1984 indeed. Some people might laugh at this, but I really hope that free-speech-oriented companies like Rumble, Gab, Substack, Gettr, and even Truth Social succeed -- as much for people on the left *like me* as for people on the right.
If I were to express my opinions freely, I would risk social and material consequences and not just for myself. So I don't. This is the outcome for someone committed to an anti-establishment and skeptical frame of reference. I find it very stressful. I get one or two good nights sleep a week. I think I'd suffer less if I were a natural double-thinker, i.e. an unselfconscious double-thinker, unlike Winston.
At the end of 1984 Winston imagines a bullet going through his brain - Big Brother had taken everything from him that mattered: love of language, books, love itself and pressured him by the thing that scared him to most -- so with all of that gone he might as well be dead. Hold onto your memories, write them down. Hold onto your freedom of thought - you know you aren't crazy, even if everyone around you is going along with it. Orwell's book resonates now because humans are predictable and history repeats. It's a great book. Just remember - it costs those idiots on Twitter nothing to come from you. They risk nothing. You are risking a lot - and for that many of us are grateful.
initially, a sideways response: I spent a number of years as a full time volunteer lobbyist in a liberal state in the west. Unlike most people i read every proposed law, there were hundreds each year. Few were necessary, nearly all were proposed by a special interest group wanting something for their group, money, or legal recognition, or restrictions on behavior or speech or economic activity for other groups and individuals for 'safety" (usually) reasons. After awhile i looked around the country and realized that in every state, each year, several hundred to several thousands bills were being introduced and each one that passed added to the already unbearable load of restrictive laws that affected people in that state.
I came to the conclusion that the ability to legislate should be rarely used and only for very necessary laws. The truth is that nearly every law that is passed disenfranchises someone else in some fashion. (I don't want to talk about what many people would consider necessary law here, murder, for example, not the point.) Merely as one example, laws against personal use and ownership of marijuana. (There are actually hundreds of examples, all relevant.) Because every time a law is passed someone is disenfranchised and that those who are disenfranchised are exquisitely aware that the disenfranchisement is not a matter of public safety but of hidden agendas, they lose respect for law. More crucially, they slowly become aware that to engage in moral behavior MEANS breaking the law and, conversely, to remain a law abiding citizen means becoming immoral. In my frame, being a moral person has little to do with religion (so don't go there) but with acting in accordance with the demands of my character, with being an honorable person, with standing up for certain truths which i have decided over long contemplation that are central to an honorable life. Matt Taibbi reflects most of those truths and the behaviors that come from them in his columns, which is why i subscribe.
The situation I describe above, the separation between moral behavior and legal behavior is becoming more extreme by the day in my country, the US. It is becoming more extreme in many places. It can be seen as well in many meritocratic groups, organizations, and institutions (the CDC for instance, the banking industry, the supreme court, pharmaceutical research, the legacy media, and so on). To remain moral in the sense i am speaking of it here means, as many of us liberals on the left have found, that, slowly, over time, we become aware that we no longer belong among the left and we certainly don't belong among the right.
I have watched in shock and disbelief as liberal friends of decades have ignored as not an issue or supported book burnings (my own work and that of J.K. Rowling for instance), speech prohibitions, imprisonment for life without trial, the invasion of Iraq, the abandonment of the right to bodily autonomy, the abandonment of biological facts and identity (but only when it comes to woman, there are no "people who produce sperm" only "people who menstruate"), even restrictions on art, and so much more including the necessity to actually think, to contemplate the meaning of things, including where their ideas are coming from and the motivations for their actions. And these are people who marched with martin luther king, jr, who served in the peace corps, who went to jail for protesting the vietnam war, who fought for free speech at berkeley in the 60s and 70s. They are the ones i sat up late at night with, drinking or smoking dope, and wondered by so many germans went along with hitler, who said, well, we would not have.
And so, shock and disbelief. It seems to no longer matter what side of the political spectrum one is on, it's crazy everywhere.
I used to hope that i would live long enough to see the next great social upheaval, like the 60s/70s or the 20s/30s. My fantasy of course was that it would be the left that it was oriented around, from which it came. It isn't nor is it from the right. There is some third position that is forming, in difficulty and pain and conflict. Some call it heterodox, whatever it is called it does exist, tiny though it is. and it is growing.
To remain moral now means not only engaging in illegal behavior but also means breaking co-dependent and identity bonds with groups which themselves once reflected back to me self-identity. To remain moral means stepping outside existing forms and systems almost entirely. And it necessitates, as difficult as that is, speaking out.
I think there are a great many people who understand that Matt is talking about here. Most of them have not yet found their voice, they are still struggling with the cognitive dissonance coming from the abandonment of what were long cultural norms by their communities, whatever they might be. The reason why taibbi and greenwald and Freddie deboer and FIRE are important (as only a few examples) is that they are finding the language that encapsulates our distress and as well marks the territory of that third space that is coming into being.
it is a lonely time, but an important one to keep the faith as it were. for this is only the beginning of how bad it is likely to become. thank you matt. as always.
When YouTube and Twitter started blocking right-wing (and not so right-wing) content in 2020, didn't it occur to anyone that they come after other content they disagreed with, even from the left?
Cornell West is an inspiration. This dyed-in-the-wool, Darwin-thumping atheist would dress up and go to church regularly if he were giving the sermons.
I have found you can get through to many people who have become immersed in doublethink. The trick is have a good memory, command of the facts, and apply gentle but constant pressure. You need to be able to make people remember what people said in the past, the reasons they gave for saying it, and be able to compare that with what they are saying now. The good news is I find this has started to become easier than ever. The shameless government and media lying has got to the point where even disengaged and politically apathetic Americans are skeptical about what they see or hear. What you need to do is remind them of why they were skeptical when their skepticism starts to fade and break down the emotional manipulation they are undergoing. The Iraq War and Covid-19 are very effective in this regard. Things may seem worse than ever (and they might be), but we also have an opportunity we cannot miss.
It’s not understatement to say I despise my government and it despises me. It seeks to control me through a hatred and fear of the other, but with each successive moral panic, I only loathe the creators of the crisis more.
I can only hope that they don’t stumble their way into Armageddon while trying to manipulate us into submission.
Goddammit this is important, will you please unpaywall it?! You will get many more subscribers from doing so than from a few of us screaming SUBSCRIBE TO TABBI!!! and posting snippets and screenshots.
One of the most salient points in this article is that our current collective state of mind exposes the spiritual rot of what used to be called "Christian Civilization." For those who have been paying attention, the hypocrisy of our current position on the Russian "incursion" into the Ukraine is very apparent. I never thought the day would come when I agreed with Cornel West, but I admit that one of my first thoughts when Russia invaded was, "they saw what we did inn a Iraq and thought, 'why can't we make a pre-emptive strike?'" We need to take a long look in the mirror. The U.S.A. is in grave need of massive reform and spiritual reawakening. A house-cleaning is in order. The war in the Ukraine is tragic and dangerous, but what's happening in the west is even more frightening, and its leading us into a vary dark place. We're in a perilous moment.
After the U.S. announced sanctions on Russia, we've watched as most powerful companies deployed their own sanctions packages. From restaurants to tech companies, they've cut off their businesses from the Russian people.
I'm a bit unnerved that the corporate world was so effective at this at a time when no one feels the need to question whether they're right to do so. I fear that lessons are being learned right now that will soon be turned on dissenters at home in the US.
I love this post, Matt. Let’s remember the Bay of Pigs. How horrified were we to find Russian weapons near our border in Cuba? If Ukraine joins NATO, we can put our weapons right next to Russia’s border. Putin is justified in not ever wanting that to happen. Biden did not even consider Russia’s defensive position in this and he did not negotiate in good faith. Speaking of the spooks, when Kennedy was trying to get leverage against Kruschev, he told his military spooks that he would threaten to put missles in Turkey. After an awkward silence the spooks said “We already have them there.” We have never honored Russia’s preference for spheres of influence. Picking off satellite countries and adding them into NATO has perhaps not been so wise if it is peace we are seeking.
Big Brother is here, you subtly pointed that out by saying spies are popular again. Some of us haven't forgotten that we cant do anything online without the NSA reading or watching, or say certain opinions without being considered a domestic terrorist. We haven't fallen for the warmongering bullshit, and won't fight until the fight is at home.
1984 indeed. Some people might laugh at this, but I really hope that free-speech-oriented companies like Rumble, Gab, Substack, Gettr, and even Truth Social succeed -- as much for people on the left *like me* as for people on the right.
If I were to express my opinions freely, I would risk social and material consequences and not just for myself. So I don't. This is the outcome for someone committed to an anti-establishment and skeptical frame of reference. I find it very stressful. I get one or two good nights sleep a week. I think I'd suffer less if I were a natural double-thinker, i.e. an unselfconscious double-thinker, unlike Winston.
At the end of 1984 Winston imagines a bullet going through his brain - Big Brother had taken everything from him that mattered: love of language, books, love itself and pressured him by the thing that scared him to most -- so with all of that gone he might as well be dead. Hold onto your memories, write them down. Hold onto your freedom of thought - you know you aren't crazy, even if everyone around you is going along with it. Orwell's book resonates now because humans are predictable and history repeats. It's a great book. Just remember - it costs those idiots on Twitter nothing to come from you. They risk nothing. You are risking a lot - and for that many of us are grateful.
I love Orwell but we need to clarify.
George Orwell predicted nothing. He was not a prophet. He was merely brilliant at fictionalizing what already was and had been.
He wrote with sheer genius about the horrors of the Twentieth Century and how we got there. It is what he lived through first hand and observed.
We are supposed to read his books so that history does not repeat itself, as it has time and time again - nothing new under the sun.
Read 1984 as education, open your eyes and finally put a stop to it because it already has been-so many times before.
initially, a sideways response: I spent a number of years as a full time volunteer lobbyist in a liberal state in the west. Unlike most people i read every proposed law, there were hundreds each year. Few were necessary, nearly all were proposed by a special interest group wanting something for their group, money, or legal recognition, or restrictions on behavior or speech or economic activity for other groups and individuals for 'safety" (usually) reasons. After awhile i looked around the country and realized that in every state, each year, several hundred to several thousands bills were being introduced and each one that passed added to the already unbearable load of restrictive laws that affected people in that state.
I came to the conclusion that the ability to legislate should be rarely used and only for very necessary laws. The truth is that nearly every law that is passed disenfranchises someone else in some fashion. (I don't want to talk about what many people would consider necessary law here, murder, for example, not the point.) Merely as one example, laws against personal use and ownership of marijuana. (There are actually hundreds of examples, all relevant.) Because every time a law is passed someone is disenfranchised and that those who are disenfranchised are exquisitely aware that the disenfranchisement is not a matter of public safety but of hidden agendas, they lose respect for law. More crucially, they slowly become aware that to engage in moral behavior MEANS breaking the law and, conversely, to remain a law abiding citizen means becoming immoral. In my frame, being a moral person has little to do with religion (so don't go there) but with acting in accordance with the demands of my character, with being an honorable person, with standing up for certain truths which i have decided over long contemplation that are central to an honorable life. Matt Taibbi reflects most of those truths and the behaviors that come from them in his columns, which is why i subscribe.
The situation I describe above, the separation between moral behavior and legal behavior is becoming more extreme by the day in my country, the US. It is becoming more extreme in many places. It can be seen as well in many meritocratic groups, organizations, and institutions (the CDC for instance, the banking industry, the supreme court, pharmaceutical research, the legacy media, and so on). To remain moral in the sense i am speaking of it here means, as many of us liberals on the left have found, that, slowly, over time, we become aware that we no longer belong among the left and we certainly don't belong among the right.
I have watched in shock and disbelief as liberal friends of decades have ignored as not an issue or supported book burnings (my own work and that of J.K. Rowling for instance), speech prohibitions, imprisonment for life without trial, the invasion of Iraq, the abandonment of the right to bodily autonomy, the abandonment of biological facts and identity (but only when it comes to woman, there are no "people who produce sperm" only "people who menstruate"), even restrictions on art, and so much more including the necessity to actually think, to contemplate the meaning of things, including where their ideas are coming from and the motivations for their actions. And these are people who marched with martin luther king, jr, who served in the peace corps, who went to jail for protesting the vietnam war, who fought for free speech at berkeley in the 60s and 70s. They are the ones i sat up late at night with, drinking or smoking dope, and wondered by so many germans went along with hitler, who said, well, we would not have.
And so, shock and disbelief. It seems to no longer matter what side of the political spectrum one is on, it's crazy everywhere.
I used to hope that i would live long enough to see the next great social upheaval, like the 60s/70s or the 20s/30s. My fantasy of course was that it would be the left that it was oriented around, from which it came. It isn't nor is it from the right. There is some third position that is forming, in difficulty and pain and conflict. Some call it heterodox, whatever it is called it does exist, tiny though it is. and it is growing.
To remain moral now means not only engaging in illegal behavior but also means breaking co-dependent and identity bonds with groups which themselves once reflected back to me self-identity. To remain moral means stepping outside existing forms and systems almost entirely. And it necessitates, as difficult as that is, speaking out.
I think there are a great many people who understand that Matt is talking about here. Most of them have not yet found their voice, they are still struggling with the cognitive dissonance coming from the abandonment of what were long cultural norms by their communities, whatever they might be. The reason why taibbi and greenwald and Freddie deboer and FIRE are important (as only a few examples) is that they are finding the language that encapsulates our distress and as well marks the territory of that third space that is coming into being.
it is a lonely time, but an important one to keep the faith as it were. for this is only the beginning of how bad it is likely to become. thank you matt. as always.
"...bubbled with rage a mile wide and a millimeter deep and could forget in an instant passions that may have consumed him or her for years"
There is no more apt description of America today, especially so the Professional Left and its foot soldiers.
The creatures outside looked from pig to man, and from man to pig, and from pig to man again; but already it was impossible to say which was which.
Animal Farm was quite prescient as well
When YouTube and Twitter started blocking right-wing (and not so right-wing) content in 2020, didn't it occur to anyone that they come after other content they disagreed with, even from the left?
Cornell West is an inspiration. This dyed-in-the-wool, Darwin-thumping atheist would dress up and go to church regularly if he were giving the sermons.
I have found you can get through to many people who have become immersed in doublethink. The trick is have a good memory, command of the facts, and apply gentle but constant pressure. You need to be able to make people remember what people said in the past, the reasons they gave for saying it, and be able to compare that with what they are saying now. The good news is I find this has started to become easier than ever. The shameless government and media lying has got to the point where even disengaged and politically apathetic Americans are skeptical about what they see or hear. What you need to do is remind them of why they were skeptical when their skepticism starts to fade and break down the emotional manipulation they are undergoing. The Iraq War and Covid-19 are very effective in this regard. Things may seem worse than ever (and they might be), but we also have an opportunity we cannot miss.
It’s not understatement to say I despise my government and it despises me. It seeks to control me through a hatred and fear of the other, but with each successive moral panic, I only loathe the creators of the crisis more.
I can only hope that they don’t stumble their way into Armageddon while trying to manipulate us into submission.
Goddammit this is important, will you please unpaywall it?! You will get many more subscribers from doing so than from a few of us screaming SUBSCRIBE TO TABBI!!! and posting snippets and screenshots.
One of the most salient points in this article is that our current collective state of mind exposes the spiritual rot of what used to be called "Christian Civilization." For those who have been paying attention, the hypocrisy of our current position on the Russian "incursion" into the Ukraine is very apparent. I never thought the day would come when I agreed with Cornel West, but I admit that one of my first thoughts when Russia invaded was, "they saw what we did inn a Iraq and thought, 'why can't we make a pre-emptive strike?'" We need to take a long look in the mirror. The U.S.A. is in grave need of massive reform and spiritual reawakening. A house-cleaning is in order. The war in the Ukraine is tragic and dangerous, but what's happening in the west is even more frightening, and its leading us into a vary dark place. We're in a perilous moment.
After the U.S. announced sanctions on Russia, we've watched as most powerful companies deployed their own sanctions packages. From restaurants to tech companies, they've cut off their businesses from the Russian people.
I'm a bit unnerved that the corporate world was so effective at this at a time when no one feels the need to question whether they're right to do so. I fear that lessons are being learned right now that will soon be turned on dissenters at home in the US.
I love this post, Matt. Let’s remember the Bay of Pigs. How horrified were we to find Russian weapons near our border in Cuba? If Ukraine joins NATO, we can put our weapons right next to Russia’s border. Putin is justified in not ever wanting that to happen. Biden did not even consider Russia’s defensive position in this and he did not negotiate in good faith. Speaking of the spooks, when Kennedy was trying to get leverage against Kruschev, he told his military spooks that he would threaten to put missles in Turkey. After an awkward silence the spooks said “We already have them there.” We have never honored Russia’s preference for spheres of influence. Picking off satellite countries and adding them into NATO has perhaps not been so wise if it is peace we are seeking.
Big Brother is here, you subtly pointed that out by saying spies are popular again. Some of us haven't forgotten that we cant do anything online without the NSA reading or watching, or say certain opinions without being considered a domestic terrorist. We haven't fallen for the warmongering bullshit, and won't fight until the fight is at home.