The Heart of Darkness & Useful Idiots...

[Junkdrawer]

I recently viewed a BBC special called The Power of Nightmares. You can view it here:

http://www.novakeo.com/?p=133

While excellent, there was one thing that stuck in my craw: they portray the NeoCons as idealists bent on bringing Democracy to the world, rather than the vicious Imperialists that I remember from the 50s, 60s, 70s and 80s. The strange thing is that I've encountered this NeoCon-As-Idealist line before and coming from sources that I've otherwise trusted. Sy Hersh has said it repeatedly as has PBS's Frontline.

As the contradiction rattled around in my brain, I eventually revisited an old Joseph Conrad classic: The Heart of Darkness.

Readers can read it free here:

http://www.online-literature.com/conrad/heart_of_darkness/1/

And there's a free MP3 audio version here:

http://www.audiobooksforfree.com/download/dl_part1.asp?refnum=1000335
(I confess that I like audiobooks better than music during my exercise and, with my heavy technical reading schedule, it's easier on the old eyes.)

Remember 'Take up the White Man's Burden' of the English colonial period. I'm now coming to think that the Imperialists have found the modern equivalent. In both cases, it proves invaluable in recruiting useful idiots. I suspect that many, but not all, of the NeoCons will meet their maker with the words "The Horror, The Horror" on their lips.

[robbedvoter]

1. "Idealists" - an old PR gambit. Dana Priest from WaPo came to NYC

in 2004 and had an event with Wes Clark - a talk about the role of the army. Dana had been quite OK in her presentation until she mouthed the ol' "idealist" chestnut. Clark who had been very courteous up to that point, intrerrupted her: "They are not idealists, they are imperialists". The room went nuts with cheers and applause.

[Junkdrawer]

2. Make no mistake: The Imperialists are in charge, but they seem to have...

recruited a few useful idiots who give their movement the "Idealist on a Mission" window dressing.

[bryant69]

10. There is some value to comenting on the idelogy

Idealist might not be the best term, but maybe Ideologue? It depends on how sincerly you believe they believe that stuff about transforming the middle east - if you think it's all about oil and taking over, than they are just lying.

I personally think that they really did think things would go smoothly and that everything would be beautiful once we conquered Iraq. Ideologue captures that sort of placing philosophy over reality.

Bryant
Check it out --> http://politicalcomment.blogspot.com

[Junkdrawer]

3. .

[Junkdrawer]

4. Last Kick

:kick:

[malaise]

5. I read that book in year one of University

and must have read it ten times since. Heart of Darkness is an absolute classic.

Kick

[Junkdrawer]

6. My favorite part:

The original Kurtz had been educated partly in England, and--as he was good enough to say himself--his sympathies were in the right place. His mother was half-English, his father was half-French. All Europe contributed to the making of Kurtz; and by and by I learned that, most appropriately, the International Society for the Suppression of Savage Customs had intrusted him with the making of a report, for its future guidance. And he had written it, too. I've seen it. I've read it. It was eloquent, vibrating with eloquence, but too high-strung, I think. Seventeen pages of close writing he had found time for! But this must have been before his--let us say--nerves, went wrong, and caused him to preside at certain midnight dances ending with unspeakable rites, which--as far as I reluctantly gathered from what I heard at various times--were offered up to him-- do you understand?--to Mr. Kurtz himself. But it was a beautiful piece of writing. The opening paragraph, however, in the light of later information, strikes me now as ominous. He began with the argument that we whites, from the point of development we had arrived at, `must necessarily appear to them in the nature of supernatural beings-- we approach them with the might of a deity,' and so on, and so on. `By the simple exercise of our will we can exert a power for good practically unbounded,' etc., etc. From that point he soared and took me with him. The peroration was magnificent, though difficult to remember, you know. It gave me the notion of an exotic Immensity ruled by an august Benevolence. It made me tingle with enthusiasm. This was the unbounded power of eloquence--of words--of burning noble words. There were no practical hints to interrupt the magic current of phrases, unless a kind of note at the foot of the last page, scrawled evidently much later, in an unsteady hand, may be regarded as the exposition of a method. It was very simple, and at the end of that moving appeal to every altruistic sentiment it blazed at you, luminous and terrifying, like a flash of lightning in a serene sky: `Exterminate all the brutes!'

http://www.online-literature.com/conrad/heart_of_darkness/2/

[malaise]

7. Conrad was brilliant

He summed up imperialism perfectly.
Last week I was reading about a British magistrate in colonial Jamaica named Bodilly. Here is what he said in 1932 "Our rule exists in the last resort on a carefully nurtured sense of inferiority in the governed. As soon as we lesson that, we lesson the security of our laws".

That's the lynchpin of imperialism.

[coalition_unwilling]

8. I agree that Conrad was brilliant, but think that actually Graham

Greene's "The Quiet American" is more a propos to the situation in Iraq than Conrad's "Heart of Darkness," expecially as I contemplate the death squads that now proliferate following Negroponte's brief tenure there as U.S. ambassador.

[malaise]

11. Haven't read that

but will put it on my 'must read' this summer.

[coalition_unwilling]

16. There was a wonderful film version of "The Quiet American"

released about 6months before we invaded Iraq (w/ Michael Caine) -- imho, should have been required viewing for every fence-sitter on the morality of the invasion\occupation.

[Junkdrawer]

17. I'm going to try to rent it today...

Thanks for the tip.

:hi:

[malaise]

18. I'll order a copy of the movie as well

Thanks.

[Junkdrawer]

9. The arc of imperialism seems timeless:

We go in to "save their souls" (and pickup the Gold, the Ivory, the Oil while we're there). And, in the end, it's 'Exterminate all the brutes!'.

What's that saw about those doomed to repeat history?

[malaise]

12. Actually they never went to save souls

They were looking for gold, silk and spices and literally and figuratively lost their way and their humanity.

[Junkdrawer]

13. And that's what I meant by Useful Idiots...

Of course the leaders were looking for gold, silk and spices. But there were useful idiots who actually believed the Save the Heathen's Souls bit....at least at the outset.

[malaise]

15. True but at least they had the excuse

of feudalism and the dominance of the roman empire. Today's despots have no such excuse but they still come with the bible (albeit a fundamentalist one now) in one hand and bombs and bullets in the other.

[KoKo]

14. Re-inventing the Neo-Cons....a REAL "Con Job" isn't it....

it makes me :puke: everytime I see these evildoers being cast as just some "hapless idealists" working for the good of their country. Seeing bogeymen under their bedclothes everywhere waiting to "POP OUT" on them.

They live in fear of the EVIL SOVIETS or the EVIL ISLAMIST FUNDIES....

It's really OTT the way they Manipulate their images from week to week depending on the polls and their feedback..