Form Letter

[Paul Mackin]

Dave Monroe wrote:

> By "(self-)reflexive/self-referential final sentence"
> I meant, er, "(self-)reflexive/self-referential final
> sentence."  The sentence, not its author.  Nothing
> personal intended towards the latter.  But "enshrouded
> in obfuscatory pap and/or rancour in order to give
> them a fool's gold glimmer of authoritativeness" IS
> rather, well, "enshrouded in obfuscatory pap and/or
> rancour in order to give [it] a fool's gold glimmer of
> authoritativeness."

You'll have to admit however that the reflexivity adds an efficacy (and
force) to the sentence that it would otherwise not have. This is because
it indicates, for all to see, that the speaker recognizes the unyielding
nature of the subject matter he is addressing. Which brings us to

> The passage cited is not only NOT
> uncharacteristic of frequent bouts of "obfuscatory pap
> and/or rancour" 'round these parts, on the part of
> several posters on any given end of any given dispute,
>
> but is a prime example of what it ostensibly condemns,
> "accus[ing some]one else of what [it it]self is
> invariably guilty of."

Recognition of the invariability of this sort of thing strikes me as a
definition of Postmodernism that is better than most.

P.