Sigmund, Carl and Alfred

Why The Pullet Moved And Other Mysteries Explored...

Plato:  For the greater good.

Aristotle:  To fulfill its nature on the other side.

Karl Marx:  It was a historical inevitability.

Machiavelli:  So that its subjects will view it with admiration, as a
chicken which has the daring and courage to boldly cross the road,
but also with fear, for whom among them has the strength to contend
with such a paragon of avian virtue?  In such a manner is the princely
chicken's dominion maintained.

Hippocrates:  Because of an excess of light pink gooey stuff in its
pancreas.

Jacques Derrida: Any number of contending discourses may be discovered
within the act of the chicken crossing the road, and each
interpretation is equally valid as the authorial intent can never be
discerned, because structuralism is DEAD, DAMMIT, DEAD!

Thomas de Torquemada:  Give me ten minutes with the chicken and I'll
find out.

Timothy Leary:  Because that's the only kind of trip the Establishment
would let it take.

Douglas Adams:  Forty-two.

Nietzsche:  Because if you gaze too long across the Road, the Road
gazes also across you.

Oliver North:  National Security was at stake.

B.F. Skinner:  Because the external influences which had pervaded its
sensorium from birth had caused it to develop in such a fashion that
it would tend to cross roads, even while believing these actions to be
of its own free will.

Carl Jung:  The confluence of events in the cultural gestalt
necessitated that individual chickens cross roads at this historical
juncture, and therefore synchronicitously brought such occurrences
into being.

Jean-Paul Sartre:  In order to act in good faith and be true to
itself, the chicken found it necessary to cross the road.

Ludwig Wittgenstein:  The possibility of "crossing" was encoded into
the objects "chicken" and "road", and circumstances came into being
which caused the actualization of this potential occurrence.

Albert Einstein:  Whether the chicken crossed the road or the road
crossed the chicken depends upon your frame of reference.

Aristotle:  To actualize its potential.

Buddha:  If you ask this question, you deny your own chicken-nature.

Howard Cosell:  It may very well have been one of the most astonishing
events to grace the annals of history.  An historic, unprecedented
avian biped with the temerity to attempt such an herculean achievement
formerly relegated to homo sapien pedestrians is truly a remarkable
occurence.

Salvador Dali:  The Fish.

Darwin:  It was the logical next step after coming down from the
trees.

Emily Dickinson:  Because it could not stop for death.

Epicurus:  For fun.

Ralph Waldo Emerson: It didn't cross the road; it transcended it.

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe:  The eternal hen-principle made it do it.

Ernest Hemingway:  To die.  In the rain.

Werner Heisenberg:  We are not sure which side of the road the chicken
was on, but it was moving very fast.

David Hume:  Out of custom and habit.

Saddam Hussein:  This was an unprovoked act of rebellion and we were
quite justified in dropping 50 tons of nerve gas on it.

Jack Nicholson:  'Cause it (censored) wanted to.  That's the
(censored) reason.

Pyrrho the Skeptic: What road?

Ronald Reagan:  Well,...................

John Sununu:  The Air Force was only too happy to provide the
transportation, so quite understandably the chicken availed himself
of the opportunity.

The Sphinx:  You tell me.

Henry David Thoreau:  To live deliberately ... and suck all the marrow
out of life.

Mark Twain:  The news of its crossing has been greatly exaggerated.

Mishima:   For the beauty of it. The chicken's extension of its
sinuous legs sent shivers of a dark despair into the souls not only of
the silently watching hens but also the roosters, who felt a sudden
sexual desire for their exquisite comrade.  The dark courage of the
chicken was as beautiful as drops of dew upon jade at midnight, struck
by a partial moon, its light filtered through clouds. One of the
deeply aroused roosters could stand the intensity of the moment no
more and bit off the head of the beautiful, courageous chicken-hero,
whose wine blood was deliciously drunken by the road, and he died.

Johnny Cochran:  The chicken didn't cross the road. Some
chicken-hating, genocidal, lying public official moved the road right
under the chicken's feet while he was practicing his golf swing and
thinking about his family.

Camus:  The chicken's mother had just died.  But this did not really
upset him, as any number of witnesses can attest.  In fact, he
crossed just because the sun got in his eyes.

John Sununu (again):  I would argue that the chicken never crossed the
road at all.  That it is a story concocted by the Clinton
Administration to distract attention from their failed agriculture
policy. Where is the evidence that the chicken crossed the road?
Where, Michael?

Michael Kinsley:  Oh, John, come on!  Everybody knows the chicken
crossed the road.  What evidence do you need?  It's obvious that the
chicken crossed the road.  Your whole argument is just a smoke and
mirror tactic to distract us from the fact that most chickens polled
now back the Democratic Party.  You ought to be ashamed of yourself,
John.

Siskel:  I don't know why it crossed the road, but I loved it.  Thumbs
up!

Ebert:  I disagree.  The whole thing left the audience wondering; the
chicken's crossing the road was never clearly explained and the
chicken didn't emote very well.  It couldn't even speak English!
Thumbs down.

Michael Kinsley:  But you both agree it did cross the road, right?
See, John.  I'm right as usual.

What happens when evolution fails? What happens, when despite all efforts, some members of a species fail to adapt?

For most of human history, man has made war against his fellow man.  Geography had little to do with it. From the African savannas, to Asia, to Europe and to the Americas, man has always managed to become embroiled with his neighbors.

Over time, that reality has changed. The process sped up in the last few centuries with the advent of capitalist societies that were either predicated on agrarian principles or societies that were more technologically advanced. It was capitalism, the free exchange of goods and ideas that underwrote and accelerated the progress of human kind. Man has learned that the benefits of peaceful trade are far superior to the benefits of war. Man has also learned that peace affords him greater opportunities for exploration, education and elevation.

It is true that the last century has birthed some of the greatest conflicts in recorded history. It is equally true that the excesses and catastrophe’s visited on human kind in the last century were underwritten by tyrants who chose to reject and refuse capitalism and the free exchange of ideas or the notion that all men are created equally. Hitler, Stalin and Mao are examples of leaders who went so far as to sacrifice hundreds of millions of their own people to keep them from participating in capitalism.

Why? Because capitalism is anathema to those who reject the idea than human freedom is essential and that humans are capable of organizing societies by themselves, without the dictates of tyrant.

As a rule, the last few centuries have proved that capitalist societies do not engage in war with each other. While capitalist societies struggled with historical prejudices, they emerged from those struggles far better than the ‘progressive’ societies which engaged (and still engage)  in the institutionalized and wholesale repression of minorities. In fact, by every standard of measurement, minorities have done far better under capitalist systems than any other kind.

The last century saw World Wars, conflicts of huge proportions, enabled by fast growing populations and unprecedented technologies. Because of the available technologies today, populations half way around the world can be become embroiled in conflict. While there are far fewer conflicts today, they are bigger in scope.

It is clear that forward human evolution has embraced capitalism, for good reason. Capitalism serves the human interests, aspirations and potential that defines us. It is just as clear that groups that have refused capitalism are all virtually failed societies. That does not mean they are not (barely) functional societies and cannot coexist with more advanced societies. Certainly they can- but that does not make those societies equal. Neanderthal man coexisted with modern man for a while before disappearing. As he was exposed to modern homo sapiens, Neanderthal man was absorbed into modern society.

One of the hallmarks of modern society is the rejection of violence (now defined by many as the rejection of even competition by some). One of the hallmarks of societies and cultures that reject capitalism the embrace of ever escalating violence and oppression (by necessity). There are those who worry that civilized society will be overtaken by less advanced cultures, but in truth, that won’t happen because humankind evolves, rather than devolves.

There was a time when slavery, genocide and torture defined the immediate awareness of of every human on the planet. Human sacrifices as both religious expression and entertainment were common, as was execution for all manner of crimes, real or imagined. Rape and exploitation of women and children were tolerated and even encouraged. Minorities were subjected to all kinds of institutionalized hate and bigotry.  They were persecuted and most often were deprived of the right to seek justice. Disputes often resulted in murder and tribal, cultural and religious loyalties often shielded the murderer, no matter how egregious the crime.

While these kinds of behaviors are no longer a part of reality of capitalist societies, they are very much in evidence in the societies that have rejected the freedoms that define capitalism. The film Fitna and other similar efforts touch a nerve because Quranic verses and religious injunctions correspond to the modern day behaviors. One only has to look at the Arab world and much of the Islamic world to see those kinds of behaviors on a daily basis.

(While both the Old and New Testaments are replete with calls to violence and mayhem, that is not a part of mainstream Judeo-Christian religious reality today. Christians and Jews today seek accommodation with their adversaries. Much of the Arab and Islamic world today call for nothing less than extermination or subjugation of their opposition).

The influence of capitalism and the corresponding evolution of the societies that embraced that ideology has begun to influence even societies that have refused to evolve. Despite their ever spiraling devotion, those societies are being forced to play by our rules. It is no longer acceptable to address conflicts with violence or hostilities as an action of first resort. Even the Arab world is now expected to negotiate their disagreements- a very different tack for regimes that still see violence and even the threat of warfare as an acceptable political expression.  In many parts of the Arab world, guns are ubiquitous and are still used to settle scores. The violence in those societies very much define those societies.

Violence against women and children is now pandemic and is still increasing in societies that have rejected capitalism. For every stoning, execution, lashing or dismembering that is reported, many more are not. A society that routinely whips, stones and executes women and children is not a society that values women and children. A culture that punishes women for being the victims of rape or a culture where ‘honor killings’ are acceptable is a broken society- one that is devolving.Capitalism does not obviate human nature- it redirects it. Societies that reject capitalism seek to control human nature. Some of those regimes may be authoritarian in nature, seeking only to control behavior. More often, they are totalitarian in nature and seek to control what you think.

Human beings want what they want, when they want it. We are all tempted to take what we want, consequences be damned. In a capitalist society, the opportunities exist for everyone to succeed. In societies that reject capitalism, only the elites have access to a real future for themselves and their children- and even then, they have to agree to play by a very specific set of rules.

In a society where violence is a part of everyday life, inflicting pain on others is not a huge leap. Where life has little value and hope is non existent, there is no reason that the ‘other’ should not share and be subjected to your misery. This is especially true if the ‘other’ is better off than you are. This kind of thinking is more easily understood in context. Recall the subdued delight Iraqis took in the power failure that impacted the northeast a few years ago. They had no electricity for months and they laughed at the New Yorkers who ’suffered’ without power for a few hours. Imagine how they would delight in the travails of their adversaries.

Capitalist societies are different. We assign great value to life. We build hospitals and medical research centers so that our lives might be prolonged and the quality of our life might be improved. Capitalist morality places a very high value on human life because capitalism places a high value on the potential of every life. In a capitalist society, it is the hope that the contributions of each individual might elevate and serve all of society and not just the elites.

Capitalism became the vehicle through which human evolution was optimized, because free and capitalist societies are diverse societies in every sense of the word. People are free to espouse whatever ideas they choose and they are free to explore any ideas that interest them. They are free to trade and establish relationships with anyone they choose, anywhere they choose. Contrast that with societies that reject capitalism. For them, control over the individual is a zero sum game, an all or nothing proposition. If the regime feels even potentially threatened, they will hold back whatever tools, freedoms or rights that might empower the individual. Travel, internet access, publishing and even fax and telephone services are severely limited and usually very controlled.

Capitalist nations have embraced the diversity brought about by technology and a smaller world. The rejectionists fear diversity, preferring instead racism and xenophobia. Outsiders can only change the status quo, a state of affairs that gives nightmares to rejectionists. They want nothing to do with foreign cultures (though they expect us to embrace them), ideas or even food. As our world encroaches upon them, they lash out, as if holding an umbrella can stop the tsunami of human evolution.

This is the thinking of those who have failed to evolve. Sooner or later, they will go the way of the Neanderthal.