Trevor Joyce wrote:
<snip>
Still seeking absolutes?
<snip>
Two stories told on the first day of the *Decameron* concern Jews.
Pressured by a Christian, a Jew travels to Rome where he finds Pope,
cardinals and prelates all up to their necks in the usual medieval vices of
sexual licence, barratry and so forth. He decides to convert nonetheless.
Because, he reasons, the mercy of the Christian God must be truly something
to forgive all this.
Saladdin, a Moslem, travels to Alexandria. Pressured by him to declare which
of the Abrahamic faiths is the _right_ one, another Jew tells a story about
three rings. Only one confers (legitimate) wealth and power. However, since
each appears identical to its fellows, the question is left in the air.
Against that view of the world in which the US is both the actor and the
audience, in which the rest of the world is reduced to a sort of disposable
stage set, assertions (joking or not) that women (or persons over, or under,
5'6" tall, for that matter) would do better if only they were in power do
seem to me rather odd. They're no solution to what is a figure/ground
problem with moral implications, the only change being along the
(rhetorical) axis of (in)visibility.
Christopher Walker
|