Althouse: "Students! Don’t give yourselves to brutes - men who despise you - enslave you - who regiment your lives - tell you what to do

December 3, 2014

"Students! Don’t give yourselves to brutes - men who despise you - enslave you - who regiment your lives - tell you what to do - what to think and what to feel!"

"Who drill you - diet you - treat you like cattle, use you as cannon fodder. Don’t give yourselves to these unnatural men - machine men with machine minds and machine hearts! You are not machines! You are not cattle! You are men! You have the love of humanity in your hearts! You don’t hate! Only the unloved hate - the unloved and the unnatural! Students! Don’t fight for slavery! Fight for liberty!"

Source material: text/video.

34 comments:

David said...: The second coming? The 12th Imam?; 12/3/14, 8:42 AM
Carol said...: "....give yourselves to MEEEEEEEE..."; 12/3/14, 8:50 AM
Grackle said...: I think it would be great if everyone could live at high altitude up in the mountains.; 12/3/14, 8:51 AM
Michael K said...: A nice touch is his wearing of a WWII officers Army cap. I wonder if it is his grandfather's and the grandfather is shrinking in shame in his grave?; 12/3/14, 8:58 AM
buwaya said...: Very much like pacifist rhetoric of the 20s - 30s.
Something to go with a showing of All Quiet on the Western Front.
Wouldnt be surprised if he is actually reciting someone's old lines from those days. The getup seems to want to recall some post-great war milieu.; 12/3/14, 9:06 AM
Tibore said...: "Students! Don't be rational! Listen instead to my vague generalizations designed to inflame passion rather than engender thought, and fight for whatever makes you burn with righteousness rather than act with barren, cold-hearted sensibility! Fight the power!! Whatever that power is! And love! Show your love by hating things!!"; 12/3/14, 9:08 AM
Rocketeer said...: Anyone who can say it's unnatural to hate doesn't know much about human nature. In fact, there is little MORE natural. That's why it takes special effort to overcome it. In fact, I kind of vaguely recall hearing that entire philosophies and religions are built around the centrality of the premise of hate being natural, and that grace and providential absolution are the only ways to fight it.

It's unnatural to think otherwise.; 12/3/14, 9:11 AM
chuck said...: At last, a defense of rape.; 12/3/14, 9:13 AM
Wilbur said...: Are we not men?; 12/3/14, 9:14 AM
m stone said...: It was Chaplin's speech verbatim with just a few changes to comtemporize like "internet" for "aeroplane and radio" and "students for "soldiers."

I don't see the need for the vendetta mask except to suggest the rebel image. The uniform: no!

Chaplin's use of "unnatural men" referring the "machine men" is curious and the impact it had then is probably lost.

We don't hear the word unnatural much these days either. The unnatural and machine men today are a combination of protected class and objects of respect.; 12/3/14, 9:16 AM
J Scott said...: It's from the Great Dictator.; 12/3/14, 9:17 AM
Heartless Aztec said...: That's something that women like to do - subliminally at least. Human nature and all that.; 12/3/14, 9:27 AM
mccullough said...: Rock Chalk Jayhawk; 12/3/14, 9:28 AM
Paul said...: I bet Charles Manson gave the same kind of speeches to women...

And you know how that turned out.; 12/3/14, 9:32 AM
Franklin said...: Fight for MORE GOVERNMENT! That will free you!; 12/3/14, 9:37 AM
Fernandinande said...: Wilbur said...
Are we not men?

We are Devo.; 12/3/14, 9:42 AM
Drago said...: Workers of the world unite! You have nothing to lose but your chains!

Please pay no attention to those mass graves! Those counter-revolutionaries had it coming! They were sabotaging our glorious revolution!

Eggs. Broken shells. Omelettes.

I'll bet this little speech stirred cookies blood so much he refused to order a second latte at starbucks today.; 12/3/14, 9:52 AM
Lyle said...: political street theatre. that's okay.; 12/3/14, 9:54 AM
Robert Cook said...: "Very much like pacifist rhetoric of the 20s - 30s."

And what's wrong with that?

"Something to go with a showing of All Quiet on the Western Front."

Too bad we don't take heed to the book and film.

"Wouldnt be surprised if he is actually reciting someone's old lines from those days. The getup seems to want to recall some post-great war milieu."

As he says, he's quoting Charlie Chaplins climactic speech from THE GREAT DICTATOR.; 12/3/14, 10:08 AM
Robert Cook said...: "Chaplin's use of 'unnatural men' referring the 'machine men' is curious and the impact it had then is probably lost."

He was probably referring to the regimentation and dehumanization of men in uniform, (and, given his film MODERN TIMES, the regimentation and dehumanization of men at work).

And he's right!; 12/3/14, 10:13 AM
Robert Cook said...: "I'll bet this little speech stirred cookies blood so much he refused to order a second latte at starbucks today."

Well, no. Chaplin's delivery of the speech is indeed stirring, but this young man's declamation is lacking.

And I don't drink Starbucks coffee, (or lattes from anyone).; 12/3/14, 10:15 AM
Big Mike said...: Does he realize he's telling them to be Republicans?; 12/3/14, 10:17 AM
Birkel said...: Robert Cook: "What's wrong with that?"

You mean other than the fact people who were not pacifists got a vote in the pacifism of other nations? You mean other than the fact the Leftists -- fascists, socialists and communists -- got a vote and they voted for war? You mean other than the body counts? The mass graves? The genocide? And the oppression of hundreds of millions under communist rule?

I see your point. You wish everyone here who does not already know to see you clearly as a dumb ass.

I'm convinced.; 12/3/14, 10:42 AM
chillblaine said...: He claims to treasure liberty yet would "do away with national barriers." Because nothing says liberty like taking away the right of self-determination!; 12/3/14, 10:59 AM
HoodlumDoodlum said...: 1. That guy's no Chaplin.

2. I really wish these assholes wearing Guido Fawkes masks would think for just a few moments about the irony of their selection (of him as their face to the world). Are they in fact fighting FOR a religious monarchy, and justifying terrorism and revolution as the means to bring it about?? Oh well, it was in a comic book and movie considered cool, what else could matter?; 12/3/14, 11:34 AM
richard mcenroe said...: I got over any sympathy for Occupy when I saw a Guy Fawkes mask displayed in the rear window of a BMW in Sherman Oaks...; 12/3/14, 12:24 PM
richard mcenroe said...: ""Very much like pacifist rhetoric of the 20s - 30s."

And what's wrong with that?"

Warm up the ovens, we're ready to let the monsters back in...; 12/3/14, 12:26 PM
Sigivald said...: So... what does a Catholic monarchist revolutionary have to do with that?

Stop wearing those idiotic masks, your thoughtless drones.; 12/3/14, 12:54 PM
JAORE said...: Guy Fawkes mask, check. Dammit, I have forgotten my Che sweat shirt. Thank goodness I thought to wear my Hello Kitty undies.

Sigh, THIS is my alma mater; 12/3/14, 1:00 PM
Alex said...: I always wear my Guy Fawkes mask in public. It unsettles people, I like it.; 12/3/14, 1:05 PM
Alex said...: It's all about sending a message to the capitalist patriarchy.; 12/3/14, 1:07 PM
Char Char Binks, Esq. said...: Fascism came to America in a V mask.; 12/3/14, 8:34 PM
Robert Cook said...: "...you mean other than the fact the Leftists -- fascists, socialists and communists...."

Okay...you've just disqualified yourself from ever being taken seriously again, by repeating the false Jonah Goldberg meme that "fascists = leftists."

Nope!; 12/4/14, 8:01 AM
Robert Cook said...: That aside, the rest of your comment is impervious to understanding.

"...people who were not pacifists got a vote in the pacifism of other nations"

I mean...WTF?; 12/4/14, 8:04 AM