A few years ago, Tom Brokaw made himself a bunch of money publishing a book praising the generation that fought WWII and grew our economy into what it is today. Dewey and sentimental, it praised the men and women of that age for their silent adherence to American values and their uncomplaining sacrifice. He summed up his views in a remarkably unqualified “it is, I believe, the greatest generation any society has ever produced.”
Whatever, Tom.
This week, we learned that the Greatest Generation thought it might be interesting to infect a bunch of Guatemalans with syphilis. So they used prostitutes to infect people in prison, in the army, and in asylums. Just like those morally inferior Germans conducted medical experiments on people they considered inferior.
My point is not that the Greatest Generation is the Worst Generation. We are all Morally Flawed Generations – it’s just that the Greatest Generation benefited from a market-savvy PR huckster with an inflated media profile by the name of Tom Brokaw.
As proof of the futility of generational analysis, look at the eerily similar Tuskegee Study, that started in the 30s and ended in the 70s, where the black population was used as lab rats in a study that Hitler and Roosevelt could both smile upon.
Wasn’t that just the Greatest?
The danger of profitable silliness like Brokaw’s is that it leads to a false nostalgia for a better time when morally elevated people (who happened to be white men) ran the country and could be trusted to do what was right. It provides a stark artificial contrast with the challenges of today, when a black man is in the White House and we’re in morally uncertain wars. It is this false god of a morally clear and earnest America that the tea-baggers are worshiping.
When you hear them talk about “Taking Our Country Back”, this is what they have in mind.
Ouch! Not to mention Eileen Welsome’s work: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Plutonium_Files
Well put Mild. Could not have said it better myself, in fact I might use it just the way it is and claim it for my own. Thanks
totally off the topic, but this is about as good a place as any to vent on Mo. politics, I figure. I just heard a Roy Blunt ad, claiming the evil liebrals are trying to gut the 2nd amendment, and are giving away our sovereignty to the UN. Christ on a crutch, how can this shit work with any voter aware enough to conduct his own breathing? There are no Dems even mentioning gun control, and nothing’s been done on it since fucking Reagan; and the UN crap was old shit during the Cold War. This nation is fucked. What’s he going to talk about next, the ten lane NAFTA highway and the Amero? Fuckitty fuck fuck.
by the way, sorry to hijack your space, Dan; and welcome back to regular posting. You’re a good voice to have around.
Honored to host a first class rant anytime. Brilliant work.
http://www.hhs.gov/1946inoculationstudy/findings.html
Instead of indicting an entire generation, read the above and the perpetrators of this crime against humanity are named. Of course, there are more, the Surgeon General and the President of the United States at the time who are ultimately responsible. Give em Hell !
Be very afraid of that Tea Party…lol
http://www.hhs.gov/1946inoculationstudy/findings.html
Instead of indicting an entire generation, read the above and the perpetrators of this crime against humanity are named. Of course, there are more, the Surgeon General and the President of the United States at the time who are ultimately responsible. Give em Hell !
Be very afraid of that Tea Party…lol
When you hear them talk about “Taking Our Country Back”, this is what they have in mind.
I call Bullshit.
While no one will defend what was done, there is absolutely NO evidence that “this” is what Tea Party supporters intend to go back to. This is just the usual baseless smear of persons who dare to disagree with you.
C’mon, Dan. If you’re gonna accuse racist, you ought to have at least some evidence to support same. At this point, the accusation has lost all its thunder. You can only cry “wolf” so many times.
So sorry. Try again.
GMC70 says:
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October 19, 2010 at 12:26 PM
When you hear them talk about “Taking Our Country Back”, this is what they have in mind.
I call BS.
While no one will defend what was done, there is absolutely NO evidence that “this” is what Tea Party supporters intend to go back to. This is just the usual baseless smear of persons who dare to disagree with you.
C’mon, Dan. If you’re gonna accuse racist, you ought to have at least some evidence to support same. At this point, the accusation has lost all its thunder. You can only cry “wolf” so many times.
So sorry. Try again.
No? Then what is it the Partiers want to go back to? What is “Their country” that they want back? For a voice crying “no evidence” you provide none yourself, to balance the signs, the incoherence, the essential old whititude of the movement. Tell me where this is inaccurate.
Welcome back Dan. Best post this year.