what's wrong with being pc?

[Jules Siegel]

Paul Murphy wrote:
> 
> Matt writes:
> 
> >If you want, I'd be more than happy to debate whether this position
> >constitutes "moral relativism", but I think it would probably be much
> >more beneficial to discuss Pynchon while attempting to avoid such
> >blithely ignorant comments such as Jules' re: African women.
> 
> I cleaned out my mailbox so I don't have Jules Siegel's original remarks in
> front of me, but at the time they struck me simply as awkwardly stated and
> requiring further clarification. The point I remember him trying to make,
> getting back to Pynchon, is that V. is an 'erotic' novel, but that the
> erotic dimension is curiously absent in the Mondaugen chapter, perhaps due
> to TRP's acculturated inability to describe the Hereros, erotically,
> physically, or otherwise. Instead of taking up this point (which I think is
> a valid one for further discussion and debate), we get a lot of ad hominem
> posturing.
> 
> Cheers,
> Paul
> 
> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
>                              Paul Murphy
>                        paul.murphy at utoronto.ca
>                  ------------------------------------
>           "Our life is often for stretches at a time a poetic
>       improvisation, and one only has to have a bit of imagination
>                      in order to sense it as such."
>             -F. Nietzsche at 19, letter to mother and sister
>               (cited in D.F. Krell, _Nietzsche: a Novel_)

Posturing is exactly the right word. Thanks for this. I knew there'd be
trouble. What I was trying to say is that different cultures have
different standards of physical beauty. The Herero standard, quite
obviously, was very different from the Anglo-European standard of the
time (and of ours) which worships a historical spectrum defined by Venus
de Milo at one end and the Playboy ideal on the other. I am not saying
this is good or bad. I am saying that it does exist.

Human beings do come in different colors and body shapes. Tribal and
racial groups do exist. The members of a given tribal or racial grouping
do share certain physical characteristics. I do not deprecate a given
body style or color by pointing out that it exists. I am not being
racist by saying that many black women living in Anglo-European
societies have suffered greatly because their body types -- not merely
their skin, but their physical proportions -- do not match the
prevailing calendar-girl iconography of industrial propaganda media such
as Playboy.

[Parenthetically: Before anyone starts screaming about the fact that I
wrote for Playboy, let me point out that the personal cost to me of not
writing for Playboy any more is the disgusting mail I just received
because I can't afford to books and was foolish enough to expose my need
to people I thought were book-lovers and would therefore understand and
empathize with my intellectual hunger. I'm not on any grants. I don't
have a job with a university. I am a blacklisted formerly almost-famous
writer who took very advanced political positions for my time. When the
times changed and Ronald Reagan was elected, I didn't. I urge anyone who
claims to feel as strongly as I did about his or her political positions
to stand as tall as I did and then see what it feels like to be cut down
hard.

I realize that I should edit out that statement. I can imagine the
stupid mail it will arouse, the misinterpretations, the nasty cracks,
the weird attacks. Let it stand. When you lose your status, your
prerogatives, your home, your livelihood, I hope you remember how you
felt when you were spitting on me. Or will you just find someone lower
than you on the street to spit on.]

There are white Americans who share the same body characteristics as the
Hereros, but they are not usually members of a geographically
concentrated population. They too suffer from the same problems of
exclusion, however, that I mentioned briefly. If Pynchon had written
about a white male having a romance with such a white female, I think
you can be sure he would have mentioned it, maybe even ridiculed it. My
point was that it is revealing that he does not do so in the Herero
sequence. Instead of arguing about my supposed lack of discretion in
alluding to the difference in body types, why not look at the point I'm
making?

I think because it's a lot easier to start duck-squawking, than it is to
carry on a reasoned examination. Political correctness should deal with
the courtesies that we owe each other as human beings, not be used to
stifle free discussion of the cultural issues that result from our
physical differences as human beings. Is Pynchon being politically
correct by avoiding the cultural confrontation implicit in the romance
of a Herero woman and a 19th Century white male? Or is he just writing a
kind of pornography masquerading as a criticism of the German racial
cleansing practises that eventually lead to the murder of so many
people?

Why do are so many of you supposedly politically correct bullies so
often cruel, unfair and generally lacking in the normal courtesies of
civilized people when expressing your opinions? Do you really wonder why
Thomas Pynchon doesn't expose himself to this? You are the reason he
keeps to himself and write his books and ignores all the malicious
hypocrites who think that they have a God-given right to vent their
wretched hostility on anyone brave enough to present himself or herself
as a target. 
-- 
Jules Siegel http://www.caribe.net.mx/siegel/jsiegel.htm
Mail: Apdo. 1764 Cancun QR 77501 Mexico
Street: Green 16 Paseo Pok-Ta-Pok Zona Hotelera Cancun QR 77500 Mexico
Tel: 011-52-98 87-49-18 Fax 87-49-13 E-mail: jsiegel at mail.caribe.net.mx