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Kandy W.'s avatar

What to do with all of these people, most especially Americans, under the spell of US empire? How do you snap someone out of a mind-controlled trance? I don't have any easy answers for it except to keep speaking out about it. And to live with integrity and be that which I want to see in the world.

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Vin LoPresti's avatar

As a former participant in the world of academia, I'd be loath to expect most academics to take any positions that fly in the face of conventional narratives. It's just not conducive to sustaining the motion of their gravy train toward tenure. Back in the 80's and 90's, it was only the most radical who were willing to speak out about climate and biosphere disaster. Past three years, most biomedical academics tucked tail when it was suggested to them that an experimental vaccine, with trials run by the profit-driven manufacturer and unaccompanied by raw data release, might be a questionable idea, unlikely to reveal systemic issues that wouldn't be exposed by reductionist analysis (e.g., "induces antibodies"). And while so-called "academic freedom" might provide a classroom forum for discussion of alternative views, most of my colleagues wouldn't take the career risk of articulating such alternative views outside the protection of the lecture hall. Oi, the dirty looks I got for "stirring up trouble" and "scaring my students." Now that most institutions have become corporate structures, it's perhaps easier to see that they're merely part of that cadre of "exponentially greater influence that western institutions have over our minds".

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