From: Lee Corbin (lcorbin@tsoft.com)
Date: Wed Apr 09 2003 - 20:49:55 MDT
Ron writes
> > > I think determining which is the best ESS is
> > > what we need to be discussing. However, I do
> > > want to emphasize that I am looking at an
> > > evolutionary society not a static one. The
> > > problem with the southern middle class society
> > > was that in many ways it was too static.
I wrote
> > Why would you say so? Was (or is) it likely to be too
> > unaccepting of new ideas, have too little emphasis on
> > education, or what?
>
> The south IMHO spent too much time on spilt milk and maintaining
> supremacy over the black race. I am in an odd position in that I am a
> southerner whose immediate ancestors of that time fought for Mr. Lincoln.
> Never the less that is my observation.
> I find myself welcoming the possibility of discussing the ideas of
> Gatto but unwilling to try to immediately prescribe what a Gatto like society
> would be like. Even a thorough statement on my part would tend to draw
> battle lines -- lines that I don't intend.
> I am much taken by Gatto's report on the dialectic method of the
> Puritans. They did not build their society based on experts opinions or on
> the dictates of the powerful. There is no doubt in my mind that through the
> dialectic they made some horrible mistakes. But equally they corrected those
> errors (IMO) and became very progressive.
> As our future society will be determined through trial and error
> perhaps a good way to start would be in a discussion of that particular
> dialectic method?
Well, there was just the beginning of a discussion of Gatto
last summer that you may wish to peruse.
http://forum.javien.com/XMLmessage.php?id=id::WjkkGGAr-SgVy-VSZT-Jh5s-ZxorRlQUHEEc
Michael Wiik posted an URL to Gatto's book. It all sounded a little
like "conspiracy theory" talk to me, that is, with rather vague
over-generalizations, and identifications of themes and links
that are more speculative than factual, and which also seem to defy
the wisdom in "Never attribute to malice what may simply be stupidity..."
and so on.
But I could be wrong. And I wouldn't mind re-examining Gatto's
theses.
Lee
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.5 : Wed Apr 09 2003 - 20:58:51 MDT