The opinions, views, thoughts, and ramblings of editors of PoliticalAffairs.net – and other stuff worth reading or viewing.
Friday, August 30, 2019
Gay Science: Public or Private
It doesn’t really matter if being gay is a genetic trait (biology is destiny) or a lifestyle freely chosen as human beings have to be regarded as free agents with the right to live their lives as they wish as long as they don’t harm others: this is covered by the UN’s Universal Declaration on Human Rights (universal in the sense that everyone violates it). This is an impotent article because the scientific information will be misused and defenders of human rights have to to know how to defend the science and confound those who pervert it. This is why the following quote is disturbing: “I deeply disagree about publishing this,” said Steven Reilly, a geneticist and postdoctoral researcher who is on the steering committee of the institute’s L.G.B.T.Q. affinity group, Out@Broad. “It seems like something that could easily be misconstrued,” he said, adding, “In a world without any discrimination, understanding human behavior is a noble goal, but we don’t live in that world.” Not only is understanding human behavior a noble goal it is necessary in order to construct a rational social order that supports the human rights enunciated in the Universal Declaration. We have seen the damage done by suppressing scientific information (the smoking issue, climate change, racism, etc.). The world without discrimination will never come about through the suppression of science but only through its propagation and the enlightening effects it can produce when people are properly educated and correctly understand the nature of the world in which they live. What needs to be suppressed are those in authority who use their power to disseminate ignorance and anti-scientific views: in 2020 the people of the US will have an opportunity to do so.
Thursday, August 29, 2019
The Need to Understand Mao
You can't understand the CPC without comprehending Mao's understanding of Marxism-Leninism. The Chinese have said that Mao, Like Stalin, was 70% good and 30% bad (not as a moral judgement but in terms of PC correct and incorrect actions). Both, while living, were the subject of personality cults and were treated as if they were 100% "good." Both were fierce enemies of capitalism and sought to lay the foundations for the future communist society free of all human exploitation but found themselves in historical circumstances that overwhelmed them at times, and in the case of Stalin eventually led to the destruction of the socialist state he created, preserved from Nazism (along with the rest of Europe) and tried to defend in the cold war to which his successors succumbed. Mao too faced Incomprehensible historical contradictions that Marxist theory was unprepared to answer at the time ( a split with the USSR and an internal CPC civil war expressed as a cultural "revolution"). So for us to understand just what and why the 30% was and came about is vitally important. But also we must study the 70% as well as it was the basis of all the past successes of the world communist movement and is the foundation of its future possibilities of victory. That 70% was based on a correct understanding and application as a guide to action of the theoretically sound foundations laid by Marx and Engels and creatively developed by V.I. Lenin and which our task today is to further develop and adapt to historical conditions in which we find ourselves. We must, of course, study other progressive thinkers within and without the Marxist tradition, but the works of the founders and their flawed great continuers in the past century will be important weapons for the communist and workers party to wield to attain victories over the capitalists and imperialists who dominate the world today and for us in the USA to bury the forces represented by Donald Trump and his enablers (conscious and unconscious) in the Republican and Democratic parties.
Monday, August 19, 2019
The Case of Placido Domingo
Whatever the circumstances, Placido Domingo is not Hitler, Epstein, or Weinstein and the fact that these are the types of comparisons in the comments that pop up is a problem. Many, if not most people, in my generation (Placido's as well) were brought up by our parents, churches, and public schools (mine were segregated) and were instilled with many values and beliefs that are, correctly, no longer politically correct or morally justifiable. The phenomenon of Trumpism indicates that millions of people still operate with these superannuated values. But people can change, and learn, and both atone and redeem themselves. Sartre has shown that we are works in progress not unchanging essences such as rocks and trees. Placido Domingo appears to be in that gray area where his consciousness today is no longer that of the past in which his alleged negative conduct occurred. Enlightenment offers redemption and should be encouraged and people should not be cast into the outer darkness for the mistakes of the past if they have sincerely changed and are no longer the same. Any real harm done must of course be rectified as far as possible and hopefully followed by reconciliation: what more can be expected?
Sunday, August 18, 2019
Slavery is Alive and Well
Slavery is still alive and well. These girls were kidnapped and brought to China as sex slaves yet we read that after the police found out and arrested their "husbands" the girls "were sent to a Chinese police station, where they were charged with illegal immigration." That doesn't sound right. At any rate they were sent home by the Chinese and authorities in both countries are arresting those involved in the actual trafficking although it is unclear whether the end of the line customers who bought the girls are very severely dealt with outside of being out of a lot of money (one girl cost $26,000). The old Chinese policy of one child only led to an unintended shortage of women in China (the sex ratio is 141 men per 100 women: the culture prefers boys to girls so the missing girls were either aborted or victims of infanticide the CPC has been trying to change this cultural bias but it takes time). China and Burma are not the only places this deplorable trade takes place. It's worldwide -- here is what goes on in the US: "Sex trafficking of women and girls is a devastating crime affecting communities everywhere in this country, including your own backyard. The National Human Trafficking Resource Center has received reports of trafficking cases in all 50 states and Washington, D.C. You might think you’re far removed from this modern-day slavery, but you’re not. How can women and children be trafficked in the commercial sex trade so easily? Hotels, casinos, resorts, nightclubs, and other establishments allow this practice to flourish in your community, because turning a blind eye can be more profitable than actually doing something about the problem."- Morgan & Morgan Law Firm. Where there is money to be made the "invisible hand" of the capitalist market will respond to the demand and supply the commodity -- a system that gladdens the hearts of Ayn Rand followers and other lovers of capitalism.
Sunday, August 11, 2019
Who supports the Swedish Alt-Right?
“But as it turned out, there was no hacking and dumping of internal campaign documents, as in the United States. Nor was there an overt effort to swing the election to the Sweden Democrats, perhaps because the party, in keeping with Swedish popular opinion, has become more critical of the Kremlin than some of its far-right European counterparts.” This is a typical cold war disinformation article. After a build up indicating Russian meddling we get the above quote which indicates Putin et al did not meddle. That’s no good, so we get the “perhaps” clause followed by opinions, innuendos, and circumstantial evidence introduced by the following quote: “Russia’s hand in all of this is largely hidden from view. But fingerprints abound.” I.e., Russian (Putin’s) interference can’t be objectively proven but his fingerprints have been found. Of course there are lots of other fingerprints as well and as you read on you find all the really well documented evidence of where the support of the Swedish “alt-right” comes from points to US alt-right organizations and alt-right politicians such as John Bolton and others, including Republicans associated with Trump, as well as Facebook and Google —American corporations which profit from letting alt-right groups at home and abroad use their platforms to influence millions of users. This doesn’t jive with the program (to demonize Putin) so other articles in the MSM create the narrative that Trump is in Putin’s pocket - and so it goes.
Thursday, August 8, 2019
The End is Nigh
Scientists tell us that 99% of all species that have arisen on Earth have become extinct — humans should be no exception to this tendency. Mass die offs and extinctions are especially associated with habitat degradation and climate change. The world economy is a capitalist one and capitalism must continually expand and find and exploit new markets as well modernize its means of production — it is not a choice that people can make about this, it is a requirement of the system and will continue to be so until the system implodes. Just as herds of cattle that over graze and run out of food die off because grazing is what they do, so our current system will lead to a mass die off of the human population and a collapse of the capitalist system after the habitat that sustains it is degraded and can no longer allow us to graze (depleted oceans, soils, and fresh water supplies, plus new diseases due to overuse of antibiotics in agriculture — all this driven by the profit motive intrinsic to capitalism). We can watch it and bemoan it but unless capitalism is overthrown we can do nothing about it as the profit motive will frustrate all our attempts. Socialism or Barbarism. Join your local CP or carpe diem!
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