SLSL Intro A Couple-Three Bonzos

[tyro tortoise]

--- MalignD at aol.com wrote:
> 
> <<"It may yet turn out that racial differences are
> not as basic as questions 
> of money and power, but have served those who
> deplore them most, in keeping 
> us divided and so relatively poor and powerless.">>
> 
> I too found this the most interesting sentence in
> the Intro and spent some 
> time thinking about what was being said.  I think it
> can be read two ways 
> but, as they are mutually exclusive, only one way or
> the other.  "... served 
> those who deplore them most ..." can be read as
> meaning "serve the interests 
> of those who deplore them most" which seems to me a
> deeply cynical statement 
> and, by that, wildly provocative. 

Yes, because if this is how we are to read him, P is
saying that racial differences have served a useful
purpose, often in the interest of those who deplore
racial differences most. Who are those who deplore
racial difference most? Not blacks. Not other racial
minorities. Not poor whites. Not working class and 
blue colors. Not labor.  Not right-wing conservatives.
 It has to be a powerful elite who divide us while
deploring racial differences. 

THEY? THEM? Jesuits? The inventors of the invisible
force field? 

 It can also be
> read to mean "serves to 
> keep divided those who deplore them most"; i.e.,
> works against the interests 
> of those who deplore them.  I think the latter is
> what is intended, if only 
> because the first reading would certainly call for
> some elaboration on P's 
> part.  How would those who deplore it be served?  By
> providing them careers 
> and reputations heroically working in the movement? 
> Or ... what?   

That would be very cynical. 


> 
> If the latter, it makes more ready sense, saying
> simply that black and white 
> poor are more joined in their shared poverty (and
> lack of power) than they 
> are separated by their racial differences.  


But with this second reading you've altered the
meaning of the sentence. Right? 


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