a political being

    '... simply that being present in the world aligns your interests
    with some people and against others -- hence, you're a political
    being ...'

    I don’t have any doubt that, had I been a Jew living in Germany
    in 1935, I should have been deeply ‘politicised’ - & perhaps
    eventually dead.

    Short of that kind of extremity, though, might it not be that some
    of us are so sceptical of ‘group action’ that our instinct is firstly
    to withhold our participation & secondly to point cynically to what
    is almost invariably a failed or corrupted outcome.
    The brave dawn of 1917 leads to the Gulag, the Freedom Marches
    to all those black corpses in Vietnam. And so on & so bloody on.

    Although in my last post I disclaimed allegiance to either Jesus
    or Sigmund, I remain sufficiently conditioned to think the ‘real’
    trouble, the ‘real’ pain can only be effectively tackled from ‘within’.
    Seductive & all as it is to blame ‘them.'

    Mind you, I was under the impression that ‘politicisation’ had some
    connection with the kind of thing John refers to as the ‘rhetorics
    of power’– & that you could observe it as close to home as in
    the bullying of homosexuals or a mere battle over a school timetable.
    In your experience, are these conflicts resolved – & I mean resolved,
    not ‘settled’ – by decisions of the groups involved?
    Or by the individuals reappraising themselves?

    Scottie B.

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Received on Tue Jul 29 03:28:30 2003