When we discussed this in class the first thing I thought of was the ridiculous things Kim Jong Il tells his nation of which are "facts". A teacher told me that in history books it says that Kim and his father fought off the Japanese by turning pine cones into grenades. A likely story I'm sure. Although it is obvious that the victors write the history books I feel that has changed some with time.

Previously in history the level of education(ability to read and write) of the world population was significantly far worse, meaning that whatever did happen couldn't be written down by a common person to begin with. As we flash forward to the present we see much greater literacy rates and the advancement of technology has made a significant impact as well. Where before, in the case of war, the scholars of said power would write of the victorious and dramatic win, but now there are hundreds of newspapers and news stations taking down every detail and broadcasting it in almost real time around the world for everyone to see. Although I wasn't alive during the the Vietnam War I have been lead to believe that the medias ability to show the battlefront of such a chaotic event is partly what sparked backlash against our involved in the war in the first place. Had the citizens of the US not seen these accounts the story may have come back a little differently and with less vivid images of the situation. Further, any historian who takes their work seriously knows of such biases and can admit them, and even try to bypass them in their own research. New books and History Channel shows come out every year revealing new aspects of history that happened hundreds and sometimes thousands of years ago.

As far as creating civilization without violence. The last paragraph of the Marcuse essay we looked at for today notes that our appetite for destruction is based out of hunger. If the world was not starving for food, clothing, and shelter then violence would be out of the question. I don't think that could happen given our capitalistic way of life. Even if these things were provided for everyone some would still have more than others and our system would just continue. On the idea of creating civilization though, I am not sure because unless somehow everyone was automatically rationed equal necessities from the start, somebody would gain knowledge faster or be stronger and use these advantages for gain over others. I'm not so sure that at the beginning of human habitation on Earth it was just mere chance that civilization took the course it did. Survival of the fittest in the most literal aspect.

Just to add onto this attack of global corporation and the illusion of choice for the consumer. It is pretty safe to say that cigarettes are bad for your health. So by not purchasing them one would think they are not supporting major tobacco companies like Philip Morris, but this is incorrect. The truth is Philip Morris owns Kraft Foods which is a combination of Kraft, Nabisco, and General Foods(Oscar Mayer, Maxwell House, and Jell-O). Also, Philip Morris holds a substantial stake(28.7%) in SABMiller which is the second largest brewing company in the world that contains such brands as Miller, Coors, and Molson. It gets better when you come to realize that Philip Morris created a holding company called Altria to further disguise itself from the consumer. So even by making a conscious choice to not support the consumption of tobacco products by not buying them, consumers may still be buying a big tobacco company without even knowing it because of the camouflage put up in buy-outs and mergers.