We haven't visited the Smallest Minority much of late, largely because we don't have a lot of time and every time we visit Kevin's site, we end up having to write a lengthy response.
His latest encyclical takes a look at mass movements and draws deeply from his ample well of pessimism.
The Posse agrees that the anti-war left has long left rationality behind and that mass movements need no real reason (in the logical sense) for being, merely a cause.
However we do not share his belief that the leftover left, pathetic anti-war movement and waning gun control lobby are either growing or of much long-term consequence.
Cindy Sheehan's 15 minutes of fame expired long ago.
Who then would lead this mass movement? What would it do? How would it act?
Recent years have seen Americans becoming more self-reliant. In addition, the relaxation of gun control laws have ensured that more Americans are willing and able to protect themselves. This makes the cost of staging an uprising prohibitively high. As we have seen in New Orleans, ordinary law-abiding citizens can and will organize for their own defense.
This is even more important when one considers that the most disaffected members of society - the core of this "movement" - are utter cowards. Their most impressive acts are anonymous firebombings of unguarded construction sites or university labs.
All they can bring themselves to do is carry signs and shout insults at the wounded - and even here, a modest show of opposition sends them scurrying away.
It is one thing to talk big on Kos, or Democratic Underground. It may stroke the ego to paint American soldiers as Nazis or dredge up the pathetic "chicken hawk" slur, but when it comes down to it, most of these people - we mean the overwhelming vast majority that would form the core of any mass movement - are simply gutless.
They talk big, cheer terrorists, even make common cause with them, but one can count the number of actual volunteers on one hand.
Even the much-discussed flight to Canada after George W. Bush won re-election never happened.
It is hard to build a revolutionary movement based on people too lazy to put down the remote or step away from their p.c.
That is why we aren't losing any sleep over this.
In the past, by the time people found that things were going downhill it was already too late. Information either traveled too slowly or it could be easily hoarded by a few malcontents. In those days, of course people didn't do anything to stop tyranny. People can't act upon what they don't know. When we look back on those days, we have the 20/20 hindsight of history as an advantage. It's difficult to see the perspective of those who lived at that time.
Today, it's almost impossible to hide information. The internet allows rapid, easy, and cheap communication between one individual and millions. Twenty years ago, CBS would have gotten away clean with the whole Memogate scandal. Today, thanks to the internet, very important people lost their jobs over that scandal.
I'd like to say there is absolutely no way this academic left wing elitism could take hold of our government. What I can say is if the left wants take this country by force they'll have a hard time doing it when the public can find the truth for themselves without the help of a few elitists.
Posted by: CT | December 28, 2005 at 11:45 PM
I hope you're right. I really do. However, I don't think humanity has changed all that much in the last two milennia, and I think Eric Hoffer's observations on the nature of mass movements are frighteningly accurate. What a successful mass movement does is motivate people to action. The spread of Bush Derangement Syndrome among otherwise nominally sane people is greatly disturbing to me.
Right now the only thing holding it all together, as far as I can see, is economic prosperity. If the jihadis manage to strike at something that creates a real economic depression, I fully expect the rise of that mass movement.
Posted by: Kevin Baker | December 20, 2005 at 01:14 PM