pynchon-l-digest V2 #1663

[Doug Millison]

rj: "The historical or "factual" component of Black's book is little 
more than a disclosure that the Nazis purchased and used IBM 
equipment, as far as I can make out. I'm not quite sure how this 
makes the company (certainly now, but even then) liable for the war 
crimes which were committed."

It is difficult to judge a book without having read it, isn't it. 
Addressing the issue at hand, we could talk about the concept of 
justice that comes into play, clumsy and faulty though the systems 
that attempt to adjudicate might sometimes be.  When criminal 
activity is legally proven, the criminals (who actively committed the 
criminal acts), can be judged and punished, along with those those 
who aided, abetted, harbored, or otherwise helped or allowed or 
covered up the crimes.  I'll reserve judgement on the book's argument 
until I read it, but the evidence may very well show that IBM shares 
in the guilt for the war crimes and genocide committed by the Nazis 
and their supporters.

I happen to like Charles Hollander's notion of Pynchon naming names 
in his books as a way of pointing to or alluding to historical 
figures who do share in such guilt, similar to the way that Dante put 
people he knew in the various circles of Hell that he described.  I 
understand that a couple of very vocal people on Pynchon-L detest the 
very mention of Hollander's name, but this knee-jerk vilification -- 
to lift a word from another current thread -- doesn't preclude the 
possibility that Hollander is onto something meaningful and perhaps 
even significant regarding the historical-political content of 
Pynchon's works.

rj: "tarring IBM (or, indeed, Bush) with some far-fetched "Nazi past" 
isn't something which seems to have them worried nor does it really 
appear to have cut the mustard with the public at large."

I don't know that the "far-fetched" descriptor is the one I'd choose, 
given that IBM's business relationship from its Nazi customers 
appears to be historical fact.  How will the "public at large" 
respond?  It's safe to say that the "public at large" (American, 
European, etc.) has, generally, shown a high level of disgust and 
outrage when they become aware of the details of war crimes and 
genocide, especially those that involve leaders, institutions, or 
companies that they know and trust.  That was certainly the case in 
the years following WWII, when atrocities of the American wars in 
Korea and Vietnam (revelation of the My Lai massacre by U.S. troops 
in Vietnam trigged widespread outrage in the U.S.) became publicly 
known, and with regard to  the more recent acts of genocide in the 
Balkans and Africa.  If the corporate-controllled media in the U.S. 
ever do permit widespread dissemination of the details of the way 
that U.S.-based corporations profited from the Nazi regime and aided 
and abetted Nazi war crimes, the reaction will be negative -- that 
would explain, at least in part, the intense public relations 
campaigns that these corporations have employed to keep such news and 
information out of the U.S. public eyes, to protect their precious 
brand images from the taint of war crime and genocide.  If the media 
don't succeed in discrediting this book about IBM and the Nazis -- 
and they will try, often by pooh-poohing it the way it has been done 
in this  forum -- IBM will find its brand tarnished, and will suffer 
to some degree as a result as people lose confidence in it through 
its association with Nazi genocide. In my opinion, Pynchon performed 
a great service by showing, in GR, how multinational corporations 
profited from a War they may also have worked to nurture; he predates 
by a generation the current group of social critics and activists who 
protest the impact of global capital and the crimes it commits in its 
pursuit of profits.

At least we seem to have gotten past -- I hope -- the suggestion that 
journalists and other writers -- you could number Pynchon among them, 
of course -- who bring this sort of information to light, who have 
uncovered these connections, are pursuing some sort of "hidden 
agenda" and using the history of Nazi war crimes and genocide for 
base motives. That doesn't appear to be what Pynchon has done, when 
he's included depictions of German genocide in V. and GR, or when he 
focused on the broader European colonization, exploitation, and slave 
trade in Africa, Asia, and North America in M&D. Nor does it appear 
to be the motive of the man who wrote the book about IBM and the 
Nazis -- news reports have said that the author, son of Holocaust 
survivors, was motivated by a desire to let people know the 
historical truth of this internationally known and respected brand 
name company's involvement with the Holocaust, after he saw an IBM 
machine at the U.S.  Holocaust museum (I don't recall the exact name 
of that institution, but it's been reported in a number of articles 
about this book.

Likewise, if historians can demonstrate with credible evidence that 
the Bush family helped the Nazis and profited thereby the way that 
some of these reports suggest, that's certainly something that will 
interest a large fraction of the U.S. public, and I would expect that 
the reaction would be one of disgust.  Again, we run into the problem 
of media outlets controlled by multinational corporations which, 
either by design, or because they share a worldview, suppress such 
information, or actively discredit it and those who bring it forward 
-- it's a common enough phenomena, with examples reported almost 
daily by media critics such as FAIR whose news I pass along to 
Pynchon-L from time to time.

  It's also true that the mass media are known to induce a certain 
degree of atrocity or tragedy fatigue in their audiences, by clubbing 
them with the same small set of sound bites and video clips over and 
over again all the while neglecting to add information, perspective, 
and analysis that would provide context and pave the way for 
understanding of why these things happen and who profits; instead, 
they simply move on to the next Third World tragedy. Eduardo 
Galeano's journalism is instructive in this regard, especially his 
recent book, _Upside Down:  A Primer for the Looking-Glass World_. 
Mike Davis' new book, Late Victorian Holocausts (I mentioned it the 
other day and posted a small excerpt), also appears to address some 
historical roots of this kind of media manipulation that makes it 
difficult for the "public at large" to get anything like a 
comprehensive picture of what's going on and why.

>As far as Pynchon goes, I would imagine that if something like this was his
>tactic or purpose then Wernher von Braun's sponsorship by Disneycorp would
>have been a prime target. The Disney name drips with scorn at every mention
>in Pynchon's texts, but the overwhelming focus there is on the racist
>stereotypes which were peddled as children's cartoons, rather than on the
>very visible "Nazi connection" that those programs which featured von Braun
>might evoke.

As so many of us point out so often here on Pynchon-L, Pynchon 
doesn't often go for the obvious jab, such as highlighting a direct 
connection between von Braun and Disneyland. I could make a credible 
argument, and I wouldn't be the first to do so, that Pynchon does 
"tar" Disney with the Nazi brush -- look again at Slothrop's E Ticket 
Ride through the Mittelwerke, and the way that Pokler's superiors use 
Zwolfkinder, with its clear echoes of Disneyland, as a way of keeping 
him under control and at the service of the Rocket.
-- 
d  o  u  g    m  i  l  l  i  s  o  n  <http://www.online-journalist.com>