[Peace-discuss] AWARE

[C. G. Estabrook]

Uh, what would count as a "solution"?

Matt at least has suggested one...


jgeo61 at comcast.net wrote:
> Silly?  I support the First Amendment as much as you do.  I want another 
> venue, stage, arena for the 3-4 of you to debate your issues as often and as
> fervently as you wish to.  I want as many AWARE folks to read and enjoy as
> they wish to and to respond in kind if they chose to.  I and the many who
> have contacted me personally through all of this, want a space too to talk
> about some differing issues related to peace.  When I am on this list, I do
> feel as if I have arrived at a party 15min. late and now am having trouble
> adapting to the current topic of conversation.  I know that it will be just
> as difficult to change the conversation even if I can get my toe in.
> 
> I want to know why you folks need an audience of 165 plus readers to host
> your own conversations?  For the record, 30 plus msgs. per day are too many
> for many of us to listen to.  No, I will not take my toys and go home; I want
> a solution to this issue.
> 
> Joy George
> 
> ----- Original Message ----- From: "C. G. Estabrook" <galliher at illinois.edu> 
> To: "Matt Reichel" <mattreichel at hotmail.com> Cc: jgeo61 at comcast.net,
> slevy at ncsa.uiuc.edu, peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net, ewj at pigs.ag Sent:
> Saturday, September 5, 2009 12:34:16 PM GMT -06:00 US/Canada Central Subject:
> Re: [Peace-discuss] AWARE
> 
> Oh, Matt -- don't be silly.  From your first line ("banning Carl and Wayne")
> I thought you were engaged in a Stephen Colbert-style jeu d'esprit, a long 
> satire of the free-speech liberal calling for banning of speech...
> 
> But then I concluded, with rising dismay, that you were serious -- I hope I'm
>  wrong -- so I'll try to answer your charges:
> 
> [1] "hate-monger": no, I don't recommend hate even against people with 
> despicable ideas or my enemies; I belong to a tradition that insists upon
> loving enemies, difficult as that may be.
> 
> [2] "homophobe": no, not just because "some of my best friends...," but 
> because I don't think holding (as I do) that the ethics of sexual behavior
> are debatable and at the same time not very important qualifies one as such.
> 
> [3] "irrelevant tangents": Stuart's been upset with this, too, but I thought,
>  e.g., that the discussion of the meaning of "pontificate" was an amusing way
> to respond to a ridiculous objection -- and it was interesting: we discovered
> (I think) that the common English connotation grew out of a political
> dispute.
> 
> [4] "pretentious off-color remarks":  this one has me stumped (and the 
> puritanism surprises, given your taste for Anglo-Saxon); the best I can come
> up with is my reference to "mailboxes getting stuffed," which could be 
> regarded as a Brit (hence pretentious) euphemism (hence off-color).
> 
> [5] "anarchistic": guilty.  As a yellow-dog Chomskyan, I wish to imitate his 
> anarchism/libertarian socialism (with the understanding that "libertarian"
> here does not mean "libertarian" in the contemporary American sense), a 
> position to the left of M-L sects.
> 
> [6] "overbearing personalities": me?!  Why, you'll quite turn my head ... but
> my professional history suggests I've rarely if ever been able to overbear 
> much of anybody.
> 
> [7] "weekly news updates": you haven't been around for a while, Matt. They're
>  an example of [6], in that they were silenced at AWARE meetings because they
>  were improperly "framed."
> 
> [8] "apology made for regressive 'anti-war' conservatives": 
> paleoconservatives have consistently been principled opponents of the war, a
> position always defended on the Left but rarely (and decreasingly) by
> liberals.
> 
> [9] "reminders that mainstream Democrats have, by and large, betrayed their 
> progressive base": you agree that they have done so, apparently, and the 
> reminder is hardly redundant for many self-styled liberals in what Chomsky
> (and other) call the political class.
> 
> [10] "Ron Paul is somehow better than Dennis Kucinich": he's certainly had
> more effect (an old Trot friend of mine thinks Dennis is just an example of 
> repressive tolerance), but where they disagree (generally in economics) I'm 
> usually on Dennis' side.
> 
> [11] "multi-millionaire": now you've done it! My wife just looked over my 
> shoulder and is raging about "Where are you hiding it!?" with angry 
> mutterings about Bernie Medoff...
> 
> [12] "racist": I'll ask the black and white members of my family to debate
> this one.
> 
> [13] "xenophobe": I'm thinking of going and living in Venice (or maybe 
> Paris...); does that exculpate me?
> 
> [14] "no passion for the good of your country":  well, I would have supported
>  neither the American Revolution nor the Civil War, though my family did; in
> fact a good bit of my adult life has been taken up with learning, somewhat 
> uncomfortably, what might count as "the good of my country": e.g., JFK's 
> inaugural speech was I now think fascistic.
> 
> OK, now tote up the score, like the magazine quizzes:
> 
> 0-3 -- terminate with extreme prejudice 4-6 -- ride him out of town on a rail
>  7-9 -- allow him to attend meetings, but only with an S&M gag in place 10-12
> -- allow him to post to the list, but no more than once a day, and only after
> the text has been passed by The Committee for relevance & framing above 12 --
> for he's a jolly good fellow...!
> 
> Solidarity, CGE
> 
> 
> 
> Matt Reichel wrote:
>> I think most of this list's problems would be solved by just banning
> Carl and
>> Wayne: maybe they can go and create their own peace group for
> hate-mongering
>> homophobes and litter each others' inboxes with their irrelevant
> tangents and
>> pretentious off-color remarks.
>> 
>> AWARE cannot go on without any organizational infrastructure, as
> attractive
>> as it sounds to be "anarchistic." A simple, respectful level of
> organization
>> backed by a widely supported set of rules will make the group more 
>> democratic, and less prone to dominance by overbearing personalities and 
>> their seemingly regressive ends.
>> 
>> Since everyone that has left the group or that are currently
> frustrated with
>> its direction seem to have a problem with the same person, why don't
> you just
>> give him the old "heave ho"? Because his weekly news updates are
> supposedly
>> of some value? Because you want to hear every possible apology made for 
>> regressive "anti-war" conservatives, coupled with redundant reminders
> that
>> mainstream Democrats have, by and large, betrayed their progressive
> base? So
>> Ron Paul is somehow better than Dennis Kucinich? . . I guess if you are a 
>> multi-millionaire, racist, xenophobe with no passion for the good of your 
>> country . .
>> 
>> Will someone down there please find the courage to defend the
> integrity of
>> this group and lay a ban down on the aforementioned assholes?
>> 
>> Best, Matt
>