"The Dumbest
People on the Planet"
Dr. Gerry Lower, Keystone, South Dakota
OpEdNews.com
In an interview with Britain's Mirror, Michael Moore referred to his
American countrymen as "possibly the dumbest people on the planet ...
in thrall to conniving, thieving, smug pricks" (Brian Reade,
"The Awkward Conscience of a Nation," www.mirror.co.uk, November
3, 2003). Indeed, the gullibility of the American people in the face of
Bush administration lies and coercion is is a central theme in Moore's
critique.
"We Americans suffer from an enforced ignorance. We don't know about
anything that's happening outside our country. Our stupidity is
embarrassing. National Geographic produced a survey which showed that 60
per cent of 18-25 year olds don't know where Great Britain is on a map.
And 92 per cent of us don't own a passport ... We, the United States of
America, are culpable in committing so many acts of terror and bloodshed
that we had better get a clue about the culture of violence in which we
have been active participants."
The right wing response to Moore's criticism of the Bush administration
has been predictably venomous and vengeful. Moore has been subjected to
the wrath of the conservative press, right wing political groups (Move
America Forward) and anti-Moore websites "dedicated to unearthing the
truth behind the doublespeak and falsehood that spews from the mouth (and
keyboard) of Michael Moore" (www.moorewatch.com).
Of course, the conservative electorate who support Bush's self-righteous
religious capitalism do not appreciate being referred to as the
"dumbest people on the planet." After all, they can also claim
to be the most monied people on the planet and, if that isn't enough, the
most militaristic people on the planet. Right wing corporate America has
worked very hard to put itself into a position where it can buy and take
what it wants.
It is much more accurate, however, to say that the members of the
conservative electorate are "the most ignorant people on the
planet." Stupid is something that can befall people for lack of
education and lack of opportunities to acquire a knowledge base
appropriate to their talents. There is, of course, plenty of this in
America today.
Ignorance, however, is something people do to themselves, typically in the
name of preserving some larger cause. In the case of the Republican right
wing, empirical and historical ignorance is an outright necessity in
preserving the corrupt, crony capitalism that has provided its followers
with wealth and power and the ability to survive without contribution,
typically at the expense of those who do contribute with time and labor
and talent.
No nation on earth has more ignored the values from which it was birthed
than America under the Bush administration. The result is the greatest gap
between rich and poor in human history, achieved by a nation birthed from
the values of honesty, human rights, fairness and equality in the eyes of
God. The result is the overt emergence of class warfare.
If Americans were the stupidest people on the planet, then America would
be in a good deal of trouble. Fortunately, self-imposed ignorance, as a
state of mind, can be overcome very quickly in the face of honest
information placed in historical context. Ignorance is only employed for
convenience's sake or survival's sake in feigning allegiance to the powers
that be. It is oftentimes only part of being loyal and obedient in the
interest of maintaining personal employment.
Moore's documentary, "Fahrenheit 9/11," goes a long way toward
the elimination of self-imposed ignorance. Not being stupid but misled,
the American people have been falling away from the Bush administration on
their own volition. In "Fahrenheit 9/11," Moore places all the
dubious actions of the Bush administration into chronological and
historical context to provide a story from which the people can ascertain
the despotic nature and direction of it all. In doing so, Moore's efforts
clearly come from a higher source than that relied upon by the Bush
administration.
More worrisome than the state of mind of the American people is the state
of mind of the Bush administration and its religious capitalistic
followers, who continue to abide deceit and coercion, who continue to
abide the Bush administration's religious folly and its resulting domestic
and international failures.
Psychosis can be defined as thoughts, words and actions that are devoid of
reason. With this criterion, the Bush administration is the most psychotic
administration in American history. Every issue is politicized and defined
with spin, no issue is discussed openly with reference to empirical fact
and historical or cultural context, every issue is decided on the basis of
religious faith, i.e., you are with us or you are against America. This is
religious self-righteousness personified.
America's current dominion by religious capitalism has led only to the
denigration of human rights and the values of democracy. It has emerged
largely because Americans have, for the past half century, been coerced by
the conservative right wing into turning the governance of American
socio-economics over to the marketplace and America's corporate
aristocracy. It has made everything in America stupid because virtually
all decisions are made in preservation of an inherently corrupt
marketplace. America has been sold a complete bill of goods in the name of
"progress" measured in monetary terms.
A greed-driven market place has determined that family farms and ranches
and the communities they support are not fit to survive. A greed-driven
marketplace has determined that mom and pop community businesses are not
fit to survive. A greed-driven marketplace has determined that those
without money deserve no or minimal access to health care and education. A
greed-driven marketplace has determined how Americans make a monied
mockery of the birth of their purported savior.
Those who fail to see this remain under the influence of Adam Smith's
"invisible hand." It is Smith's "invisible hand," that
directs our lives from above. This euphemism for God's will is capricious
and vindictive and ruthless and it exists because we allow it to exist for
our failure to place upper limits on human greed and avarice. It exists
because, while we have set disastrous lower limits to what people's lives
are worth, we have set no upper limits at all. It exists because we do not
define American socioeconomics under the values of democracy. We allow
competitive, greed-driven socioeconomics to define us. It has done a
terrible disservice to democracy since World War II, when America fell off
the edge of human reality in service to Mammon.
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Dr. Gerry Lower lives in the shadow of Mount Rushmore in the Black Hills
of South Dakota. He has a website at www.jeffersonseyes.com and he can be
reached at tisland@blackhills.com.
