The rise of what's called Islamic fundamentalism is to a significant extent a result of the collapse of secular nationalist alternatives which were either discredited internally or destroyed, leaving few other options. Something like that may be true of American society.

Noam Chomsky

Students who acquire large debts putting themselves through school are unlikely to think about changing society. When you trap people in a system of debt, they can't afford the time to think.

Noam Chomsky

change education time

The smart way to keep people passive and obedient is to strictly limit the spectrum of acceptable opinion, but allow very lively debate within that spectrum - even encourage the more critical and dissident views. That gives people the sense that there's free thinking going on, while all the time the presuppositions of the system are being reinforced by the limits put on the range of the debate.

Noam Chomsky

smart views thinking

The general population doesn't know what's happening, and it doesn't even know that it doesn't know.

Noam Chomsky

happenings population knows

As long as the general population is passive, apathetic, diverted to consumerism or hatred of the vulnerable, then the powerful can do as they please, and those who survive will be left to contemplate the outcome.

Noam Chomsky

powerful hatred long

Optimism is a strategy for making a better future. Because unless you believe that the future can be better, it’s unlikely you will step up and take responsibility for making it so. If you assume that there’s no hope, you guarantee that there will be no hope. If you assume that there is an instinct for freedom, there are opportunities to change things, there’s a chance you may contribute to making a better world. The choice is yours.

Noam Chomsky

responsibility leadership believe

Nobody is going to pour truth into your brain. It's something you have to find out for yourself.

Noam Chomsky

truth brain

The world is a very puzzling place. If you're not willing to be puzzled, you just become a replica of someone else's mind.

Noam Chomsky

willing mind world

That's the standard technique of privatization: defund, make sure things don't work, people get angry, you hand it over to private capital.

Noam Chomsky

technique hands people

He who controls the media controls the minds of the public.

Noam Chomsky

media media-control mind

It’s ridiculous to talk about freedom in a society dominated by huge corporations. What kind of freedom is there inside a corporation? They’re totalitarian institutions - you take orders from above and maybe give them to people below you. There’s about as much freedom as under Stalinism.

Noam Chomsky

freedom government power

A language is not just words. It's a culture, a tradition, a unification of a community, a whole history that creates what a community is. It's all embodied in a language.

Noam Chomsky

communication community culture

Jingoism, racism, fear, religious fundamentalism: these are the ways of appealing to people if you're trying to organize a mass base of support for policies that are really intended to crush them.

Noam Chomsky

crush racism religious

When I was in high school I asked myself at one point: "Why do I care if my high school's team wins the football game? I don't know anybody on the team, they have nothing to do with me... why am I here and applaud? It does not make any sense." But the point is, it does make sense: It's a way of building up irrational attitudes of submission to authority and group cohesion behind leadership elements. In fact it's training in irrational jingoism. That's also a feature of competitive sports.

Noam Chomsky

attitude football sports

Nobody should have any illusions. The United States has essentially a one-party system and the ruling party is the business party.

Noam Chomsky

united-states party should-have

Democratic societies can't force people. Therefore they have to control what they think.

Noam Chomsky

force people thinking

The point of public relations slogans like "Support Our Troops" is that they don't mean anything ... that's the whole point of good propaganda. You want to create a slogan that nobody is going to be against and I suppose everybody will be for, because nobody knows what it means, because it doesn't mean anything. But its crucial value is that it diverts your attention from a question that does mean something, do you support our policy? And that's the one you're not allowed to talk about.

Noam Chomsky

media war mean

You are responsible for the predictable consequences of your actions.

Noam Chomsky

predictable responsible action

Neoliberal democracy. Instead of citizens, it produces consumers. Instead of communities, it produces shopping malls. The net result is an atomized society of disengaged individuals who feel demoralized and socially powerless. In sum, neoliberalism is the immediate and foremost enemy of genuine participatory democracy, not just in the United States but across the planet, and will be for the foreseeable future.

Noam Chomsky

shopping community enemy

There's a good reason why nobody studies history, it just teaches you too much.

Noam Chomsky

edification too-much reason-why

If something is repeated over and over as obvious, the chances are that it is obviously false.

Noam Chomsky

chances-are obvious chance