Erasing History To Own Putin: Notes From The Edge Of The Narrative Matrix
caitlinjohnstone.substack.com
Listen to a reading of this article: ❖ It enrages me that "westsplaining" is a word now. Fuck off you ridiculous NPR-addled shitbrains. The absolute gall to protect a murderous globe-dominating empire from criticism and accountability for its non-stop meddling and oppression using words disguised to sound like social justice jargon. Fuck you.
I remember the atmosphere in the US when Yuri Gagarin made his flight. Quite typically for this heavily narcissistic society, it was fear, fear of Soviet Communism taking their fabulous stuff, fear of weaponry launched from space by the Russkies --- in each case, fear whipped up by media, even then, lapdogs of the DOD, CIA et al. This aspect of manufactured fear in service of manufacturing consent is nothing new. It's only that I was too young and naive to really appreciate it back then. What completely blows my mind is that some of my peers who share that deep experience of emotional manipulation seem to never have matured into the realization of how thoroughly they allow their thoughts to be controlled in ongoing fashion. Trump derangement morphs into Putin derangement and so on. What comes next? I'd scream at them to wake TF up, but recognize that all it would achieve is my own marginalization as a Putin puppet. So I speak softly elaborating some history and then beat my head against a wall in frustration, when I get rejected anyway.
OANN is currently showing Ukraine On Fire movie by Oliver Stone today and tomorrow or anyone can download. This is a very accurate depiction of Ukraine and the Nazi / US destruction of Ukraine. This is an excellent movie to watch. It shows the CIAs influence and destruction of Ukraine.
You are so brilliant Caitlin & absolutely spot on. I’m so sick of this country with it’s backwards patriarchal madness that cares only for money, it’s sickening 😕
I think a large part of the USA's arrogance is due to the fact that they have not yet experienced a real war on their territory. Maybe if that happened they would really taste the medicine they keep selling to others...
Caitlin, once again all I have is gratitude and awe for your research and writing, for your courage at putting it all out there. This one touched my heart. It is time to wake up indeed. The western world seems to be nation upon nation of children—and not even nice children, certainly not fun, carefree children, rather psychologically abused children, broken spirits, the children who fast become scared, spoiled, entitled, self-centered and violent, cry-baby, bully children. I must keep asking myself, what must I do to break free of that? And then doing it!
Either humanity comes together with the realization that our governmental and societal structures have left us and institute something radically different or we continue being led along darker and darker paths for the benefit of a relatively few misshapen individuals who regard humanity as their blank canvas to deface at will. I can see no middle ground. Like Trump, this war is a symptom of things long gone wrong.
Yes, we should be able to figure it out, all by ourselves. We don't need Divine Revelation, Big Daddy in the Sky, or Big Daddy anywhere. The facts are available, and can be easily processed by the average person. Bad positions and policies have tell-tale marks: arrogance, lack of respect for the audience or alternate view, that is, rational and fair analysis is substituted for prejudice, insult and lies. A country that screams when fascist apologists are "cancelled", but bans the long-dead and great artists of a country as a tactic in discrediting and demonizing it, and demands personal denunciations of heads of state -like I don't know what goddam mind control dictator in some cheap, comedic novel - is not a country to be much respected, isn't, in fact, respected, and counts on brute force rather than good example and reason in its objectives. But this has been the world order since at least 9/11. We must demand better as an existential imperative.
Threads gave me nightmares. I was pregnant with my daughter at the time. When the wind blows was even worse. A cartoon about a loveable couple and nuclear armageddon. Tortuous.
Putin is bad so Yuri Gagarin didn't go to space and Tchaikovsky wasn't a good composer and Dostoevsky was a lousy writer and Sputnik was designed by Lockheed Martin and Anton Chekhov was Welsh and Khabib Nurmagomedov was born in Minnesota.
I was around during WWII and I don’t recall highly respected conductors in those days like Otto Klemperer having concerts cancelled because of some foreign bloodline, or programs changed because it was Beethoven’s First Symphony, or a Schubert Trio becoming a duet because the cellist was German or Schumann’s song cycles being translated into French to avoid embarrassment.
I used to play Elizabeth Schwartzkopj every day and no one sent me to reform school. In those early days, for a short period, the leader of the world against the Third Reich was imperial Britain and being battered to death every night by German bombers added a level of realism to their lives. Staying alive in a blitzkrieg in London was important as it must have been also for Iraqis during the one-sided “shock and awe" campaign from Bush & Co, built on a disgraceful lie. Criminal charges laid? Sorry. Just a joke.
No battering from across the seas on the USA, they’ve made sure of that. They prefer to fight on other people’s land, lay on the deadly sanctions one after another, kill thousands of people, support apartheid murderers and then capitalise on making a big buck by selling everyone military gear in the billions of dollars to keep the destructive climate moving. The name of their game was and still is…. making money from death. For that they are better qualified than any other country in history. Makes them proud. They thrive on it.
So Yuri Gagarin, forgive them for removing your name. They’re called Americans and they’re exceptional. Just ask them.
By the way. Did any concert with a US artist get cancelled because of Yemen, Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Libya, Vietnam?
I was 7 during the Cuba missile crisis. It had a traumatizing effect on me. For 20 years after that, anytime there was a siren sound in the night, I'd wake up in a start, sweating.
We were told that Russia had backed down because the US refused to, knowing they were in the right. The underlying narrative was that the Soviets knew they were in the wrong and were too coward to risk a nuclear war for that. Well, I thought at the time it meant that the Russians were humans instead of the esoteric evil beings we had come to think.
Much later, I learned it was actually the US that had backed down, withdrawing their missiles from Turkey and promising not to invade Cuba. Taking credit for the resolution of the crisis didn't matter much to the USSR.
Now, the US propaganda is trying to convince everyone that Russia isn't really worried about missiles in Ukraine. And the sad thing is it's working. Matt Taibi did recently a brilliant article demonstrating we're exactly in Orwell's 1984. I posted a French translation of it on my Facebook wall and though I have more than a thousand "friends", no one was interested.
I'm sure the dominant class wouldn't mind wiping out most of humanity if they could go on living with the help of robots and amuse themselves with a bunch of slaves. But they're thoroughly aware we're very far from that being possible.
I can't think of a meaner, more childish, evil thing to do than take away the honors of a late cosmonaut. Who are they hurting? Yuri is gone, but they're hurting his kids and grandkids. It doesn't take away from his accomplishment and it certainly doesn't do jacksh*t to stop an unjust proxy war for oil.
Thanks for the Nation article link ...hadn't seen it...! Every high school kid should read this article twice thrice or more. it tells you why America is CONSTANTLY searching for wars. CONSTANTLY.
I remember the atmosphere in the US when Yuri Gagarin made his flight. Quite typically for this heavily narcissistic society, it was fear, fear of Soviet Communism taking their fabulous stuff, fear of weaponry launched from space by the Russkies --- in each case, fear whipped up by media, even then, lapdogs of the DOD, CIA et al. This aspect of manufactured fear in service of manufacturing consent is nothing new. It's only that I was too young and naive to really appreciate it back then. What completely blows my mind is that some of my peers who share that deep experience of emotional manipulation seem to never have matured into the realization of how thoroughly they allow their thoughts to be controlled in ongoing fashion. Trump derangement morphs into Putin derangement and so on. What comes next? I'd scream at them to wake TF up, but recognize that all it would achieve is my own marginalization as a Putin puppet. So I speak softly elaborating some history and then beat my head against a wall in frustration, when I get rejected anyway.
OANN is currently showing Ukraine On Fire movie by Oliver Stone today and tomorrow or anyone can download. This is a very accurate depiction of Ukraine and the Nazi / US destruction of Ukraine. This is an excellent movie to watch. It shows the CIAs influence and destruction of Ukraine.
NPR = National Propaganda Radio
You are so brilliant Caitlin & absolutely spot on. I’m so sick of this country with it’s backwards patriarchal madness that cares only for money, it’s sickening 😕
I think a large part of the USA's arrogance is due to the fact that they have not yet experienced a real war on their territory. Maybe if that happened they would really taste the medicine they keep selling to others...
Wow. "That you are is much more interesting than how you are." Thank you, Caitlin! You cut right through the knot.
Caitlin, once again all I have is gratitude and awe for your research and writing, for your courage at putting it all out there. This one touched my heart. It is time to wake up indeed. The western world seems to be nation upon nation of children—and not even nice children, certainly not fun, carefree children, rather psychologically abused children, broken spirits, the children who fast become scared, spoiled, entitled, self-centered and violent, cry-baby, bully children. I must keep asking myself, what must I do to break free of that? And then doing it!
Either humanity comes together with the realization that our governmental and societal structures have left us and institute something radically different or we continue being led along darker and darker paths for the benefit of a relatively few misshapen individuals who regard humanity as their blank canvas to deface at will. I can see no middle ground. Like Trump, this war is a symptom of things long gone wrong.
Yes, we should be able to figure it out, all by ourselves. We don't need Divine Revelation, Big Daddy in the Sky, or Big Daddy anywhere. The facts are available, and can be easily processed by the average person. Bad positions and policies have tell-tale marks: arrogance, lack of respect for the audience or alternate view, that is, rational and fair analysis is substituted for prejudice, insult and lies. A country that screams when fascist apologists are "cancelled", but bans the long-dead and great artists of a country as a tactic in discrediting and demonizing it, and demands personal denunciations of heads of state -like I don't know what goddam mind control dictator in some cheap, comedic novel - is not a country to be much respected, isn't, in fact, respected, and counts on brute force rather than good example and reason in its objectives. But this has been the world order since at least 9/11. We must demand better as an existential imperative.
Threads gave me nightmares. I was pregnant with my daughter at the time. When the wind blows was even worse. A cartoon about a loveable couple and nuclear armageddon. Tortuous.
Thankyou for your wonderful writing.
Putin is bad so Yuri Gagarin didn't go to space and Tchaikovsky wasn't a good composer and Dostoevsky was a lousy writer and Sputnik was designed by Lockheed Martin and Anton Chekhov was Welsh and Khabib Nurmagomedov was born in Minnesota.
I was around during WWII and I don’t recall highly respected conductors in those days like Otto Klemperer having concerts cancelled because of some foreign bloodline, or programs changed because it was Beethoven’s First Symphony, or a Schubert Trio becoming a duet because the cellist was German or Schumann’s song cycles being translated into French to avoid embarrassment.
I used to play Elizabeth Schwartzkopj every day and no one sent me to reform school. In those early days, for a short period, the leader of the world against the Third Reich was imperial Britain and being battered to death every night by German bombers added a level of realism to their lives. Staying alive in a blitzkrieg in London was important as it must have been also for Iraqis during the one-sided “shock and awe" campaign from Bush & Co, built on a disgraceful lie. Criminal charges laid? Sorry. Just a joke.
No battering from across the seas on the USA, they’ve made sure of that. They prefer to fight on other people’s land, lay on the deadly sanctions one after another, kill thousands of people, support apartheid murderers and then capitalise on making a big buck by selling everyone military gear in the billions of dollars to keep the destructive climate moving. The name of their game was and still is…. making money from death. For that they are better qualified than any other country in history. Makes them proud. They thrive on it.
So Yuri Gagarin, forgive them for removing your name. They’re called Americans and they’re exceptional. Just ask them.
By the way. Did any concert with a US artist get cancelled because of Yemen, Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Libya, Vietnam?
Every one of these neocon warmongers should be asked on camera about what they plan to do in the event of a nuclear attack on America.
I just was introduced to Gonzalo Lira. I find his soliloquies as informative as Caitlin's writing. If you haven't been introduced to him: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCPxpPT4b4vnDlX0sBGz3r4Q/videos
His latest, "System Pigs" is an outstanding indictment of the MSM.
He is in Ukraine right now and reports "Russia is winning because I hear the artillery getting closer and closer."
I was 7 during the Cuba missile crisis. It had a traumatizing effect on me. For 20 years after that, anytime there was a siren sound in the night, I'd wake up in a start, sweating.
We were told that Russia had backed down because the US refused to, knowing they were in the right. The underlying narrative was that the Soviets knew they were in the wrong and were too coward to risk a nuclear war for that. Well, I thought at the time it meant that the Russians were humans instead of the esoteric evil beings we had come to think.
Much later, I learned it was actually the US that had backed down, withdrawing their missiles from Turkey and promising not to invade Cuba. Taking credit for the resolution of the crisis didn't matter much to the USSR.
Now, the US propaganda is trying to convince everyone that Russia isn't really worried about missiles in Ukraine. And the sad thing is it's working. Matt Taibi did recently a brilliant article demonstrating we're exactly in Orwell's 1984. I posted a French translation of it on my Facebook wall and though I have more than a thousand "friends", no one was interested.
I'm sure the dominant class wouldn't mind wiping out most of humanity if they could go on living with the help of robots and amuse themselves with a bunch of slaves. But they're thoroughly aware we're very far from that being possible.
And, for now, it's the only assurance we have
I can't think of a meaner, more childish, evil thing to do than take away the honors of a late cosmonaut. Who are they hurting? Yuri is gone, but they're hurting his kids and grandkids. It doesn't take away from his accomplishment and it certainly doesn't do jacksh*t to stop an unjust proxy war for oil.
Thanks for the Nation article link ...hadn't seen it...! Every high school kid should read this article twice thrice or more. it tells you why America is CONSTANTLY searching for wars. CONSTANTLY.