Re: WE/nosotros/us

Honestly, the single line uttered in the context of this discussion
communicated that you were speaking for the list (Scottie excepted, I
assume), so the word "everyone" here would be limited to "everyone
reading the conversation."

I'd agree, though, that politics is the arena for the struggle of human
nature in society. This doesn't necessarily have to be governmental;
since we also talk about office politics and departmental politics, we
(meaning speakers of English in the US) commonly talk about the dynamic
of virtually any group using the word "politics."

"They" did not say "to generalize is to be an idiot," Blake did :). But
you're inappropriately applying the dictum, since what's under
discussion is the definition of a specific word. I don't know if you
read on down through my response to Scottie, but I agreed with him that
if we used the word "politics" to mean everything it starts to mean
nothing (part of my thinking about the word "poetry," actually). I said
I tried to avoid this by making my point explicit -- that there's a
political ramification to texts and our existence in the world, and that
we're being naive if we think there isn't.

I would say that we can act unselfishly in politics -- but I think what
very often happens is that we, even as individuals, are members of a
number of different groups whose interests can sometimes conflict, so we
choose the interests of one of the groups we belong to over the
interests of another. This isn't intended to exclude the possibility of
unselfishness, though. When Bartolomeo de las Casas wrote to the Pope
protesting the cruel treatment of the Indians by the Spaniards, I'm
pretty sure he was simply upset by the human suffering he witnessed.

Jim

Yocum Daniel GS 21 CES/CEOE wrote:

>
>
> We does not mean everyone Jim just two or more. Fricking? I am
> descendant from hidalgo's, you know, a 'son of something'. So,
> political is acting in society selfishly or can it also be
> selflessly also or is that impossible for the Marx minded? It
> seems that when we apply the word political to every act or deed
> we are just using it to describe the old fashioned struggle of
> human nature. I would think that if we left it for describing
> more formal governmental interaction the word would be much more
> specific, you know what 'they' say "To generalize is to be an
> idiot." So which class of people are pushing for the
> politicization of the allegiances that are reflected in our language?
> Daniel
>

-
* Unsubscribing? Mail majordomo@roughdraft.org with the message
* UNSUBSCRIBE BANANAFISH
Received on Tue Jul 29 13:56:09 2003