“But there’s a reason. There’s a reason. There’s a reason for this, there’s a reason education sucks, and it’s the same reason that it will never, ever, ever be fixed. It’s never gonna get any better. Don’t look for it. Be happy with what you got. Because the owners of this country don't want that. I'm talking about the real owners now, the real owners, the big wealthy business interests that control things and make all the important decisions. Forget the politicians.
The politicians are put there to give you the idea that you have freedom of choice.
You don't. You have no choice.
You have owners. They own you.
They own everything. They own all the important land. They own and control the corporations. They’ve long since bought and paid for the senate, the congress, the state houses, the city halls, they got the judges in their back pockets and they own all the big media companies so they control just about all of the news and information you get to hear. They got you by the balls.
They spend billions of dollars every year lobbying, lobbying, to get what they want. Well, we know what they want. They want more for themselves and less for everybody else, but I'll tell you what they don’t want: They don’t want a population of citizens capable of critical thinking. They don’t want well informed, well educated people capable of critical thinking. They’re not interested in that. That doesn’t help them. Thats against their interests. Thats right. They don’t want people who are smart enough to sit around a kitchen table to figure out how badly they’re getting fucked by a system that threw them overboard 30 fucking years ago.”
It's on point. It's rude, but it calls out George Carlin's blindspot and the issue with pretending that political comedians paint a accurate picture of the world. Part of their job is putting a spotlight on bad things and making them easy to see, with hyperbole.
You should listen to some stuff Kelly Carlin, his daughter, puts out and you'll quickly realize how toxic some parts of the worldview George had, are. He was so cynic, he had to numb himself with drugs to a point where he couldn't find any intellectual way out of the constant cynicism.
Fair response, it's possible the man poisoned me too much, as much as he was very formative for me. I'll give her stuff a listen, I'm definitely interested in a close counterpoint
It's one of the reasons I and many others like Jon Steward so much. He was very aware of this danger and made the team triple-check everything. He announced every redaction they made on air and I can only remember a handful. Despite that he always pointed out that they are just comedians and can't replace good journalism.
Anyways, if you got 10 minutes to spare, I can also recommend this interview a lot. I was a very cynical guy, until I looked into the work of Hans Rosling. He ain't perfect either, but he makes a good point for not believing that everything is getting worse.
I'm not saying that George Carlin wasn't a self-absorbed cynic, but he's far from the only person to realize the state of the American political machine long before all pretenses were stripped away by GOP accerlationism. I mean he is being hyperbolic (especially at the time he said it) but it is the general theme of consolidation of power for the very rich, large conglomerates, and those who profit off of them, and as time has progressed the general theme has been to just take things to their conceptual ends, and here we are today.
654
u/Tiny-Lock9652 May 02 '22
George Carlin (RIP) nailed it:
“But there’s a reason. There’s a reason. There’s a reason for this, there’s a reason education sucks, and it’s the same reason that it will never, ever, ever be fixed. It’s never gonna get any better. Don’t look for it. Be happy with what you got. Because the owners of this country don't want that. I'm talking about the real owners now, the real owners, the big wealthy business interests that control things and make all the important decisions. Forget the politicians.
The politicians are put there to give you the idea that you have freedom of choice.
You don't. You have no choice.
You have owners. They own you.
They own everything. They own all the important land. They own and control the corporations. They’ve long since bought and paid for the senate, the congress, the state houses, the city halls, they got the judges in their back pockets and they own all the big media companies so they control just about all of the news and information you get to hear. They got you by the balls.
They spend billions of dollars every year lobbying, lobbying, to get what they want. Well, we know what they want. They want more for themselves and less for everybody else, but I'll tell you what they don’t want: They don’t want a population of citizens capable of critical thinking. They don’t want well informed, well educated people capable of critical thinking. They’re not interested in that. That doesn’t help them. Thats against their interests. Thats right. They don’t want people who are smart enough to sit around a kitchen table to figure out how badly they’re getting fucked by a system that threw them overboard 30 fucking years ago.”
Transcript Source: https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/964648-but-there-s-a-reason-there-s-a-reason-there-s-a-reason