From: Michael M. Butler (mmb@spies.com)
Date: Wed May 28 2003 - 20:53:09 MDT
The Last Poets had an interesting line in one of their pieces:
"Speak not of 'revolution' until you are willing to eat rats to survive."
This bespeaks the sheaf of issues related to willful ongoing resistance to
tyranny. It's only an image, of course, since one might be eating rats and
still not involve oneself in revolution. The question they were pointing to
is, I think, "Just how serious *are* you?"
Points to ponder:
1) (a) Just what is tyranny? (b) Just what is appropriate response to it?
2) "Erst kommt die Fressen, dann die Moral." (That's loosely translated as
"Grub first, then morals" [some say '...then ethics']--substitute "liberty"
for "morals" and the point should be clear. "Fressen" means "eat the way an
animal does", by the way; I have always taken the saying to connote a kind
of frantic starved desperation. And the way to bet is that most people,
most of the time, will act in a way consistent with this epigram.)
3) The winning side is the one which perseveres/gives up last (in a fair
fight, whatever that is).
4) It is easy to give up.
5) It is easy to tell yourself you didn't really lose when you gave up (Is
this "internalized oppression", or "realism"?).
6) Guns don't make winning (or even resistance) a sure thing.
7) The only sure thing is that someday you will die.
(modulo LE hypotech plus a universe that permit an alternative)
Are any of these things (particularly points 3-6) surprising? Why do some
people act as if they are?
MMB
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.5 : Wed May 28 2003 - 21:04:15 MDT