Watching Naomi Wolf Figure it Out

"Great minds discuss ideas. Average minds discuss events. Small minds discuss people." -- Eleanor Roosevelt

Naomi Wolf carved her niche on the Marblehead of academe as an outspoken feminist reading the beads of “the beauty myth.” As is the usual fare with fame:  right place, right time with the right stuff.  That does not diminish in any way her talent as a scholar, writer, speaker and researcher.  It was bemusing when Wolf became alarmed about “The End of America.”  Many who have studied the Nazi time can identify with Naomi’s friend who kept repeating,”…they did this in Germany.  They did this in Germany.”

Few Historians, however, are lucky enough to have a colleague as bright and receptive as Wolf, who boiled down the slide into totalitarianism into ten steps:

1. Invoke a terrifying internal and external enemy
2. Create a gulag
3. Develop a thug caste
4. Set up an internal surveillance system
5. Harass citizens' groups
6. Engage in arbitrary detention and release
7. Target key individuals
8. Control the press
9. Dissent equals treason
10. Suspend the rule of law

Make up your own mind, but it seems we are suspended somewhere between steps 9 and 10.  Maybe the “election” of Bammo signals that Fats had to back off temporarily to someplace between 8 and 9.  But the change of puppets on the Punch-and-Judy Show stage most USAns think is a “political system” is only because more USAns are facing destitution and are angry and armed.  There are plenty of paycheck-cashing goons following orders to suppress us, but Wolf did not get into that.

The smoother the transition from status-quo to serfdom, the more profitable it is for the Rich Fatties.  Wolf wasn’t there yet.  She saw the “election” as narrowly-avoiding the “coup” that already took place some 30 years ago.  Never mind that. she had to keep her message “upbeat” and “positive,” otherwise her “audience” would change the channel.  Perhaps she believed it herself.  So she outlined what to “do” in her sequel, Give Me Liberty because shit-stirring works.

THEN… Wolf began to realize that shit-stirring has slowly, quietly been made “illegal.”  Anything that interrupts business-as-usual must be perceived as “un-American,” and therefore… “Terrorist.”  Because… the business of America is business.  And we don’t want any “new social theory”  keeping the Fats from getting as fat as possible.  She realized that “protests” and “civil activism” had become just as fake and as Disneyland™ as everything else.

Oh my… the crucible of Feminist theory is the “power structure.”  And if the President of the United States is actually POWERLESS…  what are “we” going to “do?”  If our “process” is unplugged and has nothing to do with “reality,” what are we going to “DO?”  The answer is simple… yet complex:  fucking “do” nothing but what you have always done… feed the kids… stay warm and dry and hydrated… get along with your neighbors… BUT: don’t depend on the fake “system” to help you do any of that.  The only “system” is the one that makes the Fats fatter.

And in case you haven’t figured it out yet: that’s not “capitalism,” it’s looting.