Free Republic
Browse · Search
General/Chat
Topics · Post Article

Skip to comments.

Young Americans Prefer Socialism Because They Are Ignorant of the Past: Camille Paglia
Reason.com ^ | 9/3/2019 | Nick Gillespie

Posted on 09/11/2019 5:04:43 AM PDT by simpson96

(snip) As the firebrand cultural critic Camille Paglia puts it in a new interview with The Wall Street Journal's Tunku Varadarajan, Americans take our unprecedented freedom of choice and wealth of consumer goods for granted. They are desperately in need of a richer, deeper context for the very era they are denouncing.

"Everything is so easy now," Ms. Paglia continues. "The stores are so plentifully supplied. You just go in and buy fruits and vegetables from all over the world." Undergrads, who've studied neither economics nor history, "have a sense that this is the way life has always been. Because they've never been exposed to history, they have no idea that these are recent attainments that come from a very specific economic system."

Capitalism, she continues, has "produced this cornucopia around us. But the young seem to believe in having the government run everything, and that the private companies that are doing things for profit around them, and supplying them with goods, will somehow exist forever."(snip)

Paglia argues—convincingly, to my mind—that we've forgotten even the relatively recent past.

"Our parents were the World War II generation," Ms. Paglia says, "so they had a sense of reality about life." Children now "are raised in a far more affluent period. Even people without much money have cellphones, televisions, access to cars. They're raised in an air-conditioned environment. I can still remember when there was no air-conditioning." She shudders as she sips her cold beer, adding that she suffered horribly in the heat….Ms. Paglia asks me to note that it was "because of capitalism" that her forebears "escaped the crushing poverty of rural Italy," emigrating to Endicott, N.Y., to "work in the Endicott-Johnson shoe factories, whose vast buildings, tanning pools and smokestacks dominated my childhood."

(Excerpt) Read more at reason.com ...


TOPICS: Chit/Chat
KEYWORDS: paglia; socialism
Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first 1-2021-33 next last

1 posted on 09/11/2019 5:04:43 AM PDT by simpson96
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | View Replies]

To: simpson96

It’s what a snowflake wants. Freedom? Yes freedom to stay in mommy’s basement and smoke dope. Liberty is too much of a burden for these sissy tantrum throwers.


2 posted on 09/11/2019 5:07:55 AM PDT by Vaquero ( Don't pick a fight with an old guy. If he is too old to fight, he'll just kill you.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: simpson96

Eventually, someone pays for socialism... and it ain’t the rich and powerful...


3 posted on 09/11/2019 5:08:50 AM PDT by John123 (It is Time for Debt Jubilee. Everything is Free)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: simpson96

Too many words. Too complicated for Americans with attention span of a goldfish. Useless article. For intellectuals only.


4 posted on 09/11/2019 5:10:42 AM PDT by RArtfulogerDodger (peace, Love, and Joy To All, Especially Obama and Democrats)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: simpson96

Kids always think they know so much more than their dumb old parents. They want it because we are against it. The idea of socialism has been made “cool” to snowflakes because they don’t understand it, but dad hates it.


5 posted on 09/11/2019 5:11:19 AM PDT by bk1000 (I stand with Trump)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: simpson96

Reagan was right.

Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn’t pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same, or one day we will spend our sunset years telling our children and our children’s children what it was once like in the United States where men were free.”

That generation is here.


6 posted on 09/11/2019 5:13:21 AM PDT by gattaca ("Government's first duty is to protect the people, not run their lives." Ronald Reagan)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: simpson96
Ignorance is bliss, until the trap snaps shut.


7 posted on 09/11/2019 5:17:25 AM PDT by Travis McGee (EnemiesForeignAndDomestic.com)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: simpson96

IMO, Higher education failed to teach them history. I am speaking specifically High School. It’s not that they are ignorant, some may be, they were just not taught the differences.


8 posted on 09/11/2019 5:19:24 AM PDT by duckman ( Not tired of winning!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: simpson96

Spot on.


9 posted on 09/11/2019 5:21:51 AM PDT by FreedomPoster (Islam delenda est)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: RArtfulogerDodger
Here is the most important point, made by Professor Paglia:

"Everything is so easy now," Ms. Paglia continues. "The stores are so plentifully supplied. You just go in and buy fruits and vegetables from all over the world." Undergrads, who've studied neither economics nor history, "have a sense that this is the way life has always been. Because they've never been exposed to history, they have no idea that these are recent attainments that come from a very specific economic system."

Many young people have had such a woefully poor education and have been so isolated from the challenges of life that they really don't appreciate that everything we have is a result of a hugely successful capitalist economy.

10 posted on 09/11/2019 5:25:41 AM PDT by freeandfreezing
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 4 | View Replies]

To: freeandfreezing

Camille is one of a vanishing breed, the Honest Liberal. I disagree with her on a lot but I give her credit for calling out the lunatics in her party.

And I am damned glad none of them will listen to her.

L


11 posted on 09/11/2019 5:31:37 AM PDT by Lurker (Peaceful coexistence with the Left is not possible. Stop pretending that it is.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 10 | View Replies]

To: freeandfreezing
"The stores are so plentifully supplied. You just go in and buy fruits and vegetables from all over the world."

I agree. But I suspect a lot of young people would shrug and say: "I have college loans. So the system doesn't work."

12 posted on 09/11/2019 5:38:59 AM PDT by ClearCase_guy (If White Privilege is real, why did Elizabeth Warren lie about being an Indian?)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 10 | View Replies]

To: simpson96

....and she still will vote for Bernie....


13 posted on 09/11/2019 5:40:52 AM PDT by Personal Responsibility (If we disarmed democrats gun violence would decrease by 90%.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: simpson96

If any young person says they prefer ‘socialism’, they ought to be made to define it.

I’m sure they couldn’t

I am also sure not one of them could pass a HS civics test... By that I mean, ‘civics’ as we were taught before text books were criminally ‘revised’


14 posted on 09/11/2019 5:44:16 AM PDT by SMARTY ("Nobility is defined by the demands it makes on us - by obligations, not by rights".)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: simpson96
The American education system teaches global warming, how to protest, history revision, groupthink, anti-American studies--that sort of thing. Reading, writing, and arithmetic are racist!

Is it any wonder that the dim-witted among their students have no idea what's going on?

My grandchildren, 6th to 9th grades, laugh at the stupidity of it all, but their education is richly supplemented by my abundant resources.

It's not a laughing matter. Less fortunate children are being cheated and will pay a heavy price for the malefactions of those who should be their guardians.

15 posted on 09/11/2019 5:47:35 AM PDT by Savage Beast (Was the election of Donald Trump to the Presidency liberty's last gasp? Big Brother is watching you.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: SMARTY

When I was in undergrad, one of my Philosophy professors was Dr. C.W. DiCarlo, and I still treasure the memory of one of his lectures, where he caused at least six Millennial “wymyn” to get up and walk out, when he said: “The average millennial’s understanding of ‘socialism’ doesn’t extend beyond the idea of: “Rich people have a lot of nice stuff that I want.”

I have used that quote ever since. :)


16 posted on 09/11/2019 5:51:58 AM PDT by Kriggerel ("All great truths are hard and bitter, but lies... are sweeter than wild honey" (Ragnar Redbeard))
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 14 | View Replies]

To: simpson96

American socialism has “worked” for the last 50 years.

- It was imposed on us gradually and steadily
- Anyone alive during this time sees the non-stop growth of the welfare state as inevitable. New program after new program
- Socialism and progressivism has taken over the language and culture of nearly all education
- America’s government bureaucracy, security and surveillance apparatus has grown powerful
- the mainstream of both political parties accept it.
- Above all - Government funds the welfare state at all levels with massive spending and massive debt. Our debt bubble has yet to explode.

Therefore, its perfectly logical for the average person to believe that we are naturally evolving towards some kind of future socialist paradise, except for the view of a few of those nasty “racists,” conservatives and libertarians.


17 posted on 09/11/2019 6:02:57 AM PDT by PGR88
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Kriggerel

That’s it in a nut shell


18 posted on 09/11/2019 6:07:31 AM PDT by SMARTY ("Nobility is defined by the demands it makes on us - by obligations, not by rights".)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 16 | View Replies]

To: Vaquero

Yes freedom to stay in mommy’s basement and smoke dope.

*********

Many parents seem to have no concerns about enabling their children’s extended adolescence and dependency. Even after leaving the basement the economic subsidizing often continues.

And the parents wonder why their children can’t stand on their own two feet.


19 posted on 09/11/2019 6:23:02 AM PDT by Starboard
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 2 | View Replies]

To: gattaca

Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction.

**************

Or just one election away.


20 posted on 09/11/2019 6:25:16 AM PDT by Starboard
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 6 | View Replies]


Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first 1-2021-33 next last

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.

Free Republic
Browse · Search
General/Chat
Topics · Post Article

FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson