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Unread 08-16-2018, 06:44 PM
Mark McDonnell Mark McDonnell is offline
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We're going round in circles, Andrew, but never mind. Carlson-Wee 'evoked minstrelsy', for most of his critics, just by writing the poem, regardless of its quality or the accuracy of his use of the vernacular. He simply didn't have the right to, according to them. I disagree with this. And we are talking about apology, that's the issue whether you like it or not. What he meditates on in private is his business, but he shouldn't have been made to apologise. The forced public apology is worthless. One's own conscience should dictate that. Maybe, given time, Carlson-Wee would have read enough criticism of his poem and genuinely reflected and honestly, quietly, apologised on Twitter, or in private, of his own volition. Maybe not. His choice.

I'm glad to hear you don't think a non-Jewish person putting on a production of The Producers should be jailed! That's wonderfully liberal of you! As to the hardcore porn version of Anne Frank, no, I don't think it would be more 'problematic' for a non-Jew to make this. I think it would be equally distasteful whether made by Jew or non-Jew. If you're asking whether the Jewish pornographer should be spared jail and the non-Jewish pornographer jailed then no again. If their motivation was the same, then I think they should be treated with equal contempt. But then I'm not sure I even think holocaust denial should be a crime. It just makes martyrs of right-wing extremists for other right-wing extremists. They should be ignored or, if they won't go away, publicly humiliated with facts.

I also don't believe that a Jewish or African American writer, born in say 1982, has any more or less of a right to write a first person persona novel or poem about the holocaust or slavery than anyone else. They might be more likely to do it better, but they might not. What matters is empathy for humanity, sincerity of intention and artistic merit.

'Imagine all you want: aren't you inevitably going to fail?'

That's a depressingly pessimistic view of the human capacity for imagination and empathy that might one day get us out of our tendency towards tribalism.

Last edited by Mark McDonnell; 08-17-2018 at 03:12 AM.
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