sick day
so i canceled my class
and am doing nothing productive to make the performance possible
except watching a bunch of noam chomsky interviews on youtube
so
i am here,
interested in the american culture and what american people say about these things - and sometimes shocked by how many americans tell me, that the american people are stupid and ignorant and do not want to find out what is going on in the world.
i do not think this is true.
it sounds like a strange claim to me.
i mean, all humans are stupid and ignorant in some sense, and then we learn more. but this sounds like the speakers claim to be set apart from the imaginary entity called "the american people", who, by its stupidity and ignorance, makes all these atrocities possible.
it sounds like a roundabout way of saying that they would have it differently, but can do nothing, because the majority is so stupid and ignorant.
i think a lot of people lack information.
i suppose the decisions on the matters have been removed so far from people's everyday lives, that they don't feel their actions can change anything. and this feeling of powerlessness is a
cause of apathy.
i suppose one thing that makes staying inside the apathy possible, is that many people never see the war or feel the terror. that what is happening is removed, too, as figures on screen or paper, that can be ignored, or justified by something somebody says in a speech. there is no urgency to act, because we do not see what is happening. only when death comes near, we feel it.
i am trying to understand how this is possible.
i keep going back to fear. we attack because we are afraid.
or is there another reason for attack?
i want to reach the feeling of fear, what it does in our bodies.
is there a shared sense of threat when we step on an aeroplane or ride the subway?
can we feel it?
does the threat of the other bring this nation together in a time of internal turmoil?
is the outside threat necessary in order for the state to function?
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