We Need A Revolution In Literature!

[Bewlay Brother]

Is it really - I mean if you prioritize a civilization over the individual, slavery is extremley beneficial. I mean almost all of the great civilizations were founded upon a bedrock of slavery - human history without slaver, would meant that most civlizations would not have been able to rise and culture as we know it might have never existed, for what created art and philisophy and culture was the fact that slavery meant there were also lots who did not need to work and could dedicate time otherwise, to the pursuit of culture.

Just sayin...

I'm talking about America. Of course mankind isn't past slavery. It is going on right now for crying out loud. However now, America is past it, and the people that keep bringing it back up to utilize it display the most phony type of humanity.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rkvRY...ature=youtu.be

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I3cGf...eature=related

[hillwalker]

BB - I was bemused by your Dunkin' Donuts story - not sure that being non-racist and patronising both count as being a 'good citizen'.

But apologies, we're not all on here to give you a hard time. Honest. Welcome to LitNet - and you just happen to have wandered onto the 'thread from Hell'

:-)

H

[WolfLarsen]

I guess some people here are bored of literature then?

What does this discussion have to do with literature?

If you look at Bellway's first post and some of his commentaries in his other posts you'll see what is purpose is: to hijack a thread on a literary site and use it to promote his white supremacist ideas.

I really don't think that Bellway's white supremacist ideas belong on a website about literature. Why doesn't he post this nonsense on some white supremacist posting board?

Even if I'm mistaken and Bellway's posts are not some kind of white supremacist whitewash of slavery his posts still have nothing to do with literature. Whatever Bellway is on about it certainly is not literature. He is on the wrong website.

[hillwalker]

I guess some people here are bored of literature then?
Seems so - but not Me
What does this discussion have to do with literature?
Absolutely nothing

I'm not taking sides, Wlof - merely making an observation. And I think you'll see he spells his name Bewlay.

H

[Bewlay Brother]

I guess some people here are bored of literature then?

What does this discussion have to do with literature?

If you look at Bellway's first post and some of his commentaries in his other posts you'll see what is purpose is: to hijack a thread on a literary site and use it to promote his white supremacist ideas.

I really don't think that Bellway's white supremacist ideas belong on a website about literature. Why doesn't he post this nonsense on some white supremacist posting board?

Even if I'm mistaken and Bellway's posts are not some kind of white supremacist whitewash of slavery his posts still have nothing to do with literature. Whatever Bellway is on about it certainly is not literature. He is on the wrong website.

Talk to me. Or am I a subhuman to you? Is everyone a subhuman to you? I don't see you talk directly to anyone.

Point out to me what I have said that is racist.

And my satire about Dunkin Donuts had much more to do with literature than any of your nauseatingly trite, unlearned, and sophomoric babbling sessions.

My satire about Dunkin Donuts was rather out there too. People will probably read it and just have a confused look on their face. I thought you loved things like that and that was what you wanted! Oh but of course not, because it isn't about something you agree with.

For you to call me a white supremacist is a bold faced lie. White supremacy is the belief that whites are inherently superior to other races. There is absolutely no justification for that accusation, except of course the fact that you are a phony and you don't give a damn about innovation or originality or edginess all you care about are cheerleaders for your very myopic underdeveloped views of humanity and life.

And whitewash? I'm putting things in perspective. Humanity is a different dimension. It is not affected by enormities of any side or size because if that were the case, humanity would be maimed past the point of any recognition. Sorry that I don't waste my energy and time relentlessly trying to prove just how much I care about black people, because that is not an accomplishment. You are SUPPOSED to care about all people equally based on their actions and personality and intentions and hundreds of thousands of other things before skin color comes into play. The difference is that I actually take this seriously, rather than politically like you. I would blow my brains out if I looked at this world through eyes such as yours.

Saying that slavery was not the worst atrocity of all-time isn't whitewashing. It is fact. And I pointed out that fact to show how absurd it is to believe that what bad thing happened to a particular race in the past should have any affect on how they are treated today. It would be much more reasonable to accuse people like you of whitewashing things like the Holocaust by likening something that wasn't 1/10th as bad. Actually that is exactly what I am going to do. You whitewash the Holocaust because you don't give a damn about homosapien suffering. You only care about manipulation and self-indulgence, and slavery is a much sexier thing for you to manipulate. Oh and bro, before you say it, white supremacists HATE Jews. I must really be the black sheep of my white supremacy family.

[Alexander III]

That's not mathematically correct. To discuss the minute points of ecological chaos theory would take a really long *** time but I'll give you one obvious example of a very large, observable change. What we're talking about happened a long time ago, when the world's population was quite low. If we were to go into the world's genetic tree, those people who's offspring would have been changed because of African slavery would be the starting branches for billions of people, and those are people, variables abound. People cause things, great social changes. Imagine if Hitler had never been born, or if Gandhi had never been born, or ANY huge social changer (Bush, Kim Jong-Il, Thatcher, Nelson Mandela, Stalin, the list goes on forever). How could you be sure that there wouldn't have been another huge social changer in that massive group of billions of people who would have existed in the hypothetical scenario in which black slavery in America never happened? It's a solid bet that there would have been at least a couple and that's all you need to change the world, one Shakespeare or one Alexander of Macedonia. Not to mention the fact that a few of the big names in our reality would never have been born, Martin Luthor King for example. How would the world change then? Hell, the reproduction of the slave owners would have been altered as well, not as much time for ****ing if you have to pick your own damn cotton. Some white Americans who you might not even think connected to anything at all might never have been born, and other people would have taken their place, people who would have been raised under different conditions and who would make completely different decisions. And then remember the medium and the multitudes of small effects as well, they really add up. I'm telling you, society and the world would be completely different in ways nobody can possibly predict.

That's why Bewlay's suggestion that people are "better off" because of black slavery doesn't hold water. There is no way in hell that you can predict a thing like that.

Like I said before it is all if's - all we have for certain is the concrete present, and the concrete present is that America as a nation would not be as it is now if not for the bennefits of slavery. Like all civilizations before it.

[BienvenuJDC]

And Darcy, do you know what I like to do on Saturdays? If I have no other plans?

I love to go to Dunkin Donuts and get a dozen of donuts but four boxes. Then I put three donuts in each box. I then go to miscellaneous places. Barnes and Noble, Tj Max, the YMCA, and I look for a nice wholesome Africian-American family. I then go to them and say, "Hey man, me and my family are about to go on a road trip and we couldn't finish these donuts and we don't want the car to smell like donuts. Do you want the rest?"
Normally they say yes. Now Darcy, do you know why I do this? I do it so I can prove to them that I am NOT a racist.

Now I know what you are thinking. What good will that do? Only like three families will know i'm not a racist! You see the thing is, you may not agree with everything I say - but you have to agree with evolution and homeostasis. You see, since blacks have been hunted and maimed and beaten by white people for their entire existence, they have evolved an uncanny ability to describe all of the queasy nuances of the caucasion face. I figure that when African-Americans will get together, they will talk about my acts of beauty, and describe my face. I predict that by 2025 72% of African-Americans on the east coast will know that, in fact, THIS FACE loves them!

My goodness. Sometimes I just feel like I am one with humanity itself. This is one of those times. I'm talking about paradigm-shattering, take-no-prisoners compassion. I aspire to be you Darcy.

OK....you asked. I find this post to be very racist!!


It also seems that several people have brought up about you (Bewlay Brother)...and I am addressing you. You are not subhuman, but it seems that you are acting in such a manner.

There is a reason that I have not posted on this thread. It is because the topic didn't really interest me. I'd suggest that you do the same.

Wolf, I am sorry that this is off topic. Maybe I'll try to follow this thread a little and offer something to put it back on topic. BTW, I enjoyed your two poems. You've got some wit about you.

[Bewlay Brother]

What I am talking about is much closer to substance and literature than anything you have said Wolf. The whole "oh yeah it really makes me feel good and like a genius and a great person when people are so courageous and brave to say bad stuff about God and did you know that the burden is on proving it exists and not to prove it doesn't? Like there could be a tapioca monster and you couldn't prove there isn't! Oh boy. That is such an amazing argument. I'm so brilliant. Oh I started so young. I remember when I was in 5th grade the teacher was teaching all this lame algebra stuff and I raised my hand and said 'why do we have to learn this if we are never going to use this in the real world? Oh boy she was stunned. She knew at that moment how brilliant I was. Such resilience! Such free-thinking!" thing ran out of steam infinity years ago.

OK....you asked. I find this post to be very racist!!


It also seems that several people have brought up about you (Bewlay Brother)...and I am addressing you. You are not subhuman, but it seems that you are acting in such a manner.

There is a reason that I have not posted on this thread. It is because the topic didn't really interest me. I'd suggest that you do the same.

Wolf, I am sorry that this is off topic. Maybe I'll try to follow this thread a little and offer something to put it back on topic. BTW, I enjoyed your two poems. You've got some wit about you.

I was satirizing Darcy and the fallacy of white guilt.

Also even if I was being serious, it wouldn't be racist. I don't think half of you guys have any idea what the hell racism is. Racism isn't a "gotchya" phenomenon. It is endlessly deep-rooted. Even if the post was serious, there would still be absolutely NOTHING in it to suggest a hatred for black people.

[WolfLarsen]

Once again I would like to encourage Bewlay to find someplace else that's more relevant to whatever it is he's talking about. Because whatever this Bewlay is on about it certainly is not literature.

I would like to thank Bewlay in advance for finding another place to post whatever it is he's talking about.

[BienvenuJDC]

I guess that is the problem with satire. When out of context it is hard to interpret. I'm not going to take sides without reading more, and right now I just don't have the time. (or maybe the interest either)

[Bewlay Brother]

It does not mean anything if several people have accused me of being a racist. It just means a lot of people are horribly and hopelessly wrong. Such a thing is hardly even an anomaly. Many people didn't see anything wrong with having a slave back in the day. Now many people are completely oblivious to the subconscious belittling of others based on race or dehumanization based on sexuality. I treat people based on who they are. We are all humans. Nothing else comes into the equation. If a man is homosexual and is disrespectful to women I will spit in his face. I'd do the same if he was straight. If a man is black and he refuses to work and runs around stabbing people I will consider him, for the time being, a menace to society. The same goes for if he is white. I do have sympathy for people born into the ghetto and have some ideas to improve that situation, and it has nothing to do with welfare or urging them to blame others for their shortcomings. I think it is much closer to racism to act like blacks nowadays need help from the government to succeed and that they shouldn't be held accountable for their actions, as if they are subhuman. They deserve blame when they mess up. Everybody does. One of the biggest things about being an adult human being is to be judged, good or bad, by your actions - and it disgusts me to see blacks and homosexuals deprived of that.

Blacks are human beings that happen to be black. To people like Darcy and wolf, blacks are African-Americans.

Gays are human beings that just happen to like members of the same gender. To people like Darcy and wolf, gays are just that - gay. All of their livelihood derives from the fact that they are, yes, you guessed it, gay.

Once again I would like to encourage Bewlay to find someplace else that's more relevant to whatever it is he's talking about. Because whatever this Bewlay is on about it certainly is not literature.

I would like to thank Bewlay in advance for finding another place to post whatever it is he's talking about.

You are a coward and a simpleton and a hateful foolish little boy. I am basing this completely off of your thoughts and opinions and personality. I wish you could grant blacks and gays the same courtesy, or God forbid - the rich and the religious!

I posted satire. It was much better literature than anything you have been babbling about in the most adolescent of ways. Also it was rather unorthodox too. It offended someone as well! You should be foaming at the lips right now based on your essay, but you don't even regard it as literature? Oh and why? Because it isn't something you agree with! Because it doesn't parade your views! You are a phony and the biggest imposter of art or art appreciation I have ever seen.

Do you have any defense? It is quite clear you don't give a damn about what you were preaching. You only give a damn about cheerleaders for your opinion, or something to quench your most immature and pathetic desires for shock value and the risque.

I guess that is the problem with satire. When out of context it is hard to interpret. I'm not going to take sides without reading more, and right now I just don't have the time. (or maybe the interest either)

Does it really take time to take a side in this issue? Let us summarize.

1. Wolf has essay going on and on and on and on and on about how writers need to be more creative! Write things in different ways! And be controversial! Test boundaries! Say things not everybody agrees with!

2. I post satire of white guilt.

3. Wahhhh you are a white supremacist! You aren't talking about literature you are a white supremacist wahhhhh!! Of course I won't even talk directly to you because I'm so damn above you!

[Alexander III]

You are a coward and a simpleton and a hateful foolish little boy. I am basing this completely off of your thoughts and opinions and personality. I wish you could grant blacks and gays the same courtesy, or God forbid - the rich and the religious!

wow, wow, easy there buddy. I know you have a lot in you, but maybe its best to watch some porn have a lovley little wank; and only then come back and argue on the forum, you will find post-masturbation your arguments are not fermenting with angst and pussing with anxiety. They will be clearer, and to the point, all the other nastinnes and slimley bubling angst and pertyrbation shall not find their way and corrupt your arguments.

When I used to do some rethric back in highschool, I would always masturbate in the bathroom prior, your arguments become far more clear and appealing to the audience. Its a good and effective tip.

[Drkshadow03]

There certainly is plenty of contemporary literature taught in college literary courses. However, much of that work, while often quite good, lacks innovation and experimentation. I think that there should be some conventional contemporary literature, but at the same time there should be innovative literature in these courses as well. What is often being left out of the courses is the contemporary INNOVATIVE literature.

In an earlier post I posted the work of a relatively unknown author (with his prior permission) whose work I discovered on the Internet. I believe his work to be more creative than ANYTHING I read in 16 years of formal education with a BA in English literature. This is certainly not the first time that I discovered on the Internet excellent innovative works by unknown authors.

Perhaps the best writing in the history of the human race is being written right now, or perhaps the best writing of the human race does not find its way into any canon, because the tastes of those who decide what goes in the canon might be far too conservative. The canon may contain some very good works of literature, some others that are not so good, but does the canon have the greatest works of literature written by man? I doubt it.

We've already heard the word "good taste" repeated over and over again like some mantra. "Good taste" is nothing more than the prejudices of the status quo. Certainly, until he made big, Pablo Picasso's work was not considered to be in "good taste". His paintings were considered vulgar. And certainly he is not the only one.

Each generation of artists and writers must fight against the haughty connoisseurs of "good taste". For the guardians of "good taste" new and bold does not fit their definition of "good taste".

This does not mean that I don't think there is a place for conventional writing. At the moment I myself happen to be writing in a conventional manner.

But there is no correct manner of writing. There is no such thing as "good taste". If people wish to do so let them write in a conventional manner one day and a completely innovative manner the next day. Let there be as many creative writing styles as there are poets and writers in the world.

Well, maybe you just don't have good taste. You seem to be confused about what this term means. When people speak of "good taste" they aren't necessarily talking about the tastes of those in civilized high society or academia. They don't just mean it in the sense of decorum; Mr. Reynolds walking up to Mr. Joseph at a dinner party and whispering into his ear, "Ah, Joseph, the way you handled Maryanne's inappropriate talk of divorce was in good taste." Or "those people who don't like wine lack good taste." When someone says you have bad taste in relation to the arts it can also mean they're telling you that you like bad writing instead of good writing, you like tacky dull paintings instead of good moving paintings, etc.

It's hard to take someone seriously who is claiming that some surrealist story they found on the internet is more creative than anything they've read in the last 16 years of formal education. Not to mention why is creativity the only characteristic of art being considered? Why not skill? My story can be creative as hell, full of all sorts of surrealist ideas; it doesn't mean it's any good or more specifically the writing on the prose level is any good.

I haven't seen too many people here say they aren't open to the idea of good experimental fiction. What I have seen is a lot of people say, "Oh, I read a lot of those writers from your list of innovative writers and they're good, but not better than Shakespeare, Dante, Milton, etc." To accuse them of being enthralled by the preaching of academia and they only like these works better because they're supposed to like them is a conversation nonstarter; there would be no possible way for them to disagree with you because any time they would try to make the case for an older author you could always just claim, but you only think that because you're supposed.

[Bewlay Brother]

wow, wow, easy there buddy. I know you have a lot in you, but maybe its best to watch some porn have a lovley little wank; and only then come back and argue on the forum, you will find post-masturbation your arguments are not fermenting with angst and pussing with anxiety. They will be clearer, and to the point, all the other nastinnes and slimley bubling angst and pertyrbation shall not find their way and corrupt your arguments.

When I used to do some rethric back in highschool, I would always masturbate in the bathroom prior, your arguments become far more clear and appealing to the audience. Its a good and effective tip.

No man Wolf is a different animal. I'm not doing this out of frustration. I'm just saying the truth. This Wolf guy is the absolute rectum of mankind. I'll say that now and I'll say that after I take a time machine and bang Faye Dunaway circa 1967. If someone like him had power he would do worse things than slavery.

On top of that, he is just so horribly trite too.

He has like a 5k word essay going on and on about how writing should be more innovative and risque. Then I do exactly that, and so I'm a "white supremacist!"

He is a lost cause. Darcy proved lots of redeeming qualities and the presence of a brain. He is only guilty of getting acute-minded because of the pure horror of slavery, so other things that would normally help in opinion-making were disregarded. That is fine.

Wolf though, he has absolutely nothing of value in the way he goes about life. He doesn't take being a homosapien seriously.

I don't care if my posts to Wolf seem angsty. Such belligerent inhumanity deserves backlash even if most people don't sense turmoil until their are torches and pitchforks. This is a problem because sirens don't have any effect on tyrants.

[OrphanPip]

Alex's stress relief regiment aside, he has a valid point about not getting too worked up about Wolf.

Anyway, what we're really seeing emerging here is an argument about who has the right to determine the truth or meaning, with respect to elusive categories of discrimination.

BB is echoing a rather conventional argument, but one that is problematic. Let's go back to the conception of the question that it is wrong for someone to vote for a black president because they are black. A fairly common discourse that emerged during Obama's election which implicitly, in a rather cowardly way, critiques the legitimacy of African American political choice and the legitimacy of Obama's election itself. However, where does the idea that people voted for Obama because he was black even come from. Let's not act like politicians are blank slates and we judge them merely by their policies, we also care about their cultural origins and ties to communities because we understand this effects their political actions. Even if someone voted for Obama simply because he was black, which is a rather tenuous fantasy to begin with, then we should also consider how this may reflect someone voting for someone they think has a greater tendency to have their best interest at heart. Darcy brought up the history of discrimination in America, this has left a legacy of distrust amongst African Americans which is fully justifiable. If you have grown up seeing generations of non-black elected officials not act in your best interest, might it not be a rational political choice, in terms of likely political policy to support someone black? There is nothing about voting for Obama because he is black that implies someone thinks that black people are not competent, that they are voting against a white candidate, or that they are not considering aspects of rational political action.

As to people who support gay rights dehumanizing gays, or people who support affirmative action dehumanizing blacks, that just strikes me as a rhetorical attempt to silence political voice one disagrees with. The implication that these actions are dehumanizing relies on a the appropriation of the motives of others, such that you are defining the thoughts and beliefs of people you whose minds you have no access to. It is a bizarre strategy, often deployed in conservative political rhetoric. That and the so-called reverse-racism argument, which is itself very flawed.