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Transcript:
Vox Frustrati (Vol. 6): Dysfunction
This is Vox Frustrati, a voice for progressives everywhere.
Today we feature an article entitled “Dysfunction” from geomoo
Correspondence from geomoo:
"Vox speaks today to those who understand the source of widespread dysfunction in the public arena—the unresponsiveness of our institutions to the needs of ordinary citizens, the damage inflicted by addiction to military profits and rape of the earth, the dismantling of enlightenment engines of blind justice and government for the people. He asks those still confused over these matters to refrain briefly from accusing one another with vile epithets such as purist, racist, and red neck in order to allow those with understanding to reflect on the way forward.
Writing in 1950, David Riesman postulated a new other-directed personality created by culture. His cogent thoughts have been extended by sociologist Stejpan Mestrovic. Today Vox looks at what Riesman termed “curdled indignation.” Indignation is appropriate, but the curdled part means lack of connection with action. In general, our mass culture, mediated through electronic media rather than through face-to-face interactions, have created a disconnect between emotions and actions. Emotions have become a luxury item, tried on and cast aside as the mood suits, manipulated for the sake of proving one’s bona fides or to claim a high ground in argument. What is lost is the ancient connection between feeling and doing.
Curdled indignation is a luxury emotion. It is not linked to appropriate action. It is multi-directional, divorced from perceptibly fixed moral standards. Curdled indignation arises as a response to the feeling of being powerless. We are drowning in information, yet among the people confusion reigns. Curdled indignation is a response to this distressing state of affairs, not a solution.
Indignation is not the end of the journey, it is the beginning. Balancing precariously on his frustration, Vox looks for the next solid stepping stone. Where will we stand when we leave behind curdled indignation? It is the duty of we, the reflective people, to answer this question. The world is as it is, neither just nor humane. The ruthless and powerful are well entrenched. But we the people are not helpless so long as we nurture the connection between feeling and action. Vox does not plunge indulgently into his indignation; rather he springs from it into the public realm, patiently and fiercely working to mold public institutions in the enlightenment image of equality, humanity, and liberty."
That concludes Geomoo's remarks
Vox illuminates this irate but insightful intellectual individual's input with intense and impetuous indignation and irascibility, infuriated and iritated as he is by the idiotic imbeciles who inhabit our institutions of government.
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