JDS and Zen / Atrocities that you have not heard of,
Andrew Charles Kennis (holden@escape.com)
Tue, 16 Jun 1998 14:07:40 -0400 (EDT)
On Mon, 15 Jun 1998, Camille Scaysbrook wrote:
>
>
> > which Salinger work do any of you feel most depicts his obvious
> > sympathies for Eastern philosophical thinking? I was thinking maybe
> > 'Teddy' did in 'Nine Stories', but I'd be interested to find out what
> > other people thought.
>
> Hmmm ... my opinion on this changes all the time. Sometimes he marries
> the Zen `aesthetic' as well as the philosophy, sometimes these things
> are separate and sometimes the Zen is somewhat sublimated, which is
> what I like best; not necessarily the ones where Zen is a named theme. For
> example. I tend to dislike `Teddy' a little because the message is too
> `cut and paste' and didactic. I prefer it when it's a nameless, ineffable
> part of the journey, as in TCIR. So to name a story in which the aesthetic
> - i.e. a short, perfect utterance - and the philosophy are married ...
> hmm. That's tricky. I guess TCIR is to me the closest to that - ironic
> given it's Salinger's *longest* utterance (but within the context of
> novels is fairly short and compact) ... I'll have to think about this one
> though.
>
Ahhhh, so ya like it when it's more insidious of a theme, eh? Hmmmm.
Well, the thing about insidious themes, however, is that they're kinda
hard to like realize they're even there. So, out of curiousity, how and
when do you think Zen is a theme at all in CITR? I certainly think it is
during various points in the novel as well, but it's harder for me to put
my finger on exactly what scenes I think it is most present............
....interested to hear which ones you think it is exemplified in.
Cool post, by the way, on Time Magazine. I do not remember what exactly I
liked most about what you said, but it was right on the money, I know
that much.
Ohhhhhhhhh, as long as I'm talking about media, I just KNOW that if
everybody hasn't ALREADY checkt out Malc's new online zine that he worked
tirelessly to get off the ground (and now finally is), that they are
going to soon, RIGHT all? =)
Ok, now for some political bullshit............
On Sat, 13 Jun 1998, Robert Morris wrote:
> Kudos Jim.
>
> Robert
> >
> > 2. Capitalism an oppressive system?
Uhhhhhhh, ya. By nature, hierarchal societies, and even more obvious
within societies built on 'competition', they're inherently is a class
of people who get fuct. After all, when you have a game, they're
inevitably is losers. God knows many have 'lost' thanks to capitalism,
and millions more are losing as we speak.
> > More people have died in the name of Marx in the last 100 years than in
> > the name of Christ in the last 2000. Stalin, Lenin (estimates range up
> > to 60 million soviets under these guys), Pol Pot....and what was that
> > raised by students in Tianamen Square? A statue of Liberty? Travel a
> > bit before you talk about Marxism....
> >
Uhhhhh, travel a bit before I talk about Marxism?! God knows how ya know
where I've been and where the people I've come into significant contact
have been, but I'll try and address some issues you raise with your post.
I'm so glad you brought up Stalin and Lenin though, because now's the
time where I can state clearly that I ain't no god foresaken
Marxist-Leninist thinker and I am sure as hell not a Stalinist or Maoist.
Indeed, the tragedies that occurred in both empires (and are still
happening now, in China and other so called 'communist' nations) are
nothing but appaling to myself and a lot of others who have similar
ideological sympthies as me. However, the difference between us and you
two (Robert and Jim), is that we know about and refuse to ignore ongoing
atrocities (despite very intense efforts by mainstream media to minimize or
completely refuse to cover) committed by us (i.e. our own capitalist /
imperialist / oppressive nation).
For instance, we know about, care about, and act against the ongoing
genocidal crimes committed by the U.$. of AmeriKKKa and Indonesia, against
the peaceful and indigenous inhabitants of East Timor. Hardly anybody has
heard of East Timor, but that doesn't change the fact that proportionally
speaking, they have had more of their own people killed than any other
genocide this century (check http://www.etan.org , a 1/4th have been
wiped out). The U.$. has continually funded, armed, and trained Indonesian
soldiers who did the dirty work of this genocide for 20 years now, and
AmeriKKKan multinationals who get tarriff free use of East Timor's off
shore oil are loving every minute of it (and so is Senator Moynihan,
conventionally thought of as a compassionate 'liberal', who brags about
the amount of Timorese killed in initial attacks in his memoirs).
Indonesia, which is basically the colonial mother country here, doesn't
mind turning East Timor into a island for cash crop usage either, while
the indigenous Timorese suffer in what amounts to concentration camps.
You brought up Cambodia in your post, I couldn't have been happier that
you did as much. It's yet another example of an atrocity that AmeriKKKans
too often do not realize our responsibility in that affair. The secret
Nixon administration's bombings between '69-'75, right before Pol Pot
came to power, killed over 600,000 civilians, according to CIA estimates*
at least (which are probably conservative, as you may imagine). The sheer
traumatic conditions resulting from the aftermath of the bombings, have
been estimated to have killed over a million other innocent Cambodians.
Is it any wonder then, that a terror such as Pol Pot came to power, in
the traumatic conditions that the U.$. left Cambodia in? Of course
though, Marx'ist thinking is surely more responsible for the existence of
Pol Pot's terrible reign though, according to both of yours McCarthy'ist
reactionary thinking. Uhhhhhhhhhhhhhh, ya.
Finally, we are under no illusion that even within our own 'free'
society (pfffft!) that no political repression exists. It is well
documented that the U.$. continues to imprison over 125 political
prisoners, including several that have garnered support from heads of
state all over the world for their release (e.g. Leonard Peltier and
ESPECIALLY Mumia Abdul-Jamal).
**** To give you some great sources supporting many of the postulates ****
**** I've put forward, check these sites out: ****
Edward Herman on 'Pol Pot And Kissinger: On war criminality and impunity'
http://www.zmag.org/zmag/articles/hermansept97.htm
* Quote from Edward Herman's article:
The Times, along with everybody else in the mainstream media, also
fails to mention that before Pol Pot came to power in 1975, the United
States had devastated Cambodia for the first half of what a Finnish
government*s study referred to as a *decade* of genocide (not just the
four years of Pol Pot*s rule, 1975-78). The *secret bombing* of Cambodia
by the Nixon-Kissinger gang may have killed as many Cambodians as were
executed by the Khmer Rouge and surely contributed to the ferocity of
Khmer Rouge behavior toward the urban elite and citizenry whose leaders
had allied themselves with the foreign terrorists.
The U.S.-imposed holocaust was a *sideshow* to the Vietnam War, the
United States bombing Cambodia heavily by 1969, helping organize the
overthrow of Sihanouk in 1970, and in collaboration with its puppet Saigon
government making period incursions into Cambodia in the 1960s and later.
*U.S. B-52s pounded Cambodia for 160 consecutive days [in 1973], dropping
more than 240,000 short tons of bombs on rice fields, water buffalo,
villages (particularly along the Mekong River) and on such troop
positions as the guerrillas might maintain,* a tonnage that *represents
50 percent more than the conventional explosives dropped on Japan during
World War II*. This *constant indiscriminate bombing* was of course
carried out against a peasant society with no airforce or ground
defenses. The Finnish government study estimates that 600,000 people died
in this first phase, with 2 million refugees produced. Michael Vickerey
estimated 500,000 killed in phase one.
Noam Chomsky on East Timor @:
http://www.worldmedia.com/archive/audio/9511timor.html
U.$. of AmeriKKKa hypocrisy in regards to human rights @:
http://www.lol.shareworld.com/ZMag/articles/chomud.htm
Matthew Jardine on an embassy takeover in Indonesia @:
http://www.zmag.org/zmag/articles/jan94jardine.htm
Some Truths and Myths about Free Market Rhetoric:
http://www.worldmedia.com/archive/articles/loot9401-free-market.html
The East Timor Action Network!!!!
http://www.etan.org
Always yours in solidarity,
--AK