The Feminist Was a Spy

mmooreds about 1 hour ago 31 commentsRead Article on uscpublicdiplomacy.org

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rayiner•28 minutes ago

This is the kind of bizarre article you see in an era where people reflexively support anything having to do with the federal bureaucracy. Even the 1960s CIA that was overthrowing democratically elected leaders in other countries is now “liberal, nonviolent and honorable.” Where did this come from? Politically homeless socially liberal Reagan republicans?

k310•14 minutes ago

Was modern art a weapon of the CIA? [0]

> Still, whatever the truth of the extent of the CIA’s financial involvement with Abstract Expressionism, Anfam believes that it was “the best thing the institution ever paid for”. He smiles. “I’d much rather they spent money on Abstract Expressionism than toppling left-wing dictators.”

I had a similar view of my work that involved SDI "Star Wars". Better spent on my paycheck than on bombs. Don't forget, the gorgeous mirror in the Vera Rubin Telescope was one of two donated from another three-letter agency's dumpster.

I could tell you, but then you'd have to be shredded.

Buddhists like to "turn poison into medicine". So should we all.

[0] https://www.bbc.com/culture/article/20161004-was-modern-art-...

nonsensical_•41 minutes ago

Hmm. Feminism as a CIA psyop. They’ve done more audacious things, I suppose.

neutronicus•23 minutes ago

Feminism has always been bundled up in the idea of American cultural superiority that justifies pursuing hegemony (although the term used is usually "women's rights").

han-tyumi•about 1 hour ago

Yes, yes, the good ol' "liberal, non-violent, and honorable" CIA of the 50s and 60s. So different from the one we have now.

Is this the CIA that overthrew the democratically elected prime minister of Iran after he nationalized their oil industry? Or is it the one that installed a dictatorship in Guatemala to stop land reform and tend to the whims of the United Fruit Company?

Maybe it's the organization that murdered the first elected leader of Congo, to keep cheap copper, colbat and uranium flowing? Certainly it can't be the agency that illegally spied on American citizens who fought for Civil Rights or protested against the Vietnam War.

So much for soft power.

roenxi•37 minutes ago

It interesting because the people at the CIA probably could be fairly described as "liberal, non-violent, and honorable". That sort of thing is heavily into banality of evil territory - lovely people, just a bit thoughtless about the effects they were having on huge tracts of the world.

With those types the best you can hope for is at least they act rationally and effectively. It gets really sad when they do tremendous damage for reasons that make little sense, even in context.

ch4s3•41 minutes ago

> Is this the CIA that overthrew the democratically elected prime minister of Iran

Mosaddegh Was not democratically elected, he was appointed by the Shah after the recommendation by the Majlis which itself was largely appointed. Later Mosaddegh rigged a real election and tried to give himself emergency power to dictate law. The Shah and his generals with the help of the US and Britain removed Mosaddegh. Yes the British wanted to get involved because of oil nationalization but Mosaddegh was trying to become a dictator, and alienated a lot of the population.

esafak•34 minutes ago

Majlis means parliament, and with the monarch Shah in control, that makes it a constitutional monarchy. To place a putschist general on par with that is disingenuous; it is a democratic retreat.

tancop•24 minutes ago

To be fair Iran back then wasn't a system like the UK or Sweden where the king's power is limited to signing laws. It worked more like Gulf states today with a much more personal form of government, the Shah could freely appoint ministers and dissolve parliament when he wanted. And his secret police was trained by the CIA.

throwfaraway135•34 minutes ago

It is a shame but there are almost no true grassroots political organizations, most of them are payed, bought or employed by someone.

A very good example of this is that we don't see any major feminist rallies against how the government is handling the Epstein files, whose victims where predominately young girls and women.

dgellow•31 minutes ago

Virtually every single feminist organization has spoken against Epstein, his best friend Trump, and the people around them. And in support of their victims. Where are you getting your information from?

throwfaraway135•26 minutes ago

there were some, but considering how monumental it was many people including me consider it a lackluster effort[1]

[1] https://theprint.in/opinion/pov/silence-epstein-files-global...

bell-cot•about 1 hour ago

If you want clicky headlines or simplistic denunciations, then saying that everyone ever associated with the CIA was a "spy" is quite useful.

Otherwise, it's kinda like saying that everyone ever employed by Ford Motor Co. was a mechanical engineer, and bears responsibility for exploding Pintos.*

(And bear in mind that James Bond is about as realistic a depiction of "spy" as Bugs Bunny is a depiction of "rabbit".)

A serious article on the activities Steinem was involved in: https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/03/23/a-friend-of-th...

*https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ford_Pinto#Fuel_system_fires,_...

dstnn•about 1 hour ago

Lol this is going to go over well

krapp•39 minutes ago

A thread on HN about the CIA and feminism? I'm grabbing some popcorn, this is going to be entertaining.

dgellow•36 minutes ago

Hopefully the flame war detector will be triggered quickly

2OEH8eoCRo0•32 minutes ago

Let the battle between the cynics and foreign trolls commence!

api•about 1 hour ago

People make a ridiculous deal out of someone at any point doing any work with the CIA, or a company having IQT on their cap table, or anything like that.

Yeah, right, as soon as you get involved you instantly meet with the smoking man from the X-Files and see the dead aliens and become part of some kind of grand conspiracy. After that every single thing you say or do is part of some giant perfectly organized CIA plot. Please.

Most of what these three letter agencies do is boring.

It’s a lot like guilt by association: “this person did business with this person therefore they are totally the same on everything and part of some big agenda.” False.

I don’t think this means anything at all.

6P58r3MXJSLi•43 minutes ago

> It’s a lot like guilt by association

What would you think of someone who works for KGB (now FSB) and propagandizes the values of USSR (or modern Russia)?

secondly: CIA job is exactly promote the image of a "liberal, nonviolent and honorable” agency, while killing thousands people to overthrown elected governments just because uncle Sam did not like them...

api•7 minutes ago

I didn't say everything the CIA does is great and they're fluffy bunnies of light. What I said is that they do a lot of things, much of which is boring, and that anyone ever associated with them isn't in on some giant conspiracy or agenda.

tdeck•41 minutes ago

Most of the work is probably boring and not consequential on its own. But I think that's sepaerate from whether it's reasonable to encourage people to draw an ethical line. We probably wouldn't feel comfortable with someone who knowingly did work for the KKK, even if that work was just making photocopies, picking up office supplies, and keeping track of membership dues.

21asdffdsa12•42 minutes ago

Most of what the 3 letter agencies do is also fraud- some drunk station chief phoning in some changes as "I made that happen!".

The CIA is a pillar to prop up stuck cultures excuses for why they get nothing good done - when your own ideology has no explanation power and thus no real help to offer, except calls for endless uprisings and civil wars. It also keeps a whole "nonacademic" wing of academia propped up. For when your theories have no predictive power and reality merciless digresses- its all a conspiracy by the 3 letters.

Cultural Inability to Advance is everywhere!

wry_discontent•42 minutes ago

Yes, I think it's a big deal if you worked for a big evil organization on purpose.

Arodex•40 minutes ago

Then you don't say stuff like “In my experience The Agency was completely different from its image; it was liberal, nonviolent and honorable”. It is not "guilt by association" anymore, it is pure complicity.

api•4 minutes ago

"The Agency" isn't a monolith. These government agencies are big sprawling bureaucracies. There are probably pockets of "liberal, nonviolent and honorable" people and pockets of total assholes and monsters and people doing nefarious things.

Just like in a large corporation where your experience working there can vary wildly depending on your department and who your boss is.

Look: I don't even know much about her. I'm just responding to conspiranoid guilt by association social media rumor mill crap. Maybe she was part of some agenda. If so, "I did some work for the CIA and the people I met there were nice" is not proof of anything. You'd need more evidence.

gedy•44 minutes ago

Sure, but it is really interesting to think that the 50s arts and 60s youth movements as top-down "soft power" countermeasures to the USSR and communist revolutions, and that it's not so spontaneous as it's typically thought of.

FeteCommuniste•36 minutes ago

Something similar was happening with CIA promotion of abstract expressionism in art:

https://www.guggenheim-bilbao.eus/en/did-you-know/la-cia-y-e...