Notes From Underglass- Why Pynchon Matters

[vze422fs at verizon.net]

on 2/23/03 5:26 PM, jbor at jbor at bigpond.com wrote:

> on 24/2/03 5:05 AM, vze422fs at verizon.net at vze422fs at verizon.net wrote:
> 
>>> 
>>>> What makes Pynchon important as a novelist is precisely because of his
>>>> sense of political and ethical responsibility which balances and informs
>>>> his aesthetics, something Riefenstahl, for example, failed to accomplish.
>>> 
>>> I prefer to be open-minded about the political beliefs of others. In
>>> her view, she did the same.
>>> 
>> I prefer not to be open-minded about the wholesale slaughter of people.
> 
> No, you prefer to be flip about it.
> 
>> What you call open-minded, others might call "fellow traveller",
>> collaborationist, apologist, or card carrying member.
> 
> At least you got your wish for death and carnage in Rhode Island. Now
> multiply that death toll by somewhere between 30-50,000 Iraqis and that
> apologist is YOU big fella.
> 
> best
> 
Sorry if my satire stuck you as flippant. Call it an amateurish attempt at
being Swiftian, if you must. I forgot about it a while ago.

What is the 30-50,000 Iraqi death toll figure?

I fear that full scale invasion of Iraq will kill many more people than
that.

Many of them will be ordinary people just going about their business.

I don't think that we are on opposite sides of value of human life issues.

Iraq is a complicated issue. We are all guilty ( and I as much as anyone, as
you have correctly pointed out) of reducing complex questions to bumper
sticker answers.

I don't think you want a war in Iraq. I certainly don't. George W Bush seems
to really want one. So what do we do about it? Peace marches? Letter writing
campaigns? Public forums for discussion?

Must something be done about Saddam Hussein? If so, what? What, short of
war? Are sanctions just another deadly imposition on the oppressed people of
Iraq? Can they work? Is any of it worth it?

What have you got to say? I'll listen, and I won't make light of it.