Pynchon, The War, and Doug. What else is there?

[The Great Quail]

This post contains actual Pynchon content!

Doug writes,

>But I do have access to press reports from a variety of sources
>-- you could, too, if you cared to expose yourself to something besides
>Bush Administration propaganda.

Doug, really, trust me --it's more difficult for members of this List 
to avoid being exposed to Leftist propaganda! You certainly pass 
along enough alternative news articles. (For which I am genuinely 
thankful.) But you can't make the case that anyone here is not 
exposed to alternative news. The fact is, some people simple disagree 
with some of the opinions expressed therein; or perhaps they accept 
the fact that War is Bad and yet still support it for a various 
number of reasons. You seem to under the impression that every 
intelligent and emotional being, when exposed to a few articles from 
ZNet and www.chomskycandonowrong.com, *must* agree with your stance, 
or they are simply a dupe of the Bush propaganda machine.

For instance,

I for one support the military response my country is carrying out. 
This does not mean, however, that I am happy about it. It is grim and 
sad, and in no way am I "drooling" over corpses or revelling in 
bloodshed, as Doug implies. I hate the fact that innocent civilians 
have died, and that more will die; I am disappointed in the fact the 
food drops are inadequate and perhaps even counterproductive. I feel 
disgust at the way the large TV-media corporations have suddenly 
become flag waving champions of the USA, and I am very afraid that 
certain elements of our government will use terrorism as an excuse to 
curtain our rights to an unreasonable degree. I also understand that 
our support of repressive regimes (as opposed to all those Islamic 
democracies just waiting in the wings?) and our thirst for oil have 
caused us to take morally questionable, and even occasionally 
repulsive, stances regarding the Middle East. So Doug, Barbara, 
Henry, and so on; please do not think I am uninformed our some 
cyclops-eyed crusader; that will only allow you to discount what I am 
really saying.

The fact is, this is not the black-and-white complex situation that 
Doug, with all his hysteria and name-calling, sees it to be. I for 
one do not believe that diplomacy and appeasement will work against 
the Jihad movement. The fact that they have been escalating their 
campaign for years, the fact that they have ulterior political 
motives, the fact that they are fucking religious fanatics, the 
nature of the region's political history; numerous reasons inform my 
decision that appeasement, diplomacy, and even reason will fail, 
resulting on only more dead Americans (and others) while we wait for 
some sea-change to occur in radical Islamic politics. I feel that 
military action is the best way to break the momentum and resources 
the Jihad movement has been establishing for decades. (What were we 
going to do with the Taliban? Economic sanctions until they gave us 
bin Laden, which would starve even more innocent Afghanis? Or wait 
until they invaded Poland?)

My decision brings me a great degree of personal pain. The war 
sickens me. I have no doubt the increased levels of famine are 
killing children, or that innocents have been bombed, or that kids 
may even run into a mine-field for a stupid MRE. And yet that is the 
horrible, terrible cost of war; and I do believe we are trying to 
minimize it as best we can, even while the Jihad is exploiting it. I 
feel awful for Afghanistan and their history. I hope against hope 
that after we have harmed them, we will be able to truly help them. 
Maybe that is a lie I tell myself, in my own naivety; something that 
helps me swallow the bitter pill and balances the more aggressive, 
punishing end of the equation. But reconstruction is a possibility, 
if we are wise and allow the UN to assist.

But back to Doug, and through him, Pynchon. I have said before that I 
despise the way Inquisitor Doug constantly beats his opponents over 
the head with his interpretation of Pynchon. The Pynchon *I* read is 
more ambiguous, more morally conflicted. The youthful Pynchon of 
Gravity's Rainbow deplored the War for many reasons, but seemed to 
accept that the Germans needed to be stopped. The veteran Pynchon I 
read uses military figures as complex characters in most of his 
books. The postmodern Pynchon deplores Western imperialism and 
colonialism, but also shows that "the Other" have their own 
tendencies towards violence and selfish gains. The moral Pynchon 
celebrates Dixon's use of force to stop a beating. The mature Pynchon 
of Vineland shows us that the Left can be as hollow as the Right, and 
shows us that the real "Them" are inside us all, that each heart is a 
battleground, and the world we live in stains all our hands. It is 
this Foucaultian reading of power that attracts me to Pynchon, and 
dissuades me from the black-and-white interpretation that Doug would 
put forth as some sort of acid test.

And by the way, I have little doubt that Pynchon deplores this war, 
and probably has an opinion closer to Doug's. Which is fine with me. 
I can still learn a lot from his books, even from the parts I 
disagree with.

But Doug, back to Doug! A few quibbles:

>Take, "Morris" for example, a great example of the P-list as a place to
>spew obscenity and provoke argument with insult, along with our darling
>Malign

I have wanted to ask this for a while, Doug -- why do you write 
"Morris" like that, in quotes? And also, I think MalignD's posts 
lately have been quite reasonable.

>rj/jbor/rjackson

And that -- so what? He's made no effort to pretend he is three 
people, he's just changed the way he presents his email address. Your 
constant use of this weird Trinity to describe him is childish and 
aggravating.

>Pynchon-L seems to be a place where "Morris" can come home after
>too many drinks (that's often his excuse, isn't it) and crow about the
>bombing and tell anybody he wants to to get fucked, probably because his
>wife and his boss have his balls in such a clamp he's got no place else to
>spew when he's drunk.

And another thing -- I for one am getting sick of your newest 
annoyance, which is constantly claiming that your opponents are using 
the P-List as an outlet for a frustrated off-list life. Can't you see 
how condescending and irritating that is?

--Quail
-- 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The Great Quail, Keeper of the Libyrinth:
http://www.TheModernWord.com

Better hope deferred than none. Up to a point. Till the heart starts to sicken.
Company too up to a point. Better a sick heart than none. Till it 
starts to break.
So speaking of himself he concludes for the time being,
For the time being leave it at that.
      --Samuel Beckett, "Company"