/hector

I see what you’re saying; however, totalitarianism, if we can call it that, comes in many forms, the oldest being black boots and brow shirts. When in the late 70′s early 80′s Edward Said was talking about Orientalism and colonialism, he was suggesting that there are intellectual implications — that is, the taking over, if you will, of consciousness. This is what I’m talking about: totalitarianism, today, comes through markets; it excites the imagination with possibilities, but it negates independence of thought. Sure, there are plenty of examples of creative thinking, even different thinking, but these are few and far between, a part of the agenda, as Chomsky told us in the 80′s with Manufacturing Consent. Then, there were 20 media companies controlling all delivery of information. By the time McChesney writes his book on democracy and the media, there were five. Looking at banking, too: we’re down to 4 — only 4 — major banks in the world. This is a massive, unstoppable concentration of power. And this power is being very easily maintained by the horrific educational system that nurtures individuals so that they / we fit into cogs in the system — not change agents, mind you, but instruments to fix only what’s broken at certain points and thus keeping the thing going. In 1985, Michele Foucault tells us that institutions are arbitrary. If we can go along with that, then we can understand how and why a massive concentration of power equals a totalitarianism of the mind — thus we’re subjects, subjugated.