top of page

QUASHING UNIVERSITY PROTESTS AND BANNING TIKTOK TO MAKE THE KIDS LOVE ISRAEL

Caitlin Johnstone

Apr 25, 2024

Notes From The Edge Of The Narrative Matrix


Listen to a reading of this article (reading by Tim Foley):




It’s just a tough situation, with victims on both sides. On one side you’ve got people being slaughtered in droves by genocidal massacres and siege warfare, while on the other you’ve got people whose feelings get hurt when these atrocities are opposed. Hard to say which is worse.



I have dedicated every day of my life to the project of spreading awareness of the depravity and deceitfulness of the Western empire, but I will never write anything more effective toward this end than what the empire is doing itself on university campuses right now.


I mean, you kind of have to wonder what they’re thinking. “Yeah, that’s it. Violently quash pro-Palestine protests at universities, ban TikTok to ensure the suppression of pro-Palestine content, and saturate the boomer media with obvious propaganda. That’ll make the kids love Israel.”




Meanwhile the US empire is still playing games with each and every one of our lives by continually taking insane risks in its world-threatening brinkmanship with a nuclear superpower. It turns out last month the Biden administration secretly sent Ukraine long-range Army Tactical Missile Systems (ATACMS), which Ukraine has reportedly already used to attack a Russian base in Crimea.


In 2022 when Ukraine first started urging the United States to send it the ATACMS— which has nearly four times the range of the HIMARS weapons the US has been supplying — Russia’s Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova immediately responded with a warning that their use on Russian territory would make the US a direct participant in the conflict, and Russia would respond accordingly. Crimea is considered Russian territory by the Russian Federation.


In an article published in Antiwar last year titled “ATACMS: Be Very Afraid of This Acronym,” West Suburban Peace Coalition president Walt Zlotow wrote that this missile system “has potential to draw the US and NATO into all out war with Russia”:

ATACMS are long range US missiles that can strike up to 190 miles. Top US officials, likely including President Biden, are seriously considering giving ATACMS to Ukraine in their battle to take back all Russian gains in Ukraine, including Crimea. They can reach both Crimea and the Russian mainland.
If so used by Ukraine to attack Russia, it may be a missile too far that could ignite Russian tactical nuclear weapons in Ukraine. Further escalation into nuclear confrontation between Russia and the US/NATO alliance seeking Russia’s defeat becomes more likely.


Biden proclaimed it “a good day for world peace” when he signed the World War 3 bill which will pour weapons of death and destruction into Israel, Ukraine and Taiwan. This is the inverted reality the US-centralized empire premises its narratives about itself upon. They’ve got the mainstream public espousing a completely backwards and upside-down worldview, which is why we live in a completely backwards and upside-down civilization.



The Ukraine war funding part of the bill was actually reportedly pushed through with behind-the-scenes collaboration between Trump and Republican lawmakers. Anyone who still buys Trump’s “ending the wars, fighting the deep state” schtick is a moron.



When Israel’s genocide funding made it through the House, Benjamin Netanyahu tweeted, “The US Congress just overwhelmingly passed a much appreciated aid bill that demonstrates strong bipartisan support for Israel and defends Western civilization. Thank you friends, thank you America!”


And he’s not wrong. The US Congress does have massive bipartisan support for Israel, and pouring war machinery into that genocidal apartheid state does in fact bolster the blood-fueled machine of nonstop murder and tyranny that is “Western civilization”.



Human thriving arises from curiosity. Curiosity about the way our material universe operates leads to advances in science, and all the benefits that come with it. Curiosity about how our civilization’s power structures operate leads to an understanding of how the world really works, which will lead to the emergence of a truth-based society if realized on a collective level. Curiosity about our own consciousness and inner processes leads to self-realization, and the harmonious way of moving in the world which flows from it. 


If a healthy humanity exists in the future, it will be above all a deeply curious species. The values of competition, greed and domination which currently drive the way our civilization operates will have given way to curiosity, humility and discovery. We will have cultivated a humble but intense curiosity about ourselves, about each other, about our collective societal dynamics, and about our natural world.

bottom of page