Introduction
What I didn't learn from Luke Wright, poet
The BBC and its designs on us
The BBC: manipulating opinion
Bold print and faint print
Some
Mediocrity Celebrity Worshippers
What is a mediocrity?
Love and linguistics
Strenuousness
Richard Booth, Private Eye and Edgeways Books
Nasty, brutish and short: some Harry's Place comments
Another dispute at
Harry's Place
Harry's Place: faults and failings
Losing interest in Harry's Place
Harry's Place: pseudonyms and heteronyms
Harry's Place and deleting comments This page is one of the less developed pages of the site - the section on the strengths and weaknesses of the BBC is particularly undeveloped - apart from the six sections where I criticize - and praise - the blog 'Harry's Place. Many or most readers may well find these sections over-developed. I'm not apologetic. The comments sections of Websites and blogs are an important aspect of contemporary cultural life (using the word 'cultural' very, very loosely) and this is the only place where I examine it. A much more comprehensive examination could easily be justified. It's completely justifiable, as I see it, to comment on comments sections, and to review reviews and I see no reason to apologize for thoroughness.
The content of my page on Richard Alleyne and the Daily Telegraph belongs here, but including it would unbalance the page. Like the sections here on Harry's Place, it includes criticism of some commenters, but these commenters are much less well informed than the commenters at Harry's Place, or some of the commenters.
The page is concerned with dross and the criticism of dross, dross which coexists with strengths and admirable people and organizations whose strengths outweigh their faults.
In 'The Culture Industry,' Theodore Adorno's sophistication tended to be single-minded, simple-minded. I stress contradictions, contrast, complications - as in the case of my review of Harry's Place.
Dross is
often justified by the power of numbers, such as sales figures. There are
many, many people who are very impressed when a show sells huge
numbers of tickets, when a recording sells by the million, when a book sells
by the million, the people who are impressed by 'smash hits,' the people who
scoff at minority interests. They should remember that the sales
figures for white sliced industrial bread, mass-selling mass-produced
processed cheese or cheap lager in cans dwarf the sales figures for artisanal
bread, cheese and beer, In the case of these products of fermentation, the
realization is widespread that the 'smash hits' of the bread, cheese and beer
world are likely to be the poorest in quality, the minority products of the
niche market far more likely to be outstanding.
The clear
and concise formulation in terms of {theme}, specifically the {theme} linkage,
expresses the insight that in such cases as these, there's no linkage between high sales figures and
quality:
[high sales figures] >< [high quality]
Here,
>< is read as 'not linked with.'
Similarly, any mechanical use of high sales figures to show that a film, a book, a piece of music must be a 'must-see, a must-read' or a 'must-hear' is ridiculous. Ridiculous too is the use of low sales figures in an attempt to show that a poetry volume which has sold only a few copies must be worth reading.
Harry's Place is site which amongst other things supports Israel and
opposes Islamism, even if contributors differ in the degree of their support
and opposition. I'm in sympathy with its position. Surely the world of the
site is very different from the world of mass marketing and mass
consumption? It is, but it's a prominent provider of material which can be compared with the material
goods provided by prominent suppliers. Harry's Place provides dross which coexists with strengths, the
strengths, I think, vastly outweighing the dross.
The title of this page is the same as the collection of essays on mass culture by Theodor Adorno (published by Routledge, with an introduction by J M Bernstein.) My view of 'The Culture Industry' involves disagreement as well as warm agreement, as I explain. Brian O' Connor provides a very good summary of 'The Culture Industry' in his introduction to 'Culture Industry Reconsidered. He writes,
'Adorno
notes that the term 'culture industry' is to be preferred to 'mass culture'
in that the latter suggests a type of culture spontaneously chosen by the
masses as suiting their needs. However, that is to miss the point that the
culture industry has, Adorno argues, nothing to do with the views or needs
of the masses. Rather the culture industry produces commodities which generate
false needs. And the metaphor of industry is apt, he argues, as entertainment
is produced through patterns of standardization and, with advertising and
marketing, distributed like any other manufactured goods. The culture industry
sustains itself through the illusion that it offers novelty, but ultimately
what is new is merely another instance of what is commercially proven. The
techniques of the culture industry - its skilful production of film, music,
or television - are in no way equivalent to the techniques if art ... Culture,
Adorno claims, was once the area of protest in which great art provoked consciousness
of the difficulties of existence. Now, however, the culture industry achieves
conformity ... Adorno's critique of popular culture is trenchant and it has
faced superficial charges of elitism and snobbery. It is clear that his account
of the culture industry identifies undeniable strategies of manipulation.
The more ambitious claim is that this manipulation produces social conformism.
The strength of this position can only be appreciated when read alongside
Adorno's thoughts on society and idealogy.'
My loathing
for the dross of the present time is as great as Theodor Adorno's evident
dislike, amounting to loathing, for the dross of his time, but my criticism
is modified and differs from his in significant ways. I take as my example
of dross here a commercial radio station pumping out drivel from morning to
night, throughout the night, an endless stream of monotous
and formulaic rhythms and trite non-melodies interspersed with advertisements
and self-indulgent comments delivered in the typical
tone of voice, relentless, frenzied, without contrast.
(1) I recognize that people who listen to this dross whenever they can, who find it difficult to do things without listening to this dross or similar forms of dross, can have remarkable qualities, that they may be understanding, loving, hard-working parents, that they may have reserves of remarkable courage. This is to stress the importance of factors and factorization. What people listen to is a factor, but if it can be shown that what people listen to is dross, this is a criticism in terms of one factor, not all the factors which should be taken into account. These factors include much more than what people listen to, look at or read.
George Orwell, who writes about some ordinary people in his essay 'Hop Picking,' singles them out for praise. Adorno would have given a completely dismissive account of their cultural level, although it's not likely that he would have thought them worth commenting on, or noticing. This is George Orwell:
'There was one couple, a coster and his wife, who were like a father and mother to us. They were the kind of people who are generally drunk on Saturday nights and who tack a 'fucking' on to every noun, yet I have never seen anything that exceeded their kindness and delicacy. They gave us food over and over again. A child would come to the hut with a saucepan: 'Eric, mother was going to throw this stew away, but she said it was a pity to waste it. Would you like it?' Of course they were not really going to have thrown it away, but said this to avoid the suggestion of charity.'
(2) I
see the importance of cross-linkages. I'm an atheist, but there can
be cross-linkages between my views and the views of a Christan. Someone who
has a linkage with me in terms of atheism may not have a linkage with me in
terms of pacifism and radical feminism, both of which I oppose. Someone who
shares my interest in serious music may be my opponent in other respects, and the person who listens
to drivel, inconveniently, an ally.
(3) Theodor
Adorno's view takes too little account of the history of mass entertainment,
I think. The moronic and mindless dross of commercial radio stations is far,
far better than the 'entertainment' of watching public executions or the
gladiators and other public cruelties of Ancient Rome.
(4) Theodor Adorno's account never considered ways of actively opposing the power and effects of the Culture Industry. He concentrated his entire attention on analysis.
In opposing the Culture industry, I think it's essential
to distinguish two things:
(i) The most effective techniques to oppose the Culture
industry. This will often demand short, vivid messages and simple slogans.
(ii) The reasoning which
underlies the action. This should not be simple. It should be comprehensive
(covering all relevant aspects of the subject rather than a few),
fair-minded (taking every care to avoid distortions of reality, taking note
of possible objections), sophisticated in moral argument and, also,
factually correct.
I would stress the power
of ideas. The ideas which seem vastly more forceful, developed, persuasive
than the opposing ideas are amongst the most important contributions to
activism. They're a precondition for activism, or should be. One of the most
striking demonstrations comes from the history of penal reform, on which the
Italian thinker Beccaria has had an incalculable influence. To read more
about his achievement, click
here. Beccaria's
achievement is amongst other things a massive practical achievement -
concrete reforms can be traced back to his work - but these were due purely
to his ideas. He had none of the attributes of an activist. The introduction
to his work 'On Crimes and Punishments' in the Hackett edition describes the
work as 'greater than its self-effacing author, a man of almost crippling
shyness.'
Theodor Adorno's ideas have great importance, but they aren't expressed in a form which will bring them to the attention of more than a handful of people who gain from the Culture industry, such as employees of the trivial media, or the people who are in thrall to the trivial media.
I think there's scope for the use of 'simplification
words,' simplification phrases,' 'simplification messages,' 'simplification
techniques' and 'simplfication images.' I think that simplification words, phrases, messages, techniques
and images are completely justifiable if they are supported by comprehensive
argument and analysis, which need not be supplied at the time.
It's for this reason that I give some simplification phrases, messages and images below. And, also, a 'simplification technique,' 'bold print and faint print.' If most purveyors of dross will be immune, a few may reconsider. An aphorism of mine, from the page Aphorisms: 'In the criticism of trashy material, a critic can be guided by the principles of punishment: deterrence, retribution, reformation.'
Allied tanker sinking, after being torpedoed during the Battle of the Atlantic, 1942. In the Second World War, 32,000 merchant seafarers and over 50,000 members of the Royal Navy lost their lives.
Lancastria, in the distance, sinking off the French port of St. Nazaire on 17 June 1940, after evacuating British nationals, from France, two weeks after the evacuations from Dunkirk. The ship had been bombed by German aircraft. The exact death toll is unknown: probably in excess of 3,500. Thousands of people were killed, by the bombs, by drowning, by choking on fuel oil, by burning (some of the fuel oil which leaked into the sea, more than 1,400 tonnes of it, caught fire) or were machine-gunned by German aircraft. The BBC site 'WW2 People's War' has an outstanding page on the sinking, very harrowing but with some happier incidents, such as this: 'And then there was the poignant scene of a mother, and her tiny baby being thrown into the water when a lifeboat capsized crying out to others drifting nearby, “My baby! My baby! Please find my baby!” Back came the answer, “It’s all right, Ma, we’ve got her,” as they held her baby well above the water.' There were many acts of heroism, such as the heroism of the man 'covered completely in black oil who dove time after time into the sea from the safety of the rescuing ship to bring floundering people to its side where they could be hauled aboard.'
Luke Wright is best known as the author and performer of 'What I learned from Johnny Bevan,' which does have emotional substance in some places, with real pathos. Take those flickering flames and burning log effects which some electric fires have - quite realistic and even impressive. - and compare them with the authentic flames above a real log fire. At times, the poetic flame in his poetry seems real, more often an imitation, 'mimesis.' He caters to a market, he's industrious and for the time being quite a significant figure in the Culture Industry. He's generally an attractive and likeable poet, sometimes witty and inventive, but not likely to have any lasting significance in the history of poetry. The verse is ludicrously bad on occasion, as I soon show.
Luke Wright is the author of a poem which mentions ISIS and which contains the line
twisting victims till victims stink
A poem which mentions the atrocities of ISIS and the victims of ISIS, then? A poem about beheading, burning alive, or, more likely, crucifixion? No, not in the least. It's a poem which attacks IDS (the Conservative politician Iain Duncan Smith). The victims here are the victims of Iain Duncan Smith, according to Luke Wright, not the victims of ISIS.
Its poetic badness is bad enough but its ethical
badness is far worse. The poem is hideous. Its poetic badness and its
ethical badness obviously weren't noticed by Jenny, writing on the site
'Phrased and Confused.'
http://www.phrasedandconfused.co.uk/news/a-z-of-phrased-confused-at-liverpool-acoustic-festival
Jenny ought to have insisted that the 'poetry' should be set out as poetry and not prose. In case she's not too familiar with the conventions, these two lines of 'poetry' can be set out on the page either like this
Hi! Hi! Hi! Hi! Hi!
Hi! Hi! Hi! Hi! Hi!
or like this, with '/' to show the line break:
Hi! Hi! Hi! Hi! Hi! / Hi! Hi! Hi! Hi! Hi!
but shouldn't be set out like this:
Hi! Hi! Hi! Hi! Hi! Hi! Hi! Hi! Hi! Hi!
Luke Wright's 'poem,' like this 'poem' is univocal. It uses only the vowel 'i.' Later in the section, I include a poem I wrote, 'The Rising and Falling of Luke Wright,' which is univocal as well, using only the vowel 'i.'
This is Luke Wright, in single-minded,
unsuccessful, pursuit of exuberance, in single-minded use throughout
of a single vowel, in single-minded pursuit of Iain Duncan Smith, with
complete disregard for human and humane values. A short extract from the
poem after the line
'twisting victims till victims stink,' short, because I observe
copyright restrictions, here and throughout the site:
I wish him limp dicks.
I wish him midnight shifts.
I wish him ISIS.
I wish him sinking ships.
The complete poem is given on a page of Luke Wright's Website. I'd strongly recommend reading the complete poem and I'd strongly recommend listening to the recording of the poem, but only for the insights into his mind, or one aspect of it.
http://www.lukewright.co.uk/ids-in-only-one-vowel/
The worst lines in the poem on IDS - not the poetically worst lines, because
all the lines are bad poetry, without much variation, but the worst lines
for anyone with any concern for ethics - are these:
I wish him ISIS.
I wish him sinking ships
and
twisting victims till victims stink
Did he stop to think before he wrote them? When he revised the poem,
assuming he did revise it, did it occur to him that poets may need to give
thought to ethics as well as to choice of words?
Does Iain Duncan Smith deserve to be put in a cage and burned to death, or pushed off a high building, or beheaded, or tortured and killed by any of the methods used by ISIS? I lived in Northern Ireland at the height of the Troubles. (My page Ireland and Northern Ireland: distortions and illusions has a section on the Troubles.) Not long before I left Northern Ireland, I heard a massive car bomb, planted by the IRA, which killed six civilians. My gratitude to the members of the police force and the army who did so much to protect us, at such risk to themselves, is immense. Iain Duncan Smith served in the army in Northern Ireland during the Troubles at a time of high risk for the security services. He doesn't deserve in the least to be a target of Luke Wright's facile and disturbing verse.
'The line which mentions 'sinking ships' is despicable too. I don't suppose
for one moment that Luke Wright has an exhaustive knowledge of military
history. This country stood almost alone in opposing the Nazis, who
had crushed free and independent life in such countries as France, Belgium,
the Netherlands and Czechoslovakia. Poland had been crushed but never
surrendered. Over 250,000 Polish troops escaped to Britain to continue the
struggle against Nazism.
At that time, and afterwards, convoys brought across the Atlantic the food and materials needed to continue the fight for freedom and the liberation of these countries. The Arctic Convoys took supplies to Russia. When ships were torpedoed or bombed, those who survived the blast might be coated with oil or burned alive in oil. The ones in lifeboats might float for weeks until rescued, or might never be rescued. Is Luke Wright completely sure that any of these horrific fates is a fate he wishes upon Iain Duncan Smith? But probably, his imagination failed him. 'Sinking' may be a word with insufficient meaning for him, divested of such horrors.
I think that to a significant extent he's politically naive and politically clueless, naive and clueless too in some aspects of ethics. Whatever political and ethical insights he does or doesn't have, he's naive and clueless if he imagines that he can go on the attack on his Website with no possibility of being criticized in turn. Giving some publicity to his mistakes on this site will at least be a healthy corrective to such unrealistic ideas.
A contribution of his to twitter, 2 December 2015. A picture of David Cameron next to Jeremy Corbyn. Jeremy Corbyn has his hand raised and his index finger outstretched in the direction of David Cameron. Above the picture, the caption - not his - MPs debate airstrikes against Isis ahead of crunch vote. Below the picture, Luke Wright's comment, 'Go on Jeremy, poke him in the eye. And stop the war too.' What's the best way of stopping ISIS, does he think? Does he imagine that persuasion will be enough, or 'peace talks with ISIS?' Or is he indifferent to the problem of ISIS, or does he fail to see any problem with ISIS at all? There are many people like him.
Another post (23 February 2016) gives a film clip showing Iain Duncan Smith. It must have originally shown him simply raising his right arm at a meeting, probably to make a point. The film has been repeated again and again to make it appear that IDS is making a Nazi salute again and again. Luke Wright is an infantile obsessive, in part.
Some other examples of the dross to be found on the same page of his Website as the verse on IDS. This is the closing stanza of 'Ron's Knockoff Shop:'
Ron LOLs
rolls sloth’s dosh.
“London morons.”
Locks shop for long month off.
Roll on tomorrow.
This time, of course, it's the vowel 'o' which is honoured with his time and attention. He appears to think that the achievement of writing a univocal poem is achievement enough: when the poet uses such an exacting form, any rubbish will do to confirm a reputation as a virtuouso poet. Emotional substance is completely unnecessary.
This, from 'Poem for a benefit gig in aid of the refugee crisis,' is evidence that even when there are no exacting technical demands - the full set of vowels available, the lines simply linked as rhyming couplets - he sees no need for any advance on poetic sensationalism and cardboard caricature, or can't provide any advance. Emotional substance is unattainable.
CONSERVATIVES IN SHOCK COMPASSION FAIL
Another crime to chalk up to The Mail.
A sneer for those stood clutching Starbuck’s lattes
the ones who turn up late to pity parties.
The American poet and critic Randall Jarrell, writing in 'Some lines from Walt Whitman' (the essay appears in 'Poetry and the Age'):
'The interesting thing about Whitman's worst language (for, just as few poets have ever written better, few poets have ever written worse) is how unusually absurd, how really ingeniously bad, such language is. I will quote none of the most famous examples; but even a line like O culpable! I acknowledge. I expose! is not anything that you or I could do - only a man with the most extraordinary feel for language, or none whatsoever, could have cooked up Whitman's worst messes.'
The badness of Luke Wright's worst writing is nothing like this. It's not ingeniously bad, for instance.
Luke Wright is lacking in so many things, despite his talents and gifts. One of them is basic fair-mindedness as regards certain issues at least: Conservatives have absolutely no compassion, Conservatives are scum, newspapers and Websites which generally or often support Conservative policies are valueless. He may or may not have heard that the Conservative Party in this country is currently giving 12 billion pounds a year in overseas aid. (I question whether a significant proportion of this sum is well-spent.)
Luke Wright's response to the migrant crisis is revealing. Ethical dilemmas don't seem to exist for Luke Wright. He seems incapable of grasping the notion that one duty might be in conflict with another duty, or that the exercise of compassion may sometimes have unintended consequences - including disastrous consequences - or that a solution can't easily be found for every problem. If Luke Wright is a humanitarian, he's a very selective humanitarian or an ignorant humanitarian. There are many like him. He ignores material factors, which, like humanitarian factors, I emphasize again and again in this site. The wish to help is ineffectual if material factors are ignored. Helping the victims of an earthquake requires attention to heavy lifting equipment and helicopters Helping the victims of an earthquake or, in general, other victims, requires attention to the economy and to technology.
This is a poem of mine on Luke Wright the flawed and vulnerable poet as well as Luke Wright the hideous poet, not Luke Wright, the poet at his best or his not-good-enough-best. After writing it, I'm sure that 'univocalism,' using only one vowel, involves too much restriction - {restriction}:- (feeling ...) For all that, I think I've been able to make my attitude to Luke Wright's poem on IDS very clear.
This rising Lit-Hit,
this nit-picking Lit-Big,
this Mill-Wright
grinding
his lit-bits,
grinning, grinning, grinning,
is insipid in print
[IDS
'ripping ribs in glitz grills']
his filmic fighting
filling in,
his
illicit flings
filling in
[IDS:
'I wish him limp dicks']
idling, tiring, slipping, sliding,
whittling his
whims,
signing his
sighs.
'If I ... '
'I might ... '
(might is plight)
This
Lit-Grit
is grim, grim, grim in print
['ISIS, ISIS ...'
'Sinking, sinking ...'
IDS 'twisting
victims till victims stink ...']
Luke Wright's poem on IDS is the poet in free-fall.
I criticize lacklustre, insipid content in his poem (and lacklustre, insipid
content in other poems of his on the same page of his Website). Poet-performers may be very good performers of very
poor poetry. The poorness of the poetry is disguised by the vigour of the
performance but it's readily apparent when it's read. Then, I criticize the
weakness and desperation which underlies his attacks on IDS. After that, I
criticize grim, obnoxious, hideous, lines in the poem. Quotations
from Luke Wright's poem are given in inverted commas in square brackets.
The meaning of 'idling' here is the one familiar to mechanical engineers and others, 'to turn without doing useful work,' with associations of unproductive low-level activity. 'Filling in' has associations of the routine. Fling: Luke Wright throwing words around to make his worst poem (I hope there are none worse - that would surely be impossible) and the associations of 'an occasion of unrestrained, impulsive or extravagant behaviour.' (Collins English Dictionary.) The poem captures, I think, the hesitations and doubts that Luke Wright surely has, despite his success. The words 'If I ... ' and 'I might ... ' are attributed to him and not quotes from any of his poetry. 'Rising and falling' denotes a more complex process than 'rise and fall,' in this case the surges and disappointments, the fluctuations and flux in the inner life of Luke Wright. He claims in his blog that he has a strong work ethic. Even if in general he works every day and most of the day, no poet can have the satisfaction of constant achievement every day and most of the day. The words 'slipping, sliding' are a near-quotation. The reference is to 'slip, slide' in this well-known passage from T S Eliot's 'Burnt Norton,' one of the 'Four Quartets:'
' ... Words strain,
Crack and sometimes break,
under the burden,
Under the tension, slip, slide, perish,
Will not
stay still.'
The line of my poem, 'Might is plight,' has an obvious sound-linkage with 'Might is right.' Unlike 'Might is right,' 'Might is plight' has ambiguity, the ambiguity of richness, complexity and contradiction - 'might' refers to power, political power or military power or other forms of power, as well as the vastly different tentative 'might,' the 'might' of hesitation: 'I might do that, but on the other hand ... ' Lit-Grit is sarcastic, in part: 'grit,' 'indomitable courage, toughness or resolution' (Collins English Dictionary) but with other associations which are very different: an irritant.
The poet Rilke is superb, as well as very limited, in his treatment of rising and falling in the inner life. From my page Kafka and Rilke:
This, on falling, is beautiful, but perhaps its beauty begins to seem less impressive with critical intelligence, not the uncritical reverence for Rilke the Seer in an age when a seer is an anomaly. They are the concluding lines of the last of the Duino Elegies, the Tenth:
Und wir, die an steigendes Glück
denken, empfänden die
Rührung,
die uns beinah bestürzt,
wenn ein Glückliches fällt.
And we, who have thought of happiness
as rising, would
feel the emotion
that almost alarms us,
when a happy thing falls.
Here, it would be very mistaken to view the 'alarm' as anything to do with the pains of embodied life as most people experience it.
The book 'Metaphors we Live By' (George Lakoff and Mark Johnson) is relevant to the rising and falling here, and in particular Chapter 4, 'Orientational Metaphors.' 'These spatial orientations - 'up-down' is the first example they give - 'arise from the fact that we have bodies of the sort we have and that they function as they do in our physical environment.' This isn't in the least a Rilkean viewpoint.
In their section 'Conclusions,' the authors claim 'There is an internal systematicity to each spatialization metaphor. For example, HAPPY IS UP defines a coherent system rather than a number of isolated and random cases. (An example of an incoherent system woul be one where, say, "I'm feeling up " meant I'm feeling happy," but "My spirits rose" meant "I became sadder."
See also my technical discussion in the page Metaphor.
Rilke's 'a happy thing falls' seems like a thought-experiment to do with cognitive dissonance disguised as something far more profound.
A wider view of his treatment of falling, a wider view of his poetic world, reveal his bias. Lines from his poem 'Herbst' can also be quoted (Das Buch der Bilder, Book 1, Part 2):
The first line is
Die Blätter fallen, fallen wie von weit,
The leaves fall, fall as if from far
in which the ordinariness of 'the leaves fall' is made suddenly mysterious, and exciting, by {distance}.
Later, 'Wir alle fallen,' 'We are all falling'
Und doch ist Einer welcher dieses Fallen
unendlich sanft in
seinen Händen hält.
And yet there's One who this fall
endlessly gently in
his hands holds.
The concluding lines should not be found in the least
impressive - again, despite appearances - let alone consoling. The lines are
a form of poetic piety.
Kafka was drawn to the incorporeal too, but unlike Rilke, without consequences fatal to his art.
The contrasts between Luke Wright and Rilke are immense, but they have an unexpected linkage. Luke Wright's vivid and concrete world (sometimes a view of a world which sometimes makes dismal use of the building material concrete) is like Rilke's world in its avoidance of some categories of harm in the material world, such as the sinking of ships. The fall of a roofer from a roof followed by hitting the ground, the injuries to the roofer or worse, are shattering events in the material world, just as the sinking of a ship and the drowning of the crew are shattering events in the material world. The verse of Luke Wright is vivid - although not always vivid, sometimes insipid - but he can't convey such shattering events as these, or not with any convincing force.
To illustrate his worthless poem, he uses an image of Iain Duncan Smith which comes from the site 'Left Foot Forward.' The image is copyrighted. Did he ask permission from 'Left Foot Forward' before using the image? I doubt it.
Copyright is important. It's difficult enough for a poet to earn money from poetry. Earning money from poetry isn't the point of poetry, of course, but poets deserve to be paid, whenever payment is possible. Before copyright law, anyone who wanted to and had the means could copy their work and publish it without paying them. Now, of course, vast numbers of people have the means to copy copyright material and the willingness to ignore copyright restrictions - which not only protect the financial reward of writers, whether it amounts to a pittance or much more, but which reflect the effort made by the writer: writing is often arduous. A mechanic who works on a vehicle is entitled to be paid and if a writer can be paid for a piece of writing, then the writer is entitled to be paid. For similar reasons, the copyright of photographers is important. The photographer may have well have needed to spend money before taking a picture, sometimes a great deal of money. The photographer is entitled to be reimbursed for this, and more. Unless he did ask permission and he was given permission to use the image of Iain Duncan Smith, he's at fault.
See also the
page Concrete poetry,
'anti-emoticons'
Strenuousness
The American garden designer Duncan Brine: 'A successful design doesn’t call attention to itself. It tells a story about the landscape, not the designer.' (From the Website thinkingardens.co.uk)
The two emoticons above are
meant sarcastically, of course. (My page on
Concrete poetry gives a much fuller discussion.) BBC1 News has been using graphic design in
more and more obtrusive, more and more ludicrous ways, in accordance with
its guiding policy of progressive (or regressive) infantilization. How much
longer before news of a better than expected inflation rate or a success in
English football is accompanied by the display of a happy, smiling emoticon
and news of a natural disaster or news from a war zone is accompanied by
the showing of a sad emoticon?
The team of 'graphic designers' at the BBC already has a repertoire of emoticons, primitive products of advanced computer technology which spell out, in the most hackneyed way, what viewers are expected to feel. BBC1 News, as well as showing the desperate and grotesque state of the world shows too the desperate and grotesque state of some sections of the media, such as the BBC itself.
Bad news from a bank, bad news from the City of London - this calls for dark and gloomy storm clouds above some typical high-rise financial buildings.
To show that someone is very newsworthy but under pressure, that the news about the person is very important, the film of the person walking is slowed down, so that the person doesn't just walk but walks with very, very significant steps. Again and again, crowds of people in cities are presented in a different way, this time speeded up: contemptible childishness.
To show that the team producing these computer tricks is very important and very creative, despite not being before the cameras, images are made very difficult to ignore. They're obviously determined to be recognized even if they are out of sight. They make their effects so obvious that attention is drawn to their technical wizardry. On one occasion, before a businessman could say a few straightforward words, he was shown as moving with jerky movements from place to place in the room where he was filmed. If the news is about the 50p tax rate, then a 50p coin is shown slowly rotating on its axis and if it distracts attention from the comment or discussion - and it does - then too bad. This is design as an irritating hyperactive adolescent might understand it.
There are Web designers who have a concern to avoid gimmickry and to make technique unobtrusive and juvenile designers who think it's quite something to have a heading on a block in some bright colour which slowly rotates. There are Web typographers who avoid any tendency to shout out whenever possible with their choice of type, and others who believe in the manic approach. This BBC graphics team goes for grossness and cliched obviousness every time. If it has been decided that a statistic such as 'the percentage of waste recycled has fallen below 50%' should be presented in written form, anything like a straightforward presentation is out of the question - the process of putting the text on the screen is as involved and as ornate as the convolutions some Englishmen or Englishwomen feel necessary when they make the simplest of requests, such as 'Could you pass the salt, please?' But the tone is very different- flashy excess compared with excessive gentility.
The BBC uses the opinions of shoppers, passers-by and others to manipulate opinion. The selection of these people and their opinions is often very biased, and very revealing - about the opinions of the BBC staff who put together the news bulletins. The impression is given that this is what the public - not always the British public - is thinking and that this is good sense. The impression is given that in matters of massive complexity, in matters where the public hasn't been given all the relevant information, someone on their way to buy some fish and chips has what it takes to give an instant opinion.
In Egypt, when there was mass action to overthrow Mubarak, the impression was given that the Egyptian opposition to Mubarak was homogeneous and entirely enlightened. The members of the Egyptian public selected talked about freedom - freedom as it would generally be understood in this country. This wasn't in the least a representative sample. It contained few Muslim radicals, who wanted the chance to impose a rigorous Islamic state with Sharia law.
After the national BBC1 news, regional news is shown on every day of the week but Saturday. When it was announced that six members of the Yorkshire Regiment had been killed in an explosion in Afghanistan, the regional news for this area, Yorkshire, gave the whole of its time to this harrowing event. The coverage was exemplary, I think, except for the fact that a handful of passers-by gave their opinions on Britain's involvement in Afghanistan and all of them said that the country shouldn't be involved, with one partial exception.
The BBC ought to examine with the utmost seriousness the policies of Wikipedia, the attempts made to minimize bias and selectivity. It's impossible to claim complete objectivity and complete lack of bias in matters such as this, and many more, but there's a great gulf between the BBC's practice, so often, with not the least attempt at balance and fair-mindedness, and the practice of Wikipedia.
A short news broadcast can't find the time for discussion nearly as complete as this, Stephen Biddle's piece, 'Is It Worth It? The Difficult Case for War in Afghanistan Simplification, drastic simplification, is often necessary, but the BBC's simplifications are sometimes extreme.
Razia Iqbal
The BBC has some very good correspondents, but Razia Iqbal, the BBC's 'arts correspondent' [now ex-arts correspondent] wasn't amongst them. Her reports were gems - the sort you find in tacky rings costing 20p or so.
Against all the odds - the trashy cult of celebrity, of 'big names,' 'top stories,' bureaucracy, mental stagnation, indifference, stupidity - there are still writers, artists, publishers, booksellers, editors, critics, gallery owners and even arts administrators with a concern for excellence. Their finances are often precarious, their future prospects are precarious, they may well receive next to no recognition in the wider world. Not that these people are always virtuous. Luke Wright is working hard to further poetry and to make a precarious living from poetry. Luke Wright is also naive and stupid, as I show in the section The rising and falling of Luke Wright.
Razia Iqbal has taken the easy way, which has advantages and disadvantages.
Advantages:
A good income, much, much
higher than the income of most of the people with genuine artistic commitment.
Labour-saving. No need to think. Just use pre-existing phrases such as
'A-list celebrities.'
Disadvantages:
Not having the satisfaction,
surely, of real achievement, or any achievement at all, the feeling, surely,
of hollowness, the feeling that all contributions are instantly forgettable,
negligible, without any individuality (due to dependence on labour-saving
phrases.)
* Some of Razia Iqbal's characteristic
comments:
Drooling over 'A-list celebrities' at the premiere of the film 'The Golden Compass.'
'Despite celebrity endorsement from the likes of Noel Kidman...' (on the fashion designer Karl Lagersfeld.)
A report on Annie Leibovitz (described by Razia Iqbal as a 'celebrity photographer') was embarrassingly bad even by her standards, with multiple mentions of the celebrity word.
When she reported on the promotion of the arts in Folkestone, Kent, the report was almost completely concerned not with the arts in question, with any artistic qualities but with economic regeneration. The same arguments have been made for 'super-casinos,' their supposed benefits for the economic regeneration of an area. Developers are generally no more interested in the arts than in super-casinos, but for the time being at least, the arts have more prestige.
Comments on the painter Francis Bacon by Razia Iqbal and others:
Ian Chilvers 'Characteristically his paintings show single figures in isolation or despair, set in a bleak, sometimes cage-like space, and at times accompanied by hunks of raw meat: 'we are all meat, we are potential carcasses,' he said in 1966.'
Peter Fuller 'Bacon is an artist of persuasive power and undeniable ability; but he has used his expressive skills to denigrate and degrade. He presents one aspect of the human condition as necessary and universal truth.'
David Sylvester 'The paintings are a huge affirmation that human vulnerability is countered by human vitality. They are a shout of defiance in the face of death.'
From the Times Obituary 'the sense he gave of the ultimate seriousness of art.'
Compare these comments with,
Razia Iqbal: 'Many of his paintings are owned by celebrities.' (I'm relying on memory here. The 'many' may have been 'some.')
A comment of mine
on Razia Iqbal:
'The sense she gives of the ultimate frivolity and unimportance of art, regarded
as an agent of economic regeneration, as a source of gossip and as a status
symbol for 'celebrities.' She has a consuming interest in A-list celebrities.
She was surely an F-list arts correspondent.'
On Razia Iqbal's obsession with money as well
as celebrities, from the Web site 'Open Democracy.'
http://opendemocracy.net/blog/tony_curzon_price/rowling
'But however much Razia Iqbal started in any of these directions, there was one direction that kept pulling her back: Rowling's [my faint print] huge wealth. First we had to be told that having sold millions of books, she was very wealthy; then, a few minutes later, that "Rowling never needs to write again" [for a living], and then, a few minutes later, Rowling was asked whether she was motivated by guilt, "since she has so much"...'
But I'm not suggesting that in other respects she's off-putting. She does seem to be a pleasant enough person.
This fixation on 'celebrities' has the most severe consequences for many, many gifted, interesting, outstanding people. It leads to far fewer opportunities for unknowns to make their mark - and make a living - in literature, the theatre and other arts. The fixation denies to published writers the recognition they deserve, and the chance of making even a barely adequate income.
Michael Savage, writing about Beethoven's 5th Symphony in 'The Independent,' under the heading 'Da-da-da-dum! Beethoven sales soar.' '200 years on, the work is enjoying a revival after an unlikely pair of celebrity conductors directed Ludwig van Beethoven's masterpiece during the BBC's reality television series, Maestro.' I've no idea who this 'unlikely pair of celebrity conductors' are who conducted Beethoven's 5th and I'm only mildly curious. The pair called Ant and Dec?
Masterpiece! Why do these people have to be so predictable? I wouldn't have expected a mention of some other masterly works of Beethoven, such as the Eroica Symphony or the 7th Symphony or the Choral Symphony, let alone any of the late piano sonatas or any of the late quartets - just some slight attempt to deflect the notion that here's someone who doesn't know what he's talking about. In the case of Mozart, it's likely that Savage would be writing about 'Mozart's Masterpiece, Eine Kleine Nachtmusik,' in the case of Bach, 'Bach's Masterpiece the Air on a G string, as used in the Hamlet adverts.' 'Dvorak's Masterpiece' would be 'the movement from the New World Symphony, as used in the Hovis advertisement.' We have in his piece too that absolutely decisive criterion of importance, soaring sales. Beethoven himself thought that his Quartet in C sharp minor was his best work, not his 5th Symphony. As it has never enjoyed soaring sales and never will, it won't be of any interest at all to Michael Savage.
I don't use the word in its usual sense. Strictly, I should use the word 'mediocrity (2)' to show that I'm using what I call a second meaning. Mediocrity (2) is used in an attempt to be scrupulously fair, to take note of complexities, complications, paradoxes, to express the fact that very often, our information is incomplete, to give 'the benefit of the doubt.' In the technical terms of Linkage Theory, {resolution}:- /mediocrity/.
I think that Razia Iqbal was a mediocre arts critic on the basis of the evidence I have, that she's a mediocrity (2), a mediocrity only in a restricted sense, although, since her job was that of an arts critic, the restricted sense is very important. I don't claim that she's a mediocrity (1), a mediocrity in the usual sense. My knowledge is too limited to claim that.
I don't claim that people addicted to the diseased world of TV dross are necessarily mediocrities, The British troops who served in Afghanistan were more likely to be interested in this dross than in the world of high culture. The armed forces of a democracy carrying out their task with such courage and professionalism are entitled not to grudging respect but wholehearted respect and support. In the Second World War, their counterparts showed such courage in depth-charged submarines, in burning aircraft and burning tanks, amongst minefields, in the bombed cities, in all the theatres of war that to describe them as mediocrities would be very, very wrong.
The word 'love' hasn't yet been ruined, but nearly so. Second-hand items, such as a dog-eared copy of a mediocre minor celebrity's ghost-written paperback autobiography (or biography) have become 'pre-loved' items.
From the Horticultural Trades Association's Website:
The Horticultural Trades Association’s British Conifer Group (BCG) latest campaign ‘Love Me, Love My Conifer’ will help garden centres create unique and engaging displays for this year’s National Conifer Week which takes place from 1-9 October 2011.
‘Love Me, Love My Conifer’ highlights how there is a conifer to suit every person as well as every garden situation. Conifers comes in a wide range of different shapes and sizes, just like us, and each one has its own unique personality and uses, providing the garden with structure, background, texture and contrast.'
'Personality' is on the way to ruin too, with more to do with the manipulations of marketing than the striking differences and nuances of human personality. 'Unique' too: the uniqueness of conifer personalities and the need to love these endearing conifer personalities, or so it's claimed. And so to the most important part, money:
'Gary Carvosso, Managing director of Coolings, is enthusiastic about the campaign, “Conifers contribute to the plantarea’s [sic] profitability and equal almost a fifth of our shrubs sales by turnover. With an average sale per plant of £14, and a significant increase in sales this year, with more imaginative retailing and colour blocking in volume, we expect to continue to build on these figures ... '
Now, love is everywhere, in casual form, either using the word 'love' or the symbol ♥
Already, so much has been lost. One of the supreme words of English has lost so much of its content. The word has been adulterated. When a word becomes almost unusable for conveying so much more intensity than the new use conveys, a substitute doesn't appear, to make up for the loss. 'Love' is a word which in the past has often been used insincerely, casually, but never on the scale we have now.
Descriptive linguistics has to be supplemented with prescriptive linguistics. A changed use of a word may amount to abuse and a linguistics completely without evaluation is complicit in the debasement of language.
Sometimes, a word which is abused has replacements - the language has redundancy to this extent - but not always. This is so in the case of 'love.'
Strenuousness is very widely recognized and very highly regarded in the field of physical exercise and physical skills. Many, many people run a half-marathon or a full marathon instead of taking a relaxing stroll as their only form of exercise. People practise tennis or golf or some other sport so as to become much better players.
The importance of strenuousness is more often denied in matters to do with the mind than matters to do with the body. Here, all too often, being lazy is nothing to be regretted. Aiming higher is unimportant.
Some examples of strenuousness, not in the field of physical exercise and physical skills.
From the Foreword to 'Common Families of Flowering Plants' by Michael Hickey and Clive King, quite a technical work:
'The decision to make radical changes in the book, and in particular to restrict its coverage to 25 common Angiosperm families, is one which cannot have been taken easily.
...
'However that may be, we can all unreservedly welcome the new 30-page section on basic botany. It is a fact that there is a large and growing demand from older students, many of them really enthusiastic gardeners and field botanists, who would like to move their hobby from a casual to a more committed interest, and have the enthusiasm and ability to do this. For them this new book caters supremely well.'
A second example, from serious music, including 'classical music.' There are many, many really enthusiastic listeners who could take their listening to a more committed level by sometimes following the music score whilst they listen. The knowledge of music needed to do that isn't very great. I already have the knowledge to do that, as a player - or ex-player of violin and viola - but I don't in the least have the musical knowledge needed to obtain anything like the fullest benefit from using a score, above all in knowledge of harmony. I gave up music at an early stage at secondary school and don't have the aptitude to study this particular branch of music theory. I've far more knowledge of matters such as form and instrumentation.
Ian Hislop, the editor of 'Private Eye,' is a good man, but obviously not a perfect man. The comments here relate to the magazine rather than the editor.
A letter cancelling my subscription to the magazine (revised in a few places):
'I've subscribed to Private Eye for many years. I've cancelled my subscription now. Bookworm's attack on Richard Booth of Hay-on-Wye was vindictive. This was low-level gossip, smirking, smug and unscrupulous. Richard Booth wasn't and isn't a mediocrity. What he's achieved is remarkable, outstanding - the creation, against all the odds, including bankruptcy, of the first of the Book Towns, but much more besides. In a degraded culture based on celebrity-worship and the distortions of the media (including your own distortions) he has caused no harm and done a great deal of good. To call him 'Bokassa' is ridiculous, demeaning and insulting. The Kingdom of Hay, the Hay passport, the 'Hay-on-Wye navy' (a single boat on the River Wye) are no evidence of megalomania but a combination of tongue-in-cheek cheekiness and deadly serious protest against deadening uniformity. He's exceptionally interesting and a sworn enemy of bureaucrats and commercialisation. Is his protest against the commercialisation of the Hay-on-Wye Festival something to be held up to ridicule?
'The unspeakable Bookworm refers to so-called 'grand gestures' and claims that Richard Booth 'lacks the energy to follow them up nowadays.' Richard Booth had a life-threatening brain tumour. He's worked very hard for a very long time. He's earned the right to take things easier many times over.
Yours, with revulsion,
Paul Hurt.'
Well before Bookworm's attack, I'd become more and more disillusioned and disappointed. The inventiveness of 'Private Eye' was still very impressive but the vigour it still showed was directed far more often against minor bureaucrats and politicians than in any attacks on the state of literature and the media. Here, it had become soft-centred.
The Web site of Edgeways Books has superb comment on the decline of Private Eye. I'd recommend it wholeheartedly.
From http://www.edgewaysbooks.com/
'Eyewash
'A magazine that doesn't see the simple foulness of Celebrity
Big Brother has just joined the misery it exists to satirise. There are
other things to read in the world.'
And,
'What Bookworm has taken to doing in default is weak: merely doing what he rest of the paper does, picking on those weaker than himself, the easy targets...' [I would qualify this. Not all Bookworm's targets are weaker than Bookworm. Richard Booth is in no way a weaker person than Bookworm.]
See also the pages on 'Private Eye' at
http://www.edgewaysbooks.com/Eyewash.html
and the pages of incisive comment at
http://www.edgewaysbooks.com/columns.html and
http://www.edgewaysbooks.com/magazine.html
Address of 'Harry's Place:' www.hurryupharry.org
'As someone who has written posts in defence of HP on more than one occasion, and who stood up for you when you were driven off the internet by a libel threat, I don’t think I can be accused of political or personal hostility to you. But the more familiar I become with this blog, the more distasteful I find the atmosphere here and the more questionable I find your ethics.
'For me, the turning point was having threats repeatedly posted against me by Mettaculture: he threatened me physically; threatened me with a libel suit; threatened to contact my employers. He also attacked me for the colour of my skin, and tried to intimidate me with graphic descriptions of anal sex, having previously tried to bully me into silence with references to my class background and foreign name. Not to mention all the vicious personal abuse (‘whore’, ‘douchebag’, etc.).
'I'm not intimidated by this; Mettaculture’s kind is a dime a dozen, and I’ve had my share of such creatures attempting to intimidate me. But it does constitute harassment; it has nothing to do with ‘freedom of speech’. Not only does HP not condemn such behaviour, it encourages it, providing a forum in which every little anonymous internet psycho or stalker can engage in such activities. When I tried to defend myself by outing Mettaculture, I found that I was the one whom HP censored.'
Lamia to me (written before I'd included the examples of comments Marko Attila Hoare alleges were written by mettaculture):
'Utterly extraordinary. If you are going to repeat such incredible accusations then I think you ought to say eho [sic] they are by - otherwise people might conclude that you have just made up a load of defamatory rubbish about mettaculture. I don't believe he has done any of that.
Marko Attila Hoare's gives examples of comments he alleges were written by mettaculture. All I've done is copy and paste these comments. I don't have any evidence to confirm their authenticity and veracity:
‘We are all racist’s [sic] according to the pasty white boy. He know’s [sic] you see, being a spolit middle class narcissistic solipsistic pasty white brat.’
‘No I am really fucked off and am out of here. I am out of here for my Turkish lesson where I hope to learn the correct conjugations of fuck, fuck my ass, suck it etc. Then I go to dinner with a new beau, he’s Anatolian and very dark and speaks a funny language only if you are a moron or are scandelighted by saying it. When he is sliding his very dark dick into my ass at my recently learned Turkish encouragement, i shall think of your pasty smug face and your prim white ass and what it is evidently missing. Now clutch your pearls in horror why don’t you.’
In a
reply to me, mettaculture told
me that the word 'scandelighted' is a neologism coined by him and the same
word is used here but I don't claim this as evidence that he did write
those comments.
Marko Attila Hoare is an academic with a very good publication record and very interesting personal experiences: he witnessed the Kosovo War of 1999, covered the fall of Milosevic in 2000, worked as a Research Officer for the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia in 2001, and participated in the drafting of the indictment of Slobodan Milosevic.
In general, my political views are opposed to his. In general, unlike Marko Attila Hoare, I'd endorse the views and writing of Douglas Murray, for example - but not all of them. I'm a subscriber to 'The Spectator,' where Douglas Murray often publishes.
This is mettaculture's comment on my use of the quotation from the blog 'Greater Surbiton:'
'In fact be very careful if you do not know the context you are being
foolish. I did indeed state that I was not be prepared to be defamed as a
racist. You should be aware of reproducing such libellous comments too.
'I do take action against baseless false accusations of racism. I kindly
asked Socialist Unity to stop from reproducing defamatory accusations of
racism and they did.
'If you think it is clever to falsely accuse people of racism then you are not being wise not at all wise.
'This person this prior would be defamer, for what it is worth, had personal issues with me and he was chastised for revealing my identity on HP. He did not seem to understand that some of us really are at personal risk from Islamists and their supporters.
'I think he never got over being told off. I would rather say that he was the bully thinking that an anonymous poster was a nameless loser who he could traduce with false accusations of racism.
'I am not a racist and I will not tolerate you or anyone else reproducing comments that state that I am without giving me the right to defend myself.
'Now is this perfectly clear to you?
'If it helps you to know that I am a barrister, then perhaps you might understand the waters you are wading in.
[dmra accused me of 'telling people who have long been valued contributors how they should conduct themselves' in a 'pompous manner' but do I detect a trace of pomposity in mettaculture's warning here? I did detect a trace of pomposity in an earlier comment of his, 'Oh of course you completely missed my cultural references!' He's referring to his 'fucking cunting fuck-cunts' and he's completely correct in one way. I completely missed the cultural references in 'fucking cunting fuck-cunts.' Back to mettaculture's warning to me.]
'I have no idea who you are, nor do I wish to. I have no inclination to engage with you or cause you harm.
I cannot understand your actions other than as someone who has come into a conversation, sided with the unconscionable (Jihadis who call for the death of homosexuals), and taken objection to the use of English profanities (which are incapable of being libellous, they are merely vulgar insult).
'Whether you picked a fight or are overly sensitive or are simply trolling for attention and traffic to your own website is of no real importance.
'It strikes me, however, that it is reasonably clear to an impartial observer who sees the whole picture, that rather than being some kind of defender of free speech and Internet free speech at that, that you are for whatever reasons, interested in persons and vindictive smearing of persons rather than in the actual substance of ideas and discussions.
'I will not allow you to defame me by further reproducing statements that are clearly libellous.
'Do you understand?
'I have taken screen shots of the full context so that no-one may be in any future doubt as to what transpired.
'It is you that now appear here with a thinly veiled threat to begin to dredge up and re-produce an old smear attempt, that you would do well to inform yourself of, that you are aware I consider (and it is a legally well informed opinion) defamatory.
'I sincerely hope that you reflect carefully upon this and do not drag yourself into further foolishness.
'The commenter who you seek to resurrect did not ultimately do well out of such pettiness posing as analysis. This had nothing to do with me rather more with the way that such actions were perceived by neutral observers.'
After reading all this, I could have asked, 'What do I do now? Beg for mercy?'
Martin Seymour-Smith, 'Guide to Modern World Literature:'
With the advent of the Second World War Edith Sitwell adopted a new, earnest, apocalyptic manner, which culminated in her (surely too triumphal) entry into the Roman Catholic Church in 1954 ... Edith Sitwell attempted to fuse the richness of Yeats, a grand high style, and the seventeenth-century complexity of such poets as Crashaw and Vaughan. The result is pretentious, vacuous, rhetorical, as at the beginning of 'Dirge for the New Sunrise' ... Rhapsodies of praise flowed from certain knighted cultural entrepreneurs but not from critics. These later effusions of Edith Sitwell - Dr Leavis, having been read one of them in a suitably lugubrious manner by an enthusiastic pupil, is supposed to have asked 'What do I do now? Ejaculate?' - are now for the most part unread. But the vigour of her early poetry, for all its emotional emptiness, should never be forgotten.'
This document of mettaculture's doesn't worry me in the least. Does the barrister's brain of mettaculture register that I wrote, 'I'm not in a position to endorse his [Marko's] particular criticisms of mettaculture?' If mettaculture has failed to take legal action for libel against Marko Attila Hoare of Greater Surbiton then he certainly won't be taking legal action against me.
I'm not in the least bit worried about anything else mettaculture can do. (After his brief display of outrage, I've heard nothing further.)
Mettaculture posted seven comments on 'Harry's Place' within a short time of this article first appearing here, including the one quoted above. This was ludicrous. He was posting these comments, including the one which conveys his barrister's expertise, in a section which has now disappeared from 'Harry's Place!' Although they've sprung up here.
He's welcome to publish his comments, including his outspoken criticisms of me, in the comments section of this page. But he has his own blog.
https://mettaculture.wordpress.com/
This is a very poor blog. It provides a few comments posted at 'Harry's Place' in January and June 2013. (Some of my comments at 'Harry's Place' and other sites are given in the section What's new, or was new: sections list of the page 'About this site.')
His blog could be used for other purposes. For instance, why doesn't mettaculture respond to the allegations made at 'Greater Surbiton' on his blog? It seems an obvious thing to do. What's stopping him? He can't comment - or issue more warnings - in that thread at 'Harry's Place.' Comments are now closed at the thread.
Lamia rushed in to support metaculture (I don't claim that this is an instance of 'fools rush in where angels fear to tread.')
Lamia to me:
''Utterly extraordinary. If you are going to repeat such incredible
accusations then I think you ought to say eho [try using the edit facility
provided by Disqus] they are by - otherwise people might conclude that you
have just made up a load of defamatory rubbish about mettaculture. I don't
believe he has done any of that.'
Lamia was writing before I published the extraordinary comments which Marko alleges were written by mettaculture. There was an abrupt change at this point. A very strong reaction could have been expected from Lamia but in no time at all, Lamia went from shocked to weary.
Lamia to me:
' ... Paul, this argument is of only fading interest to myself and, I suspect, mettaculture ... '
To judge from mettaculture's response to this piece - seven emails in quick succession and clumsy attempts to intimidate by alluding to his power as a barrister - I don't think for one moment that mettaculture will have regarded the further publication here of the comments Marko alleges were written by mettaculture as 'of only fading interest.' Perhaps one person in a clique was trying to protect another person in the clique.
I haven't made up 'a load of defamatory rubbish' then. I've simply quoted from Marko's site.
One very surprising fact. Sarah AB is one of the moderators at 'Harry's Place' (a very ineffective moderator) and a frequent contributor, of articles as well as comments at the site. She has a blog, 'Ariachne's Broken Woof: The Weblog of Sarah Annes Brown www.adjb.net/sab/ Sarah Brown is the Professor of English at Anglia Ruskin University. The blog gives a 'blogroll' of favourite or recommended sites. It's no surprise to find 'Harry's Place' listed. It certainly is a surprise to find the blog of Marko Attila Hoare listed.
Although mettaculture can dish it out, can he take it? This was his reaction when I informed him that I'd be writing this piece. It's followed, after some comments of mine, by one of the seven posts he directed at me in a short time after the piece was published. A sign of panic, perhaps? He gives me a severe warning, 'If it helps you to know that I am a barrister, then perhaps you might understand the waters you are wading in.'
His reaction before seeing this piece:
'Oh yes please go ahead and quote me entirely out of context, it will not be the first time that has been done.
'I am sure that you can harvest a few profanities that all were in relation to the abuse of the concept of freedom of speech by Jihadists, Islamists and their apologists.
'If you cannot see that a person who is targeted for death (me, a gay man) by a pernicious ideology, for the sole reason that I exist, is, at the very least, entitled to express his contempt for their incitement for my murder (an actual abuse of free speech) by swearing at such malevolence, then there is something very, very, wrong with you.
'That you respond to my (simply vulgar) use of free speech by expressing a desire to 'shut me down' or 'expose me' via your little blog and say nothing about the actual incitement to murder that is routinely propagated by Jihadis and their apologists, puts you with in the ranks of Jihadi apologists and firmly with the enemies of both free speech, free association and the basic right to life that all people should expect to be, well basic rights.
'Rest assured however that those of us whose existence is threatened by Jihadist apologists abusing the concept and actuality of free speech will not allow ourselves to be cowed.
'Now please quote this. After all you are not a narrow social sectarian pushing your preferred ideology, you do support freedom of speech right?'
Another of the seven posts aimed in my general direction by mettaculture included this:
'If you wish to create a post that (because of its selective quoting) misrepresents HP then go ahead but it is your own reputation you are tarnishing.
'You have been treated to a great deal of reasoanbly polite interaction on this threas.' [Spelling as in the original.]
Well, by these relaxed standards, mettaculture might even describe a knee in the groin and a thump on the jaw as 'reasonably polite interaction.'
I do the best I can. I'm under no obligation to enhance the reputation of mettaculture but I do what I can to avoid distortion. If he imagines that I carry the entire burden of presenting the issues and quoting from the participants, then he's very much mistaken. I received this communication from him not long after stopping work on this section for the day. I'd already written a large proportion of what's here, after many hours of work. I'd done preparatory research well before dawn.
If the outcome of my work isn't to his liking, then mettaculture should collate the sources, do the writing and publish his account - in the comments section of this site, on 'Harry's Place' or on his own blog. If he doesn't care for the thesis, then he could make the effort and write his own anti-thesis.
I'm sure that mettaculture, a barrister, isn't in favour of a legal system where the defence team does all the work and has the responsibility of conducting the prosecution case as well, or the prosecution team does all the work and has the responsibility of conducting the defence.
I'm not
in the least
danger of ignoring the strengths of 'Harry's Place.' I'm not in the least
danger of overlooking the fact that the poor comments of the people I
criticize in this section are outweighed by others, far superior ones. After
an exchange with Lamia on the subject of torture and the death penalty - I
consider Lamia's views abhorrent - 'Kolya,' who no longer posts comments,
defended Lamia and wrote about the quality of many of her comments. I agreed
with him.
The profession of barrister
has come a long way. In 1960, in the case R. v. Penguin Books Ltd, Mervyn
Griffith-Jones was the prosecutor. Penguin Books was on trial for publishing
D. H. Lawrence's 'Lady Chatterley's Lover' and the use of 'four letter
words' in the book was part of the prosecution case. Prosecuting council
came out with this gem: 'Would you approve of your young sons, young
daughters - because girls can read as well as boys - reading this book? Is
it a book you would have lying around your own house? Is it a book that you
would even wish your wife or your servants to read?'
Now, in these
very different times, another barrister comes out with 'fucking cunting fuck-cunts.' Will there be further loosening of the norms? Probably
nothing to compare with the changes we've witnessed. I doubt if defence
counsel will ever address prosecuting counsel using the words 'Fuck off, you cunt.'
(At least, not in court.) Obviously, mettaculture wouldn't defend
this language in this setting. I criticize the use of this kind of language
in the setting of 'Harry's Place.' This is in accordance with my view of the
site, as a prominent site for presentation of the pro-Israel case and for
presentation of other distinctive views - and, I'd hope, a site which can
promote responsible activism as well. Some commenters may have very
different ideas.
We have the clash of two very different
interpretations. If mettaculture's interpretation outweighs mine, then I'm
hopelessly misguided, for my original objection to 'fucking cunting
fuck-cunts' and for quoting (but not endorsing) the criticisms of Marko
given next. He
should remember that I criticized 'fucking cunting fuck-cunts' on various
grounds, including its blurring of essential distinctions (as I see it)
between Amnesty International and an Islamist person and organization. I know that dmra supports mettaculture's
original statement and opposes my original objections. She may or may not
support his later statements on the Marko criticisms.
I'm not a beginner as a polemicist. The image at the top of the Home Page gives 'Polemics' as one of the themes of the site. I've seen off far more formidable people than him.
As mettaculture is a barrister, there's perhaps a greater chance than usual that he understands Latin. If I could choose a motto for myself, it might be 'Nemo me impune lacessit.' 'Nobody harms me with impunity,' or 'Nobody harms me and gets away with it.'
Although my attitude is more complex than that. This is from my polemical page Crap and credulity:
' ... I'm a polemicist to a certain extent, no more. I'm not a born complainer. I've practically never complained about anything - inedible food, shoddy workmanship, or anything else. On the few occasions when I have, I've almost always regretted it, even if it could easily be justified. The critic's role comes much more easily to me than the role of complainer but I often have qualms. My criticism isn't relentless. For example, I contacted one person who had given the whole of 'The Daily Telegraph' online report on his Website, pointing out the errors in the report. I made a few critical comments on the person's Website on this page. Within a short time, I removed all reference to this person and his Website, simply because I had respect for his achievement, not any achievement in his Website, but the achievement of his business, which I thought was a courageous one, undertaken in very difficult circumstances. Later, one of his friends or colleagues contacted me to say that the material on me had been removed from his Website. I hadn't asked for it to be removed. I've never asked that anyone should remove - or alter - any material critical of me. He said that the Website would be closed down, owing to pressure of work.
I don't have vindictive feelings towards mettaculture or any of the other people criticized here in the least. I find mettaculture quite a sympathetic person - by which I don't mean, of course, sympathetic towards me. He seems much more amiable than Vildechaye. Other people's experience of him may be very different from mine. I considered removing all the material on him here. I think it's best if it stays, for the time being at least. I'm not going to do anything offensive with it. I think his response was very reckless and that he could do himself real damage if he tries anything at all similar in the future. The material here may possibly deter him from trying it on in the future with people more ruthless than me. This isn't intended to be condescending, and this is obviously based on hypothetical suppositions, but it seems to me that it's in his own interest that he doesn't attempt anything similar in the future.
When I found, from my infrequent looks at 'Harry's Place,' that he hadn't contributed a comment for quite a time, I actually began to get very worried about him. I thought it likely that the material here had had an effect on him, and sent this email to Sarah AB, moderator at 'Harry's Place:'
Not long after I'd removed his real name, he posted this at 'Harry's Place:'
'I have just spent the last three weeks in Turkey (hence my non appearance)' and 'I had a great time. I attended both a gay event (several in fact) and the Istanbul film festival.'
He refers to visiting Turkey and there are Turkish associations in the piece which Mark Attila Hoare alleges was written by mettaculture and which was directed at him, but obviously I don't claim that this is proof that mettaculture did write the piece:
mettaculture regards me as a Jihadi apologist, an enemy of free speech and someone indifferent to the plight of homosexuals. I'd previously given this information in a reply to him (If he never read it, it's not my fault):
'I'm not gay but I've opposed Islamist views of gay people in very forthright tones in public at various times. I attended a debate organized by the Palestine Society at one of the city's universities not so long ago and spoke. One of the things I mentioned was the plight of gay people in Gaza (as you probably know, homosexuality isn't illegal in the West Bank.) In the days before the debate, I contacted members of the LGBT society committee at the university urging them to attend the debate too if at all possible, giving reasons.
'You write about 'the festering climate of anti-semitic and homophobic hate that is growing unchecked' thanks to people like me. Your allegation parts company with reality.'
Well before he wrote that, I'd posted a comment on 'Harry's Place' which included a quote, a plea by 'Mitchell' for freedom of speech and for the rights of homosexuals in opposition to the views of Haitham al-Haddad:
'The liberal principles cultivated in the West will not be
sent to the moral mass grave of Islamic ‘values.’ We will not capitulate to
unreasonableness, and we pride ourselves on the enlightenment values of
Mill, Voltaire and Shelley. Alan Turing, Steven Fry, Douglas Murray ...
these men are of solid moral fibre and to condemn how they love [Mitchell is
wrong in supposing that all of these are or were homosexual - the first
three weren't] is to make a mockery of anything a decent religion would
stand for. Churchill spoke of the retrograde nature of Islamism. Second
class citizenship for homosexuals will not cut it. Your right to your
opinion is there, but if you wish to flex your theocratic muscles, please do
it to the tune of masturbating Ayotollahs and
fawning
Sheikhs, for you will not mobilise your totalitarian forces on the shores of
rational, liberal democracy. I urge you to embrace the principles that built
the World Trade Centre rather than the world-view that toppled it.'
I include the whole comment, including this quotation, on the page 'About
this site' which gives a selection of my comments at 'Harry's Place.' It has
the title Banning
extremist speakers (1).
Polemics are only one facet of this site. Technical discussion with a degree of rigour is very, very important to me. I'd claim that my page Metaphor and {theme} is an example. If people like Eleanor Turney and 'Lorelei' write condescending crap about me, ' 'Oh dearie me, someone needs metaphor explaining' then they can expect some sort of polemical response. They duly received a response, in the section The first casualties of the page 'Crap and credulity,' and by other means, as did 'Macheath,' who wrote, 'The concept of metaphor, or of extended imagery, seems to have passed him by ... ' (In the case of Macheath at least, there was appreciation as well as criticism.) Putting my name and metaphor into Google would have given them evidence in no time at all that I wasn't completely ignorant of metaphor.
dmra
added a
comment to the comments page linked to this page to complain that 'I'd
described her as 'irritating' but that I'd failed to give any evidence. I replied. I could have added that when people use a mild
word like 'irritating' or a less mild word like 'dickhead,' they don't
always provide evidence, exhaustive or otherwise. She'll find that Vildechaye didn't produce the evidence for the claim
that a commenter at 'Harry's Place' is a 'lying sack of shit.'
Vildechaye and mettaculture seem to me by far the
most far-gone of the people criticized in this section, whilst dmra is
'sensible' and 'moderate,' even if she doesn't seem to object to
Vildechaye's not overwhelmingly sensible and moderate comments or quite a
number of other comments aimed at me during the dispute. She does concede
(in one of her replies to me) that 'some of the comments may have crossed
the line slightly.' She doesn't give any examples, but perhaps she'd concede
that ''You need to remove whatever is jamming up your pompous arsehole
and piss off' is a comment that 'may have crossed the line slightly.' In general, dmra
is quite an impressive commenter, but not during this dispute, I think.
Far-gone people are
often strong, but I don't think that Vildechaye and mettaculture are strong, not in this dispute. There's a pathos in pathetic or partly
pathetic people like Vildechaye and mettaculture (not in the least pathetic
in many ways). I
think of this (it was used by
Tolstoy in 'War and Peace,' Chapter XXVIII):
'Tout comprendre, c'est tout pardonner.'
'To
understand all is to forgive all' [but not always.]
Sarah AB suggested during the dispute that Vildechaye's 'fucking cunting cunt-fucks would have been a nicely chiastic alternative' to the formulation in the original comment of mettaculture, 'fucking cunting fuck-cunts.'
Sarah AB is Sarah Annes Brown, Professor of English at Anglia Ruskin University. Her real name was given at 'Harry's Place'' years before I mentioned it. (KBPlayer's article above the line, December 20, 2013.)
She has a blog, but there's a vast gulf between the blog's promise and fulfilment. The list of topics on the archive page is promising
http://www.adjb.net/sab/archives.php?showall=1
but clicking on any of them leads to this error message, time after time:
500 - Internal server error.
There is a problem with the resource you
are looking for, and it cannot be displayed.
There may be a simple explanation for these errors, but for the time being, the blog is almost unusable. Some of the content isn't relevant to people in my circumstances. This, for example:
'06/29/07
It’s nearly holiday time so this is simply a
(disinterested) plug for a UK hotel group, ’Luxury Family Hotels’, which is
good (but quite expensive) if you have children.
'We discovered
Luxury Family Hotels when our son (now 9) was a toddler. Further details of
all their current properti ' (the blog gives no further information, but it
can be stated, with a high degree of confidence, that 'properti' is
short for 'properties.')
There's also this, on another aspect of Fine Living:
05/20/07
I went to Paris last week with Alex to continue our
investigation of France’s grandes tables. Our last such outing was to the
memorable Guy Savoy. This time we decided to try Alain Passard’s
controversial L’Arpège.'
A normblog profile - a set of answers to questions - gives this as the answer to the question, 'What would your ideal holiday be?' 'A leisurely tour of French Relais et Chateaux hotels and/or Michelin-starred restaurants.' This answer, with other answers:
http://normblog.typepad.com/normblog/2009/09/the-normblog-profile-313-sarah-annes-brown.html
I do, though, have a strong interest in cooking, including French cooking, although only in the cooking which is vegetarian or can be adapted to a vegetarian diet. My collection includes a few books on French cooking: part of Michel Guérard's 'Cuisine Gourmande' (the systematic section 'The Principal Methods of Cooking' - I threw away the rest of the book to save space), Anne Willan's 'French Regional Cooking' and the two very thorough treatises, Volume I and II of 'Mastering the Art of French Cooking' by Simone Beck and Julia Child, which are often not just thorough but excessively thorough. Examples. On beating eggs during the making of the omelette: '30 to 40 vigorous strokes should be sufficient.' Practising the technique needed to make 'L' omelette Roulée by practising outdoors with half a cupful of dried beans. But when I do make an omelette, I follow consciously the general method of the book's directions for making 'L' Omelette Brouillée.'
The only posts given in full date from June - August, 2012. The blog seems to have been abandoned after that time. Clicking on the list at the bottom of the page to view earlier pages leads to the error message.
I've come to some conclusions about Sarah AB but they're tentative and provisional, based on what I've been able to read of her blog, which isn't very much. Her life is a very pleasant one. I wouldn't say that it's lived under cloudless skies, but only because it seems to be an indoors life, in which agreeable academic conferences figure prominently. (The Normblog profile gives in answer to the question 'What commonly enjoyed activities do you regard as a waste of time?' this: 'Country walks.') The academic conferences are nothing like the tedious, time-wasting exercises in futility which anti-academic generalizers mistakenly claim are the norm. In the main, they seem full of interest, for anyone with an interest in the field. Her comments are generally interesting too, but don't often go deep. Ovid, one of her cultural heroes, isn't an unexpected choice. This is a poet whose work I don't know well, although I translated sections of the 'Metamorphoses.' (The site includes one translation of a poem in Latin, not by Ovid but Horace - the translation of 'Carmina' 1, 34, after my discussion of Seamus Heaney's version, on the page Seamus Heaney: translations and versions.)
Chris Wurster on the superficiality he finds in Ovid's poetry:
http://www.columbia.edu/itc/lithum/gallo/wurster.html
From Teresa Ramsby's review of her book 'The Metamorphosis of Ovid: From Chaucer to Ted Hughes.' (Bryn Mawr Classical Review 2000.03.30):
' ... her treatment of the material is sophisticated and well informed by past and current scholarship. Brown displays a masterful understanding of the Ovidian canon and the importance of Ovid's influence on some of the West's most cherished literature. In addition, Brown's work makes the important contribution of effacing that boundary between the disciplines of Classics and English and Comparative Literature, so that we can hope for more works in the future that trace the influences and communications between the works of antiquity and those of modern times. I highly recommend The Metamorphosis of Ovid.'
In my page on Rilke and Kafka, I refer to the 'surface profundity' of Rilke. I think that Sarah AB's blog calls for another complex, such as 'intelligent semi-superficiality.' Her writings at 'Harry's Place' are available in greater quantity and share much the same qualities, I think. It's possible that I'd need to revise my view in some ways if I read the books she's written or edited, such as her book on Ovid and the one 'Tragedy in transition.'
She declares herself a feminist. One view not in need of possible need of {modification} is the view that her feminism is one of the familiar forms of academic feminism, not one which has made the effort to understand and appreciate the skills and the hard physical work of such people as miners, quarrymen, bricklayers, roofers. My page on feminism stresses among other things the material conditions of life.
The Disqus archive of mettaculture's comments, which gives them all, leaves no room for doubt about one matter, I think - he's an intelligent man. I can't reconcile his better writing with the very poor comments he sometimes writes. The contradictions of mettaculture, like the contradictions of vildechaye and the others I criticize in this section, are very striking, instances of one of the central concerns of the site, referred to in the Home Page, 'Linkage and contrast provide a powerful way of viewing human personality in its frequent mixture of strength and weakness and the often grotesque contradictions to be found in societies ... ' From my page Aphorisms: 'As for human nature, human strengths and weaknesses, be surprised by nothing.'
Just as I defend Amnesty International, despite its severe faults (quotations given below) and the Labour Party (even though I vote Conservative) despite its severe faults, I defend mettaculture and vildechaye despite their severe faults, and the others, whose faults are less serious, as I see it. I defend 'Harry's Place,' despite its faults. I oppose the reflex response, confusion of the part with the whole, rejection of the whole on account of the faultiness of a part (but sometimes, the faults in a part are good reason to reject the whole.) This tendency is common enough in 'Harry's Place' and very common in other places. This isn't to claim that people and organizations with serious faults emerge with reputation not affected in the least. Serious damage can't usually be concealed.
In all these instances, the question has to be asked, 'Do the faults outweigh the strengths or do the strengths outweigh the faults?' I discuss my use of outweighing in the page 'Ethics: theory and practice' (the middle column.) Outweighing has more general application, though.
The BBC is criticized on this page but the BBC is yet another organization not to be dismissed on account of its faults, such as its grossly biased coverage of Israel's 'Operation Protective Edge' against Gaza, and Israeli issues in general. The BBC is deeply impressive as well as deeply flawed. To give just a few examples of its deeply impressive broadcasting: the programmes broadcast on Holocaust Memorial Day 2015 to mark the 70th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau.
There's not much about 'Harry's Place' which can be called deeply impressive, but the strengths just about outweigh the glaring faults.
The comment of mettaculture that led to the conflict I discuss here, 'fucking cunting fuck-cunts' (applied to Amnesty International and other organizations, extremist or badly misguided) can be objected to for various reasons. One is that it's the product of lazy-minded thinking. Coming out with a statement like that takes next to no thought.
At least I exert myself. I loathe bullfighting but instead of simply writing 'Fuck bullfighting' I've written close to 100,000 words on Bullfighting: arguments against and action against. I loathe the bullfighter Alexander Fiske-Harrison but instead of writing 'Fuck Fiske-Harrison' and leaving it at that, I've given a detailed demolition of his views and actions. I loathe the writing of A L Kennedy on bullfighting, whilst admiring some of her writing on other subjects. I've devoted an extensive page to appreciation of her as well as criticism.
I oppose feminism, particularly radical feminism, but instead of just saying 'Fuck feminism,' again, I've written close to 100,000 words on Feminist ideology. When I'm sarcastic, it's not as a substitute for analysis and I use sarcasm in a way which involves some inventiveness at least. I'd claim this for the material on Triona Kennedy at the top of the anti-feminist page.
When I'm ridiculed in 'Harry's Place,' I don't say, 'Fuck you, Harry's Place,' I write this critical piece, which doesn't include nearly enough appreciation for 'Harry's Place' but which includes some. I don't in the least claim that a long discussion is always necessary. Again and again, I've been impressed by short, sometimes very short, comments in 'Harry's Place,' including comments by people I criticize in this section. I wasn't in the least impressed by 'fucking cunting fucking-cunts.' This was a comment that needed to be longer, much longer, to do justice to the issues. A dismissal of Amnesty International should have been argued for, with evidence.
mettaculture mentions 'traffic' to this site as a possible motive for my comments on 'Harry's Place.' Google has been good to me, very good. The site has very high rankings for a large number of search terms. But people who write simply to achieve high rankings don't achieve them. I write about matters which interest me and of which I have knowledge. Rankings can take care of themselves.
My page on Israel, Islamism and Palestinian ideology, topics discussed at 'Harry's Place' also, but not the only topics, will never be able to compete with 'Harry's Place' for comprehensiveness, or in most other ways. In my page I've devoted a very great deal of space to profiles of academic and non-academic anti-Israel-pro-Palestinian people. This was to support my campaigning against these people. I've emailed almost all of them - but not the Palestinian supporters murdered by Islamists. I wanted to do what I could to deter future academic and non-academic action against Israel, such as boycotts. I knew that there would be next to no benefit for the site's rankings in Google. I expected only a few people to want to read my profile of Dick Pitt, emeritus, formerly of Sheffield Hallam University or the Sheffield Quaker Gordon Ferguson, for example, or any of the other profiles for that matter. Activism is that important to me. If I were going all out for higher rankings, I wouldn't have spent all that time doing the necessary research and writing the profiles. There are other sections on the page which are likely to benefit rankings for the site only slightly, ones concerned with local issues - the section on the Showroom cinema, Sheffield, and on the Sheffield Palestine Solidarity Campaign.
Nobody sets out with the ambition of achieving success in Google rankings by writing about line length in poetry. I certainly didn't. The very high rankings in Google for search terms to do with line length in poetry have been completely unexpected.
Instead of patiently adding content to his blog, mettaculture has chosen the easier way - posting comments on the high-profile site 'Harry's Place,' where his comments will be read by many, many people. I've chosen to patiently add content to my Website. When I wrote comments for 'Harry's Place,' far, far fewer than mettaculture's, it was for tactical reasons, such as arguing for changes to 'Harry's Place,' so that 'Harry's Place' became less of a talking shop (even if the pleasurable chatting is quite often high quality chatting), less self-indulgent in the war of words.
I'm sure that mettaculture overlooks one very important fact. I didn't set out to achieve temporary prominence in 'Harry's Place.' I made a point about a phrase but one thing led to another. Very quickly, there were more and more criticisms and accusations. I defended myself vigorously and called upon any evidence I thought would be useful at the time, which led to such unlikely exchanges as ones on sarcastic and humorous poetry.
Faced by comments like this one of 'Colin,' ' ... the depressing reality that PH is a dwarf of culture and intelligence' I stood up for myself, using evidence from different sources. Before all this, I'd commented at 'Harry's Place' only on a few occasions (I intend to comment in the future much more rarely - never, or practically never.) I commented many, many times during this dispute, but not for any reason to do with 'traffic to the site.'
If I'd conceded defeat at an early stage, none of this would have happened but I was determined to oppose the accusations and criticisms. Some of them were completely bizarre. To laugh them off or treat them lightly would have been wrong. If some people want to escape boredom or want to escape the difficulties of their lives for a short time by posting a childish comment on me I see no reason to humour them. If they want to have fun - or forget the realities of their lives - there are many other ways of going about it. I don't see any reason why it should be at my expense.
Some statistics. At the time of writing, Vildechaye has contributed 14,091 Disqus comments, mettaculture 5,581 and Lamia has contributed 7,728. All or almost all of these were posted at 'Harry's Place.' I've contributed 120. It would have been far, far fewer if it hadn't been for this dispute.
Time to quote some more comments made during the dispute, from a wider range of commenters.
I'm tired of the laziness of some commenters at 'Harry's Place.' That's why I objected to this comment. Anton Deque to Guest, in a comment beginning with a quotation:
' "Anyway I am waffling."
No comment.'
PH to Anton Deque:
'You're obviously taking the easy way out. Are you that lazy? If you object to the statement 'Anyway I am waffling' in the comment of this guest, then at least take the trouble to explain why you find the statement (or the entire comment) not to your liking. Don't just write, 'No comment.' There are worse examples than this, but too many commentators on the Web seem to take the instant and effortless route to superiority (supposed superiority, that is): a few quick words are all that's needed.'
Colin to Jacob Arnon:
'Naughty, naughty word association. Obama says stop it.'
Jacob Arnon to Colin:
'Who is Obama?'
Which barely counts as facile.
amie to PH:
'Are you a FOE* by any chance? Your pearl clutching (as another commenter was wont to call it) prompts the question *(friend of another person who can't abide profanity.)'
PH to amie:
'A weird and pointless comment, to me anyway. What weird and pointless and time-wasting little games a few 'Harry's Place' regulars seem to enjoy so much. If you're trying to make a clumsy suggestion that I can't abide what you call 'profanity,' (an old-fashioned word) then you're badly mistaken. This poem of mine was published in 'Krax,' the magazine of humorous poetry ... ' [Followed by the poem and discussion of the poem. It's published on this site too, in the section 'Humour and sarcasm' of the page Poems.]
Another weird and pointless comment.
Ludwig the Terrible to me:
'Silence, you mewling quim!
Hey, I enjoyed that :)'
Andrea Collins to me:
'Quim' obscure?'
Ludwig the Terrible to Andrea:
'He hasn't seen 'The Avengers,' obviously.'
I replied. I was probably mistaken. Better not to have wasted my time.
PH to Andrea Collins:
'Sorry. Not a word we use here in Sheffield, South Yorkshire. Never heard of it before now.'
Edward Tring to me:
'Look in the mirror. You're one.
PH to Edward Tring:
'Your comment is facile and instantly forgettable, to me at least. Why do you bother?'
I didn't look up 'Quim' at the time. The 'Urban Dictionary' gives this:
'The noun quim was a Victorian-era word that was used specifically to refer to the fluids produced by the vagina, specifically during orgasm. In modern usage it is primarily heard in British slang and is a derogatory or vulgar term for the vagina itself.'
This is a comment on 'mewling quim' from the blog 'Britishisms:'
'It deals with a moment in the new film “The Avengers”–written by the Americans Joss Whedon and Zak Penn–when Loki addresses Black Widow with the two-word epithet that’s the title of this post. Loki hails from outer space (John informs me) but, perhaps significantly, is played by a British actor. John writes:
'this is possibly the most offensive line in the film, beyond even Wolverine’s in X-Men: First Class. It is just that some people aren’t too familiar with the derivation. In more modern English, this would be “whining cunt”. In American English, “cunt” is generally used as a misogynistic insult, mostly used against women, insulting their very nature of being female. British English doesn’t use the female-specific aspect of this in an insult, which loses much of the mysogynistic tone. Indeed, it’s more likely to be used against a man, an exaggerated form of “wanker”. But “quim”, though rarely used, is done so in a misogynist fashion.'
A response from on 'Britishisms' by Mark Leavitt on 'mewling:'
Mewling comes down to us from Shakespeare’s monologue, “All the World’s a stage, ” in which appears the line: “Mewling and puking in his nurse’s arms.” It refers to the restless sounds a hungry or uncomfortable baby makes.'
This monologue of Jaques in 'As you like it' (Act II Scene VII) is familiar to me.
The response of JRock:
'“quim” is not as common as “cunt” in the US. It is as foreign as Mandarin to most. The only reason it passed censorship scrutiny is that no one knows what the hell it means stateside.'
The response of Rob:
'Quim seems such an archaic word to me. I honestly don’t think a lot of Brits would even know what it means. I’ve never heard anyone using it in any part of the UK ... '
Back to 'Harry's Place.' A futile interchange between two commenters. Colin to mettaculture:
'I have a suspicion that PH is figment of your imagination - invented by you to make you appear a towering giant of culture and intelligence.'
mettaculture to Colin:
'Now there was me thinking that PH is one of your sock puppets.'
mettaculture, now at his most high-minded, to colin. This is a moment to be treasured:
'I can truthfully swear that I have never created a sock puppet either as a foil or a promoter of myself.
'I have never created avatars for such a purpose.
'It is quite difficult enough dealing with the disconnected weirdness of so many e-avatars. I see no point in making them.
'No I have very old fashioned Socratic ideas of the importance of the unexamined life.
'I blog in order to meet those in the Agora who wish to discuss ideas.
'Thats it.'
The gulf between the ideal - 'The unexamined life is not worth living' - and the reality, at least in this part of the site - moronic and semi-moronic time-wasting - is immense.
Yet another weird and pointless comment.
Lamia to amie:
'Hahaha. It took me a little while, but I have just got it.
'Do you have a shrine to Laurie Penny in your bedroom, Paul?'
PH to Lamia:
'Ah, this is Lamia the humourist in action, rather than Lamia the scourge or Lamia the thinker!
'All I know about Laurie Penny is that she's a feminist. For my views on
feminism (against) see my page on the subject
www.linkagenet.com/themes/femi... '
I was wrong about one thing. This wasn't Lamia as humourist but Lamia as pathetic.
I looked up Laurie Penny later. She's the mind behind the blog 'Penny Red: every human heart is a revolutionary cell'
http://pennyred.blogspot.co.uk/
where she describes herself as 'feminist, socialist, utopian ... '
(not a description I find in the least bit endearing or attractive. I'm not
just anti-feminist but anti-socialist and anti-utopian as well.')
Now
she has a new, unimproved site
One of the articles on offer is 'Fifty shades of socialist feminism.'
I'm anti-socialist, but it depends what you mean by socialism. I detest smug socialism, but not the socialism which worked so hard for fair treatment of workers during the very long period when working conditions were atrocious, intolerable, the socialism which took full account of many other realities. My anti-feminist page has a great deal on the men and women, boys and girls in the mines of this country. (I point out that after 1842, it was only men and boys who toiled underground - an inconvenient fact for feminists.)
David Thompson has a very good page on Ms Penny.
http://davidthompson.typepad.com/davidthompson/2011/01/the-penny-hasnt-dropped.html
He writes:
Writing for Red Pepper, Ms Penny tells us that, “capitalism is built on the docile bodies of women” and that women are reduced to “reproductive labourers whose physical and sexual autonomy is relentlessly policed.” The same article rails against “US state governments [that] compete to think up ever more cruel and unusual ways to punish women for sexual self-determination.”
'It is, I think, fair to say that Laurie Penny enjoys railing against things, generally things that aren’t entirely obvious but which are framed as both terrible and somehow self-evident. A typical Laurie Penny article is long on assertion, short on facts and coherent argument, and invariably written in the highest possible gear. She rails against the Conservative Party (“hordes of drooling poshos”) and its “brutally intolerant moral agenda.” The details of this brutally intolerant agenda are, alas, somewhat vague. She rails against “the bruised superstructure of patriarchal capitalist control,” the particulars of which also remain unspecified and mysterious. She rails against a “heteronormative patriarchy that oppresses all of us.” (What, you didn’t know?) She rails against “brutal repression” by an impending police state that no-one else can see, and she rails against protestors “not being heard,” as if being heard must entail being agreed with and obeyed. Ours, she says, is a world “on fire.”
'When not railing against a heteronormative police state that’s brutal, intolerant and also on fire, Ms Penny likes to share with us an extensive menu of personal miseries, along with other aspects of her fascinating self:
'It’s getting harder to stay in touch with why I write and campaign in the first place. It’s getting harder to stay angry… That terrifies me more than anything... The centre-right have taken back my country… Across the pond, the American right are winning the fight for ideological control of the world's only superpower.'
'Ah, an elected British government that’s insufficiently leftwing. The End Times are upon us.
'That’s what clinical depression does, you see. It takes away your anger, piece by piece... When terrible things happen - like a coalition government closing down your country piece by piece, slamming the door on the young, the poor, the sick, immigrants, women - you cease to really believe that anything can be done.'
...
'For Ms Penny, politics must always be declared in the most
inflated and operatic terms. Proportion is a hindrance and realism is
irrelevant, as are minor details like facts and causality. Among which,
the relationship between a
higher education bubble and egalitarian beliefs remarkably like her
own. Thus, Laurie regards belated cuts in public spending – cuts that
merely reduce the overall
increase in spending – as “the greatest assault on social
democracy in living memory.” While 13 years of
overspending and unsustainable state expansion under New Labour, a
consequent
structural debt measured in trillions and the buying of votes with
other people’s money doesn’t count as an “assault” on anything. What
matters – pretty much all that matters – is the drama, the
role-play, the rhetorical rush. And in Laurie’s world everything is
political, no matter how
small, self-indulgent or contrived.
'Needless to say, the
news is always grim:
'The planet is boiling; the rivers are drying up; the human race may very well be about to tear itself apart.'
One of Ms Penny’s readers asks,
'Why do you feel it important to be angry all the time?'
'While we wait for an answer, perhaps we should try reversing that sequence of ideas. After all, pretending to be angry makes some people feel important all the time.'
Back to my issues. One of the moderators of the site intervened, obviously not because she recognized that things were getting out of hand and to stop the site becoming a complete madhouse but to inject a little more madness. Her comment left me more mystified than ever.
Sarah AB to me:
'To explain, it is suspected (probably not seriously) that you are Michael Ezra, who is famous for hating swearing, voting for Ken, and liking Laurie Penny ... '
Famous? I'd never heard of him. If 'Ken' here is Ken Livingstone, then I'd never vote for him and I'm not in a position to vote for him, any more than for George Galloway. I haven't the patience to find out more about Michael Ezra. Finding out more about Laurie Penny was more than enough. This glimpse into a private world of fixations on Laurie Penny and other delusions was more than enough.
Sarah AB is generally a very 'sensible' writer, one of the many moderate writers at 'Harry's Place' (unfortunately, moderate and sensible writers often have very little insight into people very different from themselves.) Some people would accuse her of taking moderation to extremes. This is Sarah AB writing effectively (with mentions of mettaculture and vildechaye, as it happens - the piece has the title 'A response (or perhaps a metaresponse - to mettaculture):
http://hurryupharry.org/2012/11/25/a-response-or-perhaps-a-metaresponse-to-mettaculture/
The striking thing in Sarah AB's comment is 'probably not seriously.' If anybody takes the claim that I'm Michael Ezra seriously, this is almost as mad as the average conspiracy theory. Secularists - you too can be barking mad. What's that I hear coming from 'Harry's Place?'
A libertarian comments policy doesn't entail a complete lack of effective moderation. Moderation is about far more than censoring and deleting. Moderators can intervene and calm things down when they've got out of hand, moderators can address obnoxious behaviour without needing to act like nightclub bouncers and throw people out regularly.
Occasionally, moderators may need to get rid of people, just as a site may need to get rid of useless moderators.
Sarah AB should have got a grip before time-wasting and space-wasting digressions got out of hand - for instance the ones involving Laurie Penny, Michael Ezra, the mewling quin and PH as a dwarf of culture and intellect. All I did was respond and point out the ridiculousness of the points. A good moderator would have intervened to end the dispute. From time to time the Speaker of the House of Commons calls out 'Order! Order." Sarah AB is a poor moderator of the site and an often lacklustre contributor of articles above-the-line. There's a case for saying that Sarah AB should be sacked/fired/deprived of this outlet, except as a generally lacklustre commenter below-the-line/deprived of her sinecure/given every opportunity to spend more time with Ovid - obviously with thanks for her 'contributions to the site over the years.'
Sarah AB did intervene, eventually, but not in the least effectively.
Sarah AB to me:
' 'Any chance of a comment from one of the mods of this site on mettaculture's 'fucking cunting fuck-cunts?' ' It was a bit repetitive I guess.'
Sarah AB to KBPlayer:
'fucking cunting cunt-fucks would have been a nicely chiastic alternative.'
A comment on the rhetorical form chiasmus doesn't do justice to the objections to the original comment.
To give some background information on Lamia, another prolific commenter at 'Harry's Place' and for a time quite a prolific commenter on me. I'd previously had some exchanges with Lamia. I give some information on the page 'About this site,' in the section Torturing and executing. As I mention there, I only found out later that Lamia is female, not male. Nobody put me right at the time. This is another disadvantage of anonymity - for more on this, there's Website and blog comments: the veil of anonymity on this page.
Before disputing with me and whilst disputing with me, Lamia found the time to dispute with someone else. One comment, not directed at me:
'Go and get mental treatment ...'
And,
'Fuck off you insane troll.'
Someone thought Lamia was telling me to fuck off. She explained that she was telling a 'guest' on the site to fuck off. Later, Lamia explained that she never used the phrase at all:
'Fuck off, you insane troll' was posted by my eleven year old niece using my handle while I was out of the room.'
Anyone who has read a great many comments on 'Harry's Place' will have come upon 'Fuck off' or 'fucking' many times. It doesn't have the least shock value to come upon it again. This is language which has largely lost its vigorous or vital or visceral qualities. It doesn't take the least imagination or inventiveness to come up with it.
These are people who have a genuine concern for Israel and a genuine opposition to Islamism, but, rightly or wrongly, I think that some of them are people who are self-indulgent. Spending time in the talking shop which is 'Harry's Place.' (it's also far more than a talking shop) posting comments of the childish kind is congenial to them.
I have a strenuous attitude to campaigning. Anyone who takes part in counter-demonstrations, as I do (ones I've arranged myself) would get nowhere if they simply said to the opposition 'Fuck off!' Granted, people tend to have very different identities, but I regard using 'fuck off' or 'fucking' on a site like 'Harry's Place' as counter-productive. It can alienate visitors to the site who aren't prim and proper in the least but don't like the language or who see no need for the language on the site, who think that the language adds nothing and has no advantage.
When I saw this comment on 'Harry's Place' and posted a reply, it was the start of a process of recriminations directed at me which has fundamentally altered my attitude to the site. The comment was posted by mettaculture in reply to this comment of Barad:
'Apologies for pointless profanity but feck Begg, Cage, Amnesty and the Quakers. If there turns out to be a hell, I hope they all burn in it for a long, long time.'
mettaculture to Barad:
'Why apologize? profanity is not pointless in relation to these fucking cunting fuck-cunts.'
Barad's comment and mettaculture's comment are hopeless, classing Amnesty International with the apologists for Islamist extremism Begg and Cage, all of them supposed to be 'fucking cunting fuck-cunts' or to burn in hell 'for a long, long time.'
An interchange in a later thread, 'Class conflict in IS?' after mention of the first Western woman to be killed fighting IS.
Barad to mirax:
'Contrast with the three "British" whores for ISIS who Sky, BBC et al are so convinced we all want back since they went "missing".'
Edward Tring to Barad:
'Not sure 'whores' is the right word to use, as we have no proof that they are willingly having sex with murderers/perverts/scum for cash. What's the word for Muslim low life who shag other Muslim low life for free? Can we get Oxford University to adjudicate for its next dictionary? Is Islamosluts a neologism? '
Jurek Molnar to Barad:
'I strongly recommend not to engage in such a language.
Jurek Molnar to Barad:
' ... I can see no reason to call them "whores".
A derogatory term does not change the reality of their departure and their
lunatic frame of mind.
To despise them does not mean to engage in
language that is simply dehumanizing them. That is something we should
avoid, in my humble opinion.'
As usual, it was left to commenters to do moderator's work. I've no sympathy for the three girls but Barad was wrong, very wrong, to describe them in the way he did.
Back to this thread. I replied to mettaculture:
'Any chance of a comment from one of the moderators of this site on mettaculture's 'fucking cunting fuck-cunts?' Does the site still have moderators? If they do exist, I only hope Vildechaye isn't one of them.'
The interchange that followed:
mettaculture to me:
'Oh of course you completely missed my cultural references! The phraseology that you are so scandelighted by is from 'Jerry Springer the Opera' ('with a reflexive nod to Trainspotting').
Such a shame that the level of contemporary cultural awareness is deteriorating due to the contaminating influence of Gilbert and Sullivan and those long running musicals at Cambridge Circus, absolutely dreadful middlebrow dreck.'
Not quite a defence of high culture rather than middlebrow culture, of course.
PH to mettaculture:
'Are you saying that my level of cultural awareness is poor, just because I don't know anything about 'Jerry Springer the Opera? A person's cultural awareness can't possibly be all-inclusive. My own cultural interests are in literature rather tha music (although I've never read Irvine Welsh's 'Trainspotting.') Even so, my musical interests are wide, including opera (particularly the operas of Mozart), chamber music and orchestral music. I've played in various string quartets and orchestras. None of the works I've played have been 'dreadful middlebrow dreck.'
mettaculture to me:
'Ah you want the profanity Police censors do you? I am sure that avoiding nasty words will make you feel very safe.
'As a gay man I no longer feel safe from Jihadi and their fucking apologists. My profanity is reserved for Jihadis and their apologists.
'But you prefer to condemn my use of words found in the Harraps dictionary of slang rather than the festering climate of anti-semitic and homophobic hate that is growing unchecked thanks to people like you.
'Congratulations for acting so prissily maiden auntish in hte [sic] face of hatred and incitement.
'Well done. God knows what goes on in your rotting brain but someone has 'to tell um that you aint got no cerebelum.'
PH to mettaculture:
'Obviously, just because words can be found in a dictionary doesn't mean that their use is a good idea in some circumstances. Calling someone 'a festering turd' or 'fucking scumbag isn't always a good idea, for instance ... '
And a further reply, PH to mettaculture:
''Don't be ridiculous. I'm not offended by what you call 'nasty words.' I've no interest in censoring at all. I just think language like that is counter-productive on this site. My view is pragmatic.'
'As for not having 'no cerebelum,' this should be 'no cerebrum,' the site of consciousness, and whilst I'm at it, 'cerebelum' has the spelling 'cerebellum.'
Vildechaye to Emma Elder on spelling:
'learn to spell, then learn to think.'
PH to mettaculture:
'Barad's equating Amnesty International and the Quakers with Begg and Cage is beneath contempt. I know all about Amnesty International's and the Quaker's bias against Israel and detest their bias but Barad (and obviously Met) don't seem able to grasp the point that organizations, like people, can be badly wrong about one thing or many things but still have strengths. Amnesty International's work is impressive in so many ways. Its bias against Israel is on the debit side but failures and weaknesses don't necessarily cancel strengths, leaving the person or organization with nothing to their credit at all.'
This is information about Amnesty International's Urgent Action Network, action for people in immediate danger.
This is just one Urgent Action case from the Amnesty International files:
'Arzhang Davoodi (m)
'Iranian prisoner of conscience Arzhang Davoodi,
already in prison for nearly 11 years, has now been sentenced to death
on a new charge of “enmity against God”, in relation to his peaceful
political activism and writings.
'Iranian writer and poet Arzhang Davoodi learned
from his lawyer on 20 July 2014 that he had been sentenced to death for
his alleged membership and support of banned group People's Mojahedin
Organization of Iran (PMOI). The sentence was imposed despite an
apparent lack of evidence and after grossly unfair proceedings. He had
been given less than an hour on 3 June to present his defence before a
Revolutionary Court in the southern city of Bandar Abbas, which relayed
it to a Revolutionary Court in Karaj, responsible for issuing the death
sentence. Neither Arzhang Davoodi nor his lawyer were allowed to appear
before the court which issued the verdict.
'Arzhang Davoodi was arrested in 2003 and held in solitary confinement for prolonged periods during which he has said he was tortured and otherwise ill-treated and denied access to a lawyer and his family. He was sentenced, in March 2005, to 25 years’ imprisonment, reduced to 10 years on appeal, on charges of “spreading propaganda against the system” and “establishing and directing an organization opposed to the government” for his peaceful activities, including directing a cultural education centre. In May 2014, he was sentenced to an additional two years’ imprisonment, on the charge of “insulting the Supreme Leader” which is under consideration in an appeal court.
'Arzhang Davoodi is a prisoner of conscience,
jailed, and now sentenced to death, for his political opinions and
peaceful exercise of the right to freedom of expression. He has no links
with the PMOI or any armed groups. He is believed to have been accused
of having ties with the PMOI merely because in prison he insisted on
calling PMOI by its official name, Mojahedin, rather than by the term
used by the Iranian authorities, Monafeghin (hypocrites).
'Please write immediately in Persian, Arabic, English
or your own language:
*Calling on the Iranian authorities to overturn
Arzhang Davoodi’s death sentence;
* Calling on them to release Arzhang Davoodi
immediately and unconditionally, as he is a prisoner of conscience, held
solely for the peaceful exercise of his right to freedom of expression;
* Reminding them that under international law, the
death penalty can be imposed only for “the most serious crimes”, interpreted
as “intentional killing” and after proceedings that comply with the most
rigorous internationally recognized standards for fair trial.
The page Urgent Actions Q&A,
http://www.amnesty.org.uk/sites/default/files/urgent_actions_q_and_a.pdf
gives good, sensible, realistic advice on specifics, far removed from the self-indulgent time-wasting of some 'Harry's Place' commenters. Reading the complete page is highly recommended. It includes interesting material on the disadvantages of emails for some Amnesty International work. The advantages of hand-written letters are mentioned. Harry's Place and other sites with similar objectives (not at all similar in some other ways, I'm glad to say): Amnesty International gives a superb model to imitate and use - Amnesty International's generally thorough, meticulous provision of background information as well as useful practical information for contacting people and organizations in positions of power, whether the power is enormous or comparatively small. (I make completely clear my opposition in general to one aspect of Amnesty's work, its work on Israel and Palestinian issues.)
I acknowledge some difficulties. When I was a member of Amnesty International, I produced a document on campaigning techniques and spoke in favour of a motion I'd formulated at an Amnesty International AGM, on campaigning techniques. I made the point that Amnesty International needed to scrutinize the campaigning techniques it used. Some were demonstrably ineffective. I pointed out that if Amnesty International had existed in the 1930's, it would have organized letter-writing to Dr Goebbels and other Nazis, along the lines, 'Dear Dr Goebbels, we are concerned about the imprisonment without charge of ... We regard him/her as a prisoner of conscience and call for his/her unconditional release.' But these Nazis were completely beyond persuasion. Amnesty International's distinctive methods are often very successful, but are sometimes unrealistic. What works in some circumstances may not work in others: hence the massive importance of military strength for this country and other democracies.
At the same AGM (held in Edinburgh) I spoke on human rights abuses in China and the need for Amnesty International to give greater priority to opposing these abuses. At a previous AGM, a motion I'd formulated on anti-personnel mines was presented, although I didn't speak on the motion (at the time, Amnesty International didn't have a policy on anti-personnel mines.) All these motions were passed overwhelmingly but I can't claim that they were implemented conscientiously.
How easily personal setbacks and difficulties which were important at the time can recede and become insignificant. I remember now that I almost didn't make it to the Edinburgh Amnesty International AGM. The vehicle I have now, a Citroen Berlingo white van, is the only one I've owned up to modern standards of reliability. I couldn't afford anything but cheap cars. The car I was driving to Edinburgh wasn't the least reliable - my first car was much, much worse - but it kept stopping and the fact that it kept stopping in the picturesque Yorkshire dales. was no consolation. I realized what was the cause - a blocked fuel filter - but I didn't have a replacement fuel filter with me. I ought to have called out the breakdown service but I didn't. (Until I bought the van, I tried to be as self-sufficient as possible in mechanical matters, including major mechanical work on the engine. Lacking a garage, I've had engine parts on the pavement in front of the house.) In the end, I made it to Edinburgh. When I broke down on the return journey back to Sheffield, I conceded defeat and got help. Now, I don't even change the engine oil and oil filter, not personally. I can't work on the carburettor, because there isn't one. Fuel injection systems, electronic engine management systems, are beyond my scope. Although struggling with corroded fixings, underneath the vehicle at the side of the road isn't beyond my scope, it's not something I do any longer. There are brute realities in other spheres of experience, as well as brutal realities.
Back to mettaculture - mettaculture to me:
'God that was banal drivel. I'd rather you don't refer to me at all but do as you wish. I can't imagine anyone does more than skims your reader's digest, digests. [sic]
'Of course my vulgarity got your attention and a fairly close reading and accurate quotation. Such is the way among those with easily scandelighted content free, poorly assembled, neural tissue.'
PH to mettaculture:
' ... skims your reader's digest, disgests' and 'Such is the way among those with easily scandelighted content free, poorly assembled, neural tissue.' But the first sentence of your second paragraph is just as bad. A reminder that Disqus allows comments to be edited - and improved - after they've been posted.
'It's easy to see that you're no perfectionist.'
After this piece was published, a comment of mettaculture's, one of the seven directed at me in quick succession, was genuinely genial - I'm thankful for that. It gave this information:
'Scandelighted ™ I'll have you know, is one of my very best personal neologisms ever.'
Another neologism, 'mettacultural.' I've got my own idea about the complex of characteristics which makes 'mettacultural' so distinctive, a blend of _, _ , _ and _ .
As for 'scandelighted,' it seems to mean the same as 'scandalized.' It doesn't add to the resources of English. The Emperor Joseph II said of Mozart's 'Marriage of Figaro' (he was misguided, I'm sure) 'too many notes.' To me, 'scandelighted' has too many syllables.
There were times when objections were made which had a lot to recommend them, such as this objection of Lamia, who can be a very effective writer. She begins by quoting some words I'd used:
'Barad's equating Amnesty International and the Quakers with Begg and Cage is beneath contempt.'
'Amnesty and Joseph Rowntree Charitable Trust chose, despite plenty of warnings, and plenty of available information, to link themselves with and fund an organisation [Cage] that they knew was only in favour of the 'human rights' of Islamists in prison, including convicted terrorists in British prisons who were not remotely suffering any deprivations, while at the same time being utterly opposed to human rights for anyone else. Amnesty threw principled people like Gita Saghal to the wolves ... '
PH to Lamia:
'No, he isn't logical and justified in his estimation. This is to blur the differences between an organization which is completely beyond hope, 'Cage,' an an organization which isn't completely beyond hope, not at all, despite its serious faults. Do you think that nobody should vote Labour in this country because far too many Labour MP's have revolting views on terrorism and Islamism? Does this negate the work of all the Labour MP's who don't share their views? Do the Labour Party's defective policies regarding Israel mean that all the Labour Party's policies are defective? (I vote Conservative, by the way.)'
Sarah AB to me:
'I agree that Amnesty is tainted, but still do good work. And I agree about the Labour Party.'
PH to Lamia:
'You say that you won't vote for the Labour Party 'until it has sorted itself out.' The Labour Party, like Amnesty International, has a history of achievement which can be respected, in fact admired, in many ways. Both the Labour Party and Amnesty International are badly in need of being 'sorted out' but this will take effort, action, commitment on the part of many people. The Labour Party and Amnesty International aren't unreformable basket-cases. This is a general comment, not directed at you, but involvement in the virtual world of Websites and blogs may often make people less likely to make an effort, less likely to take action outside the virtual world. Taking action may involve turning out on a cold, rainy evening to attend a meeting which is certain to be much less enjoyable than using the computer.'
PH to Lamia:
'I didn't say it [Harry's Place] was doing nothing. I said it could do much more - and it could. In the sphere of practical recommendations for action, practical guidance for action, practical information for action, this site is nowhere near as energetic as many anti-Israel, pro-Palestinian sites, I think.'
mettaculture to me:
'Well I am glad to hear that you have positive comments to make about this site. I am also genuinely glad to here of your personal involvement in campaigning.
'You do however seem to have a controlling need to wish to influence it according to your own preferences ... '
All I did was argue for some changes, not to the liking of some cliques at 'Harry's Place' whose members are happier just exchanging views with people similar to themselves, rather than reaching out to opponents, including people in positions of power, such as MP's, and others. Anti-Israel-pro-Palestinian people are often much more energetic, I think. But the changes I argue for and my point about cliques are separate matters.
If mettaculture prefers to keep 'Harry's Place' the way it is and is warning me to keep quiet, then this can be viewed as attempted control.
Jurek Molnar to Sarah AB:
'It is interesting, that Amnesty is often denounced as a far left organisation and at the same time considered as a Western imperialist Human Rights propaganda tool by others.
'Depends on who you ask, in the meantime they do good works in most of the areas they are operating.'
FormerCorr to PH:
'I might have said the same thing as you a few years ago, but sadly Amnesty isn't what it used to be.'
PH to FormerCorr:
'You're quite right that Amnesty isn't what it used to be - which is why I left after being an active member for twenty years - but it hasn't lost all its strengths. For Barad to suggest that Amnesty International deserves to burn in hell for a long, long time is deranged.
5_30 to PH:
'IMO, once they effectively joined as non-combatant wings of the war against Israel, both Amnesty International and *especially* the Quakers have lost their strength and betrayed their mission.'
PH to 5_30:
'Amnesty International betrayed their mission in one very important way, by their shameless bias against Israel. They haven't betrayed their mission in most other ways. Amnesty members around the world still send letters and emails in vast numbers to a very wide range of people - members of governments and many more - not just in well-known cases like the blogger Raif Badawi in Saudi Arabia but on behalf of unknown people in obscure countries.
'I only hope that many of the commenters on Harry's Place make a comparable effort and aren't content to just talk to the converted ... '
Amnesty International has now published a report on Palestinian conduct during Operation Protective Edge,
An extract:
'Palestinian armed groups, including the armed wing of Hamas, repeatedly launched unlawful attacks during the conflict killing and injuring civilians. In launching these attacks, they displayed a flagrant disregard for international humanitarian law and for the consequences of their violations on civilians in both Israel and the Gaza Strip,” said Philip Luther, Director of the Middle East and North Africa Programme at Amnesty International.
'All the rockets used by Palestinian armed groups are unguided projectiles which cannot be accurately aimed at specific targets and are inherently indiscriminate; using such weapons is prohibited under international law and their use constitutes a war crime. Mortars are also imprecise munitions and should never be used to attack military targets located in or near civilian areas.
' "Palestinian armed groups must end all direct attacks on civilians and indiscriminate attacks. They must also take all feasible precautions to protect civilians in the Gaza Strip from the effects of such attacks. This includes taking all possible measures to avoid locating fighters and arms within or near densely populated areas,” said Philip Luther, Director of the Middle East and North Africa Programme at Amnesty International.
...
' ... 13 Palestinian civilians – 11 of them children – were killed when a projectile exploded next to a supermarket in the crowded al-Shati refugee camp in Gaza on 28 July 2014, the first day of Eid al-Fitr.
...
'Although Palestinians have claimed that the Israeli military was
responsible for the attack, an independent munitions expert who examined the
available evidence on behalf of Amnesty International concluded that the
projectile used in the attack was a Palestinian rocket.
...
There are no bomb shelters or warning systems in place to protect civilians in Gaza.
'The report also details other violations of international humanitarian law by Palestinian armed groups during the conflict, such as storing rockets and other munitions in civilian buildings, including UN schools, and cases where Palestinian armed groups launched attacks or stored munitions very near locations where hundreds of displaced civilians were taking shelter.'
Back to the little local dispute. There was one person who was completely undeterred by the ridiculous sniping.
Guest to Lamia:
'It seems to me that Paul is being ganged up on and is being treated harshly. I can see that there are a few differences of opinion but they seem to be relatively minor things. You and Mettaculture normally have very good points to make but it seems today you both are being quite aggressive. Anyway I guess all these comments will vanish in 7 days time.'
Guest is wrong about only one thing. Many of the comments haven't vanished in 7 days. They're here.
Guest to me:
'I dislike playground bullies. I found this site a few weeks ago and I am getting to learn about it. Different people with different experiences with different self-interests with different emotions, comment on it.
'I am drawn to it because of its subject matter and overall point of view. Sometimes I am repelled by it - of individual comments of commenters ... '
Guest to me:
' ... You were right about Anton Deque and I was wrong. I give people the benefit of the doubt until I have sufficient reason to think otherwise. The comments is a bit like Hobbesian sociopathic barbarism. Many of the aggressive commentators appear to be internet veterans fighting their own wars - seeing people as enemies to be destroyed or allies or nobodies. It's exhausting with no 'winners' - just a polarisation of opinion. What an unbelievable palaver you were put through. Best wishes.'
Address of 'Harry's Place:' www.hurryupharry.org
More of the same, but not a re-run - a second dispute at 'Harry's Place,' this time in the thread 'Gender bias in STEM subjects and science fiction.' The article was written by one of the moderators, SarahAB. This time, she joined in the attack on me in the Comments section. The commenter Vildechaye appears once more - he describes me as a 'fucking nutter' and a 'babbling psycho' - but not mettaculture. Another regular commenter, KBPlayer, was prominent in this dispute but not the one before. She described me as 'barmy as a box of frogs' (SarahAB abandoned any pretence at moderators' detachment and upvoted the comment). She obviously liked the phrase so much that she used it, or something very like it, three times in three comments, although without being specific or providing evidence. The commenter Kolya made multiple accusations against me, implicit or explicit - accusations of harrassment, of 'purely destructive behaviour - a bit like revenge porn - without any mitigation,' and said that he would have banned me from the site. In the first dispute, I suggested that the phrase ''fucking cunting fuck-cunts' was unwise and unfair because it was applied to Amnesty International as well as Islamist extremists and blurred the all-important differences between them - not just because the language could alienate some people - and a torrent of abuse was released. I suggested that 'Harry's Place' was too much a talking shop. It could be playing a much more effective role in combating some abuses. In this second dispute, I made a contribution to the debate on gender issues and came under attack almost at once, because I was the person who had made some comments not to the liking of the cliques. At the top of the Home Page there's the proud and impressive slogan
Liberty, if it means anything, is the right to tell people what they don't want to hear.
Time for 'Harry's Place' to shed some of its pretence, time for 'Harry's Place' to remove this embarrassing little platitude. So many 'Harry's Place' regulars want nothing but to carry on chatting and to me at least they seem to be claiming, Aren't we interesting? Aren't we wonderful people? They don't want to hear anyone who takes the liberty of expressing contrary views. When they're allowed to exchange pleasantries amongst themselves, they seem very pleasant people. When they hear things they don't want to hear, they don't appreciate the exercise of liberty, they suddenly turn unpleasant, sometimes very unpleasant.
'Liberty, if it means anything ... ' is what I'd call a 'non-reflexive' slogan - applicable to other people and organizations, but definitely not to 'Harry's Place' itself.
The dispute started with a comment of mine on gender issues. I refer to it here. PH to SarahAB:
'I posted a comment. It could have been discussed, criticized - criticized severely - and that would have been it. If the etiquette of fair-minded debate had been followed, more or less, there would probably have been no wide-ranging dispute. But you, a moderator, couldn't resist making these disparaging and condescending remarks, almost certainly encouraging other people to join the attack. As I've made clear, if I'm attacked, I defend myself.
Yet again, the standard of moderation has been abysmal during this dispute. Moderation sometimes calls for intelligent, enlightened intervention. 'Do nothing' seems to be the guiding principle, if you can call it a principle, although you failed to follow the principle when you upvoted the comment on me, 'Barmy as a box of frogs.' In that case, doing nothing would definitely have been the wiser course of action. For someone who seems determined to give the impression of moderation and reasonableness, you can be surprisingly reckless on occasion.'
PH to Kolya:
You wrote,
'Outing people's real-world identity merely because you disagree with their views is tantamount to harassment. Anybody choosing to play that game deserves to be banned.'
'I think outing people is truly vile. It can cause considerable distress and even wreck lives. It should result in automatic banning.'
'It's purely destructive behaviour – a bit like revenge porn – without any mitigation.'
'A sadistic power trip for the person doing the revealing.'
According to the Website of 'Public Interest Investigations,' a commenter with the pseudonym 'Morgoth' posted this comment at 'Harry's Place:'
'Is it me or is Foley turning into another Robert Fisk? Should we arrange for some Pashtuns to beat the shit out of him?'
If an individual gave the real name of 'Morgoth' would this be tantamount to harrassment, capable of causing Morgoth considerable distress and capable even of wrecking his life? Would this be a 'sadistic power trip for the person who revealed Morgoth's real name?
On this thread, Vildechaye has referred to me as a 'fucking nutter.' Some Vildechayan comments directed at other people:
'fuck off.'
'you can fuck off too.'
'you really enjoy talking out your arse, don't you?'
'actually you're just a bigoted asshole with a thin veneer of
intellectual pomposity who cherrypicks sources -- on Youtube! -- and thinks
he's being
clever. uh uh.'
'yes we're all listening to the likes of you now, you lying sack of shit. Care
to tell everyone where I wasn't brought up again.'
If I found out Vildechaye's real name and published it, would this be tantamount to harrassment, capable of causing Vildechaye considerable distress and capable even of wrecking his life?'
PH to Kolya:
'You completely neglect a very important topic - the distress caused by anonymous commenters at 'Harry's Place.' Their anonymity sometimes allows them to cause damage which would be far less likely if they wrote under their own names.'
PH to Kolya:
'KBPlayer wrote this about me,
'Oh that one. Barmy as a box of frogs.'
'The comment was upvoted by you, SarahAB and Suada. You and Suada have
chosen to keep your comments on Disqus private. You value your privacy and
whatever accusations you make, your privacy won't be disturbed. I write
under my real name. I don't see any reason why people who make accusations
shouldn't have their comfortable privacy interrupted. I sent an email to SarahAB which
contained this,
'I wouldn’t claim that moderation during the recent dispute marked a new
low in moderation at Harry’s Place because the standard was very low
already, but your endorsement of the comment ‘ mad as a box of frogs’ was a
bad mistake. Moderators can be partisan, when they comment themselves,
they’re entitled to give a view and to defend a view, but upvoting that
facile comment is very different.
Greater detachment can be
expected of a moderator. (I regard upvoting in general as futile and not
useful. Gene has pointed out how easily the figures can be manipulated.) If
a Professor of English gets up to these childish antics, I don’t see why I
should be reticent.'
[I've cited some recent Google rankings for the site as a quick and
convenient way of providing evidence that some people might like to take
into account when they've been outspoken in their criticisms of my alleged
limitations. Without any shame, I do that yet again. There's a list of
recent Google rankings at
www.linkagenet.com/about.htm#advertisements
'Of course, I've yet to receive from anyone who has made outspoken criticisms anything so commonplace as an actual defence of their instant dismissals. These people seem to regard their own immense superiority to such poor misguided plodders as me as beyond dispute.]
'Do you have any comment to make on this? Do you seriously maintain that giving SarahAB's real name is a bit like revenge porn, without any mitigation? If so, then I regard your view as very disturbing.'
KBPlayer gave SarahAB's real name, Sarah Brown, years before, in an article. I knew that this wasn't the Sarah Brown who was the wife of the Labour politician Gordon Brown.
In my email to SarahAB I also wrote this,
'I’m not conducting a vendetta against Harry’s Place. Material about ‘Harry’s Place’ occupies a completely peripheral and a very minor role in the site.'
If you look up the home page of my site,
you'll find abundant evidence that this is so. There's a list of topics,
very, very varied - which
include gardening - and if you
look at a selection of pages and find abundant evidence that
I'm 'barmy as a box of frogs' then feel free to email me, with
the evidence. If you value your self-respect, and I'm sure you
do, and obviously I could
mention other people too, then
the time has come to put some effort into defending your
remarks.
KBPlayer wrote, 'A serious academic who I do respect but who had had run ins with HP was tweeting Culture Industry as proof of our badness.'
That same academic has written, in connection with Morgoth's comment, 'Morgoth calls for Conor Foley to be beaten up, and Conor’s wife is reduced to tears reading his comment. HP actually has the cheek to complain that Conor is unreasonable for being upset about this. Of course, your anger is never directed at any one of your revolting, anonymous little groupies, but only at the people who have the temerity to complain about their behaviour.' 'Revolting, anonymous little groupies' isn't my description. I give my own views on the 'Culture Industry' page.
This marks the end of my comment, published at 'Harry's Place' a short time before the disappearance of all the comments from public view. Some additional remarks:
Kolya advocated my banning from 'Harry's Place' and dmra upvoted his promotion of banning. A question: who has the power to ban people from 'Harry's Place?' Would one of them be the moderator SarahAB. She's a Latinist, so she'd understand the significance of a quotation not seen nearly as often now as it used to be: 'Quis costodiet ipsos custodes.' (Juvenal, Satires, Satire VI, lines 347–8.)
I don't mind if people criticize me or my views severely, provided there's the attempt to provide evidence. In that case, I'd see no need at all to divulge their real name, if I know it. If they want to engage in smearing and insult, then they shouldn't be surprised if I show much less goodwill.
Dispute No. 1, documented at much greater length in the section above, 'Nasty, brutish and short ... ' gave plenty of evidence that I can defend myself very vigorously. If some people decided to try it on this time, then they shouldn't be surprised at the result. I contributed a comment on gender bias to the thread, and very quickly, SarahAB came out with this:
A comment for 'dmra' on the site 'Harry's Place,' www.hurryupharry.org
A reply was given by dmra and I found that a previous comment of mine on 'Harry's Place' criticizing 'Lamia' was mistaken in one way - Lamia is female, not male! In this reply, I stated that I didn't know whether dmra was male or female. Later, I felt sure that dmra was female not male. In a comment, dmra had mentioned attending a girl's school. Much later, I found that dmra was male, not female. He mentioned that he was one of the few boys to attend a particular girl's school.
I argue here that anonymous comments tend to diminish the richness and complexity of human interaction but I give other arguments as well. Strictly, 'anonymous' should be 'pseudonymous.' I mention the alternative male/female but this is far too simple for some people. I suppose the proper question to ask is, 'Are you male or female, neither or both?'
I think that the arguments for banning the full veil in this country outweigh the arguments for allowing it. It's been argued that when a woman wears the veil, anyone speaking with her is denied so many visual cues, so much supplementary infomation. The conversation is likely to be restricted by that. A conversation with someone whose face we can see is very different. (An obvious counter-argument: what about the experience of blind people? Perhaps the aural cues are enough, perhaps not.)
I'm not equating wearing the veil and the anonymity of commenters. All I'm doing is pointing out some obvious disadvantages of anonymity. Exchanging views on this page with you, dmra, involves lack of some useful information for me. I don't know if you're male or female, for example! I don't know if vildechaye and mettaculture are male or female. I don't assume that because vildechaye and mettaculture seem to have a very aggressive side they must be male. [I now know that they're male.]
I strongly believe in the importance of openness. Whatever I write, I do it under my own name. I don't have an ex-directory telephone number, either. I'm listed in the phone book. If people want to criticize me on the internet, they can go ahead and do it and the results will show up in Google, whether it's on Page 1 or Page 20,000. Conversely, if I criticize someone who isn't anonymous, the criticism will appear in searches for the real name somewhere in Google, in the case of Richard Alleyne journalist (now ex-journalist, I'm glad to say) very prominently, on Page 1 for the search terms "Richard Alleyne" journalist.
Using 'dmra' for your writing is choosing the safer option. It offers protection from critical comment published on the Web, for one thing. Whatever critical comments may appear for 'dmra,' the life you live under your real name remains separate and isn't affected. There may be very good reasons for anonymity on the Web . People may have a job which makes it very difficult to write freely under their own name. (All the same, when, eventually, I found conventional employment, I carried out some high profile campaigning which caused me difficulties with my employer but thought nothing of it.)
I'd suggest to anonymous commenters on this site: consider whether you really do have to be anonymous I hope dmra, mettaculture, Vildechaye and others will consider 'coming out.' I realize there may well be perfectly valid reasons why this isn't a realistic option.
I'm glad that so many people whose views are similar to the general viewpoint of 'Harry's Place' do use their actual names. They include people who would be safer writing anonymously but don't. 'The Times Literary Supplement' used to have anonymous reviewers. This had severe disadvantages. A hostile review of a book left the author and readers wondering about the background of the reviewer and possible sources of bias. Now that reviewers are identified, there are so many sources of information about the background of the reviewer. It may be that the reviewer has been criticized by the author of the book, or that the reviewer isn't the best person to review the book because the reviewer has no background in the field. Or it may be that the background information leaves every reason to think that the reviewer is knowledgeable and fair-minded. However, in the case of anonymous commenters, Disqus does give all the Disqus comments, unless the commentator chooses to make their activity private.
Some pages which include criticism of anonymity for comments, even if the focus is on sites of a different kind. The New Yorker article also gives arguments for anonymity.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/...
http://www.newyorker.com/tech/...
A moderator is sometimes entitled to exclude comments for pragmatic reasons, by using robust common sense, not the high and noble principles of free expression (and not by thinking about consequentalist or deontological or neo-Thomist or neo-Aristotelian arguments for publishing or not publishing.)
Argumentum ad hominem, criticising not the arguments but the person who gives the arguments is, in fact, a realistic and valid way of approaching the arguments of some people: to give not much thought at all to the arguments but to summarily decide that the person has a negligible contribution to make. If a grown adult sends a description which is completely sentimental and includes an image of a teddy bear and promises to send further contributions, then, unless the site is a sentimentalist site and isn't deterred by unnecessary images of teddy bears, then the moderator will probably decide that the character of the person makes intelligent contributions very unlikely. A woefully underpowered car won't be allowed in a high-powered race. There's no need to measure the speed of the car. A look at the car is enough.
If a humanist Website or blog is besieged with comments from born-again Christians 'proving' that X is evil and giving abundant scriptural 'evidence' then the moderator may decide that enough is enough. If a Website or blog has the central aim of publishing material on modernist architecture or abstract art and is besieged by people commenting that modernist architecture or abstract art is 'a load of rubbish,' or words to that effect, then excluding these comments isn't the exercise of censorship. To uphold free speech isn't to uphold the right for someone to comment at any Website or blog.
The comment below, posted at 'Harry's Place,' refers to a very prolific commenter who happened to be a Moslem. After I added the comment, he asked for all his comments to be deleted and referred to my contribution as the reason.
'El Cid has swamped this Comments section with his Islamist views. Enough is enough. Even the most patient of people (even Sarah AB) may have found their patience close to exhaustion in the face of El Cid's prolific and predictable 'proofs.' If ten or twenty other people with similar views decided to join the 'discussion,' then the scale of the problem would be even more clear, the need for effective and realistic moderation even more obvious. Harry's Place may have its detractors but it also has a deserved reputation for interesting and informative comment to accompany the articles. If the problem continues (it may not, of course) and nothing is done, then I for one would regret it very much.
'Websites and blogs concerned with evolutionary biology or secularism or enlightenment values or the defence of Israel should give objectors the opportunity to disagree and should uphold freedom of expression but are under no obligation to present Comments sections overwhelmed by people hostile to evolutionary biology or secularism or enlightenment values or the defence of Israel. These Websites and blogs are entitled to have an identity, they are entitled to present their viewpoint, but never to the exclusion of contrary views.
'It's reasonable for the discussion sections of 'Harry's Place' to be a place where people can disagree about many, many things but are in general agreement that disagreements aren't solved or resolved by appeal to the Qur'an or the Bible or the works of Marx, for that matter.
'If El Cid knows of Islamist Websites and blogs where anti-Islamist comments are not just allowed but published in large numbers, then do please let us know.
'A suggestion: 'Harry's Place' could consider creating a new Comments section, called 'The Other Place,' perhaps, where El Cid and others would be free to present their doctrines and their 'proofs' and to answer any objections. I'd hope that Islamist Websites and blogs would make similar provision for the expression of dissenting views, though. If not, why not?'
After the comment was posted, I found one Islamist Website which freely publishes comments written by anti-Islamists, the Website of the extremist Haitham Al-Haddad, www [dot] islam21 [dot] com I gave him credit for his policy in a comment of mine at 'Harry's Place,' Comment (HP): banning extremist speakers (1)
