METAPHORS TO BE EXPUNGED

AKA - things not to write

No.1
"cost lives"

This a a terrible phrase.
Just about any other verb would be better. Channeling Lakoff, "cost" evokes a frame that, I bet when think about it, you don't really like either.

- John (resurrecting a whiteboard forum I started in a meat-space newsroom years ago)

original article:
Fighting Islamophobia: A Response to Critics
by Deepa Kumar
http://mrzine.monthlyreview.org/kumar030406.html

my response:
http://www.haloscan.com/comments/yoshie/kumar030406/#75275

#1 --The history of Islam is no more violent than the history of any of the other major religions of the world. --

And Pol Pot was not as bad as Hitler, therefore please leave Pol Pot alone. Sorry, this line of argument does not sing.

-- When Timothy McVeigh carried out the Oklahoma city bombings, we didn't hear tirades against Christianity or arguments about how all white people are to blame for the bombings. --

I certainly heard, and read (and thought) the former, and do not doubt that some falsely argued the second. But as noted by others previously, Islam is not a race.

#2 -- So, should we now blame Christianity, since the US is predominantly Christian? --

Absolutely. I would recommend Fighting Worlds: The Origins Of Religious Violence, by Hector Avalos -- to expand and strengthen the critique of religion. Abandoning the masses to the vile sky-daddy delusions instilled in them is the counter-revolutionary move. Can the Bronze-Age intellect be expected change the world for the better?

#3 -- For instance, it would have been quite foolish for the left to engage in a discussion of the flaws of Judaism in the midst of the holocaust, as this would only have strengthened the Nazi regime.--

And if the Jews had been lighting off bombs in residential Detroit, justified by their scriptures, because of Henry Ford's Nazi sympathies, the international Left must still have kept silent? Or if different Jewish factions had begun killing each other? Simply put, you are encouraging tribalism.

#4 -- By bringing to the fore and fighting for the concepts of equality, justice, and liberty, they dealt a deathblow to the rigidly hierarchical and nakedly oppressive structures of feudal society. However, the class that led these revolutions was unable to deliver on its promises because capitalism is not a system based on equality, justice, or liberty.--

True, but why give a pass to the rigidly hierarchical and nakedly oppressive structures of *religious* society. Equality, justice, and liberty are *human* concerns, not to be found in mouldering 'supernatural' texts and the jihad/crusade they predictably foster.

The simple lesson is that every person who is now repulsed by slavery is *already a better person* than Jesus or Mohammed were. It is for us to act on these superior qualities, and oppose every excuse for retrograde barbarity regardless of provenance.

John K. Fitzpatrick | 04.06.06 - 9:50 am

This Economy Is Not Human Nature
by John K. Fitzpatrick
written for Spoon Magazine, Oct. 2004

Last episode (It's Not 'The Economy', Stupid) we found that we together devise and use institutions, made up of roles and rules, so we can produce, allocate and consume stuff.  Usually talk of economics focuses on the items produced, and the money needed to allocate it, and who get's what items, and how many. They often call it "supply and demand". That IS important, and in future articles I will get back to the 'stuff'.  But now I want to delve into what is usually overlooked, which is how the rules and roles themselves are shaped by, and also shape, how we think and act, what is called our human nature.

There is no agreement about how to define and study human nature, but there are a lot of assumptions about it that get used by different economies.  Here are a few that get trotted out:
1) People deserve the outcomes of their choices.  If they choose badly, it's their own fault.
2) The more choices, the more freedom.
3) Each human has a little chunk of total freedom, called 'free will' or 'the soul' which can make these free choices.
4) People know what they're doing, people are 'rational' or 'spiritual', which makes them choose well and make themselves happy, wealthy and wise.

My point isn't that each of the above assumptions is false (though I think they are mostly false), but these are assumptions that underlie the roles and rules we play in this economy, and by playing by these rules, we become those rules.  So we have become used to thinking it is our own fault we are poor, because since we each think we are more free than we actually are, we could have made better choices than the ones we made at the moment, choices that are then used to hold us down and apart from each other.

Consider the words of David Hume, written in 1758:
"Nothing appears more surprising...than the easiness with which the many are governed by the few, and the implicit submission with which men resign their own sentiments and passions to those of their rulers. When we inquire by what means this wonder is effected, we shall find that, as force is always on the side of the governed, the governors have nothing to support them but opinion. It is, therefore, on opinion only that government is founded, and this maxim extends to the most despotic and most military governments as well as the most free and popular."

So the irony is that this economy which claims to offer us a belief in more freedom actually results in less freedom.  The only freedom we each attain is constructed and provided to us by each other. Not by competition, but by cooperation. We need to build a different economy which is based on this truth of, and in return enhances the best of, our human nature. Next issue, I will start to outline how this new participatory economy could work.

It's Not "The Economy", Stupid.
by John K. Fitzpatrick
written for Spoon Magazine, Sept. 2004

I was asked to write about the thing that puts food in your mouth and a roof over your head - economics. The most important thing to realize is that when someone says the words -- "THE ECONOMY" -- you can bet the next thing they say is going to be bullshit.  There is no "the economy" -- but we are all involved in economics, and it has consequences for everything we do as work, buy to survive, and even influences how you think.  So you better have a grasp on economics, lest economics has a grasp on you!

When politicians and the suits on TV say "the economy" what they intend is to make you forget that this is only one of many possible economic systems. (OK, sometimes they simply don't understand it either, but if they are rich, they do.) The next time you hear them use "the economy", try to substitute the phrase "this economy" and you can see how they are trying to limit your thoughts. Because once you understand what economics is about and what is possible outside "this economy", you will fight for your fairer piece of the pie and more real freedom.

So, what is economics?  It's what people do together to produce, distribute (allocate) and consume "stuff".  By "stuff" I mean goods (food, housing) and services (fix your car, babysit your kid).  What people do together usually means that people play certain roles, for instance, in this economy when you buy food you play the role of "individual consumer."  When you go to work in this economy, you might play the role of "employee", and if you're lucky "union member".  When you run a business, you play the roles of "boss" and "owner", or maybe "debtor" if you owe the bank money.

These roles are defined by the institutions that run the production, allocation and consumption of any economy, so that each person gets to play some different roles at different times. In fact, the institutions are nothing more than the roles people play and the rules they follow. So if we change the institutions, we also change the roles we can play.  Why should you care what the institutions and roles are? Because they directly effect what kind of stuff you produce when working, how it is made, how many hours you work, how much you learn, how much say you get to have about it, and how much stuff you get in return for your work.

So when people say "the economy" is good or bad, up or down, they are glossing over the facts that whether it is up or down, your roles do not change regardless of the stock market or gas prices or whatever.  If the economy is up, that doesn't give you more say!  It doesn't give you more education!  It doesn't give you more Justice!  But in theory with a different economy, it could mean that, but they don't want you to know about that.

So economics is about the roles we play to produce, allocate, and consume stuff. Pretty darn simple!  In upcoming articles I will show how different economies (Capitalism, Communism) have defined these roles, rules and institutions, and why they don't work for you. Along the way I will examine how they effect the so-called "national interest", the impact on democratic politics, the warpage of racism and sexism, the dumbing-down of education, the evolution of our species, the attack on science and rational thought, and introduce you to a new system called Participatory Economics (ParEcon) which I hope you will agree will work much better, fostering Peace, Equality, Self-Management, Fairness, Solidarity, Ecological Sanity, and Justice for us all. And that's something you don't often hear after a mention of "the economy".

Hosted By: Society For Economic Equality
When: Friday Jan 27, 2006
at 7:00 PM
Where: Institute for Global Education
1118 Wealthy Street SE
Grand Rapids, MI 49506
US
Description:
Hotel Rwanda

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Chileans prepare to welcome first female president By Jen Ross in Santiago, Chile Published: 16 January 2006 In what's seen as a cultural breakthrough for the most conservative country in Latin America, a female Socialist - promising to maintain the country's free-market policies - is poised to become the next president of Chile. "We're making history," said Mercedes Inostroza, on her way out of a Santiago polling station. "I'm so happy to be electing our first female president. She'll represent us, women." A pediatrician turned politician, Michelle Bachelet is an atheist single mother with three children by two different partners - which makes her an odd choice in a macho and profoundly Catholic country. ...read more... http://news.independent.co.uk/world/americas/article338840.ece

Hosted By: John K. Fitzpatrick
When: Friday Feb 10, 2006
at 7:00 PM
Where: John & Kathy's fragrance-free home
GRAND RAPIDS, MI 49506
US
Description:
Part 4 of Economic Justice And Democracy, by Robin Hahnel

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