Does anyone here read Noam Chomsky?

Of course. Or rather I have read, ages ago. Brilliant satirist... just brilliant...

But I'm afraid he is too straight faced that some might actually take his books seriously. :P

Now Michael Moore I have never watched films. Have you?

Don`t want to piss you off, but Noam Chomsky is clearly not a satirist, he is a scholar and scientist of language and other disciplines. It`s like saying Einstein was a hilarious comedian.

I thought Chomsky is some young(?) female, but then I am probably mixing him up with some other dissident, because in Wikipedia i didn't see in his bibliography certain book I was thinking about... So yeah I was probably thinking of someone else.

I don't think I've read any of his books. Should I? Why? Does it have some new ideas to someone who doesn't live in US (ie. I probably couldn't care that much if he has some issues with US politics or economics specifically). I don't have much interest in debates whether US should have free medical service to everyone etc., because we have that already here. And i was against US going to fight Saddam Hussein based on fake reports of weapons of mass distraction, so no argument there either.

I listened to all his lectures in the background while playing Imperialism,seemed fitting, very interesting stuff, then I read a book and it was the same infos, so no need to do that again I think.

There's his research side and his political side. The first I studied some in the past (though forgot by now), the second I tend to ignore. It's that part that Brasas referred to as satire, I would assume.

Why? He always gives sources, and I always checked them, usually he is spot on, only a few times I found he interprets stuff differently than the person who said it. (for example when he claims that the Pentagon Papers said that no more troops could be spared for vietnam because they were needed for population control at home, all I found was a short mention that there are enough for civil defense or something like that)

Don't worry mate, I know he's some kind of infamous linguist scholar.

I was referring to his other stuff, the brilliant political / historical satire which mock the typical marxist ideology. Again, I just think he should be a bit more open about how he is distorting source materials on purpose for historiographical / epistemological satire. Most people don't look that deep and might be fooled by his seriousness and composure.

I mean, the way he straight faced pretends to excuse / justify / deny all sorts of authoritarian abuses as long they can be sorted into some sort of anti american set... from Cambodja to even Serbia! It's just far out hilarious.

YMMV of course, not everyone is a fan of satire. But I take it you don't like it?

You are talking nonsense, please stop posting.

Popcorn anyone?

Just bought my first chomsky book, "profit over people", and simply hoped to connect to other people that also follow his work and maybe similar scholars like for example Richard D Wolff and his monthly update on youtube etc

Thanks for the bump :) and for confirming you're not a fan of satire.

In fairness I think I dropped enough hints that I was not being serious. Or rather, that I was hiding my serious point in satire.

Here is a very interesting analysis of what is not even one of the most controversial of Chomsky's books. As usual in SSC the comments are well worth reading.

Review of Manufacturing Consent/

If you care about my opinion I think Chomsky does it all on purpose and he is brilliant at it - a master propaganda artist in the Goebbels tradition. So I would not be as charitable as the reviewer I link to when evaluating Chomsky's motivations.

But whatever, I'm well aware of his sacred cow position for you folks on the other side.


And before I leave the thread as you so kindly suggested, let me point out I expect none of the usual suspect to decry what is one of the most transparently partisan politically motivated threads in this forum in ages.

Because some politics are more political than others obviously. Wake me up when someone makes a post about a similarly controversial ideological / propaganda figure on the right.

Oh, wait... you did about Limbaugh. And openly with intent to ridicule at that. But... but... I thought you didn't like satire.

Oh the humanity...

The most fun part about Chomsky is that he was born into wealth and comfort, given a great education, and then spent fifty years stomping around and wharrgarbling about how unfair the world is and how the man wants us all to be wage slaves. You know the current caricature of over-entitled stone-stupid young college students? Chomsky is the hipster of that.

[url= Plus anyone whose main enduring argument is one of (pseudo)anarchism should really be shipped to Somalia for a decade or two. If they still think lawlessness brings out the best in humans, at least they should have a much better framework for their argument. His worldview belongs to a Disney princess. But, like, a really grouchy, middle-aged Disney princess after a messy divorce and having to give up the castle and move to a villa somewhere in northern Argentina. Which is a gobsmackingly beautiful bit of country, but she totally doesn't even notice. ][/url]

as I said, stop posting.

TinyE, where are you? Help!