Everyone has the right to work, to just and favorable conditions of work and to protection for himself and his family [and] an existence worthy of human dignity.. everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well being of himself and his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical care.
Universal Declaration of Human Rights, 1948
We have 50 per cent of the world’s wealth, but only 6-3 per cent of its population. In this situation, our real job in the coming period is to devise a pattern of relationships which permit us to maintain this position of disparity. To do so, we have to dispense with all sentimentality… we should cease thinking about human rights, the raising of living standards and democratisation.
George Kennan, US Cold War planner, 1948
4.1
The Paradox
The above statements illustrates a contradiction in western politics that existed long before 1945. The above has been an on going theme of governments for hundreds of years. That of maintaining the disparity between the powerful rich and the sustainment of a despondent poor.
The question is. Are we any smarter then than we are now? There are two things that should worry people One is There is no end to the amount of information and material available to highlight and inform of the wrong doings of powerful nations and corporations in robbing and destroying the worlds resources.
Yet, even with wide protest and important progress made in civil liberties mostly ignored by media attention we still have an atrophy and zombified reaction by people to a lot of what is going on. We should be saying first. Stop this! Then, How can we stop this. Rather than. That’s just the way it is.
The other concern is It is always a good measure of the active dissent in a society by. How deep governments bury or attempt to hide unpopular legislation and policies from public scrutiny. Today much these dubious ideas thinly disguised as reforms but blatant cons are thrown in the publics faces with no excuses, warranty debate or protest.
There are various reasons for public apathy. One is the overpowering saturation of information. Followed by more of the same. Until all that is seen is a blurred and incomprehensive abstraction that can be difficult to understand or rationalize into any structure of importance.
Another is. Telling people what is wrong all the time can wear down peoples resistance. Without structuring a debate that can help them to understand how to put the wrongs right. This of course is much harder.
But this is the challenge to socially minded people if we are to counter the odious mentality that creates projects such as “The new American Century”
To summarize We need to concentrate on as well as the issues the machinery that drives the issues
*We need to understand the structure of oppression and the tools used that deny us the right in deciding how we would like to live
* The propaganda system used to manipulate the public mind that creates the illusion of democracy.
The structure of the system. That doles out just enough reward to the middle class in order to cushion the rich from the poor. And to maintain the above disparity of wealth and power.
*And finally.We do not have to agree with each other all of the time. But we need to insure we are all heading in the same direction Single issues need to join as one issue. In the struggle for a better world –
We will not find salvation in any one party, strategy, theory, book, leader or ideology. The job is finding the good parts and working with those while trying to avoid the bad parts .