case.”
Free Mumia. Mumia Abu-Jamal, the apparent cop-killer who got convicted on possibly less-than-reasonable doubt evidence will be lionized. Good Lord, why?
NEW! A Chavez slogan. Something obscenely nice may be said about the Venezuelan generalissimo and Castro-to-be Hugo Chavez.
NEW! Something about Katrina being a sign of racism. I’m kind of sympathetic to the charge of government and Administration serious blundering in regard to the Katrina plans and even to how Iraq detracted from the resources of responsible protection. But the spirit of Kayne West will probably prevail and the whole mess will be blamed on a fantasy regarding George W. Bush’s alleged racism.
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