Avatar

[felix_dakat]

Has a corporation ever fielded an army, much less an army of conquest?

Have you heard of Blackwater?

[Wonderer]

In a sense, capitalism is the villain of Avatar. Yet what Cameron fails to understand is that capitalism represents a far more noble and heroic way of life than that led by the Na’vi. As Abraham Lincoln noted in 1858, the unique thing about the industrial revolution wasn’t that humans invented steam-power and other ingenious inventions. In fact, a steam engine was manufactured in ancient Alexandria without ever being used. But that society didn’t value the invention and spread of labor-saving devices. Instead, it valued physical courage and martial valor. The truly revolutionary thing about the industrial revolution was the rise of entrepreneurship. An entrepreneurial society doesn’t value the ability to murder mammoths or members of the neighboring tribe above all else. It values the ability to develop useful ideas and devices and practices that had never been seen before.

Interestingly enough, it is primarily those devices which enable physical ability and martial power (call it courage or valor if you like) which we value most when it comes to industry.

It’s utterly naive to believe that the perks of industrial war-fare (like surplus goods and luxurious lives or the time to play video games) are anything but a bonus to destruction on obviously larger scales than primitive feuding cultures like the Native-Americans… Oops I mean Na’vi…

Oh well though, not seeing the context of the way our society operates is forgivable, but shamefully in this case that’s all Cameron wanted to do…

[Tab]

I really liked it, it was in 3D, had robotic suits, really nice scenary and quite a hot alien babe. The physiologies of the various species were well thought out too, as were the parallels between tech-tech and organo-tech. I’ve still got the neato 3D specs.

I’m actually waiting for the sequel where some disgruntled CEO back on Earth launches the counterattack to please the shareholders and just totally turns the whole place into ash from orbit, then extracts the unobtainium (ha-ha) ore from the floating debris.

I daresay that movie won’t be as engrossing though.

[Wobbly]

[quote=“The Paineful Truth”

Knee jerk corporation bashing by holding them up as automatically a source of evil, is anti-capitalist–unless you think that corporations are somehow not a (the) tool for attracting investment capital. Has a corporation ever fielded an army, much less an army of conquest? I dare say that if one ever did, it would at that point
be a government. Why then would you continue to refer to it as a corporation? Anti-capitalist, class warfare demagoguery perhaps?
[/quote]
Quite correct sir, in a movie about aliens, avatars, and future weapons, a company having an army is class warfare demagoguery. And having one company in the movie be dispicable is equivalent to the statement that capitalism is evil.

Although, and perhaps someone else knows more about this than me, it is never made explicit weather the army is from a government or funded by the corporation. In fact they called themselves marines, I think.

[Anthem]

It says they’re mercenaries.

[Moreno]

@The Paineful Truth

.
From the very opening scene, the political agenda is apparent

I haven’t seen the movie yet, though what you’ve said only encourages me. I will probably agree much more with its message. But hell, I can enjoy neo-conservative movies with ‘misunderstood’ violent conservative men who have messed up their family lives and were probably pricks but now we realize they were the right kind of man all along - take anything from Die Hard - which is great fun - to well, pretty much any Bruce Willis movie, Clint Eastwood movies and so on. Propaganda runs throught pretty much every film out there. Sometimes we don’t notice because we agree with it. So it simply seems realistic. But propaganda comes with pretty much any story. It may be more philosophical than political, but hey, we’s being told how it is.

[Moreno]

@felix dakat

For the last 200 years, humans have grown taller, stronger and healthier. This progress has been fastest in the countries that gave rise to the Industrial Revolution, yet it has spread throughout the world, sparking a transformation that economists Robert Fogel and Dora Costa call techno-physio evolution, “a synergism between technological and physiological improvements that is biological, but not genetic, rapid, culturally transmitted, and not necessarily stable.”

Of course, apropos the native american undercurrent in the movie, when Europeans first came to the Americas, especially those who came to the Eastern US they were all astounded by how healthy, proud, tall and independent the natives were compared to themselves.

[Wobbly]

That chick sucked at her job then.

[The_Paineful_Truth]

@Moreno

I will probably agree much more with its message.

Which message, global warming or climate change? That nature is natural or supernatural? That humanity is the bane of the natural world(s), or technology?

But hell, I can enjoy neo-conservative movies with ‘misunderstood’ violent conservative men who have messed up their family lives and were probably pricks but now we realize they were the right kind of man all along - take anything from Die Hard - which is great fun - to well, pretty much any Bruce Willis movie, Clint Eastwood movies and so on.

Die Hard(s) aren’t serious movies. Action for action’s sake. Try Gladiator, The Brave One, Rambo (the latest one), etc…or, for the pinnacle, the yet to be made Atlas Shrugged.

[anon]

@The Paineful Truth

@anon

The Paineful Truth - This movie was just plain terrible. It’s vaguely leftist political agenda was just as laughable as any stupid militaristic movie’s vaguely right wing political agenda. It made me cringe. Nice special effects though.

How exactly was it anti-capitalist though? I didn’t catch that. Unless capitalism is indistinguishable from imperialism.

Knee jerk corporation bashing by holding them up as automatically a source of evil, is anti-capitalist…

There was nothing in the movie that suggested that all corporations are automatically a source of evil. It was an evil corporation, an evil government, whatever. Movies with “bad guys” don’t suggest that all guys are bad. On the other hand the movie perhaps really did implicitly claim that all imperialism is evil.

[d0rkyd00d]

I am sick and tired of having the same moral punch-line shoved in my face. OOhhhhh, it’s so WRONG to go and rape and pillage a foreign land controlled by natives for resources. It’s so WRONG to murder innocent men, women, and children. It’s so IMMORAL, blah, blah blah.

I mean, let’s face it folks, if we’re not going burn the house down and take the gold from the ashes, somebody else is! Better us than them, at least we’ll put that gold to good use!

I don’t need no mother goose and grim tellin’ me what morality is, thank ya’.

[Bob]

@d0rkyd00d

I am sick and tired of having the same moral punch-line shoved in my face. OOhhhhh, it’s so WRONG to go and rape and pillage a foreign land controlled by natives for resources. It’s so WRONG to murder innocent men, women, and children. It’s so IMMORAL, blah, blah blah.

I mean, let’s face it folks, if we’re not going burn the house down and take the gold from the ashes, somebody else is! Better us than them, at least we’ll put that gold to good use!

I don’t need no mother goose and grim tellin’ me what morality is, thank ya’.

:-"

[The_Paineful_Truth]

@anon

There was nothing in the movie that suggested that all corporations are automatically a source of evil. It was an evil corporation, an evil government, whatever. Movies with “bad guys” don’t suggest that all guys are bad. On the other hand the movie perhaps really did implicitly claim that all imperialism is evil.

Corporations are no longer corporations when they have armies, they become governments themselves–the capability for organized force being the single defining characteristic of government, from emerging out of the chaos of anarchy on up.

If this movie had been presented in a vacuum, I’d agree with you. But in the current climate of rhetoric against “evil” “greedy” corporations and for big, intrusive government, the message is obvious–especially when associated with the leftist message that man is a pox on nature, and the automatically over-the-top-evil corporate/military leaders.

[Bob]

@The Paineful Truth

Corporations are no longer corporations when they have armies, they become governments themselves–the capability for organized force being the single defining characteristic of government, from emerging out of the chaos of anarchy on up.

Now that sounds familiar, I wonder where I have heard that before …

in the current climate of rhetoric against “evil” “greedy” corporations and for big, intrusive government, the message is obvious–especially when associated with the leftist message that man is a pox on nature, and the automatically over-the-top-evil corporate/military leaders.

I suppose that you have never considered that one job of Government is to protect it’s citizens against oppressors, even if they are the same nationality as you. The second thing is that we are a pox on nature … we are destroying the rain forests, we are polluting the rivers, we are causing various forms of cancer in babies, we are polluting the soil, we are creating multi-resistent bacteria and viruses …

What ivory tower do you live in?

Shalom

[The_Paineful_Truth]

@Bob

Now that sounds familiar, I wonder where I have heard that before …

The Truth has a nasty little habit of popping up again and again. Out of the mouths of babes or the Devil himself, the Truth is the Truth. I’ve said THAT before…many times

I suppose that you have never considered that one job of Government is to protect it’s citizens against oppressors

And I’m sure I’ve also said that very thing on this board before. I absolutely agree that government is necessary for that very reason but also must not equate to big, intrusive, socialist, elitist government.

The second thing is that we are a pox on nature … we are destroying the rain forests, we are polluting the rivers, we are causing various forms of cancer in babies, we are polluting the soil, we are creating multi-resistent bacteria and viruses …

What ivory tower do you live in?

From here I see the same thing as you do and I regret them as well as support legislation preventing them. I know of no opposition to it. The opposition comes from the leftist (now known to be corrupt) alliance putting the fix for global warming (er, now climate change), promoting phony propaganda about polar bears, caribou, ice caps melting, carbon credits, no drilling in ANWR or the Gulf or nuclear power, and attempted filching of US funds in Kyoto and Copenhagen which is fixing its/our pollution yet expected to suffer financially because India, China etc. are not fixing theirs.

[Bob]

The opposition comes from the leftist (now known to be corrupt) alliance putting the fix for global warming (er, now climate change), promoting phony propaganda about polar bears, caribou, ice caps melting, carbon credits, no drilling in ANWR or the Gulf or nuclear power, and attempted filching of US funds in Kyoto and Copenhagen which is fixing its/our pollution yet expected to suffer financially because India, China etc. are not fixing theirs.

The financial “suffering” of the US, which could be instrumental in raising the moral pressure on other environmental offenders, is a small price for the future of the planet. The discussion whether the climate change is the being caused by CO2 emissions is rather incidental when we do know that

1. It does contribute to the speed of that change,
2. We are aware of the fact that pollution is a global problem and
3. Nobody pollutes half as much as the US and China.

Shalom

[anon]

SPOILER ALERT

True story - Someone I know thinks the destruction of the tree was symbolic of the attack on the World Trade Center.

[Bob]

@anon

SPOILER ALERT

True story - Someone I know thinks the destruction of the tree was symbolic of the attack on the World Trade Center.

I think it is wrong to make an analogy out of every creative work we read or watch, although there are probably influences from current affairs that play a role in such works. The most important thing about the film was that it was made for 3D, provided amazing pictures and an alternative story to the normal kind of shooter-films. Unfortunately, to pay for the whole thing, it had to appeal to the larger audience, which explains the need for the excitement.

Its just entertainment …

Shalom

[anon]

@Bob

The most important thing about the film was that it was made for 3D, provided amazing pictures and an alternative story to the normal kind of shooter-films.

Yes, pretty much.

[The_Paineful_Truth]

@Bob

The financial “suffering” of the US, which could be instrumental in raising the moral pressure on other environmental offenders, is a small price for the future of the planet.

Yeah, if “Climate Change” could be laid solely at our feet, which it can’t, since we still haven’t eliminated the Sun as the cause of of “climate change”–if it exists at all.

3. Nobody pollutes half as much as the US and China.

Ohhhhh, cute. 15% + 50% doesn’t equal half of everybody else, especially if you ignore the rest of the world–including India, with another 35% or whatever the environmentalist’s models with their preformed results come up with.