Thank you Delta. I completely respect your strength to say that and have admiration for it. I retract everything I said, and if you were annoyed with me, I apologise to you.Originally Posted by Delta40
Thank you Delta. I completely respect your strength to say that and have admiration for it. I retract everything I said, and if you were annoyed with me, I apologise to you.
LET THERE BE LIGHT
"Love follows knowledge." – St. Catherine of Siena
My literature blog: http://ashesfromburntroses.blogspot.com/
Given the right circumstance, each of us are capable of reacting in the heat of the moment.
Yes, I know I have said things I've regretted. You're ok Delta. I like you.
LET THERE BE LIGHT
"Love follows knowledge." – St. Catherine of Siena
My literature blog: http://ashesfromburntroses.blogspot.com/
I thought Delta's response was good and valid, as was firefangled's, which no one attacked, for similar reasons. As Nick pointed out, the poem was primarily concerned with its content. These responses addressed the content, but did so poetically and, in doing so, showed up the poetic failings in Randy's poem, demonstrating by example that it was possible to take a rhetorical position and still produce decent poetry, especially in Delta's case. I certainly didn't see any failure of 'protocol'. I've been here ages and I'm not aware of any protocol against responding to a poem with another. It happens fairly frequently.
Last edited by blp; 02-05-2009 at 08:36 AM.
I read the thread An Innoncent Life where I believe the same issue has arisen. I have to admit blp, I am not sure of protocol. I considered it more appropriate to respond in poetic kind rather than let loose in a tirade of disjointed opinions and feelings. This thread enabled me to locate a creative expression. I'm thankful, at least for that.
Oh please. What that is saying is that the American way is a violent way, that American freedom is built on violence, living a life of knife attacks and gun shots. If that is not an attack on America than people who disagree don't know how to read poems. That is a political attack disguised as doggeral. This doesn't even afddress the content of the original poem, which was politically correct speech. Firefangle's comment indirectly addressed political correctness but more so the writing of poetry. I agree with Firefangle; I do not consider the original poem to be finely written, but did that deserve the attack?
Last edited by Virgil; 02-05-2009 at 09:54 PM.
LET THERE BE LIGHT
"Love follows knowledge." – St. Catherine of Siena
My literature blog: http://ashesfromburntroses.blogspot.com/
I think you might want to reconsider that last statement. The way I read the original poem is as a caricature of some gross distortion of the so-called "American way," so-called because the speaker's persona (NOT that of the author) is a jingoistic self-appointed 'patriot'. As I read Delta's response it was to that persona, not to Randy Johnson... but perhaps RJ would care to speak up and clarify that?
Last edited by PrinceMyshkin; 02-05-2009 at 11:00 PM.
Where is the jingoism? "People try to tell me how to talk and it's damn irritating." Every line after that reflects that central thesis. Every single one. Perhaps as non-Americans you don't understand the term The American Way. The fellow is speaking to Americans. I don't even think he conceptualized people from other countries here on lit net. Every line is a nuanced American notion that Americans know what he is referring to. This is why I shutter when people think they understand another country having never lived in it.
Show me which line is jingoistic. I don't see it.
LET THERE BE LIGHT
"Love follows knowledge." – St. Catherine of Siena
My literature blog: http://ashesfromburntroses.blogspot.com/
Delta, I actually enjoyed reading your poem. You have nothing to apologize about, that's what poetry's supposed to do, incite the good, the bad, the ugly---and anybody who is going to insult you for it isn't a poet.
"He was nauseous with regret when he saw her face again, and when, as of yore, he pleaded and begged at her knees for the joy of her being. She understood Neal; she stroked his hair; she knew he was mad."
---Jack Kerouac, On The Road: The Original Scroll
There's a great irony - the American way about not shutting up, contrasted with your deep response against Delta saying what she wants. Notice the irony?
In truth, the freedom of speech because it is America is a fallacy. You may have freedom of speech in The States, but you hardly are the only country that does, I think that is a blind sense of nationalism - I mean, it's even funnier given the response to a speech against, or somewhat criticizing the country. Come on, does no one else see the irony!
The silly thing though, is the fact that there is such a thing as politically correct. Why don't people just not use racial slurs. In Canada, the sense of, I guess "African Canadian" doesn't really work, so I guess it is different (60% of black Canadians are of Caribbean decent, 30% of which are Jamaican) but still, I see no problem with the political correctness, as long as people just stick to it.
The irony though, is that the poet inadvertently says that throwing racial slurs and somewhat offensive "say what I want"s is the American way - calling all black people black, regardless of decent, or culture, and all Aboriginals Indians. Why not just call them Native American, or Aboriginal?
Last edited by JBI; 02-06-2009 at 12:09 AM.
People don't have to live in America to understand the "American way,"---c'mon, stop mystifying here, we're not complex as you and the rest of America would have the outside world believe. I'm up to listen to how you figure though. Just please don't lay it on that "melting pot" notion, please no.
The way I see it, thanks to the Internet, non-Americans need only watch clips of Seinfeld to figure us out.
Last edited by jon1jt; 02-06-2009 at 01:16 AM.
"He was nauseous with regret when he saw her face again, and when, as of yore, he pleaded and begged at her knees for the joy of her being. She understood Neal; she stroked his hair; she knew he was mad."
---Jack Kerouac, On The Road: The Original Scroll
I think this is about respect. There is positive and negative freedom. Freedom from and Freedom to. I encroached upon Randys sphere and for that I am sorry. As a matter of perspective, I don't have to understand a culture to be on its receiving end. American culture is not contained within its own borders. It spews out across the world, to be freely interpreted by non-Americans whose voices are equally legitimate. So I wrote from my own platform. I write what I know and feel because I am authentic. That isn't pretense.
Come, see the view from here.
Aw c'mon you're being beaten into submission, that's thuggery. You can agree to disagree, that's respect enough.
And if anyone wants to know what American free speech is about, just take a gander at the recent suspension of Michael Phelps by the US swim team. His offense: a photo showing him smoking marijuana.Consider in the same context the president of the United States, who wrote in his autobiography of using "a little cocaine" in his high school days. Oh, but it was an unhappy moment that inspired him to take the drug.
And what about our beloved AMERICAN ex-president George W. Bush, who said in response to a question about doing cocaine in his 30s,
"When I was young and irresponsible I was young and irresponsible."
And Bill Clinton:
"I smoked marijuana, but I didn't inhale."
This is my America, folks. Free speech, free thinking America.
Last edited by jon1jt; 02-06-2009 at 01:37 AM.
"He was nauseous with regret when he saw her face again, and when, as of yore, he pleaded and begged at her knees for the joy of her being. She understood Neal; she stroked his hair; she knew he was mad."
---Jack Kerouac, On The Road: The Original Scroll
Sure. I'm still coughing from the dust after being hit with heavy tomes from shocked Lit-netters. The point is, does free speech equate to free action?
OK, I'll modify the accusation of jingoism except that whenever I hear anyone refer to the American, Canadian, Polish &c way of life I assume a sub-text of the best way of life... As for what I see as the intended parody in this, one of the few examples of free speech he offers is the 'freedom' to refer to Native Americans as "Indians," African-Americans as "blacks" and I assume that extends to calling Jews "kikes;" Italians "wops," Latin Amricans "spicks," &c. He's offering (or his persona is) the American Way as the freedom to be boorish or bigotted.
No fair-minded person would accept Randy's satiric persona as a typical American - or an explary one. Nor, I think, does Randy intend his poem to be read that way. Remember Swift's "A Modest Proposal"?
Posting Permissions
