re RE Brent apologizes

[Doug Millison]

Brent,

What does "netiquette" have to say about the half-truth you posted about
our off-list exchange?  It would have been better for you to publish the
whole exchange -- I'll be happy to do so if you won't.

The rest of the apology -- which I didn't think you'd want me  to mention,
since it's really not terribly flattering, but I guess you just weren't
aware of how it sounded, or surely you wouldn't have said it -- involved
you saying you were sorry you had insulted only Barbara and me publicly and
hadn't also gone after the people who attack. So, I understood you to say
you are sorry you didn't insult more people besides Barbara and me -- that
was the gist of it, wasn't it?  Again, I'm happy to post all of what you
and I said to each other offlist, no problemo.

If I didn't know better, I'd be tempted to say you de-lurked just to spew a
little slime at Barbara and me, perhaps on behalf of one of the handful of
folks who make that a full-time occupation -- you did mention that you had
heard offlist from another P-lister (gee, I wonder who that might have
been?).  But I'll give you the benefit of the doubt and continue to hope
the rest of 2002 goes better for you, and that you manage to get everthing
you're looking for  on Pynchon-L.

-Doug

P.S.  Barbara, they don't hate you.  They've got a shadow inside that they
don't know how to handle, and they project it onto you, then they can
vilify that shadow in the safety of their anonymous Internet existence --
it's the way litle boys project their bad feelings about themselves onto
the comic book bad guy and feel good when the good guy kicks the bad guy's
ass -- part of that whole myth of redemptive violence that makes people so
willing to project evil onto a symbol like bin Laden and then sit back and
watch the bombs fall on TV and cheer despite the collateral damage -- they
feel something likel that collateral damage inside but they have to project
it elsewhere.  I don't think they like women very much, either, which leads
me to believe they must have really been wounded by women somewhere along
the way.  I think it's our duty to try to be as nice to them as we can,
considering how they seem to be hurting so much that it just leaks out that
way.