rlr@pyuxn.UUCP (Rich Rosen) (07/20/84)
[My hope is that Alan does not take these remarks as attacks but rather as constructive criticism and constructive suggestions...] > We can argue ad nauseum about how bad things really are. In > my experience, they are not as bad as you say. On the other > hand, in Trish's experience, they are. Maybe Trish has been > hanging out with assholes. Maybe I've been hanging out with > unusually sensitive people and have insulated myself from the > real world. Who can say? Quite a number of people have said it and are continuing to say it. [Read Richard Brower's and Brad Brahms' articles as fine examples.] Some people have one impression. Others have another impression. The essence of many of your postings seems to simply deny the veracity of the other people's experiences and impressions. > At any rate, whether our culture is really rotten to the core, > or just a bit rotten, eventually, we should talk about how we > can improve things. This is the part of my article which you > failed to address. I don't think that I did. Part of the beginnings of real change is to establish how bad things may be right now and what needs to be done. Forward-thinkers may get the impression (because they hang around with other forward-thinkers) that things have already changed very drastically, only to be jolted into reality by the real world. Or, sometimes, only to deny that which other people out in that real world have to say. This may not be due to arrogance, but due to a slanted perspective. > I said: > > Trish's hostility is not productive. It will *never* help > > the situation. > You had nothing to say about this. In fact, I haven't heard > any constructive suggestions from you, just complaints. If your only goal is to get everyone to agree with your opinions about Trish's hostility rather than to work to make things different, then the first constructive suggestion would have to be to get off of this vindictive binge you seem to be on. Your private communications also seem to concentrate on "why don't you agree with me about Trish?" Please, enough already, and please accept this in the spirit in which it is offered. > I have made a number of suggestions. For starters, if we are > going to get anywhere, we're going to have to have to discard > destructive feelings/actions, such as anger and blaming. I hope that includes your anger and finger-pointing at Trish and rainbow. > By the way, your article supports a common myth, that men are > "winners" and women are "losers" in our culture, a myth which > encourages anger and blaming. I don't buy it, though. Sure, > the Real Man makes more money for doing the same job, but does > he get to enjoy it? No, he drops dead at 50 of a heart attack > because he doesn't know how to feel. You call that winning? This sounds like a white person in the 1950's south proclaiming: "Sure, both blacks and whites lose in a segregationist society. But don't claim that whites simply have it good and blacks don't, because that just isn't true! I mean, it costs us white people money to maintain those separate bathrooms and entrances for black people..." Common myth, my ass! Sure, the end result of a lifetime of being a breadwinning "head" of household *may* be a heart attack. The end result of any maltreatment of a group in a society can be disastrous (e.g., uprisings and revolt). But that doesn't prevent the ones who have it good from having it good while it lasts. This is not blame-pinning. This is fact. Shortsightedness is a hallmark of societies and individuals throughout society. What makes you think that many people (men and women both) would be willing to give up what to them is an acceptable status quo? Yes, things are changing. But they've changed only to the point where someone like Falwell can come along and say: "See how these changes have ruined our society? We've got to put a stop to these changes now before it's too late, and get back to those great old values and ideals..." If you're not *very* worried about that, if you think things have changed so much (because all of your friends are so enlightened) that you need not worry about that, then you are sadly mistaken. > So, let's hear some solutions. What do *you* think we can do, Rich? Education and enlightenment are the foremost methods to gradually cause change. (Quick change only comes about by violent upheaval, and even then the results wind up being worse than before...) Continuing to teach and raise children in old gender roles ("Don't play THAT game; play THIS game, which is more 'appropriate' for boys/girls...") will only serve to perpetuate them. And since children may be influenced strongly by peer pressure, and since many of those "peers" may still have been raised on those old values/role assignments, raising a healthy (from a mental perspective), independent-thinking child who won't put up with such garbage becomes very important. In fact, such a child (or adult) may be a harbinger of change among peers, if the child/adult can say or do something positive instead of either ignoring or sluffing off such behavior/talk. (Special thanks to Tim Morrissey for his input to these suggestions.) -- "Now, Benson, I'm going to have to turn you into a dog for a while." "Ohhhh, thank you, Master!!" Rich Rosen pyuxn!rlr