[lit-ideas] Re: Ground Zero (hey, Eric?)

  • From: "Lawrence Helm" <lawrencehelm@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
  • To: <lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
  • Date: Tue, 3 Aug 2010 23:59:08 -0700

Mike,
 
I posted that knowing in advance all the cheap shots you could take, all the
possible ways you could force D. H. Lawrence's words into something he
didn't mean.  I even referred to him as D.H. in my initial draft of the note
so you wouldn't take the obvious cheap shot of Lawrence talking about
Lawrence, but then I changed it back.  Surely, I thought, that cheap shot
was beneath you.
 
So the Scorpion told the frog, take me across the river.  And the frog said
"no, you'll sting me."  Then the scorpion said, "no, I won't sting you
because then we both would die in the river."  "Okay," the Frog said and
took the scorpion out in the river.  Half way across, the scorpion stung the
frog."  Before the frog died, he asked "why?"


We all know the answer to that.  The scorpion couldn't help it.  It was his
nature.  Well, it's also tough being a frog.
 
Not D. H. Lawrence 
 
From: lit-ideas-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:lit-ideas-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx]
On Behalf Of Mike Geary
Sent: Tuesday, August 03, 2010 10:33 PM
To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [lit-ideas] Re: Ground Zero (hey, Eric?)
 
On Tue, Aug 3, 2010 at 9:41 PM, Lawrence Helm <lawrencehelm@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:
I'm reminded of D. H. Lawrence who wrote "The minority of whites
intellectualize the Red Man and laud him to the skies.  But this minority of
whites is mostly a high-brow minority with a big grouch against its own
whiteness." 

 Lawrence and Lawrence apparently believe that white people are superior
people.  I think we've heard all this before at the cost of tens of millions
of lives.  No thanks, Lawrence.

I'm not sure what I'm supposed to take away from Lawrence's post on
Lawrence.  What does "race spirit" mean?  Why does he say: "Self-hatred is
the in-thing of the "high-brow minority "?   Who is the "high brow minority
with a big grouch against its own whiteness"?  Is it he?  

Mike Geary
Memphis





On Tue, Aug 3, 2010 at 9:41 PM, Lawrence Helm <lawrencehelm@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:
I'm reminded of D. H. Lawrence who wrote "The minority of whites
intellectualize the Red Man and laud him to the skies.  But this minority of
whites is mostly a high-brow minority with a big grouch against its own
whiteness."  Lawrence and Lawrence apparently believe that white people are
superior poeple.  I think we'vre heard all this before at the cost of tens
of millions of lives.  No thanks.

 
 
He also wrote, "There'll never be any life in America till you pull the pin
out and admit natural inequality.  Natural superiority, natural inferiority.
Till such time, Americans just buzz around like various sorts of propellers,
pinned down by their freedom and equality."
 
And at one point in his discussion of Fenimore Cooper's leatherstocking
novels, Lawrence wrote, ". . . the Natty and Chingachgook myth must remain a
myth.  It is wish-fulfillment, an evasion of actuality.  As we have said
before, the folds of the Great Serpent would have been heavy, very heavy,
too heavy, on any white man.  Unless the white man were a true renegade,
hating himself and his own race-spirit, as sometimes happens."
 
He wrote those things between 1917 and 1923.  Since then the minority he
refers to has grown.  Self-hatred is the in-thing of the "high-brow minority
wit
 
Therefore let's erase our American distinctiveness so that we can prevent
our enemy's intrusion.  Let us become nothing; so we can make him nothing as
well.  
 
D. H. Lawrence would have had quite a chuckle over discussions like this
one.
 
Lawrence
 
From: lit-ideas-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:lit-ideas-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx]
On Behalf Of Mike Geary
Sent: Tuesday, August 03, 2010 6:22 PM

To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [lit-ideas] Re: Ground Zero (hey, Eric?)
 
How is it possible to stop any religious organization from buying property
and building a center dedicated to the interests of that religion anywhere
unless all other religions are  similarly forbidden to do so within that
area as well?  Zoning laws make sense to me, but only if they're applied
equally to all, else welcome to injustice.  Islamism did not commit the
crimes of 9/11 -- radical individuals did and though they were Islamists,
they are not representative of Islamism -- only its right-wing extreme.
Many of the contemporary crimes of Christians and Jews are no less heinous.
Unless NYC is prepared to outlaw all religious institutions from operating
within Ground Zero, I see no just or Constitutional way to prohibit the
Islamists from doing so.


Mike Geary
going Muslim in Memphis
On Tue, Aug 3, 2010 at 5:08 PM, Julie Krueger <juliereneb@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
I'm interested to know the opinions of listers re. the proposed Mosque at
the GZ site ... especially (but by no means only) those in the NY region --
what's the prevailing attitude there?

Julie Krueger

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