VI. HISTORY THAT ILLUMINATES

THESE PAGES SHOW HOW TANGIBLE NECESSITIES UNDERLY ALL SOCIETIES...

and determine institutions, philosophies, customs, etc., which  buttress elites in ways so rooted that they become invisible. Take Old Regime France, where every aspect of life so deeply reinforced hierarchy by birth that the poor would insult each other with "Your father was a valet!"

For us, history and tourism fit the ads that in the last 15 years have hovered over the city: 

Richard Nahem

First noticed in Paris, 2011

Union Square in Manhattan / Elisabeth Rawson

New York

The Châtelet crossroad in central Paris

They extoll...

• Irrationality : No reason is given for buying the brand. Such mindlessness fits ignoring contradictions that should jump out at us, like the void in front of Notre-Dame Cathedral — etc.

• Obedience: The message is an order. History that stresses "great individuals"  fits that authoritarianism.

• Passivity: Happiness comes from buying. 

• Isolation: The figures are alone. Collective action, the only thing that can successfully oppose the elites, is unthinkable.

• The outside world is of no concern: The background is empty, like history whose line-up of facts without tangible roots makes no sense.  

• Interchangeable consumers : The models are young, happy and middle class, as insipid as accounts of Paris that erase all that contradicts the void.  

Even asepticized, the past defies that chasm. It is being erased as well:

The Opéra became a backdrop for ads in 2023. For an evolution that began in 2017, please click. 

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You don't have to be a leftie to deplore the disappearance of the famous culture(s) of central Paris, the invasion of brands under the arcades of Palais-Royal, the replacement of an excellent, cheerful, affordable restaurant in Saint-Germain by a fast-food — etc. 

Or to resist the billionaires who sweep away faith, tradition, social ties, all that hinders their endless greed. 

And you certainly don't want to be conned.

Unveiling a manipulation of which we are usually unaware is what these blooks most important subject.

If you find them useful,

please transmit them. 

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