Dissident Veteran For Peace

Dear Google Content Reviewer: This post has been unpublished and approved for publication multiple times since February 2021. Each time I request review and have it approved it is unpublished again within hours. Apparently, something in the post is triggering an algorithm. Can you please tell me why this post keeps getting unpublished?

Below is the trailer from 2015's A Good American featuring William Binney, J. Kirk Wiebe, Edward Loomis, Thomas Drake (a.k.a. the "NSA Four"), and Diane Roark. Below that are several videos featuring Binney.

A Good American—naturally an Austrian, which is to say non-American, film—tells the astounding, largely untold story of pervasive corruption, incompetence, and/or deliberate misconduct by high government officials in utilizing available threat intelligence. One of the most interesting segments was the discussion of how senior commanders ignored intel that predicted the 1968 Tet Offensive in Vietnam and were never held accountable.

The heart of the film, of course, is the story of the deliberate sabotage of ThinThread, an in-house US National Security Agency program that in all likelihood would have provided actionable intel to stop the 9/11 attacks had it not been shutdown just weeks earlier. In the aftermath of 9/11, the NSA opted for a mass surveillance program carried out via lucrative private contracts. The principal developers of ThinThread—which had strong built-in privacy protections—were thwarted in trying to get other government agencies to take up the technology and, eventually, raided by the FBI after they filed a DoD IG whistleblower complaint.

See also:

• Whistle-blower: Trump likely surveilled for some time (video)
• Ex-NSA official: Spies don't believe Russia collusion story (video)

Labels: 9/11, civil liberties, Edward Snowden, film & television, government, military, National Security Agency, surveillance, Trump, United States

Rabbi Nachtner: How does God speak to us? A good question. You know Lee Sussman?

Larry Gopnik: Doctor Sussman? I think I - yeah.

Rabbi Nachtner: Did he ever tell you about the goy's teeth?

Larry Gopnik: No, ah ... what goy?

Rabbi Nachtner: So, Lee is at work one day, you know he has the orthodontic practice there at Great Bear. He's making a plaster mold - it's for corrective bridge work - in the mouth of one of his patients, Russell Kraus. The mold dries and Lee is examining it one day before fabricating an appliance. He notices something unusual. There appears to be something engraved on the inside of the patient's lower incisors. He vav shin yud 'ayin nun yud. "Hwshy 'ny". "Help me, save me". This in a goy's mouth, Larry. He calls the goy back on the pretense of needing additional measurements for the appliance. "How are you? Noticed any other problems with your teeth?" No. There it is. "Hwshy 'ny". "Help me". Son of a gun. Sussman goes home. Can Sussman eat? Sussman can't eat. Can Sussman sleep? Sussman can't sleep. Sussman looks at the molds of his other patients, goy and Jew alike, seeking other messages. He finds none. He looks in his own mouth. Nothing. He looks in his wife's mouth. Nothing. But Sussman is an educated man. Not the world's greatest sage, maybe, no rabbi Marshak, but he knows a thing or two about the Zohar and the Caballah. He knows that every Hebrew letter has its numeric equivalent. 8-4-5-4-4-7-3. Seven digits ... a phone number, maybe? "Hello? Do you know a goy named Kraus, Russell Kraus?" "Who?" "Where have I called? The Red Owl in Bloomington. Thanks so much." He goes. It's a Red Owl. Groceries, what have you. Sussman goes home. What does it mean? He has to find out if he is ever to sleep again. He goes to see ... the rabbi Nachtner. He comes in, he sits right where you're sitting right now. "What does it mean, rabbi? Is it a sign from Hashem, 'Help me'? I, Sussman, should be doing something to help this goy? Doing what? The teeth don't say. Or maybe I'm supposed to help people generally, lead a more righteous life? Is the answer in Caballah? In Torah? Or is there even a question? Tell me, rabbi, what can such a sign mean?"

Larry Gopnik: So what did you tell him?   

Rabbi Nachtner: Sussman?

Larry Gopnik: Yes!

Rabbi Nachtner: Is it ... relevant?

Larry Gopnik: Well, isn't that why you're telling me?

Rabbi Nachtner: Okay. Nachtner says, look. The teeth, we don't know. A sign from Hashem? Don't know. Helping others ... couldn't hurt.

Larry Gopnik: No, no, but ... who put it there? Was it for him, Sussman, or for whoever found it, or for just, for, for ...

Rabbi Nachtner: We can't know everything.

Larry Gopnik: It sounds like you don't know anything! Why even tell me the story?

Rabbi Nachtner: [chuckling] First I should tell you, then I shouldn't.

Larry Gopnik: What happened to Sussman?

Rabbi Nachtner: What would happen? Not much. He went back to work. For a while he checked every patient's teeth for new messages. He didn't find any. In time, he found he'd stopped checking. He returned to life. These questions that are bothering you, Larry - maybe they're like a toothache. We feel them for a while, then they go away.

Larry Gopnik: I don't want it to just go away! I want an answer!

Rabbi Nachtner: Sure! We all want the answer! But Hashem doesn't owe us the answer, Larry. Hashem doesn't owe us anything. The obligation runs the other way.

Larry Gopnik: Why does he make us feel the questions if he's not gonna give us any answers?

Rabbi Nachtner: He hasn't told me.

[Larry puts his face in his hands in despair]

Larry Gopnik: And ... what happened to the goy?

Rabbi Nachtner: The goy? Who cares? 

Source: A Serious Man (2009), written and directed by Joel and Ethan Coen

Labels: film & television, Jews, Judaism

Freddie Glusman, owner of Piero's: Want me to tell you a story?

Eugene Jarecki, director-writer of The King: Please.

FG: Casino. They filmed it here [in Piero's]. True Story. I know where the bodies are buried, some of them anyway.

EJ: How come?

FG: Because I'm Jewish. I move in the right circles. I kiss the right ass.

Source: At about 1:29:50 in The King, Jarecki's documentary/op-ed on Elvis Presley and America.

Labels: crime, film & television, Jews

Fair Game is about the bogus intelligence used to justify the US' 2003 invasion of Iraq and, more specifically, the exposure of CIA operative Valerie Plame. Unfortunately, the film soft pedals the crucial role of the Israel-firsters in the drive to illegally invade Iraq. In any case, this film still tells an important story.


In late 2018, Fair Game director Liman released a director's cut of the film. This coincided with President Trump's decision earlier in the year to pardon I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, Dick Cheney's Chief of Staff and a protege of Paul Wolfowitz. Libby is a key figure in the film. He was convicted in 2007 of obstruction of justice, perjury, and making false statements in the Plame Affair.

See also (in chronological order):

• "Playing skittles with Saddam" in The Guardian
• "The Scooter Libby-Marc Rich Connection" on The Unz Review
• "The 'JINSA Crowd' and the Iraq War" on the Dissident Veteran for Peace blog
• "Scooter Libby Love Letters: Washington elite petition judge on behalf of convicted Cheney aide" on The Smoking Gun
• Fair Game reviewed by Roger Ebert
• Fair Game reviewed in The Guardian
• "Scooter Libby & Paul Wolfowitz to Teach Iraq 'Decision-Making' " in The American Conservative
• "Why Ariel Sharon Thanked Scooter Libby" in Mosaic
• "The Pardon of Marc Rich" in CounterPunch  
• "When Trump Makes Your Largely Forgotten Movie Urgent Again" in The Atlantic
• "Former CIA Spy Valerie Plame: Trump Is 'Dangerous For Our National Security' " on The Daily Beast
• "Director Doug Liman Believes 'Fair Game' is More Relevant Than Ever" on FilmSchoolRejects

Labels: Bush, film & television, Iraq, Israel Lobby, Neoconservatives, Trump, Valerie Plame, video

Shock and Awe is way, way overdue and suffers a bit from a lack of focus and poor pacing. Nevertheless it is an important film and well worth watching. It's also a timely reminder of three important points: 1) For the most part, the mainstream media has been peddling fake news for a long time; 2) The Democrats and Republicans are the two wings of the one War Party; and 3) Israel's partisans exert a malign and dominant influence on US politics and America's Near East policy.


See also:

• Archive of Knight-Ridder's (McClatchy) Iraq war reporting
• "Going It Alone" from the American Journalism Review (AJR)
• "White Knights" from the AJR
• "Buying the War" on Bill Moyer's Journal
• "The Reporting Team That Got Iraq Right" from HuffPost
• Review of Shock and Awe on RogerEbert.com 

Labels: film & television, Iraq, Israel, Israel Lobby, media, Neoconservatives, video, War

Labels: film & television, gender, LGBT, video

Look, this is Turks and Caicos ... It's a home to dirty money, which, as T. S. Eliot would observe, is a tautology, because there isn’t any other kind these days.

Source: Character of CIA agent Curtis Pelissier (Christopher Walken) in David Hare's Turks & Caicos (2014)

Labels: film & television, money, quotations

... I can do anything I want, whenever I want, if I feel it's in the people's best interest.

Source: Character of US gov't. agent Kent Mansley in The Iron Giant (1999)

Labels: film & television, government, quotations

Marc Antony: Queens! Queens! Strip them naked as any other woman, they're no longer queens.

Rufio: It is also difficult to tell the rank of a naked general. And generals without armies are naked indeed. 

Source: Cleopatra (1963) with Richard Burton as Mark Antony and Martin Landau as Rufio.

Labels: film & television, gender, military, quotations

Think about -- putting into context -- somebody moves in and decides to take your house over. You know, you're going to fight for it and that's exactly what they did.

Source: US Army Staff Sergeant Kevin Rice speaking (at 5:57) in the 2014 documentary film Korengal on Afghani resistance to US forces in the Korangal Valley. US forces maintained a presence in the "Valley of Death" for about five years. In April 2010, US forces abandoned the outposts there. By the time commanders decided the valley wasn't so vital after all, forty-two American troops had died in fighting and hundreds more were wounded along with uncounted Afghani and other casualties.

A U.S. Army soldier watches as U.S. Air Force F-15 fighter jets destroy "insurgent" positions with a bomb, after a 20-minute gun battle in Kunar province, Afghanistan's Korengal Valley, Aug. 13, 2009.

See also: "My Worst Nightmare and the Korengal Valley" from the On Violence blog.

Labels: Afghanistan, film & television, military, quotations, War

Where there is greatness, great government or power ... error is also great.

Source: Character of Pontius Pilate in William Wyler's film Ben-Hur (1959).

Labels: anarchism, film & television, government, quotations

Police officer: "Hey Major. How is the war on terror going?"

Major Thomas Egan, USAF: "Kind of like your war on drugs."

Source: Good Kill (2015) by Andrew Niccol.



See also: " 'Good Kill' Asks, 'Why Do We Wear Our Flight Suits, Sir?' "

Labels: crime, drones, film & television, War

About 25 years ago I was a computer technical assistant at a large public university. I remember then being struck and puzzled by the cult-like loyalty of my boss and two of my co-workers to Apple and its products. The Macintosh GUI was superior to what Microsoft had on offer at the time but the devotion to Apple exceeded what such a difference could rationally command.

Having recently watched Alex Gibney's excellent documentary Steve Jobs: The Man in the Machine I now have much greater insight as to why so many Apple consumers have invested themselves into the products of a huge multinational profit-making entity. Steve Jobs and his PR team deliberately and deftly branded Apple as a countercultural corporation (an oxymoron, to be sure) and the siren call of this manipulative marketing (a redundacy, to be sure) seduced tens of millions and helped changed society for the worse.

Labels: culture, film & television, psychology, technology, video

There are some real flaws in this film but it's still well worth watching.

Labels: film & television, violence, War

This film is inspired by the Valerie Plame affair but it's not a retelling of that story. It is a sophisticated cinematic exploration of the clash between the imperatives of government and a free society.

See also: "L'affaire Plame" by Justin Raimondo on Antiwar.com.

Labels: civil liberties, film & television, freedom, politics, Valerie Plame, War

Labels: Christianity, film & television, history, philosophy, religion and science

In the 1920s, the Cristero War took the lives of an estimated 250,000 Mexicans. When I learned this I was shocked that I had never heard of the war until I watched this remarkable film.

Labels: Christianity, film & television, history, Mexico, War

John Ridley's and Steve McQueen's Academy Award-winning 12 Years a Slave is a compelling film but it is not a courageous or honest film—not if truth matters. Ridley and McQueen shrink from portraying Solomon Northrup's experience and attitude toward slavery in all its complexity. This is, no doubt, because we moderns are not supposed to think critically about such things as slavery in cultural-historical context. Instead, we are to employ contemporary, Western standards in simple binary terms—good vs. evil—and judge those involved (and their figurative or literal descendants) as either oppressors or victims.

To ensure we think correct thoughts people such as Ridley and McQueen are entitled to take such liberties as may be necessary to shield us from whatever actual moral and historical complexity may be found in the true story. Our cultural guardians safely assume that the very few among us who may take the trouble to dig deeper into a story will be safely marginal. Marginality notwithstanding, I will endeavor below to share with you a few key examples of the fabrications and distortions in the 12 Years a Slave film.

In his written memoir, Twelve Years a Slave (1853, 1997), Solomon Nothrup wrote:

... I came not to the conclusion, even once, that the southern slave, fed, clothed, whipped and protected by his master, is happier than the free colored citizen of the North. To that conclusion I have never since arrived. There are many, however, even in the Northern States, benevolent and well-disposed men, who will pronounce my opinion erroneous, and gravely proceed to substantiate the assertion with an argument. Alas! they have never drank, as I have, from the bitter cup of slavery. [p. 121]

Yet, this same Solomon Northrup also wrote:

Our master's name was William Ford. He resided then in the "Great Pine Woods," in the parish of Avoyelles, situated on the right bank of Red River, in the heart of Louisiana. He is now a Baptist preacher. Throughout the whole parish of Avoyelles, and especially along both shores of Bayou Boeuf, where he is more intimately known, he is accounted by his fellow-citizens as a worthy minister of God. In many northern minds, perhaps, the idea of a man holding his brother man in servitude, and the traffic in human flesh, may seem altogether incompatible with their conceptions of a moral or religious life. From descriptions of such men as Burch and Freeman, and others hereinafter mentioned, they are led to despise and execrate the whole class of slaveholders, indiscriminately. But I was sometime his slave, and had an opportunity of learning well his character and disposition, and it is but simple justice to him when I say, in my opinion, there never was a more kind, noble, candid, Christian man than William Ford. The influences and associations that had always surrounded him, blinded him to the inherent wrong at the bottom of the system of Slavery. He never doubted the moral right of one man holding another in subjection. Looking through the same medium with his fathers before him, he saw things in the same light. Brought up under other circumstances and other influences, his notions would undoubtedly have been different. Nevertheless, he was a model master, walking uprightly, according to the light of his understanding, and fortunate was the slave who came to his possession. Were all men such as he, Slavery would be deprived of more than half its bitterness. [pp. 89-90]

And:

During my residence with Master Ford I had seen only the bright side of slavery. His was no heavy hand crushing us to the earth. He pointed upwards, and with benign and cheering words addressed us as his fellow-mortals, accountable, like himself, to the Maker of us all. I think of him with affection, and had my family been with me, could have borne his gentle servitude, without murmuring, all my days. [pp. 104-105]

When Northrup runs away from an abusive part-owner John M. Tibeats (his actual surname was Tibaut, according to Fiske et al., The Complete Story of the Author of Twelve Years a Slave (Praeger, 2013; p. 7), he flees to William Ford and describes the reunion and his recovery as follows:

... I continued my travels, and finally, about eight o'clock, reached the house of Master Ford.

The slaves were all absent from the quarters, at their work. Stepping on to the piazza, I knocked at the door, which was soon opened by Mistress Ford. My appearance was so changed—I was in such a wobegone and forlorn condition, she did not know me. Inquiring if Master Ford was at home, that good man made his appearance, before the question could be answered. I told him of my flight, and all the particulars connected with it. He listened attentively, and when I had concluded, spoke to me kindly and sympathetically, and taking me to the kitchen, called John, and ordered him to prepare me food. I had; tasted nothing since daylight the previous morning.

When John had set the meal before me, the madam came out with a bowl of milk, and many little delicious dainties, such as rarely please the palate of a slave. I was hungry, and I was weary, but neither food nor rest afforded half the pleasure as did the blessed voices speaking kindness and consolation. It was the oil and the wine which the Good Samaritan in the "Great Pine Woods" was ready to pour into the wounded spirit of the slave, who came to him, stripped of his raiment and half-dead.

They left me in the cabin, that I might rest ...

AFTER a long sleep, sometime in the afternoon I awoke, refreshed, but very sore and stiff. Sally came in and talked with me, while John cooked me some dinner. Sally was in great trouble, as well as myself, one of her children being ill, and she feared it could not survive. Dinner over, after walking about the quarters for a while, visiting Sally's cabin and looking at the sick child, I strolled into the madam's garden ...

I indulged the most grateful feelings towards Master and Mistress Ford, and wishing in some manner to repay their kindness, commenced trimming the vines, and afterwards weeding out the grass from among the orange and pomegranate trees. The latter grows eight or ten feet high, and its fruit, though larger, is similar in appearance to the jelly-flower. It has the luscious flavor of the strawberry. Oranges, peaches, plums, and most other fruits are indigenous to the rich, warm soil of Avoyelles; but the apple, the most common of them all in colder latitudes, is rarely to be seen.

Mistress Ford came out presently, saying it was praise-worthy in me, but I was not in a condition to labor, and might rest myself at the quarters until master should go down to Bayou Boeuf, which would not be that day, and it might not be the next. I said to her—to be sure, I felt bad, and was stiff, and that my foot pained me, the stubs and thorns having so torn it, but thought such exercise would not hurt me, and that it was a great pleasure to work for so good a mistress. Thereupon she returned to the great house, and for three days I was diligent in the garden, cleaning the walks, weeding the flower beds, and pulling up the rank grass beneath the jessamine vines, which the gentle and generous hand of my protectress had taught to clamber along the walls.

The fourth morning, having become recruited and refreshed, Master Ford ordered me to make ready to accompany him to the bayou. There was but one saddle horse at the opening, all the others with the mules having been sent down to the plantation. I said I could walk, and bidding Sally and John good-bye, left the opening, trotting along by the horse's side. That little paradise in the Great Pine Woods was the oasis in the desert, towards which my heart turned lovingly, during many years of bondage. I went forth from it now with regret and sorrow, not so overwhelming, however, as if it had then been given me to know that I should never return to it again. [pp. 144-148]

Needless to say, Ridley and McQueen omit all of this material from Northrup's memoir. They further contrive to paint William Ford (Benedict Cumberbatch) in a decidedly more sinister light. For example, Ridley and McQueen invent a scene (at ~36:00) where a fellow slave, Eliza (Adepero Oduye), and Northrup (Chiwetel Ejiofor) dispute over Ford's morality. Northrup mounts no defense of Ford such as we find in his memoir, where the dispute does not even appear.

Ridley and McQueen also significantly alter an incident that does appear in the book. When Tibeats (Paul Dano) tries to lynch Northrup (at ~48:00), they have Ford's overseer, Chapin, defending Northrup solely as a piece of valuable property who is nevertheless left dangling from a hangman's noose for hours. Here's how Northrup described the actual event:

At length, as they were dragging me towards the tree, Chapin, who had momentarily disappeared from the piazza, came out of the house and walked towards us. He had a pistol in each hand, and as near as I can now recall to mind, spoke in a firm, determined manner, as follows:

"Gentlemen, I have a few words to say. You had better listen to them. Whoever moves that slave another foot from where he stands is a dead man. In the first place, he does not deserve this treatment. It is a shame to murder him in this manner. I never knew a more faithful boy than Platt. You, Tibeats, are in the fault yourself. You are pretty much of a scoundrel, and I know it, and you richly deserve the flogging [from Northrup] you have received. In the next place, I have been overseer on this plantation seven years, and, in the absence of William Ford, am master here. My duty is to protect his interests, and that duty I shall perform. You are not responsible-you are a worthless fellow. Ford holds a mortgage on Platt of four hundred dollars. If you hang him he loses his debt. Until that is canceled you have no right to take his life. You have no right to take it any way. There is a law for the slave as well as for the white man. You are no better than a murderer.

"As for you," addressing Cook and Ramsay, a couple of overseers from neighboring plantations, "as for you—begone! If you have any regard for your own safety, I say, begone."

Cook and Ramsay, without a further word, mounted their horses and rode away. Tibeats, in a few minutes, evidently in fear, and overawed by the decided tone of Chapin, sneaked off like a coward, as he was, and mounting his horse, followed his companions. [pp. 115-116]

So, contra Ridley and McQueen, by Northrup's own account, he was never actually hung and there is rather more to Chapin's defense. However, Northrup was inexplicably left suffering in the hot sun:

As the sun approached the meridian that day it became insufferably warm. ... I would gladly have given a long year of service to have been enabled to exchange the heated oven, as it were, wherein I stood, for a seat beneath their branches. But I was yet bound, the rope still dangling from my neck, and standing in the same tracks where Tibeats and his comrades left me. I could not move an inch, so firmly had I been bound. To have been enabled to lean against the weaving house would have been a luxury indeed. But it was far beyond my reach, though distant less than twenty feet. I wanted to lie down, but knew I could not rise again. [pp. 118-119]

Ridley and McQueen seem to want us to understand this as indifference to Northrup's suffering, they even concoct an appearance by Mistress Ford who, in stark contrast to Northrup's written characterization of her, gazes upon the choking Northrup and then calmly walks away. She makes no such appearance in Northrup's memoir and, concerning Chapin, Northrup writes:

All day Chapin walked back and forth upon the stoop, but not once approached me. He appeared to be in a state of great uneasiness, looking first towards me, and then up the road, as if expecting some arrival every moment. He did not go to the field, as was his custom. It was evident from his manner that he supposed Tibeats would return with more and better armed assistance, perhaps, to renew the quarrel, and it was equally evident he had prepared his mind to defend my life at whatever hazard. Why he did not relieve me—why he suffered me to remain in agony the whole weary day, I never knew. It was not for want of sympathy, I am certain. Perhaps he wished Ford to see the rope about my neck, and the brutal manner in which I had been bound; perhaps his interference with another's property in which he had no legal interest might have been a trespass, which would have subjected him to the penalty of the law. [pp. 119-120]

When the incident first begins William Ford is miles away in the Great Pine Woods. Chapin sends for him as soon as Tibeats departs. When Ford arrives, Northrup, according to his memoir, literally thanks God and Ford cuts his bindings. In the film (at ~53:00), Ridley and McQueen uses the immediate aftermath to contrive to have Eliza's harsh judgment of Ford vindicated. When Northrup tries to tell him he is not a slave, but a freeman, Ford protests: "I cannot hear that."

In fact, according to Northrup, he never disclosed his status to Ford: "Sometimes, not only then, but afterwards, I was almost on the point of disclosing fully to Ford the facts of my history. I am inclined now to the opinion it would have resulted in my benefit. This course was often considered, but through fear of its miscarriage, never put into execution ... " (p. 91). Ridley and McQueen also use this scene as an opportunity to have Ford call Northrup a "nigger," something Northrup never recorded Ford doing in his memoir.

Ford was not the only slave owner for whom Northrup had kind words. Here is how he described Mary McCoy:

... a lovely girl, some twenty years of age. She is the beauty and the glory of Bayou Bouef. She owns about a hundred working hands, besides a great many house servants, yard boys, and young children. Her brother-in-law, who resides on the adjoining estate, is her general agent. She is beloved by all her slaves, and good reason indeed have they to be thankful that they have fallen into such gentle hands ...

I dwell with delight upon the description of this fair and gentle lady, not only because she inspired me with emotions of gratitude and admiration, but because I would have the reader understand that all slave-owners on Bayou Boeuf are not like Epps, or Tibeats, or Jim Burns. Occasionally can be found, rarely it may be, indeed, a good man like William Ford, or an angel of kindness like young Mistress McCoy. [pp. 284-286]

Finally, Ridley and McQueen take liberties with the historical figure of Harriet Shaw. Northrup (who refers to her once as "Charlotte" on p. 231) notes that she is the slave cum wife of Pleasant Shaw and she is a kind friend to Patsey, unwilling concubine of the cruel Edwin Epps (pp. 254-255). Beyond this, Northrup says little else.

Well, this is an opportunity Ridley and McQueen cannot pass up. So, in their film, there is no apparent love between Harriet and Pleasant Shaw. There is no allowance that Blacks could and did accommodate themselves to American slavery as slave-owners. No, instead Ridley and McQueen invent dialogue (at ~67:00) not found in Northrup's memoir where Harriet Shaw (Alfre Woodard) coldly prophesies an apocalyptic vengeance: "In his own time, the good Lord will manage them all. The curse of the pharoahs were a poor example of what wait for the plantation class."

In fact, Black women, such as Anna Madgigine Jai Kingsley, fully assimilated into the "plantation class". So, did Black men such as Anthony Johnson, who in 1655 became the "first slaveholder" in the thirteen colonies that became the United States. And don't even think about mentioning the 5.6 million slaves in present-day sub-Saharan Africa. No, the unsettling facts of slavery must not be allowed to contaminate the slaveowner = White = evil equation because 12 Years a Slave was created in support of a modern-day racial agenda and that agenda is not to be held hostage to the truthful retelling of Solomon Northrup's story or any other inconvenient facts.

In Northrup's lifetime his memoir was hailed for, not despite, its complex honesty: "NORTHRUP will be believed, because, instead of indiscriminate accusations, he gives you the good and evil of Slavery just as he found it. All kindnesses are remembered with gratitude. Masters and Overseers who treated slaves humanely are commended; for there, as here, were good and bad men" (Salem [NY] Press, July 26, 1853, as quoted in Fiske et al., p. 115). Today, such truth is seen as inconvenient, at best, and, perhaps, a Stockholm syndrome-type expression of internalized self-deception or, at worst, an unconscionable apology for evil.

See also: Black Slaveowners

Labels: art and literature, critical thinking, film & television, history, politics, race, slavery

The Pervert's Guide to Ideology is a documentary showcase for Slavoj Žižek. I've read a couple of his books and after watching the film I've concluded that Žižek is to philosophy as Coca-cola is to nutrition. They're both popular, full of empty calories, and not very good for you except, perhaps, in small doses.

Labels: film & television, philosophy

... the only thing Americans love in their reality TV more than ignorant Black kids is crazy, racist White folks.

Source: Character of reality TV producer Helmut West in Dear White People.

Labels: film & television, race, United States