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From: [email protected] (Omar Haneef '96)
Newsgroups: alt.cyberpunk
Subject: Re: Frankenstein (was Dystopia cont.)
Date: 10 Sep 1995 18:18:46 GMT
Organization: Swarthmore College Engineering, Swarthmore PA
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mpa ([email protected]) wrote:
> Omar Haneef '96 ([email protected]) wrote:
> > mpa ([email protected]) wrote:
> > > around a lot longer than this particular recipe and will very likely
> > > provide a number of new dishes before we smash the rock or hop off it.
> > And you don't think it important that we be able to control or discuss the
> > direction of this change?
> Where do you get the idea that I believe that way. Read what is written
> and not what you'd like to refute.
YOUR response was to my assertion that we should talk about change. I
assumed when you responded with your metaphor that you mean't change is
happening fast and unpredictably and that this reponse was somehow supposed
to be a counter argument.
> > > If you're not alive 24 hours a day then you are not alive. If you don't
> > > do what you enjoy for a living you're wasting precious time. Your workday
> > > should push that 24 hour limit not shy away from it.
> > This is an absurd argument. Surely one grows tired of any given activity
> > after a while.
> Once again: Who said anything about "one activity"? It is your argument
> that is absurd, Omar. Oy is based on things that I didn't say or even
> hint at.
You snipped out my original where I talked about the workday expanding to 24
hours. You responded with the argument that "if you don't do what you enjoy
for a living you're wasting your precious time." My response was to indicate
that you may enjoy what you do for a living IF you only do it for 8 hours a
day but then you get sick of it.
> > > > There is no such thing as the activist Dystopiac. I use Dystopia as a tool
> > > > to incite dialogue. We have to talk about what is going on; what is
> > > > happening to us.
> > > What a marvelously contradictory sentence. No "activist Dystopiac"'s but
> > > you use the term to "incite". You want to move people to action. You want
> > > to scare or anger them into engaging you. Umm...activist.
> > But I'm not asking for action because I'm not sure what we should do. I'm
> > asking for dialogue so we can figure it out.
> and....? Act upon this discussion. Right? And you have expressed parts of
> your agenda a number of times.
I don't see how your reservations with any given agenda of mine for action
should cause you to disagree as to the importance of dialogue.
> > > > > Dystopianism is wedded to millennial hysteria. It will provide us with
> > > > > amusement to observe some rather strange bedfellows.
> > > "'Cause tonight I'm gonna Party like its 1999." -TAFKAP
> > > > Dystopianism, whatever that is, SHOULDN'T be wedded to anything. It should
> > > > be a reminder of what COULD happen, and I am grateful to you for reminding
> > > > me that what COULD happen - what I treated formerly as horrible - may not be
> > > > so bad. But notice how important the dialogue was.
> > > So, really, we're back to dystopia meaning nothing or whatever "me" don't
> > > like. A term only useful to politicos and organiser's.
> > You missed the point. To invoke dystopia is to discuss the future
> > and its alternatives. Dystopia, even in discussing what it is or is not is a
> > vehicle for discussion. For instance, on this newsgroup Sourceror talked
> > about my dystopia as his good thing (without defending it too much) and
> > presented a case for it.
> Still, dystopia still boils down to "whatever you don't like".
Why do you insist in ignoring the point I'm making? A word - whatever its
definition is - is transformed by the contextg. Dystopia is not "whatever
you don't like". Its more like "whatever I think we all don't want" and then
when you argue for its definition you move towards an understanding of
issues.
-Omar Haneef
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