Palestinian-American Edward W. Said Wins Spain's Coveted "Premio Principe de Asturias"
arache
Palestinian-American Edward W. Said Wins
Spain's Coveted "Premio Principe de Asturias"
by Hector Carreon
La Voz de Aztlan
Los Angeles, Alta California - October 26, 2002 - (ACN)
Dr. Edward W. Said, Professor at Columbia University
in New York, has been awarded the prestigious "Premio
Principe de Asturias" in Oviedo, Spain for his
lifetime literary work on Palestine and the Middle
East. The coveted award was given on September 4, 2002
but little mention of this has appeared in the U.S.
media. The "Premio Principe de Asturias" is much
respected in the Spanish speaking world and in a few
intellectual circles of the U.S.A,
The "Premio Principe de Asturias" includes an award of
500,000 Euros and a special sculpture by the renown
artist Joan Miró. The annual award is given to,
(English translation follows) " . . . a la persona,
grupo o institución de cualquier país del mundo cuyo
trabajo haya contribuido, de una manera ejemplar y
significativa, a la superación de fronteras nacionales,
a la hermandad entre los hombres, a la lucha contra la
injusticia, la pobreza, la enfermedad o la ignorancia,
a la defensa del patrimonio de la humanidad o al
descubrimiento de nuevos campos de conocimiento."
(" . . . to a person, group or institution from any
part of the world, whose work has contributed, in an
exemplary and significant manner, to the unity of
human beings beyond national boundaries, to
brotherhood and sisterhood among people, to the
struggle for justice, elimination of economic poverty
and of diseases and of ignorance, and to the defense
of human rights or to the promotion of new modes of
positive thought.")
Dr. Edward W. Said was born in Jerusalem where he
received his early academic education. He immigrated
to the U.S. in the early 1950's and attended Princeton
and Harvard Universities. Dr. Said has lived in New
York City since 1963, the year when he accepted a
position at Columbia University. He now holds the
position of University Professor. Professor Said is an
expert in Middle East politics and has become one of
the most prominent spokesperson for the Palestinian
cause in the United States. Dr. Said, though
struggling against leukemia, is a prolific author. His
most recently published works are "Reflections on
Exile" and "Power, Politics, and Culture."
------------------------------------------------------------------
The following is an interview of Dr. Said conducted by
Alternative Radio soon after September 11, 2001:
Q: The events of September 11 have bewildered and
confused many Americans. What was your reaction?
Edward W. Said: Speaking as a New Yorker, I found it a
shocking and terrifying event, particularly the scale
of it. At bottom, it was an implacable desire to do
harm to innocent people. It was aimed at symbols: the
World Trade Center, the heart of American capitalism,
and the Pentagon, the headquarters of the American
military establishment. But it was not meant to be
argued with. It wasn't part of any negotiation. No
message was intended with it. It spoke for itself,
which is unusual. It transcended the political and
moved into the metaphysical. There was a kind of
cosmic, demonic quality of mind at work here, which
refused to have any interest in dialogue and political
organization and persuasion. This was bloody-minded
destruction for no other reason than to do it. Note
that there was no claim for these attacks. There were
no demands. There were no statements. It was a silent
piece of terror. This was part of nothing. It was a
leap into another realm--the realm of crazy
abstractions and mythological generalities, involving
people who have hijacked Islam for their own purposes.
It's important not to fall into that trap and to try
to respond with a metaphysical retaliation of some
sort.
Q: What should the U.S. do?
Said: The just response to this terrible event should
be to go immediately to the world community, the
United Nations. The rule of international law should
be marshaled, but it's probably too late because the
United States has never done that; it's always gone it
alone. To say that we're going to end countries or
eradicate terrorism, and that it's a long war over
many years, with many different instruments, suggests
a much more complex and drawn-out conflict for which,
I think, most Americans aren't prepared.There isn't a
clear goal in sight. Osama bin Laden's organization
has spun out from him and is now probably independent
of him. There will be others who will appear and
reappear. This is why we need a much more precise, a
much more defined, a much more patiently constructed
campaign, as well as one that surveys not just the
terrorists' presence but the root causes of terrorism,
which are ascertainable.
Q: What are those root causes?
Said: They come out of a long dialectic of U.S.
involvement in the affairs of the Islamic world, the
oil-producing world, the Arab world, the Middle
East--those areas that are considered to be essential
to U.S. interests and security. And in this
relentlessly unfolding series of interactions, the U.S.
has played a very distinctive role, which most
Americans have been either shielded from or simply
unaware of.
In the Islamic world, the U.S. is seen in two quite
different ways. One view recognizes what an
extraordinary country the U.S. is. Every Arab or
Muslim that I know is tremendously interested in the
United States. Many of them send their children here
for education. Many of them come here for vacations.
They do business here or get their training here.The
other view is of the official United States, the
United States of armies and interventions. The United
States that in 1953 overthrew the nationalist
government of Mossadegh in Iran and brought back the
shah. The United States that has been involved first
in the Gulf War and then in the tremendously damaging
sanctions against Iraqi civilians. The United States
that is the supporter of Israel against the
Palestinians.
If you live in the area, you see these things as part
of a continuing drive for dominance, and with it a
kind of obduracy, a stubborn opposition to the wishes
and desires and aspirations of the people there. Most
Arabs and Muslims feel that the United States hasn't
really been paying much attention to their desires.
They think it has been pursuing its policies for its
own sake and not according to many of the principles
that it claims are its own--democracy,
self-determination, freedom of speech, freedom of
assembly, international law. It's very hard, for
example, to justify the thirty-four-year occupation of
the West Bank and Gaza. It's very hard to justify 140
Israeli settlements and roughly 400,000 settlers.
These actions were taken with the support and
financing of the United States. How can you say this
is part of U.S. adherence to international law and U.N.
resolutions? The result is a kind of schizophrenic
picture of the United States.
Now we come to the really sad part. The Arab rulers
are basically unpopular. They are supported by the
United States against the wishes of their people. In
all of this rather heady mixture of violence and
policies that are remarkably unpopular right down to
the last iota, it's not hard for demagogues,
especially people who claim to speak in the name of
religion, in this case Islam, to raise a crusade
against the United States and say that we must somehow
bring America down.
Ironically, many of these people, including Osama bin
Laden and the mujahedeen, were, in fact, nourished by
the United States in the early eighties in its efforts
to drive the Soviets out of Afghanistan. It was
thought that to rally Islam against godless communism
would be doing the Soviet Union a very bad turn indeed,
and that, in fact, transpired. In 1985, a group of
mujahedeen came to Washington and was greeted by
President Reagan, who called them "freedom
fighters."These people, by the way, don't represent
Islam in any formal sense. They're not imams or sheiks.
They are self-appointed warriors for Islam. Osama bin
Laden, who is a Saudi, feels himself to be a patriot
because the U.S. has forces in Saudi Arabia, which is
sacred because it is the land of the prophet Mohammed.
There is also this great sense of triumphalism, that
just as we defeated the Soviet Union, we can do this.
And out of this sense of desperation and pathological
religion, there develops an all-encompassing drive to
harm and hurt, without regard for the innocent and the
uninvolved, which was the case in New York. Now to
understand this is, of course, not at all to condone
it. And what terrifies me is that we're entering a
phase where if you start to speak about this as
something that can be understood historically--without
any sympathy--you are going to be thought of as
unpatriotic, and you are going to be forbidden. It's
very dangerous. It is precisely incumbent on every
citizen to quite understand the world we're living in
and the history we are a part of and we are forming as
a superpower.
Q: Some pundits and politicians seem to be echoing
Kurtz in Heart of Darkness when he said, "Exterminate
all the brutes."
Said: In the first few days, I found it depressingly
monochromatic. There's been essentially the same
analysis over and over again and very little allowance
made for different views and interpretations and
reflections. What is quite worrisome is the absence of
analysis and reflection. Take the word "terrorism." It
has become synonymous now with anti-Americanism, which,
in turn, has become synonymous with being critical of
the United States, which, in turn, has become
synonymous with being unpatriotic. That's an
unacceptable series of equations. The definition of
terrorism has to be more precise, so that we are able
to discriminate between, for example, what it is that
the Palestinians are doing to fight the Israeli
military occupation and terrorism of the sort that
resulted in the World Trade Center bombing.
Q: What's the distinction you're drawing?
Said: Take a young man from Gaza living in the most
horrendous conditions--most of it imposed by
Israel--who straps dynamite around himself and then
throws himself into a crowd of Israelis. I've never
condoned or agreed with it, but at least it is
understandable as the desperate wish of a human being
who feels himself being crowded out of life and all of
his surroundings, who sees his fellow citizens, other
Palestinians, his parents, sisters, and brothers,
suffering, being injured, or being killed. He wants to
do something, to strike back. That can be understood
as the act of a truly desperate person trying to free
himself from unjustly imposed conditions. It's not
something I agree with, but at least you could
understand it. The people who perpetrated the terror
of the World Trade Center and Pentagon bombings are
something different because these people were
obviously not desperate and poor refugee dwellers.
They were middle class, educated enough to speak
English, to be able to go to flight school, to come to
America, to live in Florida.
Q: In your introduction to the updated version of
Covering Islam: How The Media and The Experts
Determine How We See The Rest of The World, you say:
"Malicious generalizations about Islam have become the
last acceptable form of denigration of foreign culture
in the West." Why is that?
Said: The sense of Islam as a threatening Other--with
Muslims depicted as fanatical, violent, lustful,
irrational--develops during the colonial period in
what I called Orientalism. The study of the Other has
a lot to do with the control and dominance of Europe
and the West generally in the Islamic world. And it
has persisted because it's based very, very deeply in
religious roots, where Islam is seen as a kind of
competitor of Christianity.If you look at the
curricula of most universities and schools in this
country, considering our long encounter with the
Islamic world, there is very little there that you can
get hold of that is really informative about Islam. If
you look at the popular media, you'll see that the
stereotype that begins with Rudolph Valentino in The
Sheik has really remained and developed into the
transnational villain of television and film and
culture in general. It is very easy to make wild
generalizations about Islam. All you have to do is
read almost any issue of The New Republic and you'll
see there the radical evil that's associated with
Islam, the Arabs as having a depraved culture, and so
forth. These are impossible generalizations to make in
the United States about any other religious or ethnic
group.
Q: In a recent article in the London Observer, you say
the U.S. drive for war uncannily resembles Captain
Ahab in pursuit of Moby Dick. Tell me what you have in
mind there.
Said: Captain Ahab was a man possessed with an
obsessional drive to pursue the white whale which had
harmed him--which had torn his leg out--to the ends of
the Earth, no matter what happened. In the final scene
of the novel, Captain Ahab is being borne out to sea,
wrapped around the white whale with the rope of his
own harpoon and going obviously to his death. It was a
scene of almost suicidal finality. Now, all the words
that George Bush used in public during the early
stages of the crisis--"wanted, dead or alive," "a
crusade," etc.--suggest not so much an orderly and
considered progress towards bringing the man to
justice according to international norms, but rather
something apocalyptic, something of the order of the
criminal atrocity itself. That will make matters a lot,
lot worse, because there are always consequences. And
it would seem to me that to give Osama bin Laden--who
has been turned into Moby Dick, he's been made a
symbol of all that's evil in the world--a kind of
mythological proportion is really playing his game. I
think we need to secularize the man. We need to bring
him down to the realm of reality. Treat him as a
criminal, as a man who is a demagogue, who has
unlawfully unleashed violence against innocent people.
Punish him accordingly, and don't bring down the world
around him and ourselves.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
La Voz de Aztlan
http://www.aztlan.net/ewsaid.htm
gandalf
"arache" <arac...@zoom.co.uk> wrote in message
news:aphm4v$1l64o$1...@ID-122120.news.dfncis.de...
> http://www.aztlan.net/ewsaid.htm
>
>
> The following is an interview of Dr. Said conducted by
> Alternative Radio soon after September 11, 2001:
>
---------------
Good article, thanks arache.
Peter Duck
"arache" <arac...@zoom.co.uk> wrote:
> ... Dr. Edward W. Said, Professor at Columbia University
> in New York, has been awarded the prestigious "Premio
> Principe de Asturias" in Oviedo, Spain for his
> lifetime literary work on Palestine and the Middle
> East. The coveted award was given on September 4, 2002
> but little mention of this has appeared in the U.S.
> media. ...
I'n not surprised at either.
- He's IMO about the most worthwhile writer in this dismal field, both as
a source of factual information and in making some sense of what's too
easily seen merely as a baffling kaleidoscope of horrors.
- His rational and (surprisingly?) unemotive style of analysis and
perceptive commentary is clearly 'dangerous' to those seeking to inflame
uninformed passions in support of their own partisan views.
He's therefore long been subject to campaigns of vilification from
quarters dissent from which is 'unrewarding' if not downright damaging
to business- or career-prospects.
Why go out of one's way to invite wrath by giving him a favourable
mention?
--
Peter Duck <pd...@zetnet.co.uk>
foucaultisdead
DOGGOD <dogg...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:900b50af.02103...@posting.google.com...
<snip>
> In the free competition for ideas, the most
> persuasive is more likely to win and if your views are not being heard
> you need to do a better job of arguing them.
And in the land of make believe everyone was happy, life was fair, full of
opportunities and no-one died anymore. And they all strolled off happily
into the horizon.
f.i.d.
foucaultisdead
news:<apoto8$5lp$1...@newsg1.svr.pol.co.uk>...
Tell you what chum - most of the group seems to have engaged in argument
with you (bar Oak and probably FACE) so the words pot and kettle spring to
mind.
More to the point until you realize that ideas and knowledge are intimately
related to power then you'll continue to spout inane crap.
Next thing you'll be telling us that the free market is a fairground of
opportunity for all (as a good Amerkin citizen you probably even believe
it).
f.i.d.
O...@oak-invalid.com
Does that "k" in "Amerkin" indicate an Anti-American attitude in you
fid?
Oak
foucaultisdead
DOGGOD <dogg...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:900b50af.02103...@posting.google.com...
> "foucaultisdead" <de...@discourse.com> wrote in message
> > DOGGOD <dogg...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
> > news:900b50af.02103...@posting.google.com...
> > > "foucaultisdead" <de...@discourse.com> wrote in message
> > news:<apoto8$5lp$1...@newsg1.svr.pol.co.uk>...
> > > > DOGGOD <dogg...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
> > > > news:900b50af.02103...@posting.google.com...
> > > > <snip>
> > > > > In the free competition for ideas, the most
> > > > > persuasive is more likely to win and if your views are not being
heard
> > > > > you need to do a better job of arguing them.
> > > >
> > > > And in the land of make believe everyone was happy, life was fair,
full
> > of
> > > > opportunities and no-one died anymore. And they all strolled off
> > happily
> > > > into the horizon.
> > >
> > > Says the bitter one whose ideas just aren't popular or persuasive...
> >
> > Tell you what chum - most of the group seems to have engaged in argument
> > with you (bar Oak and probably FACE) so the words pot and kettle spring
to
> > mind.
>
>
Ah, my premise is obviously totally wiped out with your clever response. I
must try harder ;o)
> > More to the point until you realize that ideas and knowledge are
intimately
> > related to power then you'll continue to spout inane crap.
>
> According to you! I suppose this fuzzy power theory of yours is also a
> handy excuse for weak ideas and uncritical thought.
>
No, if you turn off your TV and read an occasional book you might realise
it's probably the most commonly held theory of knowledge. Nothing fuzzy
about it, and as I am only an occasional student of sociology I can't really
call it mine ;o). Perhaps you should try Kuhn who describes how paradigm
shifts occur, maybe a bit of Gramsci so that you understand how hegemony
functions, or you could always fall back on the works of my namesake
Foucault to discover the inferences of his discursive theories. Mind you
CNN and the tabloids are a bit easier, less taxing - they can tell you what
to think and save you the bother...uncritical thought, huh. This from a man
who seems to be determined to mimic the US administrations viewpoint.
RAOTFLMAO.
> > Next thing you'll be telling us that the free market is a fairground of
> > opportunity for all (as a good Amerkin citizen you probably even believe
> > it).
>
> Your grabbing at straws...
>
And you're putting up such a great argument :oP
f.i.d.
foucaultisdead
<O...@Oak-invalid.com> wrote in message
news:3rt2suoie65qmd0m4...@4ax.com...<snip>
> >Next thing you'll be telling us that the free market is a fairground of
> >opportunity for all (as a good Amerkin citizen you probably even believe
> >it).
> >
> >f.i.d.
> >
> Does that "k" in "Amerkin" indicate an Anti-American attitude in you
> fid?
>
that's the place, but I might be confused), I like them fine (as well as
many other Americans I have met). I am not anti-American. However I do
despise a lot of supposedly 'American values' and much of the foreign
policy. Amerkin merely indicates that I am a pronounciation deficient UK
wag ;o). Amerkkkin would indicate something quite different (maybe an
attempt to link US culture to the clan, probably has more resonance down
south, or darn sarf as I say). :o)
f.i.d.
phobos_anomaly
> Kuhn who describes how paradigm shifts occur,
Is that 'The Structure of Scientific Revolutions', or was that by Karl
Popper? Either way, I remember reading it and it was excellent. I was quite
young when I read it (18 or so) and had never really thought about things
in that way before.
> maybe a bit of Gramsci
> so that you understand how hegemony functions, or you could always
> fall back on the works of my namesake Foucault to discover the
> inferences of his discursive theories.
I did wonder which Foucault you were referring to, Leon or Michel. I never
read Michel but did see Leon's pendulum in Paris once. It made me
interested in the history of science: there's something bizarrely
compelling and inspirational about reading accounts of scientists from
earlier centuries tryng to piece together the theories that we take for
granted today.
Regards
phobos
FACE
Izthatafack? The last rise of the Klan that culminated with the large march on
Washington, DC in the 1920s and was largely responsible for strict immigration
laws until 1960-something started on the West Coast and middle America where
they had most of their members.
FACE
Loz Pycock
(DOGGOD) mumble, "Summer's going so hurry, soon it'll be gone" mumble,
mumble wrote:
>"foucaultisdead" <de...@discourse.com> wrote in message news:<apqsmb$e10$1...@newsg4.svr.pol.co.uk>...
>> DOGGOD <dogg...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
>> >
>> > Says the bitter one whose ideas just aren't popular or persuasive...
>>
>> Tell you what chum - most of the group seems to have engaged in argument
>> with you (bar Oak and probably FACE) so the words pot and kettle spring to
>> mind.
>
>Spring to mind when argument fails...
>
LOL! You really are astroundingly shameless at times aren't you?
Loz
"Absence of evidence doesn't mean the evidence of absence"- Donald
Rumsfeld's response when asked to comment on the failure of attempts
to find a working brain inside the head of George W. Bush
"BLAIR ATTACKS NEW CULTURE OF CYNICISM"- Headline, The Observer 29/09/02.
foucaultisdead
phobos_anomaly <phoenix_...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:Xns92B8CC1C68C8Dph...@130.133.1.4...
> > Perhaps you should try
> > Kuhn who describes how paradigm shifts occur,
>
> Is that 'The Structure of Scientific Revolutions'
Yep, that's the one.
, or was that by Karl Popper?
No, but he also did a lot of work on the theory of knowledge IIRC.
> Either way, I remember reading it and it was excellent. I was quite
> young when I read it (18 or so) and had never really thought about things
> in that way before.
>
Yes, revolutions happen all the time =). I guess they just seem so obvious
in retrospect, and often creep in so quietly, that it becomes difficult to
see the changes as they happen - mostly we seem to just accept it as the
seemingly slow march of progress.
> > maybe a bit of Gramsci
> > so that you understand how hegemony functions, or you could always
> > fall back on the works of my namesake Foucault to discover the
> > inferences of his discursive theories.
>
> I did wonder which Foucault you were referring to, Leon or Michel. I never
> read Michel but did see Leon's pendulum in Paris once. It made me
> interested in the history of science: there's something bizarrely
> compelling and inspirational about reading accounts of scientists from
> earlier centuries tryng to piece together the theories that we take for
> granted today.
>
I don't really know much about Leon (wasn't there a fictional book about him
recently?) but I know what you mean about history of science. I studied the
life of Alfred Russel Wallace a few years ago and looked more closely at the
various discourses about evolution prior to Darwin, I found it a real
eye-opener.
I'm sure you'd enjoy Foucault, although he can get a bit stodgy and labour
his point excessively. My favourites are pretty accessible - Madness and
Civilization (a study of how madness was regarded from the late middle ages
up to the nineteenth century) and Discipline and Punish which looks at the
treatment of criminals. Both books are very French in their orientation but
the theories and perspectives are comparable to the UK and probably much
further.
cheers
f.i.d.
O...@oak-invalid.com
Charlotte North Carolina is north of me and I once traveled there to
escape a hurricane. I am not so sure about Franklin-- being
realatively new to this area. A spelling such as you did used to
indicate a communist leaning so I decided to ask you what the
significance was. Thanks for the clarification.
Oak
foucaultisdead
FACE <AFaceIn...@today.net> wrote in message
news:rb63su85lcjns2ju9...@4ax.com...
> On Thu, 31 Oct 2002 19:08:26 -0000, "foucaultisdead" <de...@discourse.com>
in
> uk.current-events.terrorism wrote:
<snip>
> >Amerkin merely indicates that I am a pronounciation deficient UK
> >wag ;o). Amerkkkin would indicate something quite different (maybe an
> >attempt to link US culture to the clan, probably has more resonance down
> >south, or darn sarf as I say). :o)
> >
> >f.i.d.
> >
> Izthatafack? The last rise of the Klan that culminated with the large
march on
> Washington, DC in the 1920s and was largely responsible for strict
immigration
> laws until 1960-something started on the West Coast and middle America
where
> they had most of their members.
>
That's interesting. AIUI the main area where integration was strongly
resisted was in the deep south, maybe I watched In The Heat of the Night too
many times :o). Isn't the Klan still vaguely active, we have a
journalist/tv presenter Jon Ronson who interviews nutters and he followed
the rump a while back, it seemed like a dying dinosaur. The UK bigots have
been doing quite well of late, 3 BNP members got onto a council not long
back and there was a spate of race riots in several northern towns in the
summer of 91.
phobos_anomaly
> I don't really know much about Leon (wasn't there a fictional book
> about him recently?)
Foucault's Pendulum, by Umberto Eco. I took it to Pakistan with me to read.
I didn't like it, unfortunately, and never got around to finishing it. I'm
reading he Island of the Day Before at the moment, which is better than FP
but still not as good as In The Name Of The Rose IMO.
> but I know what you mean about history of
> science. I studied the life of Alfred Russel Wallace a few years ago
> and looked more closely at the various discourses about evolution
> prior to Darwin, I found it a real eye-opener.
One of my favourite ever scientific 'experiments' :
Building ever-more-massive electrostatic machines to see how big a
spark you could make became something of a fad in the mid-18th
century. In 1750, French physicist Abbe Nollet arranged a
demonstration for the King of Paris in which more than one thousand
Carthusian monks were told to hold hands in a circle 900 feet across.
When a massive Leyden jar [static electricity generator] was
discharged into the monks, Nollet noted that all the monks jumped into
the air at the same time, thus proving that the speed of an electric
discharge is instantaneous, or at least extremely high. [1]
> I'm sure you'd enjoy Foucault, although he can get a bit stodgy and
> labour his point excessively. My favourites are pretty accessible -
> Madness and Civilization (a study of how madness was regarded from the
> late middle ages up to the nineteenth century) and Discipline and
> Punish which looks at the treatment of criminals.
Both sound interesting - I'll add them to my mental list (which, to be
depressingly honest, means I'll always express an interest in reading them
but probably never actually get around to it).
Regards
phobos
[1] http://www.physics.nwu.edu/classes/2002Spring/Phyx103taylor/static.html
FACE
uk.current-events.terrorism wrote:
>
>FACE <AFaceIn...@today.net> wrote in message
>news:rb63su85lcjns2ju9...@4ax.com...
>> On Thu, 31 Oct 2002 19:08:26 -0000, "foucaultisdead" <de...@discourse.com>
>in
>> uk.current-events.terrorism wrote:
>
><snip>
>
>> >Amerkin merely indicates that I am a pronounciation deficient UK
>> >wag ;o). Amerkkkin would indicate something quite different (maybe an
>> >attempt to link US culture to the clan, probably has more resonance down
>> >south, or darn sarf as I say). :o)
>> >
>> >f.i.d.
>> >
>> Izthatafack? The last rise of the Klan that culminated with the large
>march on
>> Washington, DC in the 1920s and was largely responsible for strict
>immigration
>> laws until 1960-something started on the West Coast and middle America
>where
>> they had most of their members.
>>
>That's interesting. AIUI the main area where integration was strongly
>resisted was in the deep south,
Of course that is how you understand it. That is how the sensationalist media
wants you to understand it. When is the last time you heard about the bussing
riots in Boston, Massachusetts in the 70s? ....For one example.
>maybe I watched In The Heat of the Night too
>many times :o).
Or watched PBS, or listened to NPR....
>Isn't the Klan still vaguely active,
Is it? Probably so. Ever actually seen a klansman? I haven't.
However, I know they were around in the 70s. I know people who did see them.
>we have a
>journalist/tv presenter Jon Ronson who interviews nutters and he followed
>the rump a while back, it seemed like a dying dinosaur. The UK bigots have
>been doing quite well of late, 3 BNP members got onto a council not long
>back and there was a spate of race riots in several northern towns in the
>summer of 91.
I don't really know if Nick Cooper and his party are all that bad. Emphasis on
'I don't know'. From what I gather, it is the National Front and worse than
that, Combat 18, that could be a real problem. The fact that the BNP council
members were freely elected should send a bit of a message to nulabour.
You mention '91. Recently, it has been revealed that their was a serious
black/white race clash in Notting Hill in um, '58, I think it was. It was
quashed by the media and the police. However, it is the original reason for
the Notting Hill carnival to promote racial harmony. (Or should that be the
Notting Hill Carnality, where so many have been stabbed, beaten or robbed or
all of those.)
Now, everytime I saw your handle I thought of the pendulum making marks in the
sawdust in Paris and you went and ruined that today. ;-)
A FACE in the crowd
****
All I know is that to see, and not to speak, would be the great betrayal.
--Enoch Powell
>
>
The Happy Hippy
"FACE" wrote ...
> >Isn't the Klan still vaguely active,
> Is it? Probably so. Ever actually seen a klansman? I haven't.
> However, I know they were around in the 70s. I know people who did see
them.
The KKK seems to have a current web presence at least. I guess there are
still supporters around.
http://www.kukluxklan.net/
http://www.wckkkk.com/
http://www.americanknights.com/
http://www.mysticknights.org/
and many more :-(
DOGGOD
> Mumble, mumble 31 Oct 2002 09:38:52 -0800 mumble, dogg...@hotmail.com
> (DOGGOD) mumble, "Summer's going so hurry, soon it'll be gone" mumble,
> mumble wrote:
>
> >"foucaultisdead" <de...@discourse.com> wrote in message news:<apqsmb$e10$1...@newsg4.svr.pol.co.uk>...
> >> DOGGOD <dogg...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
> >> >
> >> > Says the bitter one whose ideas just aren't popular or persuasive...
> >>
> >> Tell you what chum - most of the group seems to have engaged in argument
> >> with you (bar Oak and probably FACE) so the words pot and kettle spring to
> >> mind.
> >
> >Spring to mind when argument fails...
> >
> LOL! You really are astroundingly shameless at times aren't you?
Well I try to be, Loz.
DOGGOD
Actually it is a rather dated idea, going back to Marx. Foucault's
view was much more complex, leading me to think you haven't actually
read him. The seductive, morally-craven nature of this idea--truth
doesn't exist, only power--has been a large cause of the deceitful,
ruthless nature of communsit regimes and other radical 20th century
ideologies IMO. However Marx never overcame the paradox of how if
truth is determined by power 1) some angry German like him could
possibly write books against 'the System' and 2) if there is only
power and no truth/morality, then how do we really know and who even
cares if the workers are exploited? It is a kind of warped ethics that
renounces the possiblity of an ethics.
So I think this idea has been philosphically and factually
discredited, and only lives on in the feeble minds of 'radical'
college students who will soon abandon it when they put on a shirt and
tie, buy a car, and join the evil System....
>
> > > Next thing you'll be telling us that the free market is a fairground of
> > > opportunity for all (as a good Amerkin citizen you probably even believe
> > > it).
> >
> > Your grabbing at straws...
> >
> And you're putting up such a great argument :oP
And you keep making it so easy...
foucaultisdead
DOGGOD <dogg...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:900b50af.02103...@posting.google.com...
> "foucaultisdead" <de...@discourse.com> wrote in message
<snip>
> > > > More to the point until you realize that ideas and knowledge are
> > intimately
> > > > related to power then you'll continue to spout inane crap.
> > >
> > > According to you! I suppose this fuzzy power theory of yours is also a
> > > handy excuse for weak ideas and uncritical thought.
> > >
> > No, if you turn off your TV and read an occasional book you might
realise
> > it's probably the most commonly held theory of knowledge. Nothing fuzzy
> > about it, and as I am only an occasional student of sociology I can't
really
> > call it mine ;o). Perhaps you should try Kuhn who describes how
paradigm
> > shifts occur, maybe a bit of Gramsci so that you understand how hegemony
> > functions, or you could always fall back on the works of my namesake
> > Foucault to discover the inferences of his discursive theories. Mind
you
> > CNN and the tabloids are a bit easier, less taxing - they can tell you
what
> > to think and save you the bother...uncritical thought, huh. This from a
man
> > who seems to be determined to mimic the US administrations viewpoint.
> > RAOTFLMAO.
>
>
> Actually it is a rather dated idea, going back to Marx.
Rubbish - Marx did a lot of work on the power of capital but understood very
little about power per se (admittedly with the growing complexity of the
world power does now flow along many routes which were not previously open)
Foucault's
> view was much more complex, leading me to think you haven't actually
> read him.
Perhaps you can enlighten us with your vast understanding of the man, I mean
I have only read four of his books (admittedly not in French) and studied
his ideas whilst doing a diploma in sociology. Oh apart from occasionally
reading other analyses of his output in tedious radical academic tomes.
> The seductive, morally-craven nature of this idea--truth
> doesn't exist, only power--has been a large cause of the deceitful,
> ruthless nature of communsit regimes and other radical 20th century
> ideologies IMO.
Well I'll grant you that Foucault was a Maoist, but you are really
simplifying things too much. Foucault doesn't deny that truth exists, his
claim is more that it is socially constructed and mediated by
power/knowledge. Of course some people wish to claim that eternal truths
exist, that is their perogative. But to damn everyone else to accept those
truths as a metanarrative is somewhat blinkered. Times change, discourses
change. How? Power/knowledge!
However Marx never overcame the paradox of how if
> truth is determined by power 1) some angry German like him could
> possibly write books against 'the System' and 2) if there is only
> power and no truth/morality, then how do we really know and who even
> cares if the workers are exploited? It is a kind of warped ethics that
> renounces the possiblity of an ethics.
I repeat Marx made very few (if any) claims about truth and power, his
interest was the power of capital over the proletariat. This seems to have
been his eternal truth. Societies evolve into capitalist societies where
eventually the explotation of the working men lead them to overthrow the
system. Never happened did it. Still it appears all the Marxist stuff I've
come across was wrong - really the guy was po-mo before the fact. Watch out
Baudrillard, here comes Marx. Are you doing the lecture circuit this year?
;o)
>
> So I think this idea has been philosphically and factually
> discredited, and only lives on in the feeble minds of 'radical'
> college students who will soon abandon it when they put on a shirt and
> tie, buy a car, and join the evil System....
>
I think it's pretty clear you've no idea what you're talking about, go back
to watching your goggle box, or at least engage your brain before you try
and have a debate with people who know what they are talking about
foucaultisdead
> On Thu, 31 Oct 2002 22:10:58 -0000, "foucaultisdead" <de...@discourse.com>
in
> uk.current-events.terrorism wrote:
>
> >
> >FACE <AFaceIn...@today.net> wrote in message
> >news:rb63su85lcjns2ju9...@4ax.com...
> >> On Thu, 31 Oct 2002 19:08:26 -0000, "foucaultisdead"
<de...@discourse.com>
<snip>
> >AIUI the main area where integration was strongly
> >resisted was in the deep south,
> Of course that is how you understand it. That is how the sensationalist
media
> wants you to understand it. When is the last time you heard about the
bussing
> riots in Boston, Massachusetts in the 70s? ....For one example.
Can't say I did. However, the question bothering me is 'was the racial
tension more widespread in the south', and why has it been sensationalised
that way?
>
> >maybe I watched In The Heat of the Night too
> >many times :o).
> Or watched PBS, or listened to NPR....
Can't say I've had that pleasure
>
> >Isn't the Klan still vaguely active,
> Is it? Probably so. Ever actually seen a klansman? I haven't.
> However, I know they were around in the 70s. I know people who did see
them.
>
> >we have a
> >journalist/tv presenter Jon Ronson who interviews nutters and he followed
> >the rump a while back, it seemed like a dying dinosaur. The UK bigots
have
> >been doing quite well of late, 3 BNP members got onto a council not long
> >back and there was a spate of race riots in several northern towns in the
> >summer of 91.
> I don't really know if Nick Cooper and his party are all that bad.
Emphasis on
> 'I don't know'. From what I gather, it is the National Front and worse
than
> that, Combat 18, that could be a real problem. The fact that the BNP
council
> members were freely elected should send a bit of a message to nulabour.
I think the NF is pretty much dead now, C18 self-destructed too when a
couple of the leaders decided to kill one of their number - I think it now
exists to milk the WP music machine and act as a focus point for hooligans.
The BNP is much more concerning, they've done quite a good job on making
over the party and appearing respectable. I think there's a documentary on
BBC this Monday which may go some way to discrediting them, an interview
with one of their younger and less 'political game playing' savvy members.
>
> You mention '91. Recently, it has been revealed that their was a serious
> black/white race clash in Notting Hill in um, '58, I think it was. It was
> quashed by the media and the police.
Nope, the Notting Hill Riots were widely covered (there was another riot
around the same time too, I can't remember where though) and were one of the
factors which led to the various Race Relations Acts during the 60s (and
also the formation of the NF towards the end of the decade).
> However, it is the original reason for
> the Notting Hill carnival to promote racial harmony. (Or should that be
the
> Notting Hill Carnality, where so many have been stabbed, beaten or robbed
or
> all of those.)
>
Mostly the carnival is relatively peaceful (esp when you consider the
numbers involved), there was a fatal knifing a couple of years back, but
this year I think the arrests were drug related.
> Now, everytime I saw your handle I thought of the pendulum making marks in
the
> sawdust in Paris and you went and ruined that today. ;-)
>
I'm sorry ;o), I'll amend my sig for you this time to allow your thought to
go unimpeded
(leon) f.i. (very) d.
FACE
uk.current-events.terrorism wrote:
><snip>
>
>> >AIUI the main area where integration was strongly
>> >resisted was in the deep south,
>> Of course that is how you understand it. That is how the sensationalist
>media
>> wants you to understand it. When is the last time you heard about the
>bussing
>> riots in Boston, Massachusetts in the 70s? ....For one example.
>
>Can't say I did. However, the question bothering me is 'was the racial
>tension more widespread in the south', and why has it been sensationalised
>that way?
>>
I think the subject, particularly the last question is beyond the scope of this
forum. I don't know if the forum alt.thought.southern has descended into
usenet uselessness yet, but you might ask those questions there.
What I will say is that if you look at the serious, the violent, the ugly race
riots of the last 30 years you will find that they were not in Southern cities,
they were in places like Los Angeles (Watts) Detroit, St. Louis.
If you listen to the media, you will be told that the ONLY place that there is
racial tension is in the south. And be told it again and again and again until
you are incapable of believing that something like the 1863 draft riots in New
York City could have occurred (5 black men lynched, the black part of town
burned, including the orphanage...Lincoln had to call troops back form
Gettysburg to put it down...)
You say that the NF and C18 or pretty much dead now. From what I read, you'd
think they walk the streets of Bradford and Oldham, stirring up trouble with
those nice pakis. I think it is much the same with the Klan, that is all of
these groups are held up as bogeymen whether they still *really* exist (and I
mean as a power to be reckoned with) or not.
As to Notting Hill, others disagree with you and say that many details were
hushed up. There was quite a lively thread on the goings on in '58 in UKPM. I
am fairly sure that Google Groups could bring it up. Seems it was basically
the idea that "it can't happen here and since it did anyway we will keep people
from knowing the extent of it".
FWIW,
FACE
****
"In any case, sixty two millions was no nearer the truth than 57
millions, or than a hundred and forty-five millions. Very likely
no boots had been produced at all. Likelier still, nobody knew how
many had been produced, much less cared. All one knew was that every
quarter astronomical numbers of boots were produced on paper,
while perhaps half the population of Oceania went barefoot."
-- George Orwell, '1984'.
foucaultisdead
I knew about Watts (I guess that's the most famous one), just didn't want to
show my ignorance of where it was (and hadn't had time to check).
>
> If you listen to the media, you will be told that the ONLY place that
there is
> racial tension is in the south. And be told it again and again and again
until
> you are incapable of believing that something like the 1863 draft riots in
New
> York City could have occurred (5 black men lynched, the black part of town
> burned, including the orphanage...Lincoln had to call troops back form
> Gettysburg to put it down...)
>
No, I can believe that. I'd got the impression that racial tensions in the
north were less pronounced after the depression and that the south took much
longer to catch up. I find this quite interesting, so I'll do some digging.
Thanks for your input. :o)
> You say that the NF and C18 or pretty much dead now. From what I read,
you'd
> think they walk the streets of Bradford and Oldham, stirring up trouble
with
> those nice pakis.
No they can leave that to Nick Griffin's mob (BNP) which they did. I
believe one or two of the football firms were involved [must've dragged them
outta the pubs whilst they were doing a rousing "no surrender to the IRA"
;o)]
I think it is much the same with the Klan, that is all of
> these groups are held up as bogeymen whether they still *really* exist
(and I
> mean as a power to be reckoned with) or not.
>
I don't know. I had a look at Stormfront's webshite and that seems a hotbed
and AIUI the National Alliance (?) have some sway too.
> As to Notting Hill, others disagree with you and say that many details
were
> hushed up. There was quite a lively thread on the goings on in '58 in
UKPM. I
> am fairly sure that Google Groups could bring it up. Seems it was
basically
> the idea that "it can't happen here and since it did anyway we will keep
people
> from knowing the extent of it".
>
Cheers. I've had a look about on the net and it seems that documents have
been released which show that it was a concerted effort by white racists to
oust the West Indians who lived there. It was known about as an event but
was portrayed as race riots, without the blame being laid at any one side.
This is what appears to be new (although again I would say that this was
pretty much common knowledge, just not officially recognized), see
http://www.guardian.co.uk/arts/nottinghillcarnival2002/story/0,12331,780023,
00.html
for the story (you might need to cut and paste the URL if you want to read
the story)
HTH
f.i.d.
FACE
Thanks for the pointer, if the Grauniad says that's what it was then that's
just the last word. Except maybe for an Independent article..... LOL!
My error on Griffin's last name which i gave as Cooper. But on him, I find it
interesting that conservatives can never live down their youthful indiscretions
but in the case of say, Red Jack (Straw), liberals just seem to move on. In
the case of the US, a drunken murderer like Ted Kennedy (Chappaquidick Bridge)
goes on to become the ever darling of the liberal set, as is the case with
Democratic Senator Robert Byrd who *is* a former KKK member.
I am as conservative as you are liberal, although I started adulthood as
liberal...but without going further into that, see tagline which often is
quoted as 'socialist' instead of liberal. :-)
End Of Thread,
Ta, and all that,
FACE
****
"If you're not a liberal at twenty, you have no heart,
If you're not a conservative at forty, you have no brain"
(attributed to Winston Churchill)
****
--the mutability of history is a central tenet of socialism--
foucaultisdead
> "foucaultisdead" <de...@discourse.com> wrote in message <snip>
f.i.d. : Perhaps you should try Kuhn who describes how paradigm shifts
occur, maybe a bit of Gramsci so that you understand how hegemony
functions, or you could always fall back on the works of my namesake
Foucault to discover the inferences of his discursive theories.
Mind
you CNN and the tabloids are a bit easier, less taxing - they can
tell you
what to think and save you the bother...uncritical thought, huh.
This from a man who seems to be determined to mimic the US
administrations
viewpoint. RAOTFLMAO.
DOGGOD : Actually it is a rather dated idea, going back to Marx.
f.i.d. : Rubbish - Marx did a lot of work on the power of capital but
understood very little about power per se (admittedly with the growing
complexity of the world power does now flow along many routes which
were not previously open)
DOGGOD : Foucault's view was much more complex, leading me to think you
haven't actually read him.
f.i.d. : Perhaps you can enlighten us with your vast understanding of the
man, I
mean I have only read four of his books (admittedly not in French)
and
studied his ideas whilst doing a diploma in sociology. Oh apart
from occasionally reading other analyses of his output in
tedious radical academic tomes.
DOGGOD : You're a real legend in your own mind.
Not really, just trying to show that I have some knowledge of the guy's
sociological theories. You, on the other hand, clearly have a fairly
limited understanding of these. I may be wrong, I'm waiting for the
enlightenment I was trying to solicit in my last reply ;o), but I can only
go on the evidence you give. Feel free to correct me.
DOGGOD : The seductive, morally-craven nature of this idea--truth doesn't
exist, only power--has been a large cause of the deceitful, ruthless
nature
of communsit regimes and other radical 20th century ideologies IMO.
f.i.d. : Well I'll grant you that Foucault was a Maoist, but you are really
simplifying things too much. Foucault doesn't deny that truth
exists, his
claim is more that it is socially constructed and mediated by
power/knowledge. Of course some people wish to claim that eternal
truths exist, that is their perogative. But to damn everyone else to accept
those truths as a metanarrative is somewhat blinkered. Times
change,
discourses change. How? Power/knowledge!
DOGGOD : While I disagree with you about Foucault being any kind of
Maoist
OK, I'll accept that. He was called many things throughout his life, he
tended to decline all of them. I think he was at his most potent during the
late 60/early 70s when the claims of Maoist were common (and his
denunciation of the label less so) and you were linking his ideas to
communism, so I granted that label as a concilliatory gesture. What kind of
political animal would you say he was?
Here are some links pointing to this affiliation:
http://www.firstthings.com/ftissues/ft9312/reviews/meyer.html
http://www.whitworth.edu/Academic/Department/Core/Classes/CO250/France/Data/
d_fouca.htm
http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/bmcr/1992/03.02.07.htmlhttp://www.marxmail.org/arc
hives/august98/zizek.htm
http://www.counterpunch.org/pipermail/counterpunch-list/2001-February/006602
.html
DOGGOD : and your claims about Marx,
In what way. Your dismissal means nothing unless you say what it is you
disagree with and why. Perhaps you can point to some work by Marx where he
displays the relativity you seem to want to ascribe to him???
DOGGOD : I am more interested in the issues than biographical trivia (and I
especially am not interested in some long discussion about Foucault with
someone who has his name in their email address!)
I think I addressed the core of the idea of power/knowledge above. This is
the issue you claim to want to deal with, but bibliographical trivia and
grand statements are all that you seem to do... btw is this the same someone
who you claimed to be unable to believe had read the man having read a
cursory signpost to the revolutionary nature of knowledge? ;o)
DOGGOD : You have not addressed the great paradox that this "power
theory" is itself a discourse making truth claims and telling narratives.
Not 'truth claims' really, 'knowledge claims' I accept. This may seem
pedantic but you are the one who is distorting a discussion on 'the free
competition for ideas' being dictated by some inherant persuasiveness into
claims of absolute truth.
DOGGOD : If truth is determined by power, how exactly are they allowed to
write books that expose this power system? If truth is power-determined
then truth seems to lose its value, and in that case you can't
explain to me
why lying, or even perpetuating a power-truth system is wrong. And
indeed, this led to the extreme deceit found under communist
regimes, who believed that anything is permissible because truth
itself was a bourgeois value.
I only claimed that truth is socially constructed and mediated by power
(/knowledge) [as well as earlier arguing that ideas and knowledge are
intimately related to power], neither is a form of determinism. Anyway your
question is easy enough to address. Foucault didn't conceptualize power
like the Marxists as only working top-to-bottom, he saw it as a far more
multi-directional tool. Thus we can resist without contradicting any
pre-set rule of power. This is not to deny that power relations of
domination exist, merely that they are not the only ones. I wouldn't say
that 'truth is power determined', but I'll happily accept that power is an
important factor in constructing truth (although I'd rather refer to
epistemological knowledge). I don't see why this should diminish the value
of knowledge anyway. Tell me how you can establish knowledge of any kind in
the absence of power and discourse. I don't believe you can, but feel free
to show my how this is wrong.
I think that most communist regimes failed because of the bureaucratic
nightmare that was spawned by favouritism and the paranoia (not entirely
unjustified) inherant when living in a world divided by the Iron Curtain.
Not because of some theory of truth which claimed everything was relative.
This seems a mighty strange claim to me. Perhaps you can point to some
analyst who claims this (and is not on the run from the men with the
butterfly net) or otherwise tell me where you chanced upon the inherant
truth of this statement ;o).
<snip>
f.i.d. : I repeat Marx made very few (if any) claims about truth and power,
his
interest was the power of capital over the proletariat.
DOGGOD : I am talking about his philosophy not about specific keywords.
Well you said that his theories were flawed by his (implied) belief that
power determined truth. It's not just a semantic argument to counter with
the fact that his interest was the power of capital (not the relationship
between power and truth, or even power and knowledge). These aren't just
keywords, they are central to his philosophy/sociology.
DOGGOD : This idea is underlying his whole view of the world: material
determines spiritual. Lies and truth are part of a system that perpetuates
its own interests, so lying, cheating, murder, gulags are all justified
because morality is always bourgeois morality and truth is also
bourgeois truth.
Did McCarthy employ you at one time, boy have you got an axe to grind! Marx
would have been horrified to see Trotsky betraying the proletariat at
Krondstat let alone the wholescale perversion of Stalinism. And you want to
blame it on some weird power/truth conspiracy. Get real. Leaders are often
a tad power crazy and that more than anything else led to the atrocities you
mention. Until you can come up with some rational explanation of how you
arrive at your conclusion I'm going to have to invoke Ockham's razor.
f.i.d. : This seems to have been his eternal truth. Societies evolve into
capitalist societies where eventually the explotation of the working
men lead them to overthrow the system. Never happened did it.
Still it appears all the
Marxist stuff I've come across was wrong - really the guy was po-mo
before the fact. Watch out Baudrillard, here comes Marx. Are you
doing the lecture circuit this year? ;o)
DOGGOD : Marx was definitely not po-mo, but classic mo rather.
Well why are you trying to claim that the idea of truth being relative was
one of his ideas?
DOGGOD : His "grand narratives" are exactly what po-mo dislikes. However
po-mo itself is still stuck in the mo structure, so it has its own
problems with "what is truth", including the 'F' guy. (And po-mo
is so out of date that I think it has become something of a bad
word)
Well it will be if you look at it in such a limited fashion. Take po-mo
economy, it's generally agreed that we have moved beyond the modernist
Fordism to a po-mo stage of Post-Fordit production JIT and flexible
specialization. Politically po-mo is associated with globalization and the
way our perception of time and space have been revolutionized (more truths
gome to the wall). Yet apparently I understand this is all old hat :oP.
Po-mo apparently reduces to the infantile statement that power determines
truth, really we should open our eyes and see that the truth is out
there...:o)
DOGGOD : So I think this idea has been philosphically and factually
discredited, and only lives on in the feeble minds of 'radical'
college
students who will soon abandon it when they put on a shirt and tie,
buy a car, and join the evil System....
Another one of your straw men bite the dust, eh. I'll have to visit your
planet sometime, try and get some perspective :o)
> > I think it's pretty clear you've no idea what you're talking about, go
back
> > to watching your goggle box, or at least engage your brain before you
try
> > and have a debate with people who know what they are talking about
>
> ROTFL. Yeah, you might want to print out these articles and tack them
> on your bedroom wall.
No, I'll let them drift in cyberspace and serve to amuse thinkers and
reactionaries.
f.i.d.
foucaultisdead
> > occur, maybe a bit of Gramsci so that you understand how hegemony
> > functions, or you could always fall back on the works of my namesake
> > Foucault to discover the inferences of his discursive theories.
> > Mind you CNN and the tabloids are a bit easier, less taxing - they can
> > tell you what to think and save you the bother...uncritical thought,
huh.
> > This from a man who seems to be determined to mimic the US
> > administrations viewpoint. RAOTFLMAO.
>
>
> just like I could care less for "patriarchy"--remember that one. In
> fact, it is a worrying sign when you need to invent a specialized
> vocabulary....
>
Not ideologies, theories actually. Hegemony (theory of) isn't mine it's
Gramsci's and is highly valued as an explanational tool for how power can
work by impelling consent rather than using force. Both right and left wing
critics use it. You "could care less for patriarchy" huh, or maybe you
couldn't...it's difficult to tell sometimes ;o). I'm amused that you find
the need to invent a specialised language worrying, perhaps we should go
back to grunts, eh?
>
> > DOGGOD : Actually it is a rather dated idea, going back to Marx.
> >
> > f.i.d. : Rubbish - Marx did a lot of work on the power of capital but
> > understood very little about power per se (admittedly with the growing
> > complexity of the world power does now flow along many routes which
> > were not previously open)
> >
> > DOGGOD : Foucault's view was much more complex, leading me to think
> > you haven't actually read him.
> >
> > f.i.d. : Perhaps you can enlighten us with your vast understanding of
the
> > man, I mean I have only read four of his books (admittedly not in
French)
> > and studied his ideas whilst doing a diploma in sociology. Oh apart
> > from occasionally reading other analyses of his output in
> > tedious radical academic tomes.
> >
> > DOGGOD : You're a real legend in your own mind.
> >
> > Not really, just trying to show that I have some knowledge of the guy's
> > sociological theories. You, on the other hand, clearly have a fairly
> > limited understanding of these. I may be wrong, I'm waiting for the
> > enlightenment I was trying to solicit in my last reply ;o), but I can
only
> > go on the evidence you give. Feel free to correct me.
> >
> > DOGGOD : The seductive, morally-craven nature of this idea--truth
> > doesn't exist, only power--has been a large cause of the deceitful,
ruthless
> > nature of communsit regimes and other radical 20th century ideologies
> > IMO.
> >
> > f.i.d. : Well I'll grant you that Foucault was a Maoist, but you are
really
> > simplifying things too much. Foucault doesn't deny that truth
> > exists, his claim is more that it is socially constructed and mediated
by
> > power/knowledge. Of course some people wish to claim that eternal
> > truths exist, that is their perogative. But to damn everyone else to
accept
> > those truths as a metanarrative is somewhat blinkered. Times
> > change, discourses change. How? Power/knowledge!
> >
No comment???
> > DOGGOD : While I disagree with you about Foucault being any kind of
> > Maoist
> >
> > OK, I'll accept that. He was called many things throughout his life, he
> > tended to decline all of them. I think he was at his most potent during
the
> > late 60/early 70s when the claims of Maoist were common (and his
> > denunciation of the label less so) and you were linking his ideas to
> > communism, so I granted that label as a concilliatory gesture. What
kind > > of political animal would you say he was?
>
> An original one. Intelligent people tend to shun dogma, so more credit
> to him.
Ah, so you think he was intelligent now! Yet obviously misled with his
work, perhaps someone should inform the Academies :o)
> Maoist? Where on earth did you get that?
Well being kind of interested by the guy it is something that I have picked
up along the way, although I did provide four links for you to assess as
being independent of my own assessment. Although as I have admitted he was
more complex than that. I think a lot of people had (misguided) Maoist
sympathies at that time.
> No one in their right mind
> would want to associate themselves with little red books and
> mass-starvations.
>
Yet people want to associate themselves with many different and incompatible
political forms which lead to all sorts of aggressive policies [which some
of us here will want to associate ourselves with, eh Mr Doggod ;o)], hence
the need for this newsgroup.
> > Here are some links pointing to this affiliation:
> > http://www.firstthings.com/ftissues/ft9312/reviews/meyer.html
> >
http://www.whitworth.edu/Academic/Department/Core/Classes/CO250/France/Data/
> > d_fouca.htm
> >
http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/bmcr/1992/03.02.07.htmlhttp://www.marxmail.org/arc
> > hives/august98/zizek.htm
> >
http://www.counterpunch.org/pipermail/counterpunch-list/2001-February/006602
> > .html
> > DOGGOD : and your claims about Marx,
> >
> > In what way. Your dismissal means nothing unless you say what it is you
> > disagree with and why. Perhaps you can point to some work by Marx
> > where he displays the relativity you seem to want to ascribe to him???
> >
Still waiting...
> > DOGGOD : I am more interested in the issues than biographical trivia
(and
> > I especially am not interested in some long discussion about Foucault
with
> > someone who has his name in their email address!)
> >
> > I think I addressed the core of the idea of power/knowledge above. This
> > is the issue you claim to want to deal with, but bibliographical trivia
and
> > grand statements are all that you seem to do... btw is this the same
> > someone
> > who you claimed to be unable to believe had read the man having read a
> > cursory signpost to the revolutionary nature of knowledge? ;o)
> >
> > DOGGOD : You have not addressed the great paradox that this "power
> > theory" is itself a discourse making truth claims and telling
narratives.
> >
> > Not 'truth claims' really, 'knowledge claims' I accept. This may seem
> > pedantic but you are the one who is distorting a discussion on 'the free
> > competition for ideas' being dictated by some inherant persuasiveness
into
> > claims of absolute truth.
>
> All truth claims are in a way claims of absolute truth. Relativization
> is a politeness that comes when I am telling someone else.
>
And yet we are still moving away from the field of discussion ideas and
knowledge. Are these really the equivalent of absolute truth for you???
> You look out your window and see a car there. I know a car exists not
> because of discourse. Discourse extends first and foremost from human
> inborn faculties.
>
How was your knowledge of what that object formed then? Where did it derive
its meaning. Of course discourse extends from human facilities, did I ever
claim otherwise! Even the production of the car required discourse. Bear
in mind that Foucauldrian discourse is not just idle chit-chat (like we seem
to be having ;o/) but the whole system of producing meaning and knowledge.
> >I don't believe you can, but feel free
> > to show my how this is wrong.
> > I think that most communist regimes failed because of the bureaucratic
> > nightmare that was spawned by favouritism and the paranoia (not entirely
> > unjustified) inherant when living in a world divided by the Iron
Curtain.
>
> Nonsense. Your history is a mishmash. The Iron Curtain went up long
> after the purges.
>
Oh and I got it wrong about communism going toes up in the late 80s too
then. Did that really happen under Stalin?!? The purges are certainly an
unpleasant part of world history and are compatible with Hitler's equally
unpleasant holocaust but I don't think they killed communism. If they did
it was certainly rewritten ;o)
>
> > Not because of some theory of truth which claimed everything was
relative.
> > This seems a mighty strange claim to me. Perhaps you can point to some
> > analyst who claims this (and is not on the run from the men with the
> > butterfly net) or otherwise tell me where you chanced upon the inherant
> > truth of this statement ;o).
> >
guess what...I'm still waiting.!
> > <snip>
> >
> > f.i.d. : I repeat Marx made very few (if any) claims about truth and
power,
> > his
> > interest was the power of capital over the proletariat.
> >
> > DOGGOD : I am talking about his philosophy not about specific keywords.
> >
> > Well you said that his theories were flawed by his (implied) belief that
> > power determined truth. It's not just a semantic argument to counter
with
> > the fact that his interest was the power of capital (not the
relationship
> > between power and truth, or even power and knowledge). These aren't
just
> > keywords, they are central to his philosophy/sociology.
> >
> > DOGGOD : This idea is underlying his whole view of the world: material
> > determines spiritual. Lies and truth are part of a system that
perpetuates
> > its own interests, so lying, cheating, murder, gulags are all justified
> > because morality is always bourgeois morality and truth is also
> > bourgeois truth.
> >
> > Did McCarthy employ you at one time, boy have you got an axe to grind!
>
> LOL. The axe to grind seems to be that of bitter ex-communists who are
> quite defensive about their crimes and comparisons to Naziism.
Well I'm not aware of any historical revisionism going on in that field.
Maybe I ought to embark on the pointless task of asking for some example, or
do I like Loz just have to take the nonsense you come up with in good faith?
>
> > Marx
> > would have been horrified to see Trotsky betraying the proletariat at
> > Krondstat let alone the wholescale perversion of Stalinism. And you
want to
> > blame it on some weird power/truth conspiracy. Get real. Leaders are
often
> > a tad power crazy and that more than anything else led to the atrocities
you
> > mention. Until you can come up with some rational explanation of how
you
> > arrive at your conclusion I'm going to have to invoke Ockham's razor.
>
> I've lraeady explained why Marxism led to all kinds of crimes. Under
> Marx's idea, truth and morality are determined by the economic regime.
I think that he only really claimed that peoples lives were dictated by the
power of capital (which seems like a fair historical assessment). Perhaps
you can tell me where you have come across this strange idea???
> So all morality and truth are merely boureois means of control. This
> leads to the end-justifies-the-means tactics of communists, including
> assissinations, stealing of land and property, lying, cheating,
> gulags.
I think expropriation was Marx's limit :o), not that he ever saw it happen.
When all morality is renounced, and when truth is merely a
> tool, only unrestrained power reigns and great crimes are virtually
> inevitable.
>
Unfortuneately I think this is how things tend to happen. I don't think
this is perculiar to Marxism. In fact thinking about it I'm pretty damn
sure that Marx was unequivocal about the 'truth' of the exploitation and
alienation of the proletariat. Still it's all relative I suppose :oP (and
I'm just reiterating what I've already said below)
>
> > f.i.d. : This seems to have been his eternal truth. Societies evolve
into
> > capitalist societies where eventually the explotation of the working
> > men lead them to overthrow the system. Never happened did it.
> > Still it appears all the
> > Marxist stuff I've come across was wrong - really the guy was po-mo
> > before the fact. Watch out Baudrillard, here comes Marx. Are you
> > doing the lecture circuit this year? ;o)
> >
> > DOGGOD : Marx was definitely not po-mo, but classic mo rather.
> >
> > Well why are you trying to claim that the idea of truth being relative
was
> > one of his ideas?
>
> Why are you trying to post-modernize Marx, who was a classic
> modernist--and indeed one of the reasons "modernism" has gotten a bad
> name, since it led directly to the gulags.
Sorry I would've thought the irony and sarcasm would've been evident. BTW
you seem to dislike both Modernism and po-mo, life must be a real bind
without the feudal system ;o). I tend to associate modernism more with the
Enlightenment and the values it championed, if you want to associate it with
gulags that's your business (though maybe you ought to allow the
concentration camps in too)
>
> >
> > DOGGOD : His "grand narratives" are exactly what po-mo dislikes.
> > However po-mo itself is still stuck in the mo structure, so it has its
own
> > problems with "what is truth", including the 'F' guy. (And po-mo
> > is so out of date that I think it has become something of a bad
> > word)
> >
> > Well it will be if you look at it in such a limited fashion. Take po-mo
> > economy, it's generally agreed that we have moved beyond the modernist
> > Fordism to a po-mo stage of Post-Fordit production JIT and flexible
> > specialization. Politically po-mo is associated with globalization and
the
> > way our perception of time and space have been revolutionized (more
truths
> > gome to the wall). Yet apparently I understand this is all old hat :oP.
> > Po-mo apparently reduces to the infantile statement that power
determines
> > truth, really we should open our eyes and see that the truth is out
> > there...:o)
>
> Nonsense, po-mo is still trapped in the idea of a grand explanation or
> narrative for explaining the world.
Hang on, up above you claim (correctly I might add) that this is exactly
what po-mo rejects. You're confusing.
> Today, one can see ideas such as
> "globalisation" as being just such a grand narrative which po-mo
> originally was criticizing.
Rubbish, there are many competing theories associated with globalisation,
and many of them are sensible enough to recognise discontinuity and
disparity are part and parcel of the package. Or is this too rigid for
po-mo theory :o\
> I think po-mo was rather shortlived and
> led to some spectacularly bad dissertations and sloppy academics.
>
So what would you have in its place? What is wrong with the genre. Come
on, you must be able to cite a couple of features you object to, or will I
just get relativity and gulags???
> >
> > DOGGOD : So I think this idea has been philosphically and factually
> > discredited, and only lives on in the feeble minds of 'radical'
> > college
> > students who will soon abandon it when they put on a shirt and
tie,
> > buy a car, and join the evil System....
> >
> > Another one of your straw men bite the dust, eh. I'll have to visit
your
> > planet sometime, try and get some perspective :o)
>
> Please do, no bogeymen here.
>
Hmm, I'd ask for directions but I think I'd get very lost :o)
regards from Earth
f.i.d.
arache
> Peter Duck <pd...@zetnet.co.uk> wrote in message
news:<200210290...@zetnet.co.uk>...
> > In message <aphm4v$1l64o$1...@ID-122120.news.dfncis.de>
> > "arache" <arac...@zoom.co.uk> wrote:
> >
> > > ... Dr. Edward W. Said, Professor at Columbia University
> > > in New York, has been awarded the prestigious "Premio
> > > Principe de Asturias" in Oviedo, Spain for his
> > > lifetime literary work on Palestine and the Middle
> > > East. The coveted award was given on September 4, 2002
> > > but little mention of this has appeared in the U.S.
> > > media. ...
> >
> > I'n not surprised at either.
>
> That obscure and politicized Italian are not news? Pushing ones agenda
> as 'news-worthy' no matter how dubious is always a temptation for weak
> politics.
I think that the weak politics here come from not using this chap at least
for publicity. A little medal and a presidential handshake would make
favourable global press and be handy in convincing people that the US isn't
necessarily anti-Palestinian.
cheers,