THANKING JAMES BALDWIN, THINKING ABOUT TRUTH
& the tragedy of Ukraine, another child of Neoliberalism
I know I go on about Neoliberalism. It is the invisible hand of power that runs and ruins most of our lives. Every part of our existence is dominated by this cleverly invisible ideology/project/plot. A part of its cleverness has been to remain unnamed and unnoticed across 45 years, beginning with Reagan and Thatcher. In that time, step-by- tiny-step they have captured almost all financial and now political power in the US and the UK. Remaining unnamed in the shadows has made it almost impossible to confront.
We suffered their Austerity programmes for years after their bank failures in 2008. When people woke up to their scam, they dropped Austerity - which economist called ‘the largest transfer of wealth in history from a broad population into the hands of the rich and powerful’. Then they blamed supply chain shortages as the cause of inflation which of course they gained hugely from. Supposed supply chain shortages caused by Covid, as for instance of heating oil, petrol, wheat and corn provided them the rationale that inflation was out of their hands while meanwhile the oil corporations and others posted the largest profits per quarter in history*. Huh?
So many people have excessively suffered poverty, poor education, missed opportunities, inadequate diets and insufficient medical attention in our unnecessarily cruel world because they don’t understand that over the last 45 years they have been under siege from this greed-inspiring but invisible ideology. Neoliberalism has been hidden
*behind the news,
*within the popular culture
*inside the education systems
*and in politician’s distortions of reality.
There should be no wonder why politicians and political parties have few sensible things to say to us about building a better world when they cannot or do not refer to the invisible ideology that makes it untenable for them to discuss the truth**: that the Neoliberals are savagely greedy and via their wealth, their control over political parties and now over data, they have gained power over most individuals and the US government itself.
Before the 45 year old rise to power in our governments, TRUTH was viewed as a moral, social, personal and even a political obligation. Possessing it was an honourable or perhaps even noble aspect of personality.
Now that Trump and his knee-bending billionaires have taken almost complete control of US wealth and the government, they have via their news outlets, their educational systems and the popular culture, taken control of our thoughts including our TRUTHS. Many of us have lost our moral guardrails and become malleable playthings in their hands. They have turned TRUTH into a transactional commodity to be bent and broken like the people they rule over. No longer is TRUTH seen as a vital moral responsibility or obligation to be maintained and guarded. Its inverse, Falsehoods are now a pragmatic tactic in sniffing out more wealth and power.
For 45 years two generations have closed their eyes, refusing to admit/accept their complicity and the corruption which pays their rents.
The American novelist and intellectual, James Baldwin realised he could not save white Americans. No matter how hard he tried, no matter how often he prophesied doom, the country refused to change. America simply doubled down on its ugliness.
Baldwin understood when this pit of lies is at the centre of public life because of people’s inability to confront their own falsehoods, culture as well as morality are gutted, leaving an emptiness accompanying the lies at their centre of existence.
Two weeks ago I wrote about the extraordinary qualities of the young people we met during celebrations for Lviv becoming the City of Youth in Ukraine. To reflect on their bravery and determination is heartening, but to consider how young people in the UK and the US are lost, confused, and justifiably feel forsaken by their leaders, their teachers, their countries, and their families, deeply distresses me. Many turn to cynicism and even worse to nihilism which becomes a cause for destroying others who are usually not their real enemies but rather innocent bystanders.
It is clear that while Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez gather huge crowds to their speeches about Neoliberalism and the new American dictatorship, the media ignore or attempt to dismiss them as ‘SOCIALISTS’ - a word that now means something ‘evil’ in the ugly vocabulary of the fascists and neoliberals: that is someone who wishes that wealth created by the labour of a country’s people should actually be shared by them, someone who believes we should all have equal access to justice, opportunity and freedom.
In one of his powerful poems Baldwin wrote:
“Generations do not cease to be born,
and we are responsible to them
because we are the only witnesses they have.”
To change our lives and especially our moral lives, we must awaken ourselves by reading, discussing, arguing and by turning away from the compelling seductions of the web’s echo chambers. This is why it is so important to stop for a moment and to look carefully into the mirror remembering one's broken dreams are a consequence of the corrupted society the Neoliberals have fashioned for us which may be more a thought prison that now poisons our next generations while the stark realities of dictatorships and greed have awoken the brave young people of Ukraine.
In such a society artists are not only called upon to create beauty to confront the emptiness but also to continually bear witness to events in order to hold them up to the light of recognition, self-criticism and the insistence that people see and change.
NOTES
*The world’s five richest men have more than doubled their fortunes from $405 billion (£321 billion) to $869 billion (£688 billion) since 2020, while the wealth of the poorest 60 per cent - almost five billion people - has fallen, a new Oxfam report on inequality and global corporate power has found. If current trends continue, the world will have its first trillionaire within a decade but poverty won’t be eradicated for another 229 years.
Seven out of ten of the world’s biggest corporations have a billionaire as CEO or principal shareholder. These corporations are worth $10.2 trillion (£8.1 trillion), equivalent to more than the combined GDPs of all countries in Africa and Latin America. Using Wealth X data, it also finds that the world’s richest 1% own 43 per cent of all global financial assets.
** The uber-wealthy individuals, CEO’S and their board members have sponsored many political parties and individuals (as Musk purchasing Trump), so the political class no longer serves the people, those who elect them to represent their needs and will. In this they need to
*block progressive laws,
*to support de-regulation over financial, farming and industrial sectors,
*to not interfere with the hugely wealthy oil corporations continuing investments into future pollution,
*to support ever increasingly lower taxes for the rich.
*to reduce national public investment in education, health, welfare and the climate crisis.
This is why the politicians campaign on a combination of mistruths, fabricated ‘facts’ and tittle-tattle. Since the media is owned by the super-rich this is why journalists don’t ask the politicians the essential questions about the reality of the politician’s disservice to the electorate. Why, when the chief economist advisor to Reagan and shared by Thatcher was a know neoliberal and ever since then, no news outlet including the Guardian has spoking in depth until recently of the Neoliberal cancer that was spreading throughout the entire economy and culture of the US and the UK?
Behind the paywall are the following:
•two CONVERSATIONS/INTERVIEWS with the conductor, composer, mountaineer Graham Treacher and another with the sitar player and artist Ricky Romain.
• parts 1 - 9 of my detailed ongoing essay on Neoliberalism
•PHOTOGRAPH OF THE WEEK with an explanation.