Nov
30
2022

Dinner at Hate

[Guess who’s coming to dinner?] USC chemistry prof Anna Krylov knows whereof she speaks: From Russia with Love: Science and Ideology Then and Now. Here's the article's abstract:

My everyday experiences as a chemistry professor at an American university in 2021 bring back memories from my school and university time in the USSR. Not good memories—more like Orwellian nightmares. I will compare my past and present experiences to illustrate the following parallels between the USSR and the US today: (i) the atmosphere of fear and self-censorship; (ii) the omnipresence of ideology (focusing on examples from science); (iii) an intolerance of dissenting opinions (i.e., suppression of ideas and people, censorship, and Newspeak); (iv) the use of social engineering to solve real and imagined problems.

It's a good thing her article includes jokes…

There’s an old joke a Jewish friend of mine told me: What’s the difference between a Jewish pessimist and a Jewish optimist? A Jewish pessimist looks around and says, “Things can’t get any worse.” A Jewish optimist says, “Sure they can!”

… because otherwise you'd be cryin'.

Briefly noted:

  • If you're of a Certain Age, you must remember this:

    Ah, that was then. And this is now, as noted by Beege Welborn at Hot Air: Throwing freedom hammers no longer: Apple is Big Brother.

    I hope you have a tear in your eye for a bygone fond memory. Because now they’re the folks who write the words for the guy on the screen to read.

    The colorless drones in prison suits on benches are allowed to hear or read only state-sanctioned argle-bargle, and Apple is the arbiter. Should the well-nigh featureless creatures absorbing the approved messages become a tad restless, and begin to question their assigned lot in life, or the way things currently are done, Apple stands ready to reinforce the message of collective. Apple will utilize its iron grip on all communication to facilitate authorities herding sheeple back to their assigned paddocks.

    Yes, he's talking about Apple's crippling of its AirDrop feature on iPhones, but only for iPhones sold in mainland China. Which pairs well with its war on Elon Musk's efforts to make Twitter a little more speech-friendly.

  • And just another reminder of China's swell behavior, from William McGurn at the WSJ: The Innocence of Jimmy Lai. Click through for the whole story, but here's the bottom line:

    As for Jimmy himself, he is in prison and at peace with his not-guilty plea. It’s his persecutors who are insecure and fearful. Does anyone believe Hong Kong and China will emerge from this trial with more credibility? Or will it only increase the chances that Jimmy wins a Nobel Peace Prize—not unlike Liu Xiaobo, another champion of Chinese freedom awarded the prize in 2010 while in prison.

    To get by under communism, a man must say one thing in private and something else in public. So it was in the Soviet Union, where Natan Sharansky was arrested and falsely accused of treason in 1977. “If my aim is physical survival,” he told an interviewer in 2013 about his experience in jail, “then the KGB will defeat me.” He aimed instead to live as a free person—which meant never, ever assenting to the lie.

    By insisting on his innocence, Jimmy Lai knows he has surrendered any hope for leniency. But he is showing that a man can live as a free person, even in a Chinese prison, as long as he refuses to lie. Hong Kong’s Communist-backed authorities have yet to realize that he’s no longer really on trial. They are.

    Apple is in league with Jimmy's jailers. While trying to destroy Elon Musk.

    Now go back and read Anna Krylov's article again.


Last Modified 2024-01-30 7:11 AM EDT