Fear

In a fine rant at Stonekettle Station, Jim Wright invokes Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s first Inaugural Address (March 4, 1933):

“… the only thing we have to fear is fear itself—nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyzes needed efforts to convert retreat into advance.”

He then uses the analogy of his cats attitude towards fear to attempt to put some spine into people.

In his novel, Dune, Frank Herbert includes:

I must not fear. Fear is the mind-killer. Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration. I will face my fear. I will permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path. Where the fear has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain. – Bene Gesserit Litany Against Fear

The poster at the top reflects the attitude of the Hedgemony, the crew that ignored all of the warnings about an imminent attack against the US that is now shorthanded as 9/11.

There was a book written, The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism by Canadian Naomi Klein, that explains why corporations want people in fear, and too many governments cooperate with that desire.

The PATRIOT Act, the Iraq War, torture, loss of civil rights are all products of the fear in this country after 9/11. Remember the rainbow of terror alerts that were hauled out every time the Hedgemony wanted people distracted?

At Marcy Wheeler notes that Senator Claire McCaskill asked an important question at a hearing: Why Aren’t We Calling Sandy Hook Terror? The general answer is because the NRA and gun manufacturers wouldn’t like it. They want to keep the definition of ‘terrorism’ vague enough to be able to use it at will, but withhold it if it would bother big political donors.

The most important thing that people need to understand is fear is what the terrorists want, and I don’t care who the terrorist is or claims to support, the one thing they really want is to make people afraid.

Personally, I get angry, I don’t get fearful. I exceeded the maximum lifetime allowance for fear and panic long ago and I dealt with it, because that was the only way to stay alive under the circumstances. People depended on me to do things in response to threats and I did them.

I had the spectrum of whackoes from Palestinian groups to the IRA trying to blow me up when I lived in Europe. I have had all kinds of street trash threaten me when I was in law enforcement. I have crashed bicycles, motorcycles, cars, trucks, boats, and airplanes. I have had several governments trying to shoot me. You are really going to have to get creative to find something that might even startle me. I will react, but that is your problem, not mine.

Being afraid doesn’t help you, it paralyzes you. Being afraid won’t save you, but it may get you killed if you freeze. Giving up rights and freedom doesn’t make you safer, it imprisons you and makes you more vulnerable.

It isn’t an easy thing, not much worth doing is, but it is a better way to live. Don’t help the terrorists and politicians manipulate you.