What's wrong with Pynchon-L?

[Doug Millison]

Yes, there used to be lots of spirited disagreements and even 
arguments on the P-list.  But that was generally because people were 
putting forward ideas and suggestions that they were trying to 
support, demonstrate, defend -- quite different from the non-stop 
deconstructive mode of discourse that has come to the fore, where no 
matter what anybody says a few of the same participants just pick it 
apart and turn it upside down, never holding any identifiable 
position, constantly shifting and slipping and sliding, sparking 
flames and fanning them all the while.  An example of PoMo discourse 
in action, perhaps, and sometimes even marginally entertaining, but 
it's no way to create community or foster dialogue, especially when 
as practiced by these few individuals here the deconstruction is 
interlaced with a large and steady doses of ad hominem attack. That's 
the big change I see over the past four years -- from identifiable 
personalities who argued (sometimes vehemently) from relatively 
consistent points of view, and who got to know each other (on and 
off-list, sometimes meeting in person) well enough to joke and play 
(sometimes quite delightfully), to the current state of affairs where 
anonymous posters spew at random and steadily tear apart instead of 
building up.  Matt Wiener of course made a speciality of picking 
fights just for the sake of picking them and consistently hitting hot 
button issues, and his behavior seemed outrageous at the time because 
he was the only person doing that while most of the other 
participants were maintaining the spirited and largely friendly 
conversation -- Wiener wouldn't have a chance to stand out in this 
crowd, now, however, because the style of discourse with which he 
disrupted Pynchon-L has become the standard mode of Pynchon-L's two 
most frequent and most obnoxious participants (and I'm not talking 
about Dave Monroe and Terrance).

Meanwhile, all of the serious Pynchon scholars have departed, and 
Pynchon-L no longer serves the minimal professional function it once 
served, of letting the Pynchon academic community know about things 
more quickly than Pynchon Notes or other academic journals and 
meetings. I've continued to monitor the list in order to pass along 
the occasional tid-bit that will interest a Pynchon scholar friend of 
mine who no longer has time to read the list, and I've sent along 
exactly one item (the url to the M&D review that Otto posted not long 
ago) in nearly 2 months. Nobody here makes the effort to notify the 
list of new Pynchon-related academic publications, events, 
conferences, etc.

The list is what people make of it of course, and will always reflect 
the contributions of the folks who post most frequently.  Dave Monroe 
and Terrance post in the spirit of the old Pynchon-L, they remind me 
a lot of Andrew Dinn in terms of volume and in their spirit of 
offering up material that can stimulate and feed conversation,and 
they stick to recognizeable positions the way he did.  A few others 
manage to interact in the same vein.  The deconstructors and 
in-your-face-eat-shit-and-die-motherfucker crowd (if it is indeed a 
crowd and not a single wacko posting under multiple names) know who 
they are, and I think the rest of us identify them easily enough, too 
-- they are the ones who are posting as often as Monroe and Terrance, 
and who are either telling people to fuck off or who snipe at the 
substantial posts with the death of ten thousand cuts.

Jeremy:
"I am, however, hesitant to ascribe the change in the mood to the 
infighting of late: for it seems to me like in the old, fun days 
there was quite a bit of same, and with some of the same participants 
too. "

P.S.  Save your breath, "Morris" -- I already know you think I'm an 
asshole, and I could care less.  Save your breath, 
"rj/jbor/slothrop666/MalignD/etc.", I know that you're going to flip 
around whatever I say and assert that I've actually said the opposite.
-- 
d  o  u  g    m  i  l  l  i  s  o  n  <http://www.online-journalist.com>