Date: Mon, 17 Nov 1997 20:00:52 +0000 (GMT)
From: "J.H. McWilliams" <jhm29-AT-cus.cam.ac.uk>
Subject: Re: PLC: LA: discursive self-regulation


On Mon, 17 Nov 1997, Brian Connery wrote:

> Hi Pat--
> 
> Most of your response to my post has to do with Denis Dutton,
> whom I don't represent in any way, as I'm sure Denis would be
> the first to tell you.  Much of the rest has to do with my
> character, motivation, and past, about which you, unfortunately, make a series
> of unlucky guesses.  
> 
> > I know you'd like to fancy it up by calling this a "philosophical" issue
> > rather than a problem of 3 mods having fairly gross character defects. 
>> This distorts what I was saying by assigning to it a
> subject--the "it" that I'm characterized as fancying up-- that
> was not in fact my subject, i.e., it dismisses what I was saying
> by suggesting that I was talking about something that maybe you want
> to talk about and that I was talking about your subject in a
> mystificatory way.  Please let me talk about what I'm
> talking about.  
> 
> Here's the deal, put in slightly different terms:  thus far,
> among the general population of this list, the list has been
> defined negatively, in a binary fashion: we define ourselves as being not
> that other list.  (Hence, I suppose, it's perfectly natural, when I talk
> about THIS list for you to respond by talking about THAT list.) But it may
> be time for people to think about what else they
> agree on here and for people to become a bit more self-conscious
> about what this list is (rather than is not) and what it could
> be.  Reg's initiating this thread started exactly that sort of
> discussion.  My post was designed to call attention to the ways
> in which I think power/authority circulates and is negotiated on
> this list as it currently operates.
> 
> But I'm gonna shut up for a while.
> 
> P.S.  The Constitution that you refer to, could I get a copy of that
> somewhere?  Is it available on the web?  I'd like to see it.  You really
> mean to tell me that that's where the idea of freedom of speech comes from?
> 
> Best,
> 
> 
> * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
> Brian Connery
> connery-AT-oakland.edu
> * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * 
> 
> 
>      --- from list phillitcrit-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu ---
> 
Brian,
The 'unlucky guesses' about character, the supposition of speaking for
Denis Dutton. Sounds
familiar to me. Someone did just the same to me a few days back. A
coincidence, perhaps...

John (McWilliams))

P.S. I was going to say the same about the U.S. constitution... Wasn't the
free speech bit part of the Bill of Rights which (to bring in a bit of
conspiracy thoery) was a sweetener to get the anti-federalists (those
whose economic interests the federation did not serve) to sign the treaty.
And anyway, I'm not sure this assembly of those crazy "demi-gods"
(Jefferson) who made up the Philadelphia Convention really
thought up the idea of free-speech did they? Isn't that idea too
intangible and slippery to date exactly?

Who can say?




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