"In most [popular] references to bestiality, violence towards the animal is automatically implied. That sexual approaches to animals may not need force or violence but rather, sensitivity, or knowledge of animal behavior, is rarely taken into consideration."

In a comment on Peter Singer's article "Heavy Petting", which controversially argued that zoosexual activity need not be abusive and if so relationships could form which were mutually enjoyed, Ingrid Newkirk, then president of the American animal rights group PETA, added this endorsement:

"If a girl gets sexual pleasure from riding a horse, does the horse suffer? If not, who cares? If you French kiss your dog and he or she thinks it's great, is it wrong?

"We believe all exploitation and abuse is wrong. If it isn't exploitation and abuse, [then] it may not be wrong."   more »

The ideology that sustains capitalism trains us to accept it as a natural and universal development to which we all tend.

Its basic premise is that human beings are unfit for anything better.

We are inadequate to the task of creating a world beyond selfish, narcissistic, consumerist narrowness, in which we are all mutually exploitative and indifferent, in which some thrive in the struggle better than others.

Because human beings are self-interested, 'rational' creatures, constantly devising strategies, sizing one another up, figuring off ways to rip off the mark and track down the latest born sucker.   more »

It's ostensibly about health care in America; it's not, any more than Moby Dick is about a fishing trip.

Like Moore's other documentaries (Fahrenheit 9-11, Bowling for Columbine), Sicko's central theme is American democracy -- how it works, where it doesn't -- and the culture of capital.

Moore's a polarizing figure -- the right wing loves to hate him, and at the same time much of the left wing hates to love him:

I know many people who agree with Moore's ideas and yet despise how he articulates them, if only because his arguments are designed to provoke a general response more than they are to prove a particular point.   more »

The US government and Washington elites are aggressively ramping up their “war on terrorism” rhetoric and propaganda.

They are stoking fear and paranoia in order to bolster their war agenda, and reinvigorate the mass public perception of new and growing “homegrown terrorism” threats to the US homeland.

The next phase of America’s war abroad (under the management of a post-Bush neocon/neoliberal consensus), and the deepening militarization of the US homeland towards a full police state, are well underway.

It has been clear for months that the scandal-ridden Bush administration, collapsing under the weight of its own criminality, and plummeting public confidence and political support, is desperate to manufacture the appearance of progress, even triumph, in its waning months.   more »

While official politics and the media in the United States are focused largely on competing plans for salvaging the American occupation from the debacle it confronts in Iraq, little serious consideration is given to the historic catastrophe that has been inflicted upon Iraqi society itself.

Although no definitive figures can be given on the total number of Iraqis who have died as a result of the US war and occupation—including those killed in the invasion and subsequent armed violence and those whose lives have been cut short by disease and hunger, particularly among the young and old—every serious estimate places the excess death toll between several hundred thousands and one million human beings.

Iraq, once among the most advanced countries of the region, has been reduced, in terms of basic economic and social indices, to the level of the poorest countries of sub-Saharan Africa.

What is involved is the systematic destruction of an entire society through the unleashing of violence and criminality on a scale not seen since Hitler’s armies ravaged Europe in the Second World War.   more »