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The Final Speech from The Great Dictator (1940)

charliechaplin.com

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Re: The Final Speech from The Great Dictator (1940)

#81

Post by concordDance »

vasco wrote: post #53
TeMPOraL wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Nazi Germany thought their way to the holocaust. That's bullshit though. You don't think your way to holocaust, you hate and greed and fear your way to it. Those are all feelings. Even indifference to the violence and death of others is a feeling - or at least fear-driven emotional defense mechanism. The Nazis weren't "machine men, with machine minds and machine hearts", no matter how much it nicely riffs off machi…

Eugenics and Phrenology were very relevant at the time and used as a scientific basis to justify many attrocities. It's important to remember that science evolves, and what we "know" to be part of scientific knowledge today might be debunked in the future. Specially with the state of peer review in the social sciences my feeling is many things that are said to be scientific fact today will be proven wrong later, incl…

[flagged]

Re: The Final Speech from The Great Dictator (1940)

#82

Post by AndyPa32 »

flashback2199 wrote: post #17

I find it ironic that "We think too much and feel to little" appears to contradict the conclusion at the end "Let us fight for a world of reason, a world where science and progress will lead to all men’s happiness."

I don't think that it's a contradiction.

Too much of any of those is bad. Four year olds are driven by feeling only. Psychopaths are driven by thought only. You don't want the world in the hands of any of those.

It's a good mix of both feeling and reason that we should strive for.

Re: The Final Speech from The Great Dictator (1940)

#83

Post by robomartin »

This speech is, in a nutshell, a call for humanity, peace and tolerance.

It pains me to see a world where our centers of education have become almost precisely the opposite. They have distorted the minds of our young to the point that they are full of hatred, intolerance, bigotry and, yes, racism. All underscored by a solid foundation of utter ignorance.

There's a video somewhere of an interviewer asking university students to list the Great Books they have read. The vast majority of them had no clue what the interviewer was talking about at all. Not a clue. Because our centers of education are indoctrinating, not educating. Those engaged in indoctrination don't want young minds to be exposed to the vast world of thought and reason represented by these works.

Note that this comment isn't about the US. I think I can say this wave of ignorance and hatred has travelled the planet, taking many forms.

A friend often says that humanity is one good power outage away from reverting to cavemen behavior. Frankly, it is hard to disagree with his view. We have seen this time and time again, no power outage required.

This reality makes me wonder what Chaplin's speech might be if he had to write it in today's context.

Re: The Final Speech from The Great Dictator (1940)

#84

Post by ncallaway »

Kamq wrote: post #16
GoToRO wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let's not forget about the feed algoritms that will prioritize anger and only anger because this is what drives impressions.

That's still indicative of choosing to spend your time in an environment where content is algorithmically controlled. Which is most of the mainstream ones, but following along with the mainstream is a choice.

I mean, as an individual it is a choice. But as a society it’s not a choice (or, maybe, a better way to phrase it is the “mainstream” is a reflection of the choice society has already made)

Re: The Final Speech from The Great Dictator (1940)

#86

Post by [deleted] »

robomartin wrote: post #83

This speech is, in a nutshell, a call for humanity, peace and tolerance. It pains me to see a world where our centers of education have become almost precisely the opposite. They have distorted the minds of our young to the point that they are full of hatred, intolerance, bigotry and, yes, racism. All underscored by a solid foundation of utter ignorance. There's a video somewhere of an interviewer asking university s…

[deleted]

Re: The Final Speech from The Great Dictator (1940)

#87

Post by mozman »

VinLucero wrote: post #21
questinthrow wrote: post #2

I'd wager it's more like we don't think at all and feel only anger. At least online that is.

I feel in my heart a deep sense of empathy after watching that. Like the quote from National Treasure, “People don’t talk like that anymore.” But the response from Nicolas Cage is, “But they feel it”. As I understand it, Hitler used an economic narrative to build his team of supporters and eventually, desperate times cause people to vote with their wallets. Does anyone else feel like the advent of modern online inter…

The only way the internet has a chance at recovery is to eliminate all financial incentives. No monetization, share information because you want to

Re: The Final Speech from The Great Dictator (1940)

#88

Post by vpribish »

"Don't let your mind speak louder than your heart" - I think many have this so very wrong. Is support for fascism is a sensible, logical, well-thought-out policy? No, it's a heart-felt, emotional appeal to scared, proud, paranoid, crude, brutal people (who seem to be about half of our neighbors). surely the mindful decision is empathetic, constructive, and wise - not just base.

Re: The Final Speech from The Great Dictator (1940)

#89

Post by carlosjobim »

yks wrote: post #85

> And so long as men die, liberty will never perish > Over the past ten years, the [longevity research] industry has grown in financing from $500 million in 2013 to a peak of $6.2 billion in 2021.

Death is God's greatest safe guard to counter human evil. Nobody escapes it.

Re: The Final Speech from The Great Dictator (1940)

#90

Post by givan »

qingcharles wrote: post #44

I always liked this version with music added: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WibmcsEGLKo I remember sharing a jail cell with a 19-year-old Mexican kid once and we were talking about the guards being assholes and he said "they're like machine men"; and I said "with machine minds and machine hearts?" and he was like "YES! You know it?!" -- it was a good moment, we spent the next few days trying to remember the whole s…

He is a machine, everything with him happens.

He cannot stop the flow of his thoughts, he cannot control his imagination, his emotions, his attention.

He lives in a subjective world of 'I love,' 'I do not love,' 'I like,' 'I do not like,' 'I want,' 'I do not want,' that is, of what he thinks he likes, of what he thinks he does not like, of what he thinks he wants, of what he thinks he does not want.

He does not see the real world.

The real world is hidden from him by the wall of imagination.

He lives in sleep.

He is asleep.

What is called 'clear consciousness' is sleep and a far more dangerous sleep than sleep at night in bed.

"Let us take some event in the life of humanity.

For instance, war.

There is a war going on at the present moment.

What does it signify? It signifies that several millions of sleeping people are trying to destroy several millions of other sleeping people.

They would not do this, of course, if they were to wake up.

Everything that takes place is owing to this sleep."

---

In Search of the Miraculous - Ouspensky

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