Noam Chomsky - Distorted Morality: America's War on Terror?
by John Junkerman
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DVD Cover Information
Actor: Noam ChomskyDirector: John Junkerman
DVD: Region Code 1
Audio: English (Original Language), Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo; English (Subtitled); Chinese (Subtitled)
Format: Color, DVD, Full Screen, NTSC
Picture Format: 1.33:1
Running Time: 55 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2003-03-25
Audience Rating: Unrated
Studio: Epitaph / Wea
Movie Reviews of Noam Chomsky - Distorted Morality: America's War on Terror?
Movie Review: A case study in how to indoctrinate college students.
Summary: 3 Stars
First of all, I obtained this DVD as part of a good faith effort to understand exactly who Noam Chomsky is and what he stands for. I genuinely tried to put any preconceived notions "on hold" and, to paraphrase Chomsky, "bend over backwards" to give him the benefit of the doubt.
Now, this DVD is basically a one-camera tape of a lecture by Noam Chomsky, so all I really have available to review is the content of the lecture.
What I heard was to me a case study in how to indoctrinate people who may be very bright but have not yet developed critical thinking skills.
Here's how it goes.
First, a healthy dose of false guilt to make the audience feel morally superior. "We are all hypocrites..." Why? Because we have a lot of resources and can find out the truth if we want to. (Noam Chomsky graciously includes himself as this kind of "hypocrite" too. Quite ironic given the way this lecture developed: many accusations with little background information.)
(Now, can I really find the truth if I want to? How do I do that exactly? By listening to the media? Chomsky has already proven that this doesn't work. All the media does is manufacture consent, right? By listening to Noam Chomsky lectures? Hmmmmm. How do I find out the truth if I want to again? Should I call the CIA and ask to look at top secret stuff just becuase I want to "find the truth"? Or, maybe just read dozens of blogs every day. That'll do the trick!)
Second, Chomsky decided to "take leadership pronouncements seriously". This means he can cherry pick a definition of terrorism -- "The calculated use violence to obtain goals that are political, ideological, or religious in nature." -- that fits his ideological objective to morally equivocate the violence of the United States and Israel with the violence of the enemies of the US and Israel.
So, now the stage is set, and what I end up hearing is Chomsky mumbling his way through a list of accusations against the US and Israel (much centering on the Israeli invasion of Lebanon in the early 1980's) with no background information at all to put things into perspective. (Except, of course, the occational reference to The New York Times which of course settles all argument. If the NYT says it, it's true and that's all there is to it.)
Having already read "Because They Hate: A Survivor of Islamic Terror Warns America by Brigitte Gabriel" I know there's another point of view on the events in Lebanon during that time period, but Chomsky isn't about multiple points of view, he's about moral equivalence.
So, without regurgitating this entire lecture point by point, I'll end with the following observations.
First, Chomsky opens his lecture by saying he's going to "bend over backwards" to give the US the benefit of the doubt. This seems like just a rhetorical divice to disarm the listener in preperation for Chomsky's bending over backwards to make the US and Israel out to be terrorist sponsoring states. Chomsky actually did the opposite of what he said he would do.
Second, the talent Noam Chomsky demonstrated in this lecture seems to be the ability to get bright, affluent college students to feel smart and morally superior without really teaching them anything whatsoever.
Certainly, it takes a really really "good" education to miss this.
Summary of Noam Chomsky - Distorted Morality: America's War on Terror?
Studio: Wea-des Moines Video Release Date: 03/25/2003The hypocrisy of the U.S. government is powerfully scrutinized in Distorted Morality, a scathing thesis presented by renowned scholar Noam Chomsky. Speaking before an intimate audience at Harvard University on February 6, 2002, Chomsky sets fair and logical parameters to his thesis (namely, we are all hypocrites and, for the purposes of debate, the U.S. government should always be given benefit of the doubt) before outlining, with academic precision and citation of real history (as opposed to biased written history), the reasons why America's post-9/11 war on terror is a logical impossibility.
This, according to Chomsky's carefully supported analysis, is because the U.S. government has been, and continues to be, a major supporter of state-supported terrorism, favoring retaliatory or preemptive aggression over mediation in the world court, and avoiding accountability by excluding itself from the globally accepted definition of terrorism. (To underscore his point, Chomsky repeatedly volunteers his sources, inviting scrutiny at every turn.) With an additional hour-long Q&A session (in some ways more compelling, since it offers Chomsky's response to opposing viewpoints), Distorted Morality deserves the widest possible audience. In the short period between Chomsky's Harvard speech and the start of America's war against Iraq in March 2003, Chomsky's thesis has attained the chilling status of prophesy. Inevitably, Chomsky will be labeled anti-American, but at least his morality is crystal clear, immune to the obfuscation of politics and mainstream news. --Jeff Shannon
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