World Idiocrination

[vegetariantaxidermy]

American idiomination is galloping across the planet like the final stages of cancer, getting into every nook and cranny. There are a multitude of reasons, but clearly the internet and its obvious bias towards the US is the driving force behind its escalation in recent years. The US has the monopoly and the big money to do it. Of course this is immoral-- to use something as all-encompassing as the internet (which happens to belong to everyone) as a tool to destroy everyone else's culture and unique identity except your own questionable one. 'Resistance is futile' as the Borgs like to say. Hmmm. How appropriate... That should make America happy. Signs are that in just one more generation the entire population of the earth will be as moronic as its own, give or take a few individuals, unless something major happens eg. the idiocracy manages to start a nuclear war that sends the survivors (if there are any) back to the caves.

[davidm]

It looks like the other thread where Veg first posted this book cover has been nuked.

Anyhow, I agree with Veg about the idiocracy that is the United States, and particularly how it is spreading its idiocy to every nook and cranny of the world. There’s nothing new here. As Henry Miller wrote in Black Spring (1936):

I see America spreading disaster. I see America as a black curse upon the world. I see a long night settling in and that mushroom which has poisoned the world withering at the roots.

But that’s not what I’m interested in. What I’m interested in is Veg’s contention that there is some kind of Platonic form of “the” English language that can never, ever change. What is the argument for this idea? Well, so far it’s the posting of the above book cover and apart from that … crickets. *CHIRRUP*

[vegetariantaxidermy]

It looks like the other thread where Veg first posted this book cover has been nuked.

Anyhow, I agree with Veg about the idiocracy that is the United States, and particularly how it is spreading its idiocy to every nook and cranny of the world. There’s nothing new here. As Henry Miller wrote in Black Spring (1936):

I see America spreading disaster. I see America as a black curse upon the world. I see a long night settling in and that mushroom which has poisoned the world withering at the roots.

But that’s not what I’m interested in. What I’m interested in is Veg’s contention that there is some kind of Platonic form of “the” English language that can never, ever change. What is the argument for this idea? Well, so far it’s the posting of the above book cover and apart from that … crickets. *CHIRRUP*

You obviously know as little about Plato as you do about language. Since you 'dont read any of my posts', only 'making exceptions' for particular ones, then I suggest you go back over all my comments to find what you are looking for.

Gosh, I wonder what 'Henry Miller' would think today. America was a country of geniuses back then compared to what it is now. Some people do have the gift of foresight.

As for the thread-nuking, I only post a thread once in a blue moon and they generally get 'nuked' quite quickly, typically thanks to the deplorable parsnip-brain PE.

[davidm]

BTW, the word "idiocrination" is a neologism, and not a bad one at that. Are you sure that's permissible under your authoritarian view of language?

[davidm]

It looks like the other thread where Veg first posted this book cover has been nuked.

Anyhow, I agree with Veg about the idiocracy that is the United States, and particularly how it is spreading its idiocy to every nook and cranny of the world. There’s nothing new here. As Henry Miller wrote in Black Spring (1936):

I see America spreading disaster. I see America as a black curse upon the world. I see a long night settling in and that mushroom which has poisoned the world withering at the roots.

But that’s not what I’m interested in. What I’m interested in is Veg’s contention that there is some kind of Platonic form of “the” English language that can never, ever change. What is the argument for this idea? Well, so far it’s the posting of the above book cover and apart from that … crickets. *CHIRRUP*

You obviously know as little about Plato as you do about language. Since you 'dont read any of my posts', only 'making exceptions' for particular ones, then I suggest you go back over all my comments to find what you are looking for.

Gosh, I wonder what 'Henry Miller' would think today. America was a country of geniuses back then compared to what it is now. Some people do have the gift of foresight.

1. Still waiting for your argument about language.

2. Henry Miller was an American.

[davidm]

Also, why did you put the name Henry Miller in quote marks? Are you suggesting I made him up? Do you not know who he is?

[davidm]

Since you 'dont read any of my posts'...

That would be don't, not 'dont.

You're welcome.

[vegetariantaxidermy]

It looks like the other thread where Veg first posted this book cover has been nuked.

Anyhow, I agree with Veg about the idiocracy that is the United States, and particularly how it is spreading its idiocy to every nook and cranny of the world. There’s nothing new here. As Henry Miller wrote in Black Spring (1936):



But that’s not what I’m interested in. What I’m interested in is Veg’s contention that there is some kind of Platonic form of “the” English language that can never, ever change. What is the argument for this idea? Well, so far it’s the posting of the above book cover and apart from that … crickets. *CHIRRUP*

You obviously know as little about Plato as you do about language. Since you 'dont read any of my posts', only 'making exceptions' for particular ones, then I suggest you go back over all my comments to find what you are looking for.

Gosh, I wonder what 'Henry Miller' would think today. America was a country of geniuses back then compared to what it is now. Some people do have the gift of foresight.

1. Still waiting for your argument about language.

2. Henry Miller was an American.

So is the guy who wrote that book. As I said, some people have the gift of foresight and ability to see themselves as others see them.
I'm all for clever new words. Lewis Carroll added many new words to the English language. I'm also not idiotic enough to attack people for typos, but Americans just butcher the language. They use verbs as nouns and nouns as verbs, leave out letters (but not consistently), add words that are not needed (off ofofof, outside of, 'where are you 'at'?'), invent superfluous words out of ignorance--not cleverness (eg. 'functionable' and all those bizarre words that Bush2 came up with) etc.etc.etc.
Then there are the baby-spellings, like 'donut'. FFS. A doughnut is spelt that way because it is made out of DOUGH, and it looks like a 'nut'. Do they also spell 'dough' as 'do'? The irony here, of course, is that an American came up with the word in the first place.

MAKE THE PIE HIGHER
by George W. Bush

I think we all agree, the past is over.
This is still a dangerous world.
It’s a world of madmen and uncertainty
and potential mental losses.

Rarely is the question asked
Is our children learning?
Will the highways of the Internet become more few?
How many hands have I shaked?

They misunderestimate me.
I am a pitbull on the pantleg of opportunity.
I know that the human being and the fish can coexist.
Families is where our nation finds hope, where our wings take dream.

Put food on your family!
Knock down the tollbooth!
Vulcanize society!
Make the pie higher! Make the pie higher!

[Walker]

That's pretty funny.

Sounds like you’re primed to take the next step, beyond words and into the meanings.

Black Spring is a brilliant work.

[vegetariantaxidermy]

That's pretty funny.

Sounds like you’re primed to take the next step, beyond words and into the meanings.

Black Spring is a brilliant work.

Pierce seems to blame everything on the 'right', but the side who like to think of themselves as liberal, the fanatical and patently unliberal American PCProgessive movement, is equally moronic. So basically the country is stuffed on both sides because there doesn't appear to be a rational and objective group in the equation at all. In other words idiots all round.

[Walker]

All you know is media presentations.

You would like, The Air Conditioned Nightmare, by Henry Miller.
He wrote this passage just before WWII.

“As to whether I have been deceived, disillusioned … The answer is yes, I suppose. I had the misfortune to be nourished by the dreams and visions of great Americans – the poets and seers. Some other breed of man has won out. This world which is in the making filled me with dread. I have seen it germinate; I can read it like a blue-print. It is not a world I want to live in. It is a world suited for monomaniacs obsessed with the idea of progress – but a false progress, a progress which stinks. It is a world cluttered with useless objects which men and women, in order to be exploited and degraded, are taught to regard as useful. The dreamer whose dreams are non-utilitarian has no place in this world. Whatever does not lend itself to being bought and sold, whether in the realm of things, ideas, principles, dreams or hopes, is debarred. In this world the poet is anathema, the thinker a fool, the artist an escapist, the man of vision a criminal.”

[davidm]

All you know is media presentations.

You would like, The Air Conditioned Nightmare, by Henry Miller.
He wrote this passage just before WWII.

“As to whether I have been deceived, disillusioned … The answer is yes, I suppose. I had the misfortune to be nourished by the dreams and visions of great Americans – the poets and seers. Some other breed of man has won out. This world which is in the making filled me with dread. I have seen it germinate; I can read it like a blue-print. It is not a world I want to live in. It is a world suited for monomaniacs obsessed with the idea of progress – but a false progress, a progress which stinks. It is a world cluttered with useless objects which men and women, in order to be exploited and degraded, are taught to regard as useful. The dreamer whose dreams are non-utilitarian has no place in this world. Whatever does not lend itself to being bought and sold, whether in the realm of things, ideas, principles, dreams or hopes, is debarred. In this world the poet is anathema, the thinker a fool, the artist an escapist, the man of vision a criminal.”

Excellent cite! This is the great visionary Henry Miller, who was what Walt Whitman would have been, had Whitman lived in the horrific 20th century. How much more is this passage, written on the eve of WWII, relevant to today? I love Henry Miller. Ancestor to Ginsberg and Kerouac. Do you know the story of the failed meeting in the late 1950s between Kerouac and Miller?

[Walker]

No, what happened?

[vegetariantaxidermy]

All you know is media presentations.

You would like, The Air Conditioned Nightmare, by Henry Miller.
He wrote this passage just before WWII.

“As to whether I have been deceived, disillusioned … The answer is yes, I suppose. I had the misfortune to be nourished by the dreams and visions of great Americans – the poets and seers. Some other breed of man has won out. This world which is in the making filled me with dread. I have seen it germinate; I can read it like a blue-print. It is not a world I want to live in. It is a world suited for monomaniacs obsessed with the idea of progress – but a false progress, a progress which stinks. It is a world cluttered with useless objects which men and women, in order to be exploited and degraded, are taught to regard as useful. The dreamer whose dreams are non-utilitarian has no place in this world. Whatever does not lend itself to being bought and sold, whether in the realm of things, ideas, principles, dreams or hopes, is debarred. In this world the poet is anathema, the thinker a fool, the artist an escapist, the man of vision a criminal.”

Excellent cite! This is the great visionary Henry Miller, who was what Walt Whitman would have been, had Whitman lived in the horrific 20th century. How much more is this passage, written on the eve of WWII, relevant to today? I love Henry Miller. Ancestor to Ginsberg and Kerouac. Do you know the story of the failed meeting in the late 1950s between Kerouac and Miller?

I was just going to say how interesting that passage was. I wonder what he thought when his vision became all too true and multiplied by a hundred (although he died before the worst of it).

[davidm]

Kerouac lets Miller's dinner get cold.

Miller, Kerouac, Ginsberg, Ferlinghetti ... they don't make 'em that way anymore. Now we live in a nightmare of people thumbing their cellphones.

I interviewed Ferlinghetti once at the City Lights bookstore for a San Francisco weekly newspaper. I believe he is still alive, and getting close to 100 years old.