reply to post by soficrow
I hope so!!!
Let's break the parameters of the paradigms and re-set OUR world!
Breaking the Parameters of the Parasitic-Paradigm
Haven’t I said that the story is ambient in your culture?
Children assemble it from many media…
You’ve obviously turned off your mind.
Mother Culture has crooned you to sleep.
-Ishmael (Quinn, 1992, p. 3)
Discourse creates paradigms and it is within these paradigms that societies are. Therefore, the ability to control discourse parlays into the
ability to control how society is.
Telecommunications infrastructures have changed the procedures and tools needed to dominate discourse. The transmission mediums are no longer mothers
and nurses telling city-state approved stories orally to children as in ancient Grecian society (see Plato, The Republic, Book II ). The use of
transmission mediums that rely upon the electro-magnetic spectrum now facilitate communication arrangements. The radical disintegration of spatial
and temporal dimensions of communication arrangements brought about by the use of the electromagnetic spectrum for communication has increased the
breadth and depth, the complexity and intensity, of the struggle between powerbrokers (known here as “the passengers”) and the masses (known here
as “the pullers/toilers”) to control discourse, and subsequently control society. Communication arrangements have changed; yet, American
government is still eerily Ancient Greek-like; it is manipulatively logocratic , overtly plutocratic , unjustly kleptocratic and downright
hegemonic; rather than actually democratic . The prevailing local and global discourse is manufactured and maintained, and undemocratically and
hegemonically dominated, by “the passengers,” by a gang of ‘wealthy’ humans.
The struggle to control the discourse is a struggle between the takers and the leavers (Quinn, 1992), between the passengers in riding in sections A
[armed forces], B [bureaucracy], and C [corporate power] of the coach (society) and the toilers who pull the coach (Bellamy, 1888; Green, 2001),
between the powerful few and the masses of humanity (Blum, 2004; Herring, 2008; Rothkopf, 2006). The passengers and the toilers struggle to dominant
discourse in order to dominate society so that they are able to attain their respective desired socio-economic dynamics; those being, an ‘earth
raping, coach-like, parasitic socio-economic dynamic’ versus an ‘earth preserving, everyone walking, symbiotic socio-economic dynamic’.
Instead of a symbiotic relationship among humans, the dominant paradigm we’ve been conditioned to think and operate within demands that some
passengers ride, while others toil and pull. Adam Smith summed up the logistical view that supports this philosophy when he wrote the following in
“The Wealth of Nations”:
“Among civilised and thriving nations… a great number of people do not labour at all, many of whom consume the produce of ten times, frequently of
a hundred times more labour than the greater part of those who work; yet the produce of the whole labour of the society is so great that all are often
abundantly supplied, and a workman, even of the lowest and poorest order, if he is frugal and industrious, may enjoy a greater share of the
necessaries and conveniences of life than it is possible for any savage [!??] to acquire. The causes of this improvement, in the productive powers of
labour, and the order, according to which its produce is naturally distributed among the different ranks and conditions of men in the society, make
the subject of the first book of this Inquiry.”
Of course this view and the paradigm it supports is fallacious and immoral.
Everyone should be walking.
The masses of toilers can and should dismantle the paradigm and replace it with one that respects the commons, and does not segregate the commons so
that most of it is controlled by only a few, while the rest of the populace get scraps that they are told they otherwise would not have. The toilers
must regain control over discourse to break free of this unacceptable paradigm. To do so they must understand the way in which the passengers’
chosen discourse controls society, break that control and build communication situations that head in an opposite direction, toward a non-parasitic
paradigm.
Again, today, mediums are no longer mothers and nurses, mediums are so vast and quick that the messages can break former time and space constraints,
and when they do, they are much more consequential. Today, technology is embedded in the communication arrangements in such a way that control over
the mediums and/or controlling the messages carried by the mediums is more potent a power than ever. In a way, and in the words of others,
telecommunications “collapses distance, between here and there, near and far, fact and fiction. It widens the distance between those who have and
those who have not. Representing the most penetrating and sharpest (to the point of invisibility) edge of globalization, it disappears the local and
the particular. It leaves little space for the detached observer.” (Der Darian, 2001, p. xviii) “We walk around with media-generated images of
the world, using them to construct meaning about political and social issues. The lens through which we receive these images is not neutral but
evinces the power and point of view of the political and economic elites, [the passengers], who operate and focus it. And the special genius of this
system is to make the whole process seem so normal and natural that the very art of social construction is invisible.” (Gamson et al, 1992, p.
9)
The message and the medium are equally important, equally used, equally effective in the quest to build-up and maintain unpopular paradigms, in the
quest to manipulate perspective. However, it is easier to control the message, whether sent or received or in mid transmission, if in control of the
medium. This goes back to Plato. He understood that the content of the stories, the messages, were very important to social manipulation missions,
however, he honed in on the mothers and nurses because he knew these were the transmission facilitators, they were the mediums. Today, the mediums
are satellites and transmission materials in towers, a variety of cables, the electricity or power plants they require, and more, including, again,
the electromagnetic spectrum .
Telecommunications infrastructure has replaced mothers and nurses in discourse schematics. When Disney broadcasted its’ messages throughout Chilean
culture via telecommunication, local intellectuals recognized the stories transmitted by the megaspectacle that is the medium called television as
intentionally socializing. They coined the term ‘media imperialism’ to describe Disney’s use of media to infiltrate, erase, and replace culture
(Dorfman, 1983). As well, local Iraqi and Afghani intellectuals realized that telecommunications infrastructure were pivotal in discourse control
schematics. Not only did the American military pay private companies to create news outlets, write stories, and publicize them in a way that
attempted to camouflage the source, they choose broadcasting stations to be amongst the first targets in their so-called strategic airstrikes
(Barker, 2002). Too often, discourse control by way of monopolizing telecommunication mediums goes unnoticed, and the powerful are further empowered
and the not so powerful are further unknowingly disempowered. In Hope’s Edge, Francis Moore Lappé writes, “…most of us are [trapped] in the
dominant ideas of our modern world, solidified in the last thirty years and reinforced daily by ever-more concentrated media. These ideas have become
“thought traps,” making us believe our only path is the one we’re on, blinding us to solutions already in bud and within the reach of each of
us.”
The media is indeed “ever-more concentrated” in the hands of the passengers (Sarikakis, 2004). Josh Silver of the media reform group ‘Free
Press’ said of the current attempt by the largest TV cable provider in America to merge with another large media corporation, “If Washington
allows this deal to go through, Comcast will have unprecedented control of marquee content and three major distribution platforms: Internet, broadcast
and cable. We’ve never seen this kind of consolidated control.” The owning of mediums to such a drastic extent occur when both infrastructural
and institutional entities are able to be controlled by the passengers. The parasitic paradigm that ABCs operate within allows for, and indeed
encourages, this control. A recent study of medium ownership in ninety-seven countries found that across the world the largest media firms are owned
by the passengers. Moreover, during the study, two theories of government ownership of the media were examined. The public interest theory,
according to which, government ownership alleviates market malfunction. And the public choice theory, according to which, government ownership
undermines political and economic freedom. The data supported the public choice theory. The authors of the study concluded that the evidence was
“broadly consistent with the ideas that there is large amenity potential (control benefits) associated with owning [mediums]” (Djankov et al,
2003).
Interestingly, the monopolization of media to control discourse was acknowledged decades ago. At a conference in Mexico in 1976, it was said within
the final statement that "News has become a mere merchandise to be sold according to the 'logic' of the dominant market, and, consequently, cannot
reflect the historical, cultural, and political realities that give facts their real dimension.” In 1983, in his book Media Monopoly, Ben Bagdikian
declared that the “result of the overwhelming power [enabled by the revolving door] … has been the creation of widely established political and
economic illusions [or fallacious paradigms] with little visible contradictions in the media to which a majority of the population is exclusively
exposed.” He went on to say, that at “issue is the possession of power to surround almost every man, woman and child in the country with
controlled images and words, to socialize each new generation…” And, yet, still, the toilers have not solved the problem. On the contrary the
situation, arguably, has worsened, despite ‘new media’. The parasitic paradigm is pervasive and difficult to see past when the most highly
funded, most widely sent and received messages, support it.
The passengers continually move between sections A, B, and C. This dance is known as the ‘revolving door’. For example, Gregg Rothschild was
Vice President of Government Relations at Verizon after spending over a decade in government positions. Dorthy Attwood is now Senior Vice President
of Regulatory, Planning and Policy at AT&T, she was the Bureau Chief of the Federal Communications Commission. Donald Rumsfeld served as CEO of
General Instrument Corporation (“A leader in broadband transmission, distribution, and access control technologies for cable, satellite and
terrestrial broadcasting applications, the company pioneered the development of the first all-digital high-definition television technology
(Wikipedia)”. He also served as the 13th and 21st Secretary of Defense. The list of examples is extensive. The existence of a revolving door
allows for drastic discourse control, such as the Verizon corporation blocking hundreds of text messages requested by pro-choice abortion activists
while the government stands by idly. Regarding this situation, Timothy Wu, a law professor at Columbia University in America, cited an analogy to
Verizon’s decision, stating, “Another entity that controls mass text messages is the Chinese government” (Liptak, 2007). The result of the
revolving door is a maximization of discourse control by way of blurring the checks and balances democratic societies are supposed to maintain so as
to keep those in sections A, B and C, honest, just, and non-monopolistic… financially and informatively.
Thomas Jefferson once said “Information is the currency of democracy.” In order for democracy to exists and function the pullers must take back
the control of information from the passengers, they must dominant discourse. The US armed forces are working hard to prevent this. The former
Director for Strategic Communications and Information on the National Security Council claimed that there “is no alternative but to harness
information to protect and promote national interests (Jones, 2005).” Perhaps the most famous proponent of government monopolization of
information, John Poindexter, has purported, “It would be ideal if we could have an uncontrolled flow of information. But we realized you can't do
that.” A leading receiver of military money has been the Rendon Group, the president of which "insists that information is terrain and someone
will occupy it, either the adversary, a third party, or US... [it] is an instrument of national power, just as military, economic and political. Like
any weapon or tool, the United States Government needs to use it or cede the 'battlefield' to someone else” (Urrutia-Varhall 2002). Technological
advances, such as in quantum cryptographhy, are enabling the passengers, especially those or close to section A to dominate communication arrangments
as they wish.
Ultimately, for democracy to function, the currency…the information... must not be concentrated in the hands of a few and controlled by a few.
Justice Louis Brandeis shrewdly pointed out, "We can have a democratic society or we can have great concentrated wealth in the hands of a few. We
cannot have both.” The toilers should believe in and actively protect and participate in democracy. The toilers must recognize the evil wolf in
sheep’s clothing; they must heed Bill Moyers advice, and feed the good wolf, as he analogizes below:
“I heard this story a long time ago – of the tribal elder who was telling his grandson about the battle the old man was waging inside himself. He
said, “It is between two wolves, my son. One is an evil wolf: Anger, envy, sorrow, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, lies, false
pride, superiority, and ego. The other is the good wolf: Joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth,
compassion and faith.” The boy thought this over for a minute, and then asked his grandfather: “Which wolf wins?” The old Cherokee replied
simply: “The one I feed.” Democracy is that way: The wolf that wins is the one we feed, and the media provides the fodder. Democracy without
honest information creates the illusion of popular consent while enhancing the power of the state and the privileged interests protected by it.
Democracy without accountability creates the illusion of popular control while offering ordinary Americans cheap tickets to the balcony, too far away
to see that the public stage is just a reality TV set. Nothing more characterizes corporate media today – mainstream and partisan – than disdain
towards the fragile nature of modern life and indifference toward the complex social debate required of a free and self-governing people. This leaves
you with a heavy burden – it’s up to you to fight for the freedom that makes all other freedoms possible.”
To escape the “thought-traps” and support the “good wolf” the toilers must ignore the paradigms’ parameters (parameters the passengers work
very hard to keep intact). The parameters are dangerously stifling; the manifestation of the passengers’ chosen paradigm essentially results in a
society in which we destruction and harm are accepted as progress and development.
GDP actually measures the rate at which the economy is extracting useful resources from nature,
running them through the economic system, and disposing of them as toxic waste into our air, water, and soils.
-David Korten (2009)
“The ability to bestow meanings – to ‘name’ things, acts and ideas- is a source of power” (Wolf, 1982, 388). By separating the referent
from the reference, situational awareness is drastically diminished. This is one of the most important aspects of telecommunications based power, as
it is now possessed by the few…
the inside meanings of situations and things is continually successfully separated from the outside meaning of situations and things. For instance,
the term ‘strategic communication ’ (outside meaning) is not connotative of propaganda and privacy breeching (inside meaning), but is indeed just
that. For instance, the term ‘information operations ’ (outside meaning) is not connotative of hegemonically consolidating and monopolizing
telecommunications infrastructure (inside meaning), but it is indeed just that. For instance, ‘enterprise approach’ (outside meaning) is not
connotative of turning the military into a giant hegemonic corporation that controls the flow of information (inside meaning), but it is just that.
The Air Force’s Vision 2020, the Joint Chiefs of Staff’s Joint Publication 3-13, Secretary of State’s Information Operations Roadmap confirm the
Federal Government of the United States’ concentration on controlling the flow of information imperially, or more accurately, hegemonically
(considering the end goal is a New World Order); as do the recent contracts given to private corporations for psychological and combat operations. If
the toilers are to control discourse and attempt to cut the reins that not metaphorically, but psychologically and financially keep them attached to
the coach in which the passengers ride they must unbury the inside meaning and ignore the distractive fluff that is often the outside meaning.
Somewhat paradoxically, one way to begin to find the inside meaning is to recognize the illusiveness of semantics and gain the courage to demolish
many of the semantics used by the passengers in discourse.
Initially I wanted to begin this paper by engaging in the radical act of disrespecting their discourse by saying: call it a spatial process,
modernism, network warfare, acculturation, strategy, information warfare, natural, technological determinism, economic information warfare, soft or
hard power, social determinism, theory, intelligence based warfare, new world order, cocacolonization, command and control warfare, geospatial
intelligence, globalization, cyberspace warfare, capitalist expansion, post-colonial, strategic communication, mcdonalization, a concept,
post-industrialism, consumption or production, realism, electronic warfare, electromagnetic warfare, psychological operations….It’s all the same.
damn. thing. The same referent. There’s clearly a group of people trying to take over the world; trying to create, a global hegemony. It’s
hegemonism. It is all, of, by and for the same thing (and that’s not the people); it’s all of the hegemonic, by the hegemonists, and for the
hegemony.
Today the ways in which information flow through cultures or from land mass to land mass, the way information is generated and logged is increasingly
privatized and militarized in concert with the global hegemonizers instead of the global communers. Communication mediated by technology allows the
United States government and its partners to control society. What the Chileans experienced, they called media imperialism. The current situation
should be called media hegemonism. A brief excerpt on the term “hegemony” might be helpful here.
“[Hegemony] means the way in which the entire ideological complex of beliefs, values, and perceptually based attitudes that function for the
reproduction and sustenance of ruling class domination comes to saturate every aspect, and particularly the social institutions, of society … the
corporate domination of mass culture in a class-stratified society has as its ultimate consequence an industrial control of consciousness. The
[passengers] not only control the production of mass culture in order to accumulate wealth, [they] also, by dominating the belief systems of the
working class, reproduce [passenger] rule. In particular…the abilities of the [toilers] to think reflexively and to analyze the social and
individual conditions of everyday life [are] short-circuited by this consciousness industry. Consequently, hegemony is one of the reasons that the
[toilers do] not revolt…”
(Gottiener 1985, p. 982)
Media hegemonism embedded in the pursuit of a global hegemony is the use of the electromagnetic spectrum, the waves, associated wires, mirrors,
etcetera, to control mediums and the messages, essentially, to control the communication of information, ideas, history (and causally, reality,) in
order to sculpt a social situation conducive to global hegemony. Information sharing is an integral part of human survival. Commun-ication of
information, or discourse, is a means to a popularly desired sustainable global commune. Unfortunately, a global hegemony, not a global commune, is
the desired end to a slew of ideologically immoral policies devised, pursued and implemented by the passengers, by old families of money, be it
acquired from banks, oil, timber, steel, water, enslavement…and/or accordingly. Weak propaganda and monopolization legislation fail to prevent the
passengers from pouring billions into what they, for instance, refer to as information operations, public affairs, information warfare or strategic
communication. In a sense, the root meaning of communication, that being ‘to share’ has been completely stolen by the passengers.
Breaking the parameters of the passengers’ parasitic-paradigm requires media autonomy instead of media hegemonism. Media autonomy is in opposition
to feeding the evil wolf. Media autonomy is the physical and virtual framework for “honest” information sharing; for organic, unprocessed,
unrefined communication, which is necessary in order for democracy to exists (Colby, 2005), but, (and in opposition to one of the parameters planted
by the passengers) media autonomy cannot exist in a capitalistic society. Currently the dominant paradigm is that it can, it is a paradigm the
passengers actively work to maintain and proliferate (Barker 2008). The toilers must break it.
Again, Bill Moyers offers insight into the situation:
Extremes of wealth and poverty cannot be reconciled with a truly just society. Capitalism will breed great inequality that is destructive… [it must
be overrun] by an intuition for equality which is the heart of democracy. When the state becomes the guardian of power and privilege to the neglect of
justice for the people who have neither power nor privilege, you can no longer claim to have a representative government.
As does Naomi Klein, author of No Logo:
[The toilers] the autonomous media activists [must work to]…liberate “meaning-making” from ‘public relations’ specialists and corporate
board rooms. As they engage, connect, and project the voices of people around the world who are demanding freedom and justice, they crack open spaces
in which social movements can grow and genuine democracy can flourish.
In other words, they break the parameters of the parasitic-paradigm. So go be autonomous media activists and help demolish the coach. Pick an axel, a
spoke, a thread in a seam! Bring the passengers back down to earth so that they can remember that dust is not all that bad. After all, they did teach
that "In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return unto the ground; for out of it wast thou taken: for dust thou art, and unto
dust shalt thou return” (Genesis 3:19). Combobulate! Take back the discourse! Take back your ability to engage in non-parasitic ratiocination and
your right to live in peace, symbiotically. Go engage in social determinism! ‘Dis’ the current dominating course by dominating discourse.
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