← Autodidact Archive · Original Dissent · neoclassical
Thread ID: 17650 | Posts: 4 | Started: 2005-04-05
2005-04-05 04:13 | User Profile
Strength Through Joy
When Adolf Hitler designed the initial prototype for the Volkswagen Beetle in 1932, the social benefits of inexpensive personal transportation were already clear in his mind. When mass production began, the car was appropriately named the Kraft durch Freude Wagen, meaning literally the "strength through joy car."
Accompanied by government programs that were the first to protect workers' rights and preserve the environment, the KdF-Wagen helped make relaxing vacations in the beautiful Germany countryside more accessible. The efforts of the government to give its people the best combined well in a population unified for mutual success and let the people rediscover the joy of life, and through that: their strength.
Though we cannot recreate the conditions of 1930s Germany and the solutions to that era's unique problems, we have to find our own paths to joy. One way to do this is to find joy in activism. Too often activists becomes one-dimensional caricatures of human beings; serious about winning people over to one or two ideas but blind or incapable of considering any other ideas or a larger picture of the whole. Having killed the joy within themselves, their bleak personality casts a black cloud over everything and encourages normal people to avoid them.
Activism should be a joy made of solutions shared to help others. Fighting enemies should be a joy as well, and opponents promoting silly ideas should be considered amusing jesters and openly mocked. We should illustrate the consequences and contradictions of their ideas so we can all point and laugh at them. Eventually, when they speak fawningly about some childish approach to a serious matter, the audience will respond with laughter and derision -- at which point it will be clear that their simplistic and superficial answers are not taken seriously by anyone.
While detailed philosophical and ideological explanations are needed and will be offered as well, they have a limited audience. Laughter as a means of explaining ideas is a currency that travels far.
We should not be bitter at our opponents, as that disposition is unsuitable for emotionally mature adults. Rather, why not take advantage of our enemies and use their arguments as comedic fodder? Through this method their ideas will be easily discredited and the joy of seeing them as amusing spectacles can be widely shared. Let others see how easily we shrug off idle talkers and their feeble solutions. Our platform stands firm on a solid foundation and we are certain that others will want to be part of a movement that has the freedom of laughter -- and the strength of joy.
[url="http://www.nazi.org/community/columns/lindstrom/"]http://www.nazi.org/community/columns/lindstrom/[/url]
2005-04-08 20:58 | User Profile
A Bug? What I need for joy is a Porsche 911, new, black or cobalt blue, coupe, not convertible, no need for Turbo, just the basic. Must have Alpine system with after-market amp.
Happy! Happy! Joy! Joy!
2005-04-09 01:56 | User Profile
Joy to me is my 91 Toy pick up that gives me [B]70 MPG[/B] and with 150,000 miles, the only thing that has gone wrong with it is a [U]broken fan belt[/U], one right [U]front wheel bearing,[/U] [U]two batteries,[/U] [U]five winshield wipers[/U] and [U]three sets of tires[/U].
[B]Can anyone do any better? [/B]
2005-04-09 03:00 | User Profile
Ponce, is this the truck with the extra engine hooked up in the truck bed? The one you have rigged to supply power at highway speed? That one?
Otherwise, 70 mpg is a misprint.
I can't quite top that maintenance record, but I did have a Dodge Neon I put 90,000 miles on with the only things being replaced were one set of wipers, one battery, and one set of tires. A seven dollar thermostat and a three dollar rubber exhaust hanger were the only repairs. Original brake pads were just starting to squeal when i traded it in.