“To me war is a lot of prick waving. OK? Simple thing that’s all it is. War is a whole lot of men standing out on the field waving their pricks at one another,” said George Carlin, in his 1992 special Jammin’ in New York.
“Men are insecure about the size of their dicks and so they have to kill one another over the idea. That’s what all that asshole jack bullshit is all about. That is what all that adolescent macho-male posturing and strutting in bars and locker rooms is all about. It is called dick fear. Men are terrified that their pricks are inadequate and so they have to compete with one another to feel better about themselves and since war is the ultimate competition basically men are killing each other in order to improve their self-esteem. You do not have to be a historian or political scientist to see the bigger dick foreign policy theory at work. It sounds like this: What? They have bigger dicks?! Bomb them! And off course the bombs and the rockets and the bullets are all shaped like dicks. It is a subconscious need to project the penis into other peoples’ affairs. It is called FUCKING WITH PEOPLE!”
George Carlin (1937-2008), was an American stand-up comedian, social critic, satirist, actor and writer/author, who won five Grammy Awards for his comedy albums. His commentary and criticisms about the government and media on the war in the Persian Gulf are just as “We like war… because we’re good at it. You know why we’re good at it? Because we get a lot of practice!… and it’s a good thing we are — we are not very good in anything else anymore. Can’t built a decent car; can’t make a TV set or VCR worth a fuck. Got no steel industry left; can’t educate our young people; can’t get health care for our old people; but we can bomb the shit out of your country alright! Especially if your country is full of brown people…”
Comedians are like poets, capturing in a few lines what takes other types of writers thousands of words. The irony, the absurdity, the obvious… when put in the right way makes you wonder: how does such a state of political economics continue?
“You probably noticed that I don’t feel about that war the way we were told, we were supposed to feel about that war, the way we were ordered and instructed by the USA government to feel about that war. You see, I tell you, my mind does not work that way. I got this real moron thing I do, it’s called thinking and I am not a very good American, because I like to form my own opinions! I don’t just roll over when I am told to. Sad to say most Americans just roll over on command. Not me. I have certain rules I live by.”
“I’d like to point out things that bring us together, things that point our similarities instead of our differences cause that’s all you ever hear about: our differences. That’s all the media and the politicians are ever talking about, the things that separate us. Things that make us different from one another. That’s the way the ruling class operates in any society: they try to divide the rest of the people: they keep the middle classes fighting with each other so that they, the rich, can run off with all the fucking money. Fairly simple thing, happens to work. You know, anything different, that’s what they’re going to talk about: race, religion, ethnic and national background, jobs, income, education, social status, sexuality, anything they can do to keep us fighting with each other so they can keep going to the bank. You know how I describe the economic and social classes in this country? The upper class keeps all the money and pays none of the taxes. The middle class pay all of the taxes, does all the work. The poor are there just to scare the shit out of the middle class — keep ’em showing up to those jobs.'”
The sad but true (and slightly absurd) state of society. Twenty years have passed since Carlin spoke these words, has anything changed? Yes – the global upper, middle and lower have gotten bigger, and the gap wider. It’s an interesting state of play. These rules, that the upper class seems to set… they work for the upper class, but not really for anyone else…
Why do the masses – the middle and lower class – keep playing a game they are destined to lose? Well when one is born into a social situation it’s hard to imagine it will ever be different. But power is always shifting, constantly re-negotiated. There’s always a counter-culture and occasion they overpower the dominant one. The only truth I know is that everything will always change. In what way, only time will tell… but to be sure, whether we know it or not, we are all part of the negotiation process.
