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Pastimes : Let's Talk About Our Feelings!!! -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Skipper who wrote (13549)	11/7/1997 2:18:00 PM
From: Jacques Chitte	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 108807

Okay. Sorry to imply you were putting words into my mouth. I do suggest, however, that persuasion is as real a force as freedom. (Think for a second how hard it is to describe "freedom" in a definite way, in a way a wage slave can understand.) The American public is awesomely gullible. Look at the big money in psychic hotlines, for example. Persuasion worked wonders in Germany in the '20s and '30s. And look where it got them. I don't think there is anything inherently unethical in using eloquence or persistence (always tempered with politeness and consideration, the bridesmaids of integrity) to make or belabor a point, especially if it'll get some of the less adventurous intellects with voter cards to make up their minds for themselves after exposure to a dissenting opinion. One of the real problems with freedom is that it is a virtue of absence. It doesn't confer ant immediate apparent gains. A restriction of freedom, however, can be skillfully handled in a way that pays a quick dividend. Curtail freedom of speech: suddenly the media are a friendlier, more "moral" place. The casualty of truth gets obscured by this. Curtail gun ownership, and you can sell the idea that society is at last filling a great gap in its degree of civilization. The losing end of that bargain imho is the transfer of power from the Individual to the Group. Curtail inefficient search&seizure laws: same deal. The imediate shot-in-the-arm of more effective use of police dollars, with the slower, less obvious forfeiture of protection for citizens who merely look bad. And it seems to me that Americans are more prone than ever to fall for the quick fix. It'll take a whole wad of voices in the wilderness to slow the trend. I submit that persuasion is not to be discarded.