Is Noam Chomsky a good source?

[Jontg]

How, exactly, do we know all of this? Pure Communism, like pure Capitalism, has never even existed--and for just about as good a set of reasons. And as for natural societal evolution, it's been going on, with a few setbacks, since the dawn of time. It's most blatantly obvious in the past hundred years, just like every other aspect of humanity's progress as a species--I mean, how can somebody be so blind as to yak online about demented right-wing extremists and not realize what they're so demented over? Obama's just a Social Democrat like myself, but he's a step forward, and they're freaking terrified of that.

 

[NWO Sentryman]

How, exactly, do we know all of this? Pure Communism, like pure Capitalism, has never even existed--and for just about as good a set of reasons. And as for natural societal evolution, it's been going on, with a few setbacks, since the dawn of time. It's most blatantly obvious in the past hundred years, just like every other aspect of humanity's progress as a species--I mean, how can somebody be so blind as to yak online about demented right-wing extremists and not realize what they're so demented over? Obama's just a Social Democrat like myself, but he's a step forward, and they're freaking terrified of that.

You are not a social democrat. You are a Marxist.

They are terrified and unjustly so becasue of

a) the red terror in Russia

b) the mass famines in China

c) Year Zero in Cambodia

If we are supposed to be loving and sharing why then were there the crusades, the dark ages, nobility, serfs etc. for 1 millenium?

 

[Jontg]

Because **** happens. Society is a tenuous thing, and it can all collapse if things break down badly enough, for long enough. In this case, Rome had the bad luck to experience political stagnation, natural disasters so gradual that nobody noticed them until people began starving, and a series of massive invasions all at the same time, which basically rebooted "Western" civilization. Since then, we've rebuilt, going from complete anarchy to increasingly complex feudalism to capitalism, and now we're making slow, but steady advancements toward socialism. Globalization, the spread of the internet and the Open-Source movement that accompanies it, and the increasingly transparent and inclusive nature of modern governments--these are all baby steps toward a real New World Order. And when we've automated labor to the point where there are no more jobs to be done, the cycle that created Capitalism will come to its logical conclusion, replacing the slave armies that made older non-Capitalist civilizations possible with robotic workers and freeing up time and resources to the point where we will experience a nearly post-scarcity economy. And from there, it will be a small step from techno-Socialism to true Communism.
Oh, and I love the cognitive dissonance in your post--talking about the Dark Ages and the Crusades in the same breath that you announce that RRRR ARG COMMIES BAD because somebody used the trappings of Socialism in a petty power grab. By definition, what went on in Russia and most of Asia was the diametric opposite of Communism. I repeat, if you think Communism can be achieved by violent revolution, you're not a Marxist; you're a Leninist. And if you think Communism involves genocide and totalitarianism, you're a Stalinist.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

....I don't have much respect for Hitchen's pro-Bush foreign policy views anyway, although I like some of his stuff against religion.

Good example. And some find Hitchen's views on the Islamic religion over the top.

People are not either all good or all evil (with a few exceptions). Hating a person for some ideological difference is not a healthy way to explore the world. In an effort to hate the person you hate's every view, the arguments lose any quality of a reasoned debate and instead just sound like a boring tirade.

 

[lightfire22000]

Chomsky has been one of the most informative and accurate sources when it comes to the development of language, though I have sharp and extreme disagreements on political issues.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

...
As I said Chomskyites insist genocide was committed by the US in Vietnam.

Well I hate to break it to you, NWO, but not everyone in the world views our military interventions as being noble causes. Big bombs kill lots of innocent civilians. Massive Napalm drops don't just target enemy soldiers. Mass defoliation of forests destroys food crops. Bombing Cambodia allowed Pol Pot to take power.


Why do you want to completely ignore this reality just because other countries also killed lots of people?

 

[thought_fugitive]

Concerning the core question you have, NWO, I think you should be aware that Chomsky doesn't tend to hold demonstrably false beliefs on matters of fact. There are numerous examples in this thread. On the matter of the Truman quote, he admitted that it was an error based off of a misattributed paraphrase which was corrected for the second time the book went to print:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticism_of_Noam_Chomsky#President_Truman

With regards to Vietnam, I've always known of the American loss of life as being >59,000. Likewise, considering such a significant number of American casualties along with the sheer force of our military, I'd assume something was terribly wrong if there were only 100,000 deaths (either including or in addition to Americans... but I still don't quite understand the implications of your analogue.)

I'm not certain whether or not Chomsky claims America was executing a deliberate genocide, but one relevant example I've seen him cite is a transcript of discussions from Nixon and Kissinger before the commencement of Operation Freedom Deal which was a massively destructive air raid against the Communist forces.

Kissinger is quoted as saying the operation will be "anything that flies on anything that moves." Chomsky condemned this as a blatant call for genocide. Anyway, this is where you get into the semantic gray area that Chomsky's famous for, so I think ultimately you should assume that statements of opinion stem from his ideology. That's not to say they should be dismissed completely, but if you're curious about using him as a source I think your best bet would be to research specific points of interest as opposed to accepting or ignoring something just on the basis of who made the claim.

 

[Meed]

NWO Sentryman,

No defense of your reasons for considering Chomsky a bad source? Any more retractions you'd like to make?

 

[whatnot]

skeptigirl: can you link to examples of Hitchens criticizing Muslims in general (as opposed to Wahhabists and Ba'athists)? I'd be interested to see such language from him. He describes himself as anti-theist, but he's non-denominational.

 

[NWO Sentryman]

Well I hate to break it to you, NWO, but not everyone in the world views our military interventions as being noble causes. Big bombs kill lots of innocent civilians. Massive Napalm drops don't just target enemy soldiers. Mass defoliation of forests destroys food crops. Bombing Cambodia allowed Pol Pot to take power.


Why do you want to completely ignore this reality just because other countries also killed lots of people?

I do realise that vietnam was horrible.

And you try to portray america as genocidal in vietnam.

Genocide is a crime of intent. The US did not intend defoliants to starve millions.

as for the "anything that flies on anything that moves", that is indeed a grey area. Who said those words? Kissinger trying to humour nixon or Nixon giving a direct order?

 

[thought_fugitive]

Kissinger said it, but I'm pretty sure the statement was made to military leaders. I apologize for implying it was a dialogue between him and Nixon. I don't necessarily think that genocide is always a gray area, but it's tough on the surface to judge in a circumstance like this. Nixon expressed the desire to obliterate the North, but when you consider that he's in a quagmire with a dismal outlook and an increasingly unsettling domestic climate, I find it understandable that he'd respond in a dramatic fashion like this.

Also, unless you share Jean-Paul Sartre's outlook on the Nobel Foundation, it'd be understandable to be reluctant to accept that a recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize would be overtly genocidal. However, when you consider a statement out-of-context that seems to suggest the annihilation of all life in the target area, things do start to get confusing. I don't know much about Kissinger, though, and as it stands I'm still confused.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

skeptigirl: can you link to examples of Hitchens criticizing Muslims in general (as opposed to Wahhabists and Ba'athists)? I'd be interested to see such language from him. He describes himself as anti-theist, but he's non-denominational.

I'll look for something in writing for you later but my recollection having heard him at TAM 5 was that he insisted the religion itself called for the destruction of everyone who wasn't a believer.

 

[McHrozni]

Is noam chomsky a good source on the Cold War?

In my view, he is much too cynical to be taken literarily, and severely biased against the one system that allows him to criticize it freely and make money from it.

Some of his works may be good though, but you need to look at them with a critical eye and a good shovel of salt.

McHrozni

 

[thought_fugitive]

I'll look for something in writing for you later but my recollection having heard him at TAM 5 was that he insisted the religion itself called for the destruction of everyone who wasn't a believer.

Somewhat off-topic, but this is something I've read in some pamphlets by Slavoj Zizek. One of the more popular ones is called "Welcome to the Desert of the Real" and was I think it was commissioned as part of a series of far-left criticisms of 9/11 and its impact on the West.

I'm not familiar with much of Hitchens' work so I don't know how they compare, but Zizek is bitterly critical of Bush's insistence on saying "we're not at war with Islam, we know that Muslims are peaceful people" because Zizek would contend something like there is an element of inherent violence in the political incarnations of Islam.

Anyway, I don't have much of an opinion on that subject, but this is another example of the use of developing critical thinking skills. Zizek is very vocal and charismatic and interesting, and he's also very contemptuous of people who don't share his interpretation of Hegel or Lacan or Deleuze etc. It'd be rather harmful to take what he says as gospel but by the same token it'd be harmful to ignore the totality of his scholarship.

 

[Meed]

I think there are portions of the Qur'an that can be used to support the idea that Islam supports killing infidels. Then again there are other portions supporting peace and non-violence. It's a bit like the Bible, sort of a grab-bag that can be used to support a variety of things.

I'm not familiar with much of Hitchens' work so I don't know how they compare, but Zizek is bitterly critical of Bush's insistence on saying "we're not at war with Islam, we know that Muslims are peaceful people" because Zizek would contend something like there is an element of inherent violence in the political incarnations of Islam.

Bush is right, we're not at war with Islam, but it has nothing to do with them being peaceful. Saudi Arabia is our ally for obvious reasons and Indonesia has been as well.

Chomsky was once asked what a war on Islam would look like and I believe he said "world war III".

 

[gtc]

I think there are portions of the Qur'an that can be used to support the idea that Islam supports killing infidels. Then again there are other portions supporting peace and non-violence. It's a bit like the Bible, sort of a grab-bag that can be used to support a variety of things.

That is my understanding too. Most muslims don't seem to take those sections of the Quran seriously enough to do anything about it.

 

[DropGems]

I copied "Chomsky vs Leo Casey" from your post and googled it (without quotation marks). This thread was the first result it came up with. Found one hour ago.

Google really likes this forum.

edit: Here's a link to a part of "The Chomsky - Casey - Hitchens Debate". Other parts are listed at the bottom in no apparent order. I'm not willing to untangle it.

Yea you have to read the entire debate. Part 1 Leo starts out against chomsky, then comes noam's rebuke (which is very good), then comes Leo's counter with plenty of evidence to back up his claims as well as expose chomskys bad logic, then chomsky has the last rebuttal where he can't rebuke, doesn't address all the issues that Leo points out and ultimately loses the debate (in my eyes and many others).

I know my synopsis is very vague as I haven't read the debate in about 5 years but at the time, I concluded that chomsky's way of rationalizing his 9/11 statements proved to be pretty absurd after Leo Casey exposed him.

 

[PixyMisa]

How, exactly, do we know all of this?

Mathematics. Read the Haldane piece, it's excellent. Communism does not work.

Pure Communism, like pure Capitalism, has never even existed--and for just about as good a set of reasons.

Every time anyone goes to set up a communist state, we end up with a prison camp. Once might be coincidence, but every time?

And as for natural societal evolution, it's been going on, with a few setbacks, since the dawn of time.

Evolution works through selective pressure, through competition. As we have seen - and as Haldane showed 80 years ago - communism is an impossible optimisation problem, and capitalism will outperform it on any but the smallest of scales. Capitalism is the "natural" evolutionary outcome, and communism a clear dead end.

It's most blatantly obvious in the past hundred years, just like every other aspect of humanity's progress as a species--I mean, how can somebody be so blind as to yak online about demented right-wing extremists and not realize what they're so demented over? Obama's just a Social Democrat like myself, but he's a step forward, and they're freaking terrified of that.

What are you talking about now?

 

[PixyMisa]

And if you think Communism involves genocide and totalitarianism, you're a Stalinist.

Then why, I have to ask, does communism invariably involve totalitarianism, and very often genocide as well? The USSR and Eastern Bloc, China, Vietnam, Cambodia, Cuba, North Korea.... It's a litany of disaster.

 

[PixyMisa]

Wikipedia has a good article on the structural inefficiencies of communism, with plenty of interesting links.