Subject : ON BLAMING THE
VICTIM, AND OTHER PARLOR GAMES: FROM THE CENTER FOR THE ADVANCED STUDY OF
AMERICAN INSTITUTIONS AND SOCIAL MOVEMENTS,
12 January 2005
Dear Colleagues and Friends of CEIMSA ,
The social sciences have taught us to look for signs of non-verbal
violence used to colonize the minds of subjugated people, so that their
"inferiority" and their abuse are perceived as part of "the
nature order of things". Anthony Wilden writes
in his critical study, The
Imaginary Canadian :
in which they play the role of the "natural" inferiors.
The result is a country of amnesia victims. We cannot
know who we are unless we know what our domestic
and "external" relations actually were at different times
in our history --the record of our social memory-- and how
those relations
changed over time.
or another conquered and colonized like ourselves, and some
of them still
are. (1981, p.2)
An example of this psychological "colonization" is found in the
contemporary history of Japanese Americans, who, writes Michi Weglyn (author of Years
of Infamy, The Untold Story of America's Concentratioin Camps),
were made
to feel shame for having suffered humiliation at the hands of state
authorities during the Second World War, in much the same way that rape
victims, according to psychological studies, are made to feel guilty
and are
reluctant to talk about the abuse they have suffered.
It took the Japanese American victims of abuse a generation before they
could
find the words to talk about their experiences in the prison camps
during WW
II, even to their own children. The anti-imperialist movement in the
1960's
engaged many students of Japanese ancestry, and it was their
involvement in
this movement that led them to discover what their parents and
grandparents had
suffered in the 1940's. Out of this public testimony came the demand
for
reparations, which was finally won in the 1980s.
This "banality evil" was expanded by the Nixon-Agnew administration
into a strategy for claiming the support of "the silent majority" of
Americans for the murderous
The silencing of victims and their defenders is a classic tactic
of
power cut free from any democratic restraints. The specialists &
technicians, once they are alienated from society, become convinced
that their
ends justify any means necessary, and, having crossed this threshold,
all
political differences are reduced to administrative problems to be
solved by
obedient underlings, sometimes in exchange for small rewards but more
often for
nothing more than promises. Naturally, inside this system anyone who
demands
democratic accountability is stigmatized as "the enemy" by the higher
order of political decision makers. He is the "spoiler" in the
game of Perfect Tyranny. . . .
The seven items below speak to this dynamic of maintaining
hierarchical
control through the manipulation of
perceptions, by use of censorship, by
disinformation, rumors, stereotypes, stigmas, etc., etc.... --always at
the
high cost of truth, and sometimes at the cost of sanity.
Item A. is a short
article forwarded to us by William Blum (author of
Item B. is
my December 17, 2005, letter addressed to a member
of the Regional Council of Rhone-Alpes,
in
which I request an explanation for why I was not informed in advance that the money granted to me for the publication of papers presented at
the CEIMSA International Conference on The Impact of American
Multinational
Corporations, which was held at Stendhal University in January
2002, could
not be used to pay authors' royalties to the 25 specialists whose
papers were
published on the CEIMSA web site. The Regional Council demanded
that the
money be returned after it was spent, and it was this debt that
was used to justify : a.) the closure of our research center at the University of Grenoble in 2004, b.) the removal of our web
site of more than 5000 pages of documents and publications from the
University
server, and c.) the refusal to
allow my 8 Ph. D. students to enroll at the University of Grenoble,
thereby forcing them to enroll at the nearby University of Savoie,
in Chambéry. [For complete documentation
of this
Scandal at
Thus far, I have no explanation from the Conseil Régional, nor from the
Item C. is a sample of the the official test questions, from Greg Palast,
for public school children in President Bush's dynamic neo-liberal
educational strategy, called "The No Child Left
Behind Program."
Item D. is an
Item E. is an article
from peace activist, Al
Burke, in
Item F. is a
communication from U.S. Newswire on the International Commission of
Inquiry on Crimes Against Humanity Committed by the Bush Administration : "Citizen's Tribunal Indicts
Bush Administration for War Crimes and Crimes Against Humanity; Indictments to
be Delivered to White House, on 1/9/2006 at 12:01:00 PM."
And, finally, item G. is a scholarly essay by Canadian Professor
Michael Keefer (at the University of Guelph's School of English
and Theatre Studies) on "Canada`s Thinker-activists and Critics of
Globalization", which was recently published by CEIMSA-IN-EXILE.
[Please visit : CEIMSA Scholarly
Publications, Volume II.]
Sincerely,
Francis McCollum Feeley
Professor of American Studies
Dircector of Research
Université Stendhal Grenoble 3
http://www.ceimsa.org/
________________
A.
from William Blum :
Washington, D.C.
Common
Courage Press
DANCING ON THE
ELECTRIC GRID
by Per Fagereng
Picture this standard
experiment in psychology: A group of rats is placed on an electric grid
and the
voltage is slowly increased. After a while the rats feel a burning
tingle in
their feet. The experimenters up the voltage some more, and watch the
rats
dance and bite each other.
The experimenters are seeking knowledge, and the rats’ pain is
presumably worth
it. The experimenters don’t blame the rats for fighting each other, or
punish
the more aggressive ones. They know that individuals react to pain in
different
ways.
Now picture the economic terrain as a different kind of pain grid.
Instead of
electric shocks, the inhabitants experience job loss, higher prices,
less pay,
overwork, polluted neighborhoods and so on. Controlling the grid are
not
psychologists, but CEOs and bankers. Instead of knowledge, they are
seeking
profit. And so they up the pain, but not because
they want to
hurt people. They are really trying to up their profits, and the
pain is
a side effect.
After a while people on the grid do nasty things to each other,
everything from
domestic violence to immigrant-bashing to crime. Unlike the rats, the
people
get blamed for their misbehavior. We are told to point our fingers at
the
victims on the grid, instead of at the economic rulers who keep
increasing the
pain.
You’d think that the CEOs and bankers would ease up on the pain, but
think
again. They continue to demand more sacrifice from the poor, knowing
full well
how they’ll react.
Would you call this a big conspiracy? Or the sum
of many
small conspiracies? Maybe it doesn’t matter that much. I’m not a
mind
reader. The point is, the economic rulers pursue their profits and they
know
the consequences. So to that extent, they are choosing to inflict pain.
______________________
Per Fagereng is
a writer, artist, commentator and activist. He is a senior editor of
the
______________________
B.
Letter from Francis Feeley :
To: M. Michael Wilson
Conseil Régional Rhône-Alpes
17 December 2006
Monsieur,
Je vous remercie pour m’avoir aider retrouver l’attitude du Conseil
régional à
propos de leur refus de subventionner la publication des ACTES du
colloque
bilingue sur "L'impact des entreprises multinationales américaines
dans
la societé/Reflections on the Social Impact of American Multinational Corporations", organisé par mon centre de recherche,
CEIMSA, en janvier 2002 à l’Université Stendhal.
Permettez moi de répondre à votre message dans lequel vous m’avez
expliqué que
le Conseil régional ne se trouve pas très disposé de m’accorder une
subvention
de 3000 euros pour une partie des frais d’un colloque en 2006 parce que
:
En réalité le Conseil régional a tout simplement refusé de payer les
droits
d’auteurs demandés pour la publication des ACTES sans m'avertir que
la somme que vous citez, qui était de 30 000 francs, et que
j’ai
reçue plusieurs mois avant le colloque de janvier 2002, n’était pas
destinée à
subventionner une publication avec tous les frais que cela comporte,
mais
devait se limiter plutôt à couvrir les achats tels que le papier, la
colle,
l'encre, etc… , bref, tout sauf le travail
intellectuel. Si j’ai bien compris ma communication hier par téléphone
avec
Mme. Joëlle BACHELIER, mon “ interlocuteur ” à
Je dois cependant souligner que cette “ règle ” était imposée ipso
facto.
Voici les règles que j’ai lues et que j’ai suivies en 2001 en faisant
la
demande d'une subvention au Conseil Régional pour le colloque du CEIMSA
de
janvier 2002 selon la publication : Colloques, Guide
d’Organisation,
Service Recherche, (Université Stendhal, 2000), page 19.
Comme vous voyez, ni dans ces règles, ni dans la communications
envoyées
plus tard par le Conseil régional [voir, SVP, pour le dossier de cette
histoire
de “ malentendu ” au Conseil régional, Document N°69 dans le dossier
"Scandale à Stendhal"], est mention d’une politique excluant
l’utilisation de cette subvention pour payer les droits d’auteurs relatifs
à la publication des ACTES.
En conclusion, je ne comprends pas comment on peut m’accuser d’avoir «
fait
perdre de l’argent à l’université Stendhal ». Et je ne sais pas comment
démontrer ma bonne foi et à qui m’adresser pour faire reconnaître que
le but
fondamental de cette subvention régionale a été atteint bien
au-delà des
conditions habituelles en me permettant de publier sur Internet, avec
la
participation de tous les intervenants, l’intégralité des résultats du
colloque.
Veuillez accepter, Monsieur, l’expression de mes sentiments
distingués.
Francis Feeley
Professeur d’Etudes américanes
_________________
C.
From: Greg Palast :
10 January 2006
Subject: No Child's Behind Left: The Test
NO CHILD'S BEHIND
LEFT: THE TEST
By Greg Palast
Try it yourself. This is from the state's actual practice test. Ready, class?
"The year 1999 was a big one for the Williams sisters. In February,
Serena
won her first pro singles championship. In March, the sisters met for
the first
time in a tournament final. Venus won. And at doubles tennis, the
Williams
girls could not seem to lose that year."
And here's one of the four questions:
"The story says that in 1999, the sisters could not seem to lose at
doubles tennis. This probably means when they played
"A two matches in one day
"B against each other
"C with two balls at once
"D as partners"
OK, class, do you know the answer? (By the way, I didn't cheat: there's
nothing
else about "doubles" in the text.)
My kids go to a
There are no tennis courts in the elementary schools of Bed-Stuy or
Now, you tell me, class, which kids are best prepared to answer the
question
about "doubles tennis"? The 8-year-olds in
Is this test a measure of "reading comprehension" -- or a measure of
wealth accumulation?
If you have any doubts about what the test is measuring, look at the
next
question, based on another part of the text, which reads (and I could
not make
this up):
"Most young tennis stars learn the game from coaches at private clubs.
In
this sentence, a club is probably a
"F baseball bat
"G tennis racquet
"H tennis court
"J country club"
Helpfully, for the kids in our 'hood, it explains that a "country
club" is a, "place where people meet." Yes, but WHICH people?
President Bush told us, "By passing the No Child Left Behind Act, we are regularly testing every child and making sure they have
better
options when schools are not performing."
But there are no "better options." In the delicious
double-speak of class war, when the tests have winnowed out the chaff
and kids
stamped failed, No Child Left results in that child being left behind
in the
same grade to repeat the failure another year.
I can't say that Mr. Bush doesn't offer better options to the kids
stamped
failed. Under No Child Left, if enough kids flunk the tests,
their school
is marked a failure and its students win the right, under the law, to
transfer
to any successful school in their district. You can't provide
more
opportunity than that. But they don't provide it, the law
promises it,
without a single penny to make it happen. In
Hint: When de-coding politicians' babble, to get to the real
agenda,
don't read their lips, read their budgets. And in his last
budget,
our President couldn't spare one thin dime for education, not ten
cents.
Mr. Big Spender provided for a derisory 8.4 cents on the dollar of the
cost of
primary and secondary schools. Congress appropriated a half penny of
the
nation's income -- just one-half of one-percent of
President Bush actually requested less. While Congress succeeded
in
prying out an itty-bitty increase in voted funding, that doesn't mean
the extra
cash actually gets to the students. Fifteen states have sued the
federal
government on the grounds that the cost of new testing imposed on
schools, $3.9
billion, eats up the entire new funding
budgeted for
No Child Left.
There are no "better options" for failing children, but there are
better uses for them. The President ordered testing and more
testing to
hunt down, identify and target millions of children too expensive, too
heavy a
burden, to educate.
No Child Left offers no options for those
with the
test-score mark of Cain -- no opportunities, no hope, no plan, no
funding. Rather, it is the new social Darwinism, educational
eugenics:
identify the nation's loser-class early on. Trap them then train them
cheap.
Someone has to care for the privileged. No society can have winners
without
lots and lots of losers. And so we have No Child Left Behind -- to
produce the
new worker drones that will clean the toilets at the Yale Alumni Club,
punch
the cash registers color-coded for illiterates, and pamper the
winner-class on
the higher floors of the new economic order.
Class war dismissed.
See a clip of the actual practice test at www.GregPalast.com
____________________
Greg Palast is the
author of the New York Times bestseller, The Best Democracy Money
Can Buy.
_______________
D.
from Mike Arreste :
9 January 2006
Hi Mr Feeley,
I hope this message finds well. Hows things coming
along for the CEIMSA? Anyways I guess we gotta keep
fighting for our rights such as the right to speak out against the
injustices
that are inflicted upon us or the right to refuse immoral orders when
it comes
to destroy thousands of Iraki families for
money's
sake.
Here's a link about US soldiers who deserted the
I was forwarded this other video ( see the
attached
link) about the multinatinals pillages of
Chili's
resources. Its worth watching.
Cheers,
Mike
_______________
E.
from Al Burke :
Date: Tue, 10 Jan 2006
Subject: Medea & Co.
www.nnn.se
Women Launch Global
Bid to Stop
Abid Aslam
OneWorld.net
January 8, 2006
WASHINGTON-- Women peace activists launched Thursday a global
campaign to
end warfare and bloodshed in
Pennsylvania Democratic Congressman John Murtha, a former Marine and
Vietnam
veteran who had backed the war, said this week in an ABC News interview
that
were he eligible to join the U.S. military now, he would not and nor
would he
expect others to join.
Gen. Peter Pace, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, took the
unusual step
of wading into an ongoing political controversy Thursday, when he told
a
Pentagon news conference that Murtha's comments were damaging to troop
morale
and recruitment efforts.
Murtha, the House of Representatives' top Democrat on military
spending,
replied in a statement that ''the military had no problem recruiting
directly
after 9/11 because everyone understood that we had been attacked. But
now the
military's ability to attract recruits is being hampered by the
prospect of
prolonged, extended and repeated deployments; inadequate equipment;
shortened
home stays; the lack of any connection between Iraq and the brutal
attacks of
9/11; and--most importantly--the administration's constantly changing,
undefined, open-ended military mission in Iraq.''
Murtha had voted in favor of going to war against
Likewise, the Women Say No to War campaign is to call for the
withdrawal of all
foreign troops and foreign fighters from
''Iraqi women are devastated now, and it will take us decades of
struggle to
regain a peaceful and civilized life,'' Yanar Mohammed, a campaign endorser and president of the Organization of
Women's
Freedom in
Initiated by the group CODEPINK: Women for Peace,
the effort
sets out to be the highest-profile of a very small number of campaigns
that
have sought to bring women together across borders to demand an end to
the
bloodshed in
More than 3,000 women signed on before the campaign launched, according
to Medea Benjamin, co-founder of CODEPINK
and the San
Francisco-based human rights group Global Exchange. By Sunday, the
number of
endorsers on the campaign's Web site had grown to nearly 10,000.
Signatories include Gold Star Families for Peace founder Cindy Sheehan,
whose
son was killed serving in the
Other endorsers include Gold Star mother Rose Gentle of Scotland;
entertainers
Susan Sarandon, Eve Ensler, and Margaret Cho; authors Alice Walker, Anne Lamott,
Maxine Hong Kingston, and Barbara Ehrenreich;
and
legislators Barbara Lee, Cynthia McKinney, and Lynn Woolsey of the
U.S., Libby
Davies of Canada, and Caroline Lucas of the U.K. In addition to
Mohammed, Iraqi
endorsers include Hana Ibrahim of Iraqi Women's Will.
In the campaign document, the women declare that ''we have had enough
of the
senseless war in
CODEPINK, in a statement, said the
98
''As the three-year anniversary of the invasion of Iraq approaches, the
country
is still wracked by violence, Iraqi civilians are suffering from a lack
of
basic services including electricity and clean water, and women's
rights are
under attack.''
The attempt to unite and mobilize women peace activists worldwide also
marks a
new effort to diversify the
Diversity has brought dilemmas, however. While a broad spectrum of
organizations came together to protest the rising death toll in
Many activists eager to shield
CODEPINK seems to think it has found a way to resolve
some of
those differences. It said the Women Say No to War document urges ''a
shift in
strategy in
_______________
F.
from Connie Julian :
U.S. Newswire
10 January 2006
Citizen's Tribunal
Indicts Bush Administration for War
Crimes
and
Crimes Against Humanity
Indictments to be
Delivered to
White House on 9 January 2006, at 12:01:00 PM
http://releases.usnewswire.com/GetRelease.asp?id=59009
_______________
G.
from Michael Keefer :
9 January 2006
Subject: Re: Article from Global Research
Dear Francis Feeley,
I've been following your struggles at
I wonder whether the following article might be of interest to
you
(given that Canada, a major energy exporter to the US, is in the
throes
of a federal election, and that he Conservative party, whose
leaders
are in the pockets of the Bush Republicans, currently enjoy a
narrow
lead in opinion polls).
Best wishes for the New Year,
Michael Keefer
"Canada`s Thinker-activists and Critics of Globalization,"
by Michael Keefer.
CEIMSA
Scholarly Publications, Vol . II-2005.
*********************
Francis McCollum Feeley
Professor of American Studies/
Director of Research
Université de Grenoble-3
http://dimension.ucsd.edu/CEIMSA-IN-EXILE/