The land of the free and the home of the brave is a pretty good place to live judging by the amount of legal and illegal immigration. If you keep your nose clean and mind your own business you can prosper. Still . . . a stranger soon finds out that Americans are pretty close-mouthed . . .especially when it comes to religion or politics. Like the old war-time poster, "Loose lips sink ships." Loose lips can cost you a job, or your reputation, and can put you in the "nut" category. There are few coffee-house intellectual arguments in the U S of A. Most of us keep our opinions to ourselves. Not that there aren't any hot arguments. Watch the T.V. talk shows. There are heated battles fought every day for the spectator. Geraldo against the Klan, and all kinds of dirty (personal) linen is laundered for the boobs.
Going against the Klan might look courageous on the tube, but going against the government or anything that might anger a sponsor is frowned on. Warring against the Klan in a T.V. studio is a different proposition from doing it in Mississippi. Like any other good 'American I do not want to be considered a conspiracy nut, but there is a lot of evidence to suggest that some source is deliberately stupiding-up the population. The general opinions among the populace seem to have been pre-fabricated . . . that is if you can get anyone to hazard an opinion.
The cold-war that started after world-war two against the Communist menace spawned a class of professional witch hunters who took their cue from Tail gunner Joe McCarthy. Many writers and intellectuals were destroyed at this time. When the mad McCarthy called General Eisenhower a communist he went too far. Still there was forty years of heavy censorship and oppression justified by the "The Communist Menace." With the destruction of communism any further repression would seem senseless but like dismantling the defense industry . . . it is a slow proposition.
People seem to have lost the ability to resist the suffocating blanket of non-information that is put out by the media. They know they are being taken for a ride and their support for Ross Perot showed it, but once the hero falls the army, like the followers of Goliath, disbands and goes home. The only characters left are guys like Andy Rooney who's complaints are about minuscule annoyances. Even the teen-agers adhere to a pre-fabricated culture that is handed them. Maybe it is only a habit. The American public spends more money on dope than they do on welfare. This is a form of protest they are comfortable with. It precludes thinking. Why think when you can not do anything about your thoughts?
Living here on the Mexican border and speaking Spanish I often watch the Mexican Television news. "Muchas noticias con pocos palabras." Often they present news about my own country that is totally blacked out here. They cover Latin American and European stories that never make it here.
Historically protest started in the universities. The Viet Nam War threatened the youth and they fought heroically. They could stand against the guns at Kent State. but they could not resist the blandishments of Timothy OLeary and other weapons of the C.I.A. that attacked them where they were most vulnerable. They were easy victims of planted gurus and provocateurs that led them down some crazy paths. The Symbianese liberation Army is an example. It was obviously a product of the same boys that wanted me to carry dynamite in my truck. This is a conspiracy theory that works.
It only makes sense to me that the think tanks are thinking about ways to keep the populace amenable. This is bad enough but lap-dog social scientists who restrain discussion on so important a subject as the origin of Man are unthinkable. If there are any disagreements among anthropologists it is usually of the tempest in a teapot variety. Surely the fact that Man is suffused in technology must have provoked some discussion. That technology is blithely passed by in the modern literature has to be viewed with suspicion. The dedication of minds that can be reined in so easily has to be called under question. Then again: What good is dedication if a career is lost? The answer is . . . of what value is such a career?
Family societies have traditionally hated the memory of their old organization . . . the tribe. Whenever they could destroy extant tribes they have tried to do so. Early America was not content with destroying the Indian tribes but persecuted the Mormons for their tribal ways. The attack on the Branch Davidians tribe in Texas is the only known use of flame throwing tanks to incinerate women and children in history. The old man who owned everything in sight insisted on maintaining discipline. The alpha-male was acting in the best tradition of the Chimp family. These are the "family values" that really operate.
Having savaged the noble institution (the family) you probably think I advocate a return to the tribe. The tribe had one defect. It was a major one too. The tribe depended on war. All the young men were called "warriors" and war kept the tribe cohesive and viable. Those tribes who live in the Kalahari or at the North Pole are exempted. Their enemy was the climate and other tribes were not anxious to displace them from their inhospitable surroundings. The tribe invented totemism and did not consider other peoples human at all when they went on the warpath. Many modern tribes are creations of the Fascist. The new social organization that must be originated will have to be a peaceful one. The only war between tribes must be the Soccer World Cup, or the Olympics. We are now ready to anticipate . . . The World Tribe. Our central problem is that the techno-jungle has its fingers in our brain. If the brain of a society could be considered its intelligentsia we Americans have been given a pre-frontal lobotomy. In spite of all the so-called liberal whining that has deleted justice from our justice system and turned our schools into baby-sitters, the intellectual life of the country is nil. If you want to be a writer you subscribe to a writers magazine that will educate you on what to avoid in order not to anger a publisher. When I worked for the old "California Farm Reporter" the editor was an ex-United press reporter who had marched with Mao tse tung across China. Pat Browne moonlighted by writing True Confessions. He instructed me in the art of the formula. Once he wrote a story for True Confessions where his heroine became pregnant, and later on repeated the folly. The editor wrote Pat; "Our girls are good girls . . . they only sin once!
The large publishing houses are now owned by conglomerates. When ever I get rejected I am left with the feeling that the editor was really waiting for another book by Oprah on how to lose weight. In 1946 writing that was aimed at the boobs was confined to the pulps. What passes the editors today for the literate public would have been too inane for the pulps. Today old pulp heros like Indiana Jones and Batman are turned into movie epics. The intelligent public is still out there somewhere. They are reading John LeCarre, an Englishman who's spies inhabit a real world. Nothing in a LeCarre novel indicates that he is "Writing down" or catering to the boob mentality, yet every novel is a sell-out.
Most of the writing in the territory that I have staked out is by formula hacks with strong scientific credentials. They promise to enlighten and instruct but are subject to the same admonition given my old editor Pat . . . "Our girls are good girls!"