Ralph Wessman wrote
<<Lawrence, I appreciate your sentiment but can't help thinking how the
political capturing of a popular wave of sentiment can sometimes lead to
change for the better (Marcos, Mandela, the Berlin Wall). And grief
probably fuels the anger, (t'was grieving-a-plenty for blacks under
apartheid). It fuelled the passion of Earl Spencer's words too.>>
I am not convinced that there was a _popular wave of sentiment_ over Diana.
There was clearly *something* there but the cult of diana had been built up
for a long time, often perversely by attacking her; and we woke up to an
unrelenting radio and tv broadcast which exaggerated and
masturbated the feelings that people had for the woman. I know because I
made a specific study of the radio - i have given away my tv - from the
factual story of her life broadcast by the world service before 5 a.m.
right the way through the banal repetition of the bbc improvised day - even
the Archers was deferred to give more time for the same thing to be said in
several different orders which suggests severely altered states on the part
of programme controllers - reaching its first forced orgasm in mid
afternoon with Elgar's Cello Concerto and Williams Lark Ascending -
interesting not least for the image set in which she was being placed
I believe it was hysteria similar to appearances of the virgin mary - often
in places in deep distress - one i know of used to and perhaps still does
occur on a hillside off the neretva valley in bosnia - and they used to go
there in tens of thousands and they SAW the virgin mary although all a
camera ever picked up were a stretch of grass and a lot of people staring
at it. The cult of the virgin mary is interesting for the hands off manner
in which it is both encouraged and allowed to occur on its own
i am not sure who in this case would be doing the political capturing...
our politicians are riding it and whipping it up...
political activity leads to change and sometimes change is for the
better...
i dont think things are that great since marcos left
and it is too early to think that south africa has been saved from civil
war
i am interested in the way that there is still a belief that things WILL
get better by one means or another when people are clambering over
themselves to prove that Marxism has been defeated and discredited
political capturing of a popular wave of sentiment can sometimes lead to
change for the worse - Adolf Hitler, Le Pen, Greater Croatia, Greater
Serbia, Cyprus, Margaret Thatcher...
- for good or bad, political it aint, leastways not in the Aristotelian
sense... no debate, no vote
I will just emphasise for meditation the word _capturing_
i remain to be convinced that the downing of the berlin wall *was*
necessarily good -
it surely wasnt bad but the best I can make of it so far is that it is
different. It is part of a much larger move for change which has very
complex causes as well as many catalysts including a reactionary RC leader
and a bigot called Lech Walesa... there have been some rather
unpleasant side effects of the changes of wch the fall the Berlin Wall is
part - an epidemic of terrible civil wars is only one and we are all now at
greater risk from nuclear weapons than before
i think the political changes in so many countries of the world that we
have seen over the last decade are of a piece with the french revolution or
the religious wars a couple of centuries before that - the events of which
they are apart have only just begun and we who live in presently safe
places may yet be swept away
i dont see popular sentiment shifting the chinese government whose
brutality makes the east german regime look benign... i dont see it sorting
out the mess created by the iraq war
my _sentiment_ was anger - my point was that we as a species could have
sensible change if we wanted it and this isnt it... had we done justice to
our rationality then there wouldnt have been a berlin wall in the first
place - unless one allows the evil empire / us and them analysis
as to the passion of earl spencer's words, well... maybe he wrote them,
maybe he meant them; it was extremely interesting as a piece of rhetoric...
i hope you all like listening to Elton John
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