Most recently, I've been spending some time wondering how a PFC who was diagnosed with a gender disorder, who possibly was a victim of fetal alcohol syndrome and who was clearly a disturbed person could be given access to the most classified, top-secret files in the nation. Furthermore, it concerned me that the person or persons who decided to allow Mr. or Ms Manning this degree of access has never been identified or assigned the slightest degree of responsibility while Manning is supposed to serve the next 35 years in prison. The answer to this question came to me as the answer to another set of seemingly unrelated questions dealing with the increasing tendency to condemn as un-American any attempts to question Big Business while at the same time attacking Big Government which is largely financed by Big Business.
The answers to both questions can be found in the incredible growth of the Cult of Stupid. More after the squiggle.
The "how" of the Cult of Stupid has been discussed and dissected many time by many writers. Funding cuts for after-school programs and Head Start, shorter hours for museums and libraries, dismissal of teachers resulting in larger classes and cuts in salary for educators have been cited for America's relatively low educational ranking in relation to money spent - at which we've proven to be highly skilled. Less widely discussed about the Cult is the "why."
When a nation embarks on a project that seemingly is designed to result in a more moronic population, it seems fitting to ask "Who benefits?" Being a materialist, my question devolves into "Who stands to profit monetarily?" This leads me to look for a definition of the kind of American our present system is trying to shape. There are two.
The first is a small group of highly-trained specialists in math, science, communication and PR. They have to be able to live the work ethic and illustrate the virtue of putting competitive endeavor ahead of home, family, country or anything else. Preferably, they should attribute all this to God. The second group is much larger - and it it this group with which the Cult is most concerned. This group contains the voters, without whom the Cult could not don the cloak of democracy. It's easy to see that should this group become well-educated, they might start committing the prime sin in any Cult of Stupid. They might start asking questions, like about PFC Manning's superiors. Or about corporate taxes or loopholes. Or about why only South Africa and the U.S. doesn't have universal medical care. Or why we ask our children to believe in equal justice for all when it's pretty clear that a celebrity or a billionaire isn't going to get the same treatment as a small businessman or a teacher. The Cult can't afford questions.
To eliminate questions, especially embarrassing ones, the Cult has to have Prophets - and it does. Names aren't useful because we know who they are. They can easily be recognized because they're the ones that offer the simple solutions and generally use words like "all" and "those people." Other key words for the Prophets are "values," "rights" and "traditions." Invariably, we find that all these happen to be the ones held by the Prophets to the exclusion of any to the contrary. The Prophets ask only one thing from their followers - acceptance. Sometimes, they even hold this acceptance as a virtue, as in "Dittoheads." Upon research, an investigator will find Prophets extremely well paid and, upon deeper investigation, often find that the Prophets' actual beliefs are very different from the ones they espouse. As a matter of fact, most Prophets are very clever people. They had to be to get the job.
So what's the motive for the Cult of Stupid? Money. Lots and lots of money. Intelligent people simply won't let greedy weasels get away with the kind of thievery an accepting bunch of sheep will allow. Therefore, anything that will produce more sheep is a step in the right direction. In this case, it's no accident the staff carried by the shepherd is called a "crook."
Who are the shepherds? The ones that pay the Prophets. They can be corporations, Government agencies, networks, individuals who have enough money, labor unions, non-profits - just about anybody who can gain from ignorance. Anyone who can convince the public to support wars when there isn't evidence for them or give billions to countries who'd stab us in the back in a minute if they could make money on it or let criminals get away with murder if they could distract our attention long enough or convince us to elect a congressman, a governor or a president just because he or she could afford a sufficient army of lawyers, lobbyists and publicists.
The job we have - and it's a doozy - is to keep the Cult from becoming an Army. We have to fight against Stupid and its Prophets. We can do this by encouraging things that get people to ask questions and fight things that tell people to shut up.
And it might be a good idea, when you see or head some talking head spouting off the same blather you've been hearing for weeks, to write a note to the station informing them that the sponsors of the program will no longer be a part of your home.