Why Politicians Care About Pacquiao So Much And Why They Want You To Care

Filipino politicians are pretty much idiots. Part of the problem is us. We believe them . Politicians in general are idiots but over here they are uber idiots. Here is a guy I wouldn't want the young folk emulating based on what I have read in the Metro section. Yet look at all the biased coverage he gets. Every politician we have wants to jump on the Manny Bandwagon. People put so much stock in his every fight and for what? Boxing is a mess as a sport and it has been for a while. http://media.www.dailygamecock.com/media/storage/paper247/news/2008/06/11/Sports/Boxing.Takes.Huge.blow-3380471.shtml

Internationally Manny is known but has yet to experience the presence other non Americans have reached in their prime ( Ray Mancini, Mano de Piedre, Julio Chavez) and he may never will based on boxing's shrinking stage. I am a sports junkie and I never heard of any of the Manny opponents that makes this country shut down when the bell goes off unless of course he beat them before.

For me media and the audience is a chicken and egg kind of thing. Does the audience care because media's scope and "depth" of coverage or does the media show us what they do because of the audience. Either way I find the current state moronic.

Let's review, I am not enamored of the guy. I am not a big boxing fan and I dislike local politicians. Also my previous post talks about all the misery this country is going through and all the attention this guy garners despite of that . ( http://www.inquirer.net/specialfeatures/ThePacquiaoFiles/)

Why should you care? Because of a little concept known as hegemony.

Boiled down to it's simple terms , any ruling class needs more than force and violence to maintain their positions. There has to be some cultural acceptance to prevent a crippling overthrow. As long as us idiots give Many undue attention then that's less brain cells questioning the corruptness so rampant in this country. Manny even tried to be even more hands on. I suggest reading up on this and question what is really going on.

Ed

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cultural_hegemony

http://services.inquirer.net/print/print.php?article_id=67464

http://www.theory.org.uk/ctr-gram.htm#hege

Cultural hegemony is a concept coined by Marxist philosopher Antonio Gramsci. It means that a diverse culture can be ruled or dominated by one group or class, that everyday practices and shared beliefs provide the foundation for complex systems of domination

Gramsci's theory of hegemony

The analysis of hegemony (or "rule") was formulated by Antonio Gramsci to explain why predicted communist revolutions had not occurred where they were most expected, in industrialized Europe. Marx and his followers had advanced the theory that the rise of industrial capitalism would create a huge working class and cyclical economic recessions. These recessions and other contradictions of capitalism would lead the overwhelming masses of people, the workers, to develop organizations for self-defense, including labor unions and political parties. Further recessions and contradictions would then spark the working class to overthrow capitalism in a revolution, restructure the economic, political, and social institutions on rational socialist models, and begin the transition towards an eventual communist society. In Marxian terms, the dialectically changing economic base of society would determine the cultural and political superstructure. Although Marx and Engels had famously predicted this eschatological scenario in 1848, many decades later the workers of the industrialized core still had not carried out the mission.

Gramsci argued that the failure of the workers to make an anti-capitalist revolution was due to the successful capture of the workers' ideology, self-understanding, and organizations by the hegemonic (ruling) culture. In other words, the perspective of the ruling class had been absorbed by the masses of workers. In advanced capitalist societies hegemonic cultural innovations such as compulsory schooling, mass media, and popular culture had indoctrinated workers to a false consciousness. Instead of working towards a revolution that would truly serve their collective needs, workers in "advanced" societies were listening to the rhetoric of nationalist leaders, seeking consumer opportunities and middle-class status, embracing an individualist ethos of success through competition, and/or accepting the guidance of bourgeois religious leaders.

Gramsci therefore argued for a strategic distinction between a "war of position" and a "war of manoeuvre". The war of position is a culture war in which anti-capitalist elements seek to gain a dominant voice in mass media, mass organizations, and educational institutions to heighten class consciousness, teach revolutionary analysis and theory, and inspire revolutionary organization. Following the success of the war of position, communist leaders would be empowered to begin the war of manoeuvre, the actual insurrection against capitalism, with mass support.

Although the analysis of cultural domination was first advanced in terms of economic classes, it can be applied more broadly. Gramsci's analysis suggested that prevailing cultural norms should not be viewed as "natural" or "inevitable". Rather, cultural norms - including institutions, practices, beliefs - should be investigated for their roots in domination and their implications for liberation.

Gramsci did not contend that hegemony was either monolithic or unified. Instead, hegemony was portrayed as a complex layering of social structures. Each of these structures have their own “mission” and internal logic that allows its members to behave in a way that is different from those in different structures. Yet, as with an army, each of these structures assumes the existence of other structures and by virtue of their differing missions, is able to coalesce and produce a larger structure that has a larger overall mission. This larger mission usually is not exactly the same as the mission for each smaller structure, but it assumes and subsumes them. Hegemony works in the same manner. Each person lives their life in a way that is meaningful in their immediate setting, and, to this person the different parts of society may seem to have little in common with him. Yet taken as a whole, each person’s life also contributes to the larger hegemony of the society. Diversity, variation, and free will seem to exist since most people see what they believe to be a plethora of different circumstances, but they miss the larger pattern of hegemony created by the coalescing of these circumstances. Through the existence of small and different circumstances, a larger and layered hegemony is maintained yet not fully recognized by many of the people who live within it. (See Prison Notebooks, pp. 233-38.)

In such a layered hegemony, individual common sense, which is fragmented, is effective in helping people deal with small, everyday activities. But common sense also inhibits their ability to grasp the larger systemic nature of exploitation and hegemony. People focus on immediate concerns and problems rather than focusing upon more fundamental sources of social oppression.^[1]

[edit] Influence of Gramsci

Although leftists may have been the primary users of this conceptual tool, the activities of organized conservative movements also draw upon the concept. This was seen, for instance, in evangelical Christian efforts to capture local school boards in the U.S. during the 1990s, and thus be able to dictate curriculum. Patrick Buchanan, in a widely discussed speech to the 1992 Republican Convention, used the term "culture war" to describe political and social struggle in the United States.

Theory about hegemonic culture has profoundly influenced Eurocommunism, the social sciences, and activist strategies. In social science the application of the concept of hegemony in the examination of major discourses (as by Michel Foucault) has become an important aspect of sociology, political science, anthropology, and other cultural studies. In education the concept has led to the development of critical pedagogy.

Inquirer Headlines / Sports http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/inquirerheadlines/sports/view_article.php?article_id=67464 BARE EYE Bare Eye : Did Pacquiao produce a senator? By Recah Trinidad Inquirer Posted date: May 23, 2007 MANILA, Philippines -- Now that it’s finally over, Manny Pacquiao’s fight at the polls is bound to go down as the most brutal, most expensive in his great career. The sheer savagery surpassed the worst he had suffered in earlier defeats. Pacquiao, as could only be expected, had refused to take a step back at the height of battle. But it did not help any that, given his big fighting heart, the loser also squandered hard-earned pogi points when he refused to concede and acknowledge defeat long after the (people’s) verdict had been rendered. * * * The Pacman was said to have wasted over P100 million in his bitter bid to topple the incumbent Darlene Antonino-Custodio from Congress. But, more than finances, it was in the sensitive area of public trust and respect wherein Pacquiao had been severely battered. Yes, the boxing super hero nearly went bankrupt after he indefinitely refused to acknowledge defeat at the hands of a small, gentle foe. Every second he had spent on the floor protesting, as Custodio continued to pad her lead in the official tally, would cut a deeper wound in Pacquiao’s proud psyche. * * * The angelic winner definitely didn’t look like she packed a devil’s punch that could stop the most popular living Filipino hero. You can now call that winning shot the sweetest, wildest. Call it whatever you may. But please don’t buy the cheap tout which says Pacquiao’s resounding defeat in the recent congressional polls has effectively softened Pacquiao, thereby rendering him ripe for a loss inside the boxing ring. In the first place, do you expect Mike Buffer to also welcome Pacquiao into the arena in his next fight as “the losing congressional candidate from the Philippines?” * * * OK, Pacquiao had allowed himself to be sucked blind into the dirty world of Philippine politics. He had, in fact, lent losing (in the polls) a new, silly face. He had, repeat, allowed himself to be a mascot of Malacañang madness. But you definitely don’t know your super hero if you entertained the idea Pacquiao would be bringing his record defeat at the polls inside the boxing ring. Pacquiao is doubly tough inside there. This is what separates him from other ordinary fighters. He’s a supreme stoic when it comes to business inside the cruel boxing ring. Anyway, if the defeat against Custodio would have any impact, it should be in goading Pacquiao to be a better ring warrior. * * * The lessons learned in his sorry loss in the last election may not contribute physically in his next big bout. But it goes without saying that, unlike against Custodio, Pacquiao would next study all angles and possibilities in that next ring outing. Pacquiao need not be told that, in his last defeat, Custodio ended up lending him some solid pointers on athleticism. She, for example, did not waste time to assure Pacquiao that he should not feel bad because the poll defeat was not a message that people no longer loved him. In fact, Ms. Custodio had humbly assured Pacquiao she had not actually knocked him out, contrary to popular feel. Well, it’s too early to say, but it appears Pacquiao has also succeeded in introducing a strong candidate for senator in the person of the wispy charmer who took the fight out of a famous knockout artist. That, needless to say, should go down as the biggest point Pacquiao had scored in the biggest loss of his career.

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