Bullshit - the book!

[eve]

There was an interview with the author on abc radio national today. Sounds like a great little book, that shows how bullshit is used by our pollies even more than outright lies. The interviewer, Philip Adams, said that while people get annoyed when their pollies tell outright lies, they get nice warm fuzzy feelings towards them when they indulge in bullshit - the sort of stuff we get on 'patriotic' events.

It's by Harry G. Frankfurt
published by Princeton University Press, ISBN 0691122946
Available from http://neturn.sinacity.com/item/1_06..._53_index.html as well as Amazon.

[adam antichrist]

I believe that patriotism is any governments way of channelling instinctive feelings of territorialism that are no longer useful in this day and age into forms they find desirable. I think that 'national' sports and cultural events entice us into supporting our 'nation' since we (as a species) like applauding meaningless entertainment. Governments can then turn that around and get people to fear communism or satan or whatever they say is coming to get us. I think the United States is a great example where the government moulds the minds of young children from their first days in school, pledging allegiance to the flag and singing the national anthem and then inundating them their entire lives through the media with statements like "the greatest country in the world" used regularly.

As an aussie, I am continually amazed at the quantity of propaganda in drama series' that are exported from the US which work elements of the sanctity of the US constitution into their storylines. Entire series are even dedicated to such concepts, see "the Agency", "The west wing" and "first monday" as recent examples.