So, as Duncan Black quite reasonably says, the notion that a bunch of adolescent Vampire Diarists not knowing about the obscure Silver-Age comic-book villain Osama bin Laden is cause for fucking despair is just fucking crazy. I mean, lemme axe you thusly, mes folles: does Ezra fucking Klein "know" "who" "bin Laden" "is"? Not to get all post-structuralist all up over his pretty boyface, but insofar as his character is continually recreated by the historical (con)text in which he be encountered, yo, can he be said to be at all? But let's not be too hard on Ezra, who is, after all, just parotting Jamelle Bouie, who actually coughs up the following without the slightest hint of irony:
Still, it's sobering; not because it reveals anything profound about our educational system or the attacks on 9/11, but because it points to an absolute truth: for each generation, America is a very different place, and the America we lost on 9/11 -- the America that didn't profile citizens, torture people, or monitor their phone calls -- isn't even a distance memory for the children and teenagers of today's America.Oh, um, what? HAVE YOU EVER HEARD OF A LITTLE THING CALLED VIETNAM? Look, I love the progressive notion that America's soul was whiter than the shaved ass of a Bel Ami model until that dastardly do-bad, George Dubya and his team of nefarious lawyers turned it black, but honestly. America didn't profile its citizens before 9/11? Written by a black guy? Seriously? Wonders will never cease.
45 comments:
You make everything a fucking travesty!
I think we might've even learned about COINTELPRO and McCarthyism etc ad inf at my public high school. "The America we lost on 9/11." jeeeezussss.
But you know, I sure would like to lose America for a while. Where can I get some of that pixie dust?
http://thefastertimes.com/politics/files/2011/05/obama_got_bin_laden.jpg
http://punditkitchen.files.wordpress.com/2010/10/b4d5b021-08a0-425e-ac97-e64f58c6003d.jpg
I think by profiling, he means write ups in the New Yorker.
No 'profiling' in this context means capping their ass with a killr robot.
I'm glad anonymous provided the link to that sassy birth certificate picture. I never would have encountered it if not for him.
I actually think it's a good thing, and surprising, that this shit hasn't been drummed into the kids here.
And I hear you on this quaint notion that OBL made us the bad empire that we are today. Still, it does seem that he provided a pretext for making things worse in some critical areas, mostly from a civil liberties standpoint. It's all stuff the Empire wanted to do, but the WTC calamity provided a whole lotta lube.
This is not to discount the shitty stuff that was done in the past and that black people have been living with this shit a whole lot longer than everyone else.
All things must pass.
Who knows if it's good or bad?
@ freddy: u mad bro?
http://asset-server.libsyn.com/assets/a/4/4/e/a44eda72001c397f/obama-shark-oops-too-cool.jpg
http://punditkitchen.files.wordpress.com/2010/10/b4d5b021-08a0-425e-ac97-e64f58c6003d.jpg
Remember when we didn't torture? I do! Those were the days, when guys like Dan Mitrione would go to other countries, particularly places like Latin America, and say, "Hey fellas, you guys are being awful mean. There are more civilized ways to get the information you need to stop those terrible jungle rebels. You should try asking real nice like."
It's like he'd remembered hosting an awesome party and everybody was there, but then he woke up and found that nobody had shown up at all. Can't he be happy that a few friends showed up? What, aren't we good enough?
BTW, I think I know what you meant by "post-structuralist". Sweeet.
When I was a teenager I wish I had had the good sense to pay absolutely no attention to anything. It's too late for me now, but maybe these kids have a chance.
Teenagers who don't know shit like this are at least not the kind of douchebags who grow up to blog for the American Prospect. That the kids don't know who the guy was is the best news I've heard about America in YEARS.
Seriously, the first time I saw one of those screencaps of a Facebook status saying "OMG wtf is osama lol" I fucking applauded.
It's all changed, gone to shit since 9/11. Just last week, I'm driving through Georgia, figure I'll drop by the School of the Americas and say bonerz deez to some of my old compadres, and what do I find? Some fucking thing called the "Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation." Jesus fucking wept.
savages chop off heads, real men demonstrate the use of electrical shock on panhandlers then execute them
There's a reason why the voting age used to be 21.
Back before TV, there was nothing to do, and so many people read the papers and educated themselves about politics as a pastime. Hard to imagine just how boring the world used to be for the average couch-potato. But now we have TV, video games, free porn, etc. to compete with knowing anything about the world. And so Americans are less fit than they've ever been to exercise the power of the franchise.
It's a pity we cannot revert the voting age back to 21. But really we need to go beyond that, to raise the voting age considerably. I think 40 is about right for modern Americans.
Voting with the Stars.
I say raise the voting age to 100.
I say raise it to retirement age. And work until you're dead.
I think we should raise the voting age to 200, at the very least. No one should be able to vote except the government itself!
In mathematics, I believe this is called an asympvote.
And at the think-tank that aside would have prompted the reply, "Well, that clinches it, then!"
One does have to wonder though... I got thrown out of class in 8th grade for trying to explain to my 'social studies' teacher that the textbook was wrong about what happened to Allende, getting into the nuts and bolts of the whole CIA paying the miners to go on strike shit...
I was a very popular kid in middle school.
black people have been living with this shit a whole lot longer than everyone else
A few million native Americans might disagree with this assertion.
I'm on a Ken Russel kick, now you mention Mitrione. Ill be on a Costa Gavras kick now, though Father Barre and him have a lot of similarities. God I hate people..
Meh. I doubt that anyone can name the various Hitler's of the Month from the past decade.
Not that I'd want them to. Just look at Serbia for an example of what happens when you nurse a memory for 500 years.
Screw all this 'voting' stuff.. Let's all just move to Burma. The weather's a bit warm, but you can always have some 12 year old fan you all day..
The only different between then and now is that the blacks have peacefully returned back to the plantation, now that they think they own a piece...
'yippie! somebody else is being profiled now!'
Yes, we should raise the voting age to..uh... never, and reduce the age for the draft to a minimum where shooting an M-16 won't knock you over backwards
To fish:
Are there even a few million native Americans left?
"A few million native Americans might disagree with this assertion."
Yeah. I was thinking mainly about the heightened police measures. I am aware of genocide. Also slavery. If I am missing anything - and certainly, I am - anyone who wants to challenge fish for the 'preeningly-aware-commenter' award is welcome to step up.
I love awards! I was put in award for 6 months for evaluation once.
I would really love to hear Ezra Klein's version of bin Laden:
Well, he was about 8 feet tall with really big fangs. This one time him and his buddies flew a rocket ship into the Freedom Building in New York City and killed 6 million people. It was called the Holocost at 9/11 Street. He survived, though, and flew back to Afghaniraqovia on a magic carpet. He then set to building a gigantic army of evil which consisted of every man, woman and child of Arab descent. He used mind control like Dr. Mabuse. I think everyone was, and understandably so, convinced that he could only be killed with Excalibur. And when I asked Wally down at the yogurt shop what he thought about his death, he shrugged his shoulders and asked, "Do you want Oreo cookie bites on this like usual?" I lost it right there and started screaming and yelling and asking if he cared about anything in this world. I think I had a right!
Ezra's really dating himself, isn't he?
The chirren probably just hate an Evil guy that us olds have never even heard of.
Women and children. Yoink!
@Scats - Justin Beiber?
Bristol Palin has had plastic surgery
http://gawker.com/#!5798691/bristol-palins-face-looks-different-doesnt-it/gallery/1
"the notion that a bunch of adolescent Vampire Diarists not knowing about the obscure Silver-Age comic-book villain Osama bin Laden is cause for fucking despair is just fucking crazy."
You're right: the real disgrace is that they don't know who Trago the Trumpeter was. It was only Ant-Man's finest hour, that's all. No wonder we're in Libya.
There's no memory quite like a distance memory, is there?
It's just one too many mornings in a thousand years.
And now I'm taking the coke and I'M GOING BACK TO GREENSBURG!!!11!!
What is that Greensburg riff about? this?
@leonard
wtf theyd mkit illgl lol
Capt'n Obvious
No one can touch my preening.
You're a real prude! Everyone is free to touch mine.
Maybe 'distance memory' is what happens when you do 'distance learning'?????
Klein every mountain, forge every stream, etc.... and so on
Did teenagers not know about the Vietnam war a decade after it occurred? Possibly, because teenagers are stupid.
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