RE: EXTRA! EXTRA! Get it here FIRST!

I learned (the hard way) that it isn't worth it try to change people's
minds if they are obviously immovable.  Since then, I've focused all my
activism efforts on helping to inform and empower people who are
fundamentally empathetic, but uninformed, undecided, and/or inactive.

Remember, we need a majority, not a plurality.  It really doesn't matter
if my father and sister remain loyal Republicans and
anti-environmentalists.  The same is true for your parents.  And people
who care need to avoid burnout, which is a sure thing when you attempt
to do the impossible (i.e., try to change people's minds when they are
obviously immovable).

The most difficult thing is to try to change people.  It's much easier,
and indeed more effective, to change how you respond to people who
should change (if they knew what was best for them and all living
things).  No response, or a brief "I disagree" is an acceptable
response.  For family and friends who should change but never will, I
suggest you talk about other things entirely, unless perchance they ask
for your opinion.  And then, provide it calmly without attempting to
change their beliefs.
 
-----Original Message-----
From: [email protected]
[mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Adam Miller
Sent: February 13, 2004 7:45 AM
To: BH.org List
Subject: [ballistichelmet] EXTRA! EXTRA! Get it here FIRST!


http://www.usatoday.com/

Look at the top story about how it was said in '02 that it would hard to
find WMDs, and that they might not exist. Wow, really? 

OK, now here's the thing that pisses me off: I talk to, say, my parents,
and tell them all this shit BEFORE everthing goes down, and I'm told
that I'm a wacko leftist because I'm trusting information that's not IN
USA today (yet). Now, with this in the "real news," what will they say? 

"Jeez, that's horrible!" 
"How could they do that?"
"How were they allowed to do that?"

Never once a:

"You were right, Adam."
"Maybe I should start looking at some of the news you do."         
"Maybe I don't trust the press as much as I thought."

Now, going back to what Aaron wrote about this being an important time
in America's political history and how our input is needed, how do I
resolve the need for the truth to come out with the fact that fewer and
fewer people seem to want to listen to it? Aaron is a more patriotic
person than I am, only because he really does care about helping these
people in spite of themselves. I'm getting fucking sick of it, the fact
that your average American will not only accept the bullshit news he
sees on NBC, but will say that it's the only valid news, and that
anything not broadcast into every home is obviously incorrect. This is
rooted in the fact that they really do believe that this news is
IMPARTIAL, they don't understand the capitalist processes at work behind
the presses, nor do they WANT TO. 

It's that old adage about leading a horse to water and not being able to
make him drink: We can keep pointing out the truth, but until it can't
be ignored any longer, Americans will keep watching their Nascar and
drinking their Bud Light while we get lied to and sedated with
consumerism. And even then, what comes of it? This will be buried in a
week by someone's boob on TV, or a white kid getting shot at school, or
some other bullshit. Personally, I feel like the fact that Bush has
gotten away with what he has for so long and is STILL a good bet to get
re-elected is the last sign that Americans don't care anymore. We can
scream til we're hoarse, but until Dan Rather says it, it just isn't
true to most people.

So, I really feel as if it's not my fight anymore, not like it was. It
doesn't matter what I point out to people - it matters what they choose
to see. And if they were to see the stuff we're trying to tell people on
the mainstream news, they'd immediately see their own guilt, for owning
a gas-guzzling SUV, for voting in a President with no respect for other
nations' sovereignty, for benefiting from the system at all. And that
would be great for ratings, wouldn't it?

No, I'm (probably) not moving to Canada, and I probably will be a lot
more optimistic at some point in the near future. But honestly, this
feeling has been growing in me for a while. Whose minds have we changed?
The biggest thing right now is Gay marriages, something that doesn't
really affect anyone other than the gay people who it would help. If our
country is divided over something that doesn't even really involve most
of them, how can the sacrifices that would need to be made by all
Americans to make the world a safer and better place ever happen? 

The only answer that I see is the natural progression of our generation
to power, and even that I'm not sure of. There's no way to make my
parents understand, and they've only had TV for most of their lives, not
all of it, and certainly not 500 channels of it. So, our generation
faces a choice - we either embrace the glut of information (as we do at
BH, to the best of our ability), or we shut off and take what we're
spoonfed. But until the baby boomers, with their perfect credit and
houses they own (i.e. a lot to lose), are ripped from the controls of
this country, most of us aren't even able to make THAT decision for
ourselves.

Fuck, I should have put this as a rant or something, sorry about the
volume of the message here...But, in writing this, I've done my
anti-establishment act for the day... 

This annoyingly long message has been brought to you by the friendly
folks at Worker's Risk Services: paying for leftists to preach via email
since 2003.


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