It looks like you're using an Ad Blocker.
Please white-list or disable AboveTopSecret.com in your ad-blocking tool.
Thank you.
Some features of ATS will be disabled while you continue to use an ad-blocker.
Originally posted by guavas
reply to post by elrem48
We could all collectively stop paying taxes at the exact same time. I'm sure THAT would get someone's attention and ruffle a few feathers.
We actually have more power than we think, and we can exercise that power collectively with money. Stop using banks, stop buying garbage manufactured in Chinese sweat shops and live as naturally as possible. If voting at the ballot box changes nothing, then perhaps voting with our checkbooks will..
"There's a time when the operation of the machine becomes so odious, makes you so sick at heart, that you can't take part. You can't even passively take part, and you've got to put your bodies upon the gears and upon the wheels, upon the levers, upon all the apparatus, and you've got to make it stop. And you've got to indicate to the people who run it, to the people who own it, that unless you're free, the machine will be prevented from working at all" -Mario Savio
Originally posted by lambros56
reply to post by guavas
This is one of the best threads I've read in a while here on ATS.
The last one was titled something like ' we're in trouble' but it was a great read.
I can only concur what most have said in their replies.
I suggest we copy and print this out.
Make as many as possible and pass them out to everyone including those in authority and in government and military but mostly the younger generation, who need to be warned and informed.
Thanks for taking the time out and being so precise in what you have said.
Originally posted by Starchild23
reply to post by guavas
Hey, wait a second there.
You're assuming we CAN change the system.
Let me ask you this, then...is it better to be aware of the system we cannot change, or remain ignorant of it?
No one here has been able to say whether or not we CAN change the system. It's always "possibly" or "I hope so"...there are no definite answers. We don't know we can overthrow the current regime.edit on CWednesdaypm414140f40America/Chicago18 by Starchild23 because: (no reason given)
People (some) seem to think if we didn't have government or someone controlling the group, it would turn all slavery and death in a heart beat.
But that wouldn't happen because we're smarter than that.
Originally posted by Mark16
I loved the post, but ifeel there are ways around it. I know we are all products of the environment but ever thought you could change it? I mean if it is their facade covering our eyes, Why are they doing so? Have you ever thought about the fact that they are scared that you too will realize that everything comes form you so they dumb us down so nobody can realize it?
Originally posted by zayonara
Lot's of people believe the gist of the OP, but I would like to see a synopsis of how we got to this point. Where did it start? Did this exist when we were living in caves? Did it start when we traded pigs for chickens, or when we substituted "symbolic materials" for actual goods. ie money. Did it start with the establishment of modern government, or back when one caveman was more popular than another one?
What I am getting at, is that, whatever happened, didn't just happen; it developed. So at what point does it become a population control conspiracy, in the road from "caveman" to "sheep-man-2012"?
Originally posted by RadioKnecht
I am sure you will benefit a lot -if you haven't already- from delving into Antonio Gramsci's concepts of "hegemony".
Gramsci was a marxist thinker of the early 20th century, founder of Italy's communist party and put in jail for contesting Mussolini's fascist party.
His great contribution to the history of ideas, was precisely the concept of hegemony: that is to say, the way that the elites impose their worldview, values, and conducts into the 'lesser' classes, so as to make them act and comply with a worldview without them even questioning it, because of this "way" of things being so evident.
This represents not only political and economic control, but also the ability of the dominant class to project its own way of seeing the world so that those who are subordinated by it accept it as 'common sense' and 'natural'. Common sense, suggests Geoffrey Nowell-Smith, is 'the way a subordinate class lives its subordination'. In this framework, hegemony becomes a straightjacket for the mind, our mind.
Keep on thinking the way you do, mate! And really, really read Gramsci. His ideas are fascinating, enlightning and liberating.
Originally posted by kosmicjack
reply to post by guavas
Excellent post.
There was a thread not to long ago that I think supports your thesis. It was on how the system is now demanding everything be subscribed or contracted, even the most basic of things like television and phone service. In this way credit continues to be a factor with the added bonus of being able to track your habits. The best way to usher in subscription requirements is through privatization. By privatizing everything from 911/ambulance services to trash pick up they can make sure you are forced into their system. Ultimately everything will be commodified, everything is for sale.