Vineland revisited

[Teufelsdröcke]

Such treaties as NAFTA, GATT, FTAA protect the free movement of goods
and capital but continue to prevent the free movement of people. In this
way they are inherently fascist, codifying the continuing availability
of essentially prison labor in countries already ravaged by capitalist
predation. The very opposite of their claim of bringing "western"
economic vitality and progress to "developing" nations, it is in fact a
new kind of colonialism.

Indeed, the anti-globalization movement provides some reason for hope,
because unlike the economic desperation behind the 1930's and the war
conscription behind the 1960's it is driven by a long-term and
principled vision of a democratic world.

--
Diogenes T.


Phil Wise wrote:
> 
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Doug Millison" <DMillison at ftmg.net>
> > They are media-savvy, able to turn the media against themselves, aware of
> > paradigm limitations in a way that not many of the '60s crew were, and
> they
> > have access to the 'net as an organizing tool. I wonder if Pynchon might
> > rethink Vineland's dismal view of the possibilities for meaningful protest
> > in light of today's anti-globalization movement.
> 
> Maybe so, or is it an emerging pattern... if the 50s sold out the 30s, and
> the 80s sold out the 60s movements, and now we have 90s/00s movements, how
> do we prevent the "mild heard creatures" of our own generation from being
> turned over like the PR3ers?  How do we prevent the pattern repeating?  And
> by the time the 2010 generation comes along, will the system all our
> Governments are busy negotiating - I'm sure even George W doesn't realise
> what the potential consequences of these negotiatins are - have become a
> fully fledged totalitarianism?
> 
> What they're negotiating seems to me to be pure GR's Cartel.  Each of the
> previous totalitarian movements - Stalin's USSR, Hitler's Germany, Mao's
> Revolutionary China - began with widespread popular support because of the
> advances in quality of life they were supposedly going to achieve.  Each
> needed huge numbers of people to achieve a genuine state of totalitarianism,
> and each once they did this, began to devour their own population when an
> outside enemy wasn't available or sufficient.  In addition, those who helped
> establish and\or enable these totalitarianisms had no idea what they had
> wrought.
> 
> As the paradigm of the market extends itself more completely into social
> life (cf Claude Lefort's definition of totalitarianism), and sets all around
> them into motion (cf Arendt's), will or won't these protesters seem
> prophetic?  Or will we all be too numbed to know?