Do it for the children!
Joel Bakan, Canadian* law professor, wants to protect children from the predatory rampages of corporate greed:
By the early 20th century…[m]ost modern states embraced the general idea that government had a duty to protect the health, education and welfare of children. Child labor was outlawed, as were the sale and marketing of tobacco, alcohol and pornography to children. Consumer protection laws were enacted to regulate product safety and advertising aimed at children.
…But the 20th century also witnessed another momentous shift, one that would ultimately threaten the welfare of children: the rise of the for-profit corporation…[C]orporate interests now prevail…Childhood obesity mounts as junk food purveyors bombard children with advertising, even at school…
Much of what children watch involves violent, sexual imagery, and yet children’s media remain largely unregulated. Attempts to curb excesses ”” like California’s ban on the sale or rental of violent video games to minors ”” have been struck down by courts as free speech violations.
Another area of concern: we medicate increasing numbers of children with potentially harmful psychotropic drugs, a trend fueled in part by questionable and under-regulated pharmaceutical industry practices…
I read Bakan’s op-ed expecting him to mention that at least some of these and other trends he deplores have been allowed to take hold because of abdication of traditional parental responsibility to monitor what children are doing. But nowhere—not even once—does he mention that parents have any direct role at all. His sole remedy is through increasing state regulation.
This highlights one of the main differences between left and right: the left believes the individual is powerless, except to agitate for more state control. It’s the government’s responsibility to fix social ills, and liberty can certainly fall by the wayside in the effort. For the conservative, the accent is on individual and personal responsibility, and government should have as light a footprint as possible.
[*NOTE: Although Bakan has mostly resided in Canada since his parents brought him there in 1971 when he was 12, he was born in Michigan. I was unable to discover whether he is now a Canadian citizen or not.
After writing this post, I read a bit more of his Wiki entry and found the following (bingo!):
Joel Bakan is distinct by criticizing the actions of civil liberties groups and their overemphasis on individual liberty at the expense of collective rights and duties.]
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/columnists/janetdaley/8713091/UK-riots-The-end-of-the-l iberals-great-moral-delusion.html
UK riots: The end of the liberals’ great moral delusion
Let’s try this . . .
http://tinyurl.com/3wr62h6
UK riots: The end of the liberals’ great moral delusion
I just started reading Jonah Goldberg’s “Liberal Fascism.” He discusses exactly this phenomenon. The “fascist” is a left-winger who always turns to the state to solve problems. Some fascists are “nice,” others are vicious, but they all are statists.
I’m somewhat “statist” in matters of clean food and water, building codes, and baby clothes that don’t burst into flame. But many current nanny staters go way too far in even those sensible areas. Hence the mandated toilets that don’t flush properly, the mercury-filled light bulbs, and the banning of chocolate milk in public schools.
Hitler said that first..
something to the effect that if you do if for the children the people will comply and even debase themselves
after all, inequality before the court was first developed as a child protection thing…
a police officer cant enter my home, but CPS can take my child…
ie… delegation of powers is forbidden, but its what we are doing… or have you not noticed the new supreme soviet (comittee) of finance?
“The receptivity of the masses is very limited, their intelligence is small, but their power of forgetting is enormous. In consequence of these facts, all effective propaganda must be limited to a very few points and must harp on these in slogans until the last member of the public understands what you want him to understand by your slogan.”
“The victor will never be asked if he told the truth. ”
“I begin with the young. We older ones are used up but my magnificent youngsters! Are there finer ones anywhere in the world? Look at all these men and boys! What material! With you and I, we can make a new world.”
“The great strength of the totalitarian state is that it forces those who fear it to imitate it.”
“Anyone can deal with victory. Only the mighty can bear defeat.”
“I use emotion for the many and reserve reason for the few.”
“Through clever and constant application of propaganda, people can be made to see paradise as hell, and also the other way round, to consider the most wretched sort of life as paradise.”
“The application of force alone, without support based on a spiritual concept, can never bring about the destruction of an idea or arrest the propagation of it, unless one is ready and able to ruthlessly to exterminate the last upholders of that idea even to a man, and also wipe out any tradition which it may tend to leave behind.”
“I don’t see much future for the Americans … it’s a decayed country. And they have their racial problem, and the problem of social inequalities … my feelings against Americanism are feelings of hatred and deep repugnance…
everything about the behaviour of American society reveals that it’s half Judaised, and the other half negrified. How can one expect a State like that to hold together?”
the left accepts the first part, and the second part is hidden in ignorance
you can imagine reverend wright saying this:
I’d also give good odds that:
1) He’s a red diaper baby.
2) He’s Jewish.
Awww his dream job is to be a people herder. What a sick bastard.
How funny!
Here’s a guy whose opening paragraph shows his own parenting skills need work and he wants to blame, get this, corporations? And he is a law professor!
His own kids are absorbed in the ” titillating roil of online social life,” but that is not his fault; it is the fault of naughty corporations.
Protecting kids . . . snort. Kids don’t need protection from corporations. They need parents who will spend more real time with them.
We need protection from the likes of Joel Bakan.
Advertising, gasp! And look at the assumptions about who is responsible- the child! Of course, the child runs the house and the parents dutifully buy anything the child desires. Best not to let anyone make decisions for themselves and let Joel Bakan, et al., make the important ones for you, you Epsilon Minuses, you.
” … their overemphasis on individual liberty at the expense of collective rights and duties.”
I have a pretty decent — if alarming — idea of what the good Mr. Bakan considers a collective duty. I expect I’d be rather more alarmed at what he considers a “collective right”.
And, of course, he’d probably be rather alarmed by the idea that such a thing is a complete fiction. Without it he’d have nothing to stand on.
People such as Bakan are scary. They may mean well, but when their utopian dreams collide with reality, the temptation is to dial up the level of coercion – for the very best of reasons, of course, that’s for the children too, and only “temporarily” – to make that last push over the top to Heaven on Earth.
But that happy day never comes. It’s always tantalizingly close (as such people see it), but those pesky counter-revolutionaries keep screwing things up. For the collective (there’s that word again) good, it would be best if someone “dealt” with them. Omelettes, eggs, ends, means, and all that. Once those cranky individualists are no longer a problem, all the good people can live in perfect peace, harmony, and happiness. Just a little unpleasantness, and then nirvana!
Except nirvana never comes, and the unpleasantness and the organs of state security that inflict it are not temporary, but permanent features.
People try to flee. That’s OK for the elderly and infirm, but for the young and productive that cannot be permitted. After all, the state paid for their educations! The state therefore has an ownership interest in them. What do do? Inevitably some bright spark comes up with walls, barbed wire, machine guns, and guard dogs to keep these selfish people from fleeing nirvana.
This whole sorry saga starts out with a Bakan trying to “help” people, and if seen through to its logical conclusion, inevitably ends with barbed wire. Starting from Bakan’s premise, each step follows logically and ineluctably from its predecessor.
Unless this time you have the right people running it, in which case it’s guaranteed to work, if only you go far enough …
I’m to the point that whenever I hear some big-state A**hole plead that it’s “for the children” that I reach for a weapon.
Well, the weapon at hand is either the mini-canister of pepper gas, a for-show Japanese souvenir sword, or the part Boxer-pit dog, who slobbers relentlessly over all comers.
Anyway, you get the point. I think the “for the children” card is nearly as played-out as the race card.
I’m to the point that whenever I hear some big-state A**hole plead that it’s “for the children” that I reach for a weapon.
I couldn’t agree more. A more mawkish, vapid exhortation cannot be imagined. The irony is that those tirelessly invoking it – the liberals – typically don’t have any children.
Go figure.
When “It take a village to raise a child” comes out of a liberal’s mouth I hear flies buzzing over the killing fields. A small tribe related by blood may be able to successfully (no killing fields) organize as a communal enterprise. A nation can never successfully organize as a communal enterprise. We need look back no farther than the 20th century to know this is true. That is what collectivists refuse to understand and why they will never be able to admit that big, intrusive government will always devolve into a dictatorship that can only be sustained by repression and torture.
Sex is the ersatz or substitute religion of the 20th Century.
Malcolm Muggeridge
All he is doing is following tightly to the “party line” of “destruction of family”, and “end of capitalism (Judaism/Christianity)”.
The truth is that if revolution was faster you would have fewer people attempting to make a living from it… but its gone on long enough and slow enough that one could take the position and think that in the future it still wont happen. sell t-shirts, hawk ideas, etc…
behind it all is the idea that it cant be totalitarian if they dont think they are totalitarian… ie, they believe that these others have a special quality that they dont have….
People do not believe lies because they have to, but because they want to.
Malcolm Muggeridge
There is no such thing as darkness; only a failure to see.
Malcolm Muggeridge
These monsters never mean well. Listen to the speech or read the tomes..This bag of infection means nothing but evil..
I think the “for the children” card is nearly as played-out as the race card.
But just think how much thought their use saves.
Stop the rampages of corporate greed for the children, for the animals, for the planet.
Sounds all great until you notice the people not suffering the rampages of corporate greed, cook any animal they can kill on a dung fire so their malnourished kids can live another day to swat flies and curse the hell hole called Gaia.
[*NOTE: Although Bakan has mostly resided in Canada since his parents brought him there in 1971 when he was 12, he was born in Michigan. I was unable to discover whether he is now a Canadian citizen or not.
Suffice it to say that his moving to Canada is Canada’s loss and the gain of the US. Addition by subtraction.
I agree with the others who state that he wants the state to take responsibility for what parents should be doing. I guess that “Because it’s the law” is more compelling than “Because I said so,” especially when one doesn’t want to say the latter.
A further observation from his Wiki : he is SO concerned about children, but he has only only one child. That is a favor to us: fewer of the likes of him in the next generation.
Perhaps because I spent 3 years between high school and completing my degree in do-gooding jobs or in actvism, I am very skeptical about do-gooding. Most of the time do-gooding is a waste of time. Recently some have quoted Heinlein to the effect that there are two different kinds of people: those who want to be left alone, and those who want to do something for others- which involves controlling others. Which is why I am no longer a do-gooder.
Children have been subjected to TV ads for 60 years. What is the effect? By teenage years or earlier, most have developed a cynical attitude towards advertising, as they have found out that advertising makes promises it cannot deliver upon. That would suggest no need for government involvement. People can think for themselves. Progs and libs consider that a sin: people should think what progs and libs want them to think.
Nevermind that corporations employ millions of people, providing a livelihood for many millions more (a large percentage of them children), and supply much-wanted and often-needed goods and services to hundreds of millions.
And… oh, yeah… don’t forget, all the advertising that corporations buy in the New York Times so the rag can actually be profitable and publish anti-corporation bilge.
Guys like that are so devoid of thought it’s a wonder their heads don’t implode.
And… oh, yeah… don’t forget, all the advertising that corporations buy in the New York Times so the rag can actually be profitable and publish anti-corporation bilge.
The NYT is profitable now? When did this happen?
Hmmm. You may have a point there.
He is right though in stating that the ever increasing drugging down of children (and adults, but he doesn’t mention that) by shrinks and other “health workers” is a very troubling trend.
He’s wrong however in claiming that that’s caused by “evil capitalism” (which is his effective claim) and that government control would make everything better.
It’s of course caused by government control of parenting and education, skyhigh taxes meaning parents have no time (if they were so inclined in an environment that punishes it) to parent, and schools and parents alike that want to see children pliant, quiet, and sitting on the couch playing videogames or watching television rather than be active, playing, maybe making a mess that needs cleaning up.
I do some substitute teaching at a homeschool coop for kids aged 5 – 17. I also teach CCD on Sunday mornings at my parish to 5th and 6th graders who attend public school.
The differences between the two groups are so marked that I have been tempted to do further research.
Homeschoolers: Unfailingly polite, attentive, prepared to work, no phones, and I have never needed to discipline anyone, ever.
CCD: At least a quarter of the class is spent trying to get everyone’s attention due to talking, cell phones, flirting, etc. Homework is disregarded as unimportant and every year I am informed about how many of these kids are on some kind of drug. ADD is rampant.
I know that this is just an off the cuff, anecdotal assessment, but the differences are so self-apparent that it is an easily made observation.
My opinion on why this occurs? First, the homeschoolers have highly motivated PARENTS involved in teaching discipline, self-control and values. Yes, VALUES that they want to pass along to their children. Second, probably 90% of them have a parent that stays home.
None of these families are wealthy and the reason that the homeschoolers don’t have cell phones probably is more due to the fact that their parents can’t afford them because they live on one salary.
I’d guess Bakan has retained his US citizenship. Reminds me of a pair of doctrinaire US leftists who moved to China in the 50s because, after all, communism was the wave of the future, but didn’t become Chines citizens, retaining US citizenship as a convenient parachute.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joan_Hinton
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Dan
My senior year in high school we had an interesting speaker at a LRY(Unitarian youth group) meeting. He had been one of the few- 30?- POWs in the Korean War who chose not to get repatriated back to the US. After several years in China, he requested a return to the US. He told us that he had always intended to return to the US; he just wanted to see what Red China was like.
Over a decade after returning from China, he had not lost the tint of his rose-colored glasses. In the midst of the Cultural Revolution, he described Mao’s approach to governing as that of a poet. Yeah, right.
yeah, that “corporate greed” will get you but nevermind that “government greed”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=76frHHpoNFs
After a while, reading articles from Joel Bakan types becomes tedious and predictable. Assuming Wikipedia is correct, Bakan’s background very much explains his worldview: His entire career has been in academia save for a one year judicial clerkship (a government position). It is always surprising when individuals who have never worked in the private sector (at least in their professional career) are NOT inclined towards statism. It is what they know and what they find comfortable and “just”.
The possibility that what corporate excess, greed and immorality do exist might sometimes be addressed better by the market itself, by consumers themselves, with the state taking only a passive role of facilitating the market to correct its own excesses; the notion that state regulation CAN actually cause more harm then good at times and that when it does the solution is NOT necessarily more tinkering and refining with the regulation, but deregulating; the view that sometimes middle America is better suited to handle the ills of society than an army of Ivy League educated career bureaucrats: all of this is completely lost on the Bakans of the world. As lofty and erudite as their prose may be at times, it really usually does come down to one emotive expression:
“State regulation, GOOD. Corporations, BAD”
“… overemphasis on individual liberty at the expense of collective rights and duties …”
= = = = = =
Gee-Freakin-Willie, *THAT* phrase makes the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end….
Has anyone here read, “THE MAN ON MAO’S RIGHT,” BY Ji Chaozhu?
It is an “insider’s account” of the creation and evolution of modern China. Thanks to his work as a translator for Mao Zedong and Zhou Enlai, Ji was present during such historic occasions as Nixon’s historic visit to China, the negotiations seeking an end to the Korean conflict, and the chaos of the Cultural Revolution. He was an immigrant student at Harvard after WWII, but returned to China to fight for the communists during the Korean War. He nearly starved to death twice during various leaps forward and was saved from the Red Guard students by the mercy of Zhou. He spent many years in the U.S. on China’s UN delegation. Now an old man who has seen so much, he is still an unrepentant communist.
What is it about communists? In spite of all the stupid chaos and starvation brought on by Mao, Ji cannot seem to grasp how evil the system really is.
Bakan, although not an eyewitness to the evil as was Mr. Ji, seems cut from the same cloth.
I guess there are two great faiths among humans. One says that utopia is possible here on Earth. The other says the only utopia is in Heaven.
What is it about communists? In spite of all the stupid chaos and starvation brought on by Mao, Ji cannot seem to grasp how evil the system really is.
it has to do with whether you believe things as they are, or believe a “explanation” that makes whatever happened ok and justified.
this is a reason why i have commented about thinking and other games, as most of our discussions are not about thinking, world views, dominant interests that inform judgments etc. we mostly talk as if everyone is equal and the same (the zeitgeist), and so, if your good, the other must be good, and rationalizations always start from the unacceptable knowing oneself to be evil.
the equality doctrine is very pernicious and not a goodness as we take in premises and re-jigger our mental concepts as if that point was a foundational principal… and so we also have to ignore other proof to sustain that principal.
usually this is made acceptable by making one who doesnt believe a traitor to their friends, family, nation, all womenkind, etc..
however at the top… they work the belief that we below know and sort of take into account, but dont really…
for instance… if we did… we would understand what it means to have a post modern mentality where you believe in nothing, so you can present any idea to anyone for any reason that is required. with no belief in anything, one has no restriction in what one can present in social engineering arguments.
given the equality doctrine, you assume the perosn is like you and so has something vested in the idea itself, when all that’s invested is how that idea affects the animals they want to do something for which if explained out right, they wont… like “we need room, can you climb into an oven to make room for us?” or “excuse me, can you put this slave collar on, we need to replace you wants, goals and efforts with what we want, and what effort we think you should make” or “we need more tax money to pay off people and if you dont work, we cant get it, so will you abandon family and work for us?”
since the ovens thing didnt work, they changed it to… look at those peolle they are 14 percent of the population, but they control 40 percent of the businesses!!!! we are equal, so they myst be cheating you… its bad times… and look how good they are on your dime… if you vote for me, i will help the good volk (Designated by me and my friends in terms of which groups can be bought by favors more), and hurt the bad volk for you..
and so… they got angry and came up with redistributed laws that would desenfranchise poor jews (Wealthy can escape if not stupid), poor christians, and others… and set the whole on a course for war genocide..
then when that didnt work, they said.. hmmm… maybe convincing them to abort their genetic futures would be better… we can sell it as a social good..
what we do is we come up wthi justificvations, and such that rely on the premises and ideas… we dont believe in anything we say, so we can easily have arguments among ourselves:
“A world where men and women would be equal is easy to visualize, for that precisely is what the Soviet Revolution promised.” — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, (New York, Random House, 1952), p.806
but when talking publicly and with common people we need to manipulate to our ends… we will just tell them what we need to tell them to get the material to do what we want. which is the purpose of social engineering, to enable the ruling class to manipulate people by exploiting their biology, psychology and such against them, while denying they have any of that at all…(so they dont get wise – if they do, we marginalize them… as we have not the power yet to imprison them, kill them, etc)
when this happens, we ignore it.. we accept that a missile launch we all see… is what they say, not what it is.. (then ignore the follow up that explains the launch as a demonstration of women submariners launching a tomahawk for show)
this is why everyone is confused… they beleive the leaders believe… but they dont… they believe in ONE Thing… collusive (conspiratorial) and manipulative acquisition of power.
read george kenans long telegram
the mentality hasnt changed..
and in fact has gotten worse.
after all, when your winning, your apt to push harder
the funniest thing is when someone denies they speak in coded terms…
and then turns to you and speaks in coded terms so that the children in the room dont understand..
not accepting your being treated like a child and tricked does not make one an adult… it just makes a child think they are grown up… as the wonder why they dont understand and that words dont match what happens…