Comments on: Hope Killers http://jhfarr.com/farrfeed/2008/04/29/hope-killers/ Living Planet Mystery Tales Wed, 7 Jan 2009 00:17:47 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.7 hourly 1 By: K.J. Webb http://jhfarr.com/farrfeed/2008/04/29/hope-killers/comment-page-1/#comment-1239 K.J. Webb Wed, 30 Apr 2008 17:57:35 +0000 http://jhfarr.com/farrfeed/?p=428#comment-1239 Christopher Lasch wrote a very provocative book back in the early 90's called "True and Only Heaven: Progress and Its Critics". Lasch was a man of the Left with a very large critique of American society. But he identified very presciently a certain developing problem with the Left: It had sold its soul to the gods (false gods, he thought) of Progressivism, Technocracy and Bureaucracy. He preferred an older populist tradition of the Left based on individual responsibility and free thought, which came down through the labor movement, cooperative societies, fraternal organizations, anarchists and churches. He thought the Left could regain some of that fertile ground if it only remembered where it came from and gave up on the sterile dream of endless progress through an ever-expanded organization of the state. Populism is never far below the surface in America, and populists have all the best political tunes. Those tunes have largely been appropriated by conservatives, and that's a pity. I'd shove a few post-modernist professors and policy wonks overboard if that's what it took to sing the old songs again. Christopher Lasch wrote a very provocative book back in the early 90’s called “True and Only Heaven: Progress and Its Critics”. Lasch was a man of the Left with a very large critique of American society. But he identified very presciently a certain developing problem with the Left: It had sold its soul to the gods (false gods, he thought) of Progressivism, Technocracy and Bureaucracy. He preferred an older populist tradition of the Left based on individual responsibility and free thought, which came down through the labor movement, cooperative societies, fraternal organizations, anarchists and churches. He thought the Left could regain some of that fertile ground if it only remembered where it came from and gave up on the sterile dream of endless progress through an ever-expanded organization of the state. Populism is never far below the surface in America, and populists have all the best political tunes. Those tunes have largely been appropriated by conservatives, and that’s a pity. I’d shove a few post-modernist professors and policy wonks overboard if that’s what it took to sing the old songs again.

]]> By: Byron http://jhfarr.com/farrfeed/2008/04/29/hope-killers/comment-page-1/#comment-1238 Byron Wed, 30 Apr 2008 12:11:29 +0000 http://jhfarr.com/farrfeed/?p=428#comment-1238 Yes, your own brain will be illegal under yet another still another Republican reign of fear, derision and paranoia. John's remarks led me to the eulogy by Ted Kennedy for his brother Robert Kennedy. He said "Some men see things as they are and say why. I dream things that never were and say why not." Yes, your own brain will be illegal under yet another still another Republican reign of fear, derision and paranoia.
John’s remarks led me to the eulogy by Ted Kennedy for his brother Robert Kennedy. He said “Some men see things as they are and say why. I dream things that never were and say why not.”

]]> By: Number 6 http://jhfarr.com/farrfeed/2008/04/29/hope-killers/comment-page-1/#comment-1236 Number 6 Wed, 30 Apr 2008 05:06:44 +0000 http://jhfarr.com/farrfeed/?p=428#comment-1236 "BREAK THE LAW By order of the King of the United States It is now illegal to dance in this place Please do not dance By order of the Law of Coincidence It is now illegal to sing and dance Please do not dance This is a story about love and glory Everybody's doing it now Break the law    Break the law It's mandatory for love and glory Everybody's doing it yeah Break the law    Break the law Break break break the law By order of the King of Reality It is now illegal to live for free Please do not dance This This This This is a mystery about the end of history Everybody's thinking it now Break the law    Break the law It's mandatory for love and glory Everybody's doing it yeah Break the law    Break the law Swing your partner round and round Break the law and hit the ground You don't need no alcohol Break the law and crawl the wall Dose--ee--doe and yes means no Break the law and go go go By order of the Law of the Nightly News It is now illegal to tell the truth This is a story about love and glory By order of the Law of Your Mom and Dad If you feel too good then you've been bad Everybody's doing it now Break the law    Break the law According to what your teachers taught You are not allowed to think these thoughts It's mandatory for love and glory By order of your evil alter ego Your own brain is now illegal Everybody's doing it yeah Break the law    Break the law By order of the Queen of the Earth and Sky Break the law    Break the law" -World Entertainment War (Rob Brezsny's old band) “BREAK THE LAW

By order of the King of the United States
It is now illegal to dance in this place
Please do not dance
By order of the Law of Coincidence
It is now illegal to sing and dance
Please do not dance

This is a story about love and glory
Everybody’s doing it now
Break the law    Break the law
It’s mandatory for love and glory
Everybody’s doing it yeah
Break the law    Break the law
Break break break the law

By order of the King of Reality
It is now illegal to live for free
Please do not dance

This This This
This is a mystery about the end of history
Everybody’s thinking it now
Break the law    Break the law
It’s mandatory for love and glory
Everybody’s doing it yeah
Break the law    Break the law

Swing your partner round and round
Break the law and hit the ground
You don’t need no alcohol
Break the law and crawl the wall
Dose–ee–doe and yes means no
Break the law and go go go

By order of the Law of the Nightly News
It is now illegal to tell the truth
This is a story about love and glory
By order of the Law of Your Mom and Dad
If you feel too good then you’ve been bad
Everybody’s doing it now
Break the law    Break the law
According to what your teachers taught
You are not allowed to think these thoughts
It’s mandatory for love and glory
By order of your evil alter ego
Your own brain is now illegal
Everybody’s doing it yeah
Break the law    Break the law
By order of the Queen of the Earth and Sky
Break the law    Break the law”

-World Entertainment War
(Rob Brezsny’s old band)

]]> By: david in maine http://jhfarr.com/farrfeed/2008/04/29/hope-killers/comment-page-1/#comment-1235 david in maine Wed, 30 Apr 2008 02:27:12 +0000 http://jhfarr.com/farrfeed/?p=428#comment-1235 small world, i'm sitting here reading, "William James in the Maelstrom of American Modernism" by Robert D. Richardson... 'hope' all is well with you, John, and your friends - enjoy your trip! david in maine small world, i’m sitting here reading, “William James in the Maelstrom of American Modernism” by Robert D. Richardson…

‘hope’ all is well with you, John, and your friends - enjoy your trip!

david in maine

]]> By: K.J. Webb http://jhfarr.com/farrfeed/2008/04/29/hope-killers/comment-page-1/#comment-1234 K.J. Webb Tue, 29 Apr 2008 23:49:36 +0000 http://jhfarr.com/farrfeed/?p=428#comment-1234 William James - a great American pragmatist - believed that we could never know what was real except by imagining what didn't yet exist. No man is able to do a great thing, he said, unless he is first able to imagine a thing not yet doable. Imagining leads to doing. It engenders a new reality. This is stirring stuff, even if I don't quite believe it. It is a dialectic driven by a gut sense of optimism. James was in the great American tradition of boosters and puffers. He was a guy who never doubted he could jump any ditch, no matter how broad. He was not unlike his contemporaries, John D. Rockefeller and Horatio Alger. A lot of what Barack has to say - and what you say, John - puts me in mind of James, voiced in a language of 21st century disenchantment. This fascinates me. My own personal intellectual tradition is grittier, grimier and more working-class - a bleaker view of human possibility. A century ago these differing attitudes would have made us, respecitively, a Marxist (me) and an entrepeneur (you). Today they have morphed in entirely opposite directions. You dream of a benevolent state, I cast a cold eye on the state. It's fundamentally a matter of temperament. There are those of us who love the cold waters of disillusionment, and there are those of us who cling to a hope of transcendence. That's a pretty dream, I admit. Dreaming has never given me much sustenance. William James - a great American pragmatist - believed that we could never know what was real except by imagining what didn’t yet exist. No man is able to do a great thing, he said, unless he is first able to imagine a thing not yet doable. Imagining leads to doing. It engenders a new reality.

This is stirring stuff, even if I don’t quite believe it. It is a dialectic driven by a gut sense of optimism. James was in the great American tradition of boosters and puffers. He was a guy who never doubted he could jump any ditch, no matter how broad. He was not unlike his contemporaries, John D. Rockefeller and Horatio Alger.

A lot of what Barack has to say - and what you say, John - puts me in mind of James, voiced in a language of 21st century disenchantment. This fascinates me. My own personal intellectual tradition is grittier, grimier and more working-class - a bleaker view of human possibility. A century ago these differing attitudes would have made us, respecitively, a Marxist (me) and an entrepeneur (you). Today they have morphed in entirely opposite directions. You dream of a benevolent state, I cast a cold eye on the state.

It’s fundamentally a matter of temperament. There are those of us who love the cold waters of disillusionment, and there are those of us who cling to a hope of transcendence. That’s a pretty dream, I admit. Dreaming has never given me much sustenance.

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