one more in meta-mode RE: Pynchon-L history...

[Doug Millison]

"Mittelwerke" got laughs, too.  Whether he/she did anything to enrich
Pynchon-L as a forum that the founders of the list felt comfortable using is
another question, and one that's easily answered -- those Pynchon scholars
are nowhere in view. MalignD's history of insulting authors of Pynchon Notes
articles might have something to do with that; "jbor's" campaign against
Hollander (with able assistance from running dog "David Morris") would be
another fine example. Yes, MalignD and "jbor" can be entertaining  --
they've achieved some exceptional contortions of logic and argument in the
course of their knee-jerk disagreements with everything I've posted (or with
everything some others have posted -- "jbor's" predictable opposition to
each post or point made by Dave Monroe or Terrance, for example), and quite
a few of us have enjoyed big yukks in our off-list correspondence in that
regard, watching them tie themselves in knots just for the sake of an insult
(Wiener suffered the same weakness); you have to wonder what they might
accomplish if they spent that energy putting out something constructive (and
we see hints of that in Malign's positive contribution today).  But I do
find rather pathetic the notion that somebody who goes around kicking people
(or trying to -- those blows don't connect very well in cyberspace, after
all) would claim after the fact that the kickee invited the blow. In another
arena, that could be diagnosed as sociopathic (violent criminals so often
blame their victims-- "she asked for it," the mentality that Pynchon
critiques at such a deep level in the section of V. currently under
discussion, at least nominally, here on Pynchon-L), but here it's just
run-of-the-mill Internet flamebaiting, laughable really -- there's a manual
online somewhere that shows a few standard techniques for tripping up verbal
opponents or embarrassing them, which gimmicks we see dusted off regularly
here by the folks who try to start the arguments. Encountering the rare
occasions when we see these voices ("MalignD", "jbor")  coming up with
something that actually has to do with Pynchon, instead of simply calling
somebody else "crazy" or "insane" because of what they've posted or
interlarding such insults in tangled skeins of straw-man revisions, leads me
to believe that that it's probably deliberate flamebaiting on their part and
to see that they are capable of exhibiting a type of fine-grained control
over the mode of discourse that appears beyond the capacity of a lackey like
"David Morris", for example, who seems compelled to go for the crude insult
everytime, lacking both insight and wit. That the flamebaiting comes to
prevail over the construction contributions over time leads one back to the
conclusion that they are, in the final analysis, out to tear down rather
than build up -- the proof is in the pudding, of course, so show us what
you're made of is my invitation. 

Cordially,
Doug

Michael Baum:
Actually, over the years, I've generally found MalignD rather
entertaining. Mad as a hatter, yes, but interesting.