Date: Tue, 5 May 1998 13:49:15 -0400
From: jiml-AT-heinemann.com (Jim Lance)
Subject: Re: fanon and Eldridge Cleaver


     To paraphrase Gertrude Stein, a rape is a rape is a rape, an 
     unspeakable act of violence and desecration.  No amount of poco 
     politesse can hide that essential fact. I am reminded of a lecture a 
     friend of mine heard in which the speaker claimed the Gulf War was 
     nothing but a metaphor.  A hand rose in the back of the room.  The 
     speaker asked the questioner to stand.  The questioner replied, "I 
     can't because I'm a disabled veteran of a foreign metaphor."
     
     So much of this talk about "social construction" or "media 
     construction" hides an essential unwillingness to take a definite 
     position concerning violence and oppression committed by those 
     "subalterns" whom academics claim to defend so passionately and 
     patronizingly.  Yes, Cleaver was oppressed, yes Cleaver was a victim 
     of racism, but to hide his actions behind a smokescreen of politically 
     correct ideology basically denies him any sort of accountability or 
     responsibility.  By so doing, one is essentially denying Cleaver and 
     those academics have defined as oppressed any sort of influence upon 
     their roles as historical actors consciously shaping their own 
     destinies.  
     
     A reactionary position, perhaps, but I have to voice my alarm at the 
     violence to ideas and language (not to mention flesh and blood human 
     beings) that is taking place in this discussion of Cleaver and rape. 
     Cleaver himself came to accept full responsibility for his actions. 
     Why can't we?
     


     --- from list postcolonial-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu ---