Maximum Advantage: Inevitable Deductions 86-96

86. On Popular Culture
Popular culture must be influenced if not outright controlled for maximum advantage. Rogue icons have a disproportionate influence which may legitimize appositional philosophies and lifestyles. The mass media creates and breaks stars. Art, like any other commodity, is co-opted and the artist soon follows one way or another. Money corrupts everything. Anti-establishment sentiments may be espoused but not meant. Example is everything. Only foolish kids believe the words which adulthood will show to be a sham and a scam, therefore leading to the disillusionment of the fold. What other options are there? Negation is really quite simple, and it doesn't involve empty slogans...

87. On Intellectual Decline
i. Truly free thinkers have always proven a thorn in the side of power structures. No opportunist likes to be questioned. New ideas are dangerous by their potential to disrupt, rather than modify, the established order. Radical change is inherently inefficient. Re-direction and diversion are necessary to keep strong profound impulses diluted and weak. True discovery must be minimized while appearing to be constant in the form of technological development. Social stagnation is masked by technical progress. The intelligencia must be managed and focused on the continual drive for efficiency, called progress. All roots still lie in the long dead 1800s. Reality has changed whereas the ideas have stayed static. The opposition has neutralized itself. Efficiency demands specialization and compartmentalization. The intelligencia is weakened by isolation from all but direct peers. The exchange of ideas is inhibited. In addition, efficiency hampers analysis and investigation via time and financial constraints. Grant money must show relatively quick results or funding is risked. Hence, only a general personality mold or archetype is suited and suitable for modern academic life. Those believing in action will simply find themselves unable to tolerate the situation and will find other occupations. Therefore, no appositional philosophies have been developed because the "doers" have been eliminated from intellectual circles. Conversely, the "doers" lack foundation and will accomplish less than they might otherwise. The threat has been negated.
ii. The post-modern "intellectual" community would protest the above analysis, which essentially verifies the assertion concerning their impotence. Of course, their dissent is not really worth hearing or even seriously regarded except for its stunting present and future development. Their babble precludes any serious social advancement and hence promotes the static quo. Their impact means nothing because they say nothing. These idiots are so clueless, they may be easily fooled by simply sounding educated. Physicist Alan Sokal's practical joke on the editors of a "respected" sociological journal would have been impossible otherwise. Their condemnation for his actions further justify that little prank. Granted, the scientific community also suffers from the problems resultant from specialization, but at least the foundation is sound. The babble of worthless post-modern "intellectuals" will not even warrant an historical footnote. They have accomplished nothing and will be forgotten for it. Post-modern "intellectuals" are the most useless parasites ever to infect culture and deserve a place against a wall for all the wrong reasons...

88. In the information age, facts provide ample opportunities for emotional manipulation. The technological society favors those utilizing such tactics and strategies, therefore all others find it necessary to follow suite down the path of least resistance. Sympathy is easy to evoke from those lacking empathy...

89. The only rights espoused by the verbal worlds associated with consumerism are economic, like the freedom to exploit...

90. As maintained by Ellul, politics is mainly an illusion. Although a politician could go against the grain, the result will generally amount to little. "Do-nothings" are seldom re-elected. Bringing home the bacon requires cooperating with the system. Granted, some political types, notably war heroes, enjoy more latitude, but will only rail against corruption rather than against the system for which they fought. Sensitive to anger, the war hero-politician is perhaps more capable of sensing the bubbling discontent and seething resentment. Unfortunately, he mistakes it as directed against the decline rather than the fall, and therefore advocates systemic remedies rather than any fundamental change. It is only a matter of time before this situation explodes...

91. Self-awareness may be the most sublime pathos.

92. A Dialog:
"Do you have any moral sentiments?"
"No."
"But you condemn the holocaust [pick which one]."
"I see nothing advantageous in that kind of thing." Glares at newscaster. "Kind of like inbreeding."
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"Nothing."
"What do you mean nothing?"
"I'll never tell..."
"That's not very cooperative."
"Fine. Isn't morality frequently used as justification for genocide? Morality is a disease."
"Not inherently. Moral instincts may be warped from their intent by the unscrupulous."
"I only care about atrocities..."

93. An Example of Maximum Advantage:
Recently [pre-911], under the Freedom of Information act, the CIA was forced to disclose its annual budget. Who cares? The real question is how much the NSA spends...

94. Maximum Advantage dilutes strong sentiments...

95. If alienation is a normal response to civilization and society, is it still alienation?

96. Sometimes entire generations of knowledge may require discarding to arrive at fresh truths. How many?