MDDM Dixon's act of violence
jbor
jbor at bigpond.com
Sun Mar 10 15:51:49 CST 2002
Fair enough. Suffice it to say, then, that far from endorsing a "pacifism at
any cost" morality the text at the point in question appears to advocate
quite the opposite, and a far more realistic, response to injustice and
atrocity.
By the way, I was speaking retrospectively with the example in my last
sentence. My view on "the current situation" (NP though that topic certainly
is at this point in time) is that responsibility for both the peace-keeping
and military initiatives in Afghanistan should now pass to the U.N. rather
than the U.S. And that it is also high time that an impartial but firm hand
from outside the conflict is brought in to put a halt to the ongoing
"retaliatory" killings and strife in the Middle East.
best
on 11/3/02 8:28 AM, Thomas Eckhardt at thomas.eckhardt at uni-bonn.de wrote:
> All agreed, except for the last sentence in which you - like Doug - attempt to
> use the text in order to support your own view of the current political
> situation. In both cases this doesn't work, IMHO.
>
> Thomas
>
>> In the episode with the slave-driver, for example, Pynchon acknowledges
>> through his portrayal of Dixon's "act" that the only way to begin to achieve
>> "justice" in certain extreme situations of injustice and violence is to
>> neutralise the adversary's potential to do violence through an initial act of
>> brute force. Just as with the international alliance
>> against terrorism and the military assault on al Qaeda and the Taliban.
>
More information about the Pynchon-l
mailing list