The Islamic State (IS), formerly known as the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) and the Islamic State of Iraq and the Syria (ISIS), has been front page material for weeks now. After being unable to make citizens fear Iran and North Korean and only having moderate success at making citizens fear Vladimir Putin the state and its corporate media partners have been trying to make the IS the thing for fashionable citizens to be afraid of. But the IS is way the fuck over in the Middle East so why should an American citizen fear it? Here we see Allen West, one of the state’s most effective agents at instill fear in the hearts of neocons, entering stage right:
Judicial Watch reports that ”Islamic terrorist groups are operating in the Mexican border city of Ciudad Juarez and planning to attack the United States with car bombs or other vehicle borne improvised explosive devices (VBIED).”
“High-level federal law enforcement, intelligence and other sources have confirmed to Judicial Watch that a warning bulletin for an imminent terrorist attack on the border has been issued. Agents across a number of Homeland Security, Justice and Defense agencies have all been placed on alert and instructed to aggressively work all possible leads and sources concerning this imminent terrorist threat. Specifically, the government sources reveal that the militant group Islamic State of Iraq and Greater Syria (ISIS) is confirmed to now be operating in Juarez, a famously crime-infested narcotics hotbed situated across from El Paso, Texas.”
This article combines the IS, illegal immigration, and drug cartels into one giant fear smoothy! Oh, I also forgot to mention, that it is almost certainly bullshit. Why would Mexican drug cartels, which are not exactly apostles of Islam, work with an organization that seems bent on destroying anything not Islam? If the only answer you can come up with is “Because drug cartels hate Americans.” then you don’t understand how drug cartels work. Americans are their biggest source of revenue. The last thing they want is for their customers to get slaughtered en masse, which the IS is supposedly interested in doing.
Another question one should be inclined to ask is why anybody would give weight to a government terror warning. Since 9/11 this country has lived in a constant state of terror warnings. Statistically if we looked at the number of terror warnings issued since 9/11 versus the number of actual instances of terrorism in this country we would see that the percentage is almost in the negative (for those of you who don’t believe I understand how percentages work please look up hyperbole)!
But the state needs a scared citizenry. Tyrannical bullshit is very hard to sell by itself. That’s why tyrannical acts are usually preceded by a period of fear mongering. The United States government has been trying to get widespread support from the citizenry to turn this country into a prison. We’re told that our “unprotected” border will let communists (removed from the latest version of the Newspeak Dictionary) violent drug cartels, terrorists, and other people who want to kill every American across. And since the threats looking to cross today are far more dangerous than the nuclear armed militaries that were supposedly trying to cross previously we’re also told that the police must be militarized. Supposedly if our police officers aren’t roaming the streets in armored personnel carriers, clad in body armor, and armed with machine guns we’re all going to be killed by terrorists!
But fences, guard towers, and barbed wired are interesting in their ability to equally keep things outside of an area and inside of an area. The more secure a border becomes the more difficult it is to cross it when escape is your goal. Uprising are also more difficult to successfully pull off when you’re facing a force that is much better armed than yours. People know this, which is why selling tyranny is difficult unless you have a good pitch. Fear is probably the best pitch of them all.
Whenever you hear people like Allen West, Bill O’Reilly, Anderson Cooper, and Wolf Blitzer talk about why you should be afraid of the week’s boogeyman just remember that their revenue is generated by generating fear. Fear leads to page clicks, video views, and better Nielsen ratings. They’re also in, what George Carlin referred to as, the big club. If you’re in the big club the tyrannical shit being enacted by the state doesn’t impact you. But we’re not in the big club so we should be wary of people peddling fear because what they claim we need sure as the hell will impact us.