Cancerous Stories, Part 3: Cure and Prevention

In today's story we will continue with the metaphor of cancerous ideas spreading throughout a society and its body politic. The murder of innocents in France, Denmark and other world capitols supposedly bastions of democracy frighten me. I feel increasingly hopeless with the rise of anti-semitism and religious hated in general, the increasing deradation of women, and the general failure of political leaders and citizens to theorize as to the cause and cure of these cancers as well as suggesting ways of meeting them except by surgery provided by military activity. I despair as authoritarian regimes fail and are replaced by totalitarian demogagues demanding total obedience to their hate filled ideologies. I cringe as science, free inquiry, abstract thought, respect for facts and individual creativity are replaced by concrete thought and destructive fantasies accepted whole and literally. I watch in terror as education is demeaned and scapegoats are sought on who can be blamed for the problems created by poverty, hopelessness, social injustice, rank materialism, and our general fear of facing monumental environmental degradation. I cannot sleep nights as I have come to believe that political democracy (my beloved America in particular) the surest immunity against the spread of cancerous fantasies is in retreat and decline. I do this podcast to give myself hope and to live up to the ideals that I still believe in.