Mal: You know, you ain't quite right. River: It's the popular theory.

'Objects In Space'


All Ogle, No Cash -- It's Not Just Annoying, It's Un-American

Discussion of episodes currently airing in Un-American locations (anything that's aired in Australia is fair game), as well as anything else the Un-Americans feel like talking about or we feel like asking them. Please use the show discussion threads for any current-season discussion.

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Zoe Ann - Apr 01, 2003 11:13:24 am PST #2932 of 9843
Mathair & Athair beo.

I spent a long part of my childhood thinking that Britain was vast, because it took days to get from here to there. (You know, I knew they were riding horses, but somehow I assumed that horses and cars went the same speed.) I was very disappointed when I discovered that the English and the Scots had been fighting over a football-field's worth of territory for several hundred years. I mean, for crying out loud.

Bwah!
If it’s any consolation most of us grow up thinking the same thing and there are grown adults, educated grown adults I have met who still believe that the world revolves around the South of England.

British geography and dialects etc all evolved from walking distances. 10 miles in a day is a fair days walk and defines the radius of most local and dialect boundries.
By this definition Edinburgh and London are actually in different worlds.

It’s fascinating to read about travelling in the US. The distances are mind-boggling.


moonlit - Apr 01, 2003 11:20:40 am PST #2933 of 9843
"When the world's run by fools it's the duty of intelligence to disobey." Martin Firrell

Until the early sixties there were states where Black peple could not vote, could not enter most shops or resteraunts, had to ride different classes of accomoadation on public transport, had to go miles out of their way compared to whites to find a restromm they could use ... Legal equality between blacks and whites in the U.S. is a comparatively recent phenomena.

Thanks Gar, this is what I knew some of and why I had made the assumption that 'voting rights' were part of the 'civil rights' movement. That is why I was so surprised when the answer was 1868, I was sorta expecting 1968.

I'm trying to suss out if there is any correlation with people's experience/knowledge of things like the civil rights movement and their conception of democracy. As in, are you more likely to see democracy as an evolutionary process if you were born around the time of the CRM or the decade or so after, when the issues were still at the forefront of socio-political education.

The angle I'm coming from is that much of the peace/anti-war and even some of the anti-US imperialism sentiment seems based in a gut-understanding of the hypocrisy inherent in the way that most US foreign and economic policies are enforced around the world.

Is it because many who have experiential, or at least academic understanding, of such major issues as civil rights and equality, recognise that those are aspects of democracy that we have only recently figured out for ourselves?

Why do some people believe so strongly that democracy as a practical application can be forced/co-erced/enacted as a static entity onto nations and cultures who have no background of anything resembling democracy and no real understanding of the concepts which go to make up democracy (as we know it), such as equality, to take one example?

Have these people(?) forgotten that we only achieved some of this stuff for ourselves within the last few decades and have we really gotten all the wrinkles ironed out ourselves, or are our legal systems still struggling with case after case brought about on racial or discriminatory grounds.

Sorry this isn't particularly structured it's sorta stream-of-consciousness at the moment.

Sarameg, thanks for the link I'm going to go read it now.


Betsy HP - Apr 01, 2003 11:25:41 am PST #2934 of 9843
If I only had a brain...

moonlit, I don't think you realize that the civil rights movement isn't universally recognized as a good thing. Or that millions of Americans believe the gravest civil rights abuse current at the moment is the denial of the rights of whites.


meara - Apr 01, 2003 11:33:43 am PST #2935 of 9843

There should be six hours between cities!

Heh. I grew up in Indy, so Chicago was about 4 hours away. And now I'm in DC, and NY is about 4 hours away...I think four hours between cities is perfect!

Megalopolis is a cool word, but much as I enjoy the East Coast, I LIKE the space out west or even just midwest, and find the unending city a little scary as a concept....


Nutty - Apr 01, 2003 12:02:43 pm PST #2936 of 9843
"Mister Spock is on his fanny, sir. Reports heavy damage."

Well, I don't know if you can call Hamden, Connecticut an unending city, but at least you can get doughnuts there.

moonlit, what Betsy said. I don't think it can be broken down generationally, or not really; and after all, we've been fighting on and off about the same issue (democracy in other countries leading to results the US doesn't like, or similar) for a very long time. I'd be more likely to call it That Dude (Country) Don't Learn than anything specifically related to the time-period/culture in which one grew up.


moonlit - Apr 01, 2003 12:07:31 pm PST #2937 of 9843
"When the world's run by fools it's the duty of intelligence to disobey." Martin Firrell

Sorry Betsy, I haven't said anything wrong or offensive have I?

I don't think you realize that the civil rights movement isn't universally recognized as a good thing.
Do you mean that there is a fairly high percentage of Americans who think that segregation/non-voting etc should still be in effect? As in the fairly commonly held view that even though African Americans have legal equality, right to vote and be voted for etc. America is still very racist.
Or that millions of Americans believe the gravest civil rights abuse current at the moment is the denial of the rights of whites.
As in they feel that the pendulum has swung too far the other way, a backlash?


brenda m - Apr 01, 2003 12:09:33 pm PST #2938 of 9843
If you're going through hell/keep on going/don't slow down/keep your fear from showing/you might be gone/'fore the devil even knows you're there

As in they feel that the pendulum has swung too far the other way, a backlash?

Yes, that's it. There are people who feel we've Gone Too Far, that since there is no more discrimination it's time that white folk, particularly men, got their due.

Whatever.


Betsy HP - Apr 01, 2003 12:18:08 pm PST #2939 of 9843
If I only had a brain...

Sorry Betsy, I haven't said anything wrong or offensive have I?

No, no, far from it. I'm just responding with despair.

Yes to both of your questions. Various politicians have made healthy careers using coded phrases to express their disapproval of civil rights -- Jesse Helms, for instance, calling Martin Luther King a Communist. Jesse Helms won his 1990 election by running an ad showing two white hands crumpling a sheet of paper. "You needed that job. And you were the best qualified. But they had to give it to a minority."

Cites


Hayden - Apr 01, 2003 12:29:14 pm PST #2940 of 9843
aka "The artist formerly known as Corwood Industries."

Is it because many who have experiential, or at least academic understanding, of such major issues as civil rights and equality, recognise that those are aspects of democracy that we have only recently figured out for ourselves?

I'd say experiential is the key. The people I've met or known (Larry Goodwyn, the Rev. James Lawson, a handful of SNCC organizers located in the NC Triangle area) who were part of that first round of nonviolent direct action in the civil rights movement have been some of the most passionate committed small-d democrats I've ever known. Academic understanding is a step removed, and the people, like me, who have encountered these forms of democratic ideals in the classroom may feel committed, but it's hardly the same thing as being tested in the proverbial trial by fire. Even many of the student demonstrators today are not receiving that sort of experience. The dance between protesters and authority has become far more formalized in the intervening time.

Anyway, I've highly recommended Larry Goodwyn's books before, but again I say that the guy's understanding of history and philosophy is profound and profoundly influenced by his experience as a Texas Observer reporter on the ground floor of the 1965 SNCC campaign in the South. Larry's most profound works are about the Farmer's Alliance, which became the Populist Party, and the Solidarity movement in Poland. Both are flat-out amazing in capturing the importance of democratic ideals and communication in movement-building and movement-sustaining.


meara - Apr 01, 2003 12:30:34 pm PST #2941 of 9843

Yeah, but...what kind of percentages are we talking here? I mean, yeah, obviously there's a sizeable number who feel "it's gone too far". And there's bound to be a few whackos who believe giving up slavery was going too far. But are there really large numbers of people out there who seriously think we should go back to Jim Crow laws, or something??