Hacker Cinema
Requiem for the American Dream
2015 · Film · documentary · 73 min
Directed by Peter D. Hutchison, Kelly Nyks, Jared P. Scott
Through interviews filmed over four years, Noam Chomsky unpacks the principles that have brought us to the crossroads of historically unprecedented inequality – tracing a half-century of policies designed to favor the most wealthy at the expense of the majority – while also looking back on his own life of activism and political participation. He provides penetrating insight into what may well be the lasting legacy of our time – the death of the middle class, and swan song of functioning democracy.
2 positivefrom 2 commenters
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2 comments on Hacker News
I recently watched "Requiem for the American Dream" (the documentary is included with Prime Video, and there is also a book of the same name) [0]. One of the points that Noam Chomsky made near the end was about undermining solidarity (I don't remember the exact phrase, but it had solidarity its name). I found the why in which Chomsky portrayed the accomplishments of unions and how the political elite dealt with unions afterwards (e.g. McCarthyism) both enlightening and depressing. Workers regardless of profession were all united towards better conditions for all. The gradual exaltation of selfishness and self-interest has become a silent but effective tool in pitting people against each other.
I highly encourage others here to watch it should they have 72 minutes to spare.
[0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rWD8Wksx_zI
While I've been meaning to read Noam Chomsky's: "Understanding Power" I ran across the documentary: "Requiem for the American Dream" over the weekend and this is clearly showcased within the first 5 minutes as he begins to describe "The 10 Principles of Concentration of Wealth & Power" and starts out with this infographic: http://imgur.com/QVcagot.
Quoting Chomsky from this portion of the film: "Concentration of wealth yields concentration of power. Particularly so as the cost of elections skyrockets which forces the parties into the pockets of major corporations. And this political power directly translates into legislation that increases the concentration of wealth. So fiscal policy like tax policy, deregulation, rules of corporate governance, and a whole variety of measures - political measures designed to increase the concentration of wealth and power, which in turn yields more political power to do the same thing."
The documentary has spurred me to start reading the book, but falls in line with what's coming to light in the mainstream media today unfortunately.
Edit: Honest question - why the downvote? Directly falls in line with the original post.