When we refuse to recognize that food, health care, housing, education and jobs are human rights, the glorification of charity is an index of social cruelty. Today, the compelling reasons to struggle for economic justice have never been more acute. Rather than entertain any such notions, mainstream politicians and most national media outlets are busy perpetuating vertigo for the public. If you're closely watching the coverage of a Republican or Democratic convention, you probably start to feel dizzy from all the spinning. It was impossible to imagine that any of the GOP delegates would scrawl a word of real graffiti, unless of course it had been duly authorized by proper authorities.
Conformity can be deadly when combined with political power and popularized fantasies.
In the relentless spinning game that takes no quarter in a presidential election year, simplistic flunkies for corporate America are apt to be presented as men wise beyond their years. Later in the week, presenting the usual media mix of ponderous centrism and conservative ideology, the same CNN program featured a protracted discussion with a panel that included someone familiar to many baby boomers and their parents. Blending easily into the rigid discourse was none other than former 1950s television icon Art Linkletter. Yes, people are funny. But sometimes, not very.