Honouring graves is a basic human instinct. Consider Antigone.

It's also one of the ways that palaeo-anthropologists differentiate between 
the human and the animal.

joanna

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Roger Day" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Monday, July 30, 2007 10:10 AM
Subject: Re: New de blog - Stencil Art


> Every year in the UK, we have Armistice Day, with it's attendant pomp
> and circumstance. Originally meant to commemorate WW1, it became a
> commemoration of *all* wars, even the sordid little ones like Kenya.
> Now the 2 minutes silence is foisted on us in the workspace. Everyone
> *has to wear poppies. It's become an act of enforcement rather than
> remembrance. By this time, my bullshit meter is registering high, and
> I now opt-out of such "commemorations". It's become just another tool
> of patriotism, with little or no thought behind it.
>
> I'm with Mark about the desecration of the graves. I'm an atheist
> however I respect symbolism and feelings. Desecrating gravestones is
> distasteful and a gift to the bigot.
>
> Roger
>
> On 7/30/07, Mark Weiss <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>> If memory serves, the right wing and a lot of other people protested
>> the war memorial not because of the names but because it lacked the
>> traditional statuary--the hard-right types thought its understatement
>> was an expression of shame, and the rest that a sort of decorum had
>> been violated, although the names have been enormously successful as
>> a sight for the expression of personal and generational griefs.
>> Myself, I think we should be ashamed that anyone dies in any war, no
>> matter how just. The resistance to adding statuary was largely on
>> aesthetic grounds, and the solution, to have the statuary somewhat
>> apart, seems to have worked for most.
>>
>> In every small town square in the US and Europe--I can't speak for
>> the rest of the world--the names of the dead of this or that war are
>> inscribed on monuments, whether the town was on the winning or losing
>> side. All over Britain the walls of churches are lined with the names
>> of those who died for the Empire, that evil sham. Who's trying to
>> keep the names from anyone?
>>
>> The problem, I think, is that governments and political activists of
>> right or left tend to treat those names as abstractions, just as they
>> tend to treat the living as abstractions, so many eggs that may need
>> to be broken to make an omelette. Neither the dead nor those who
>> loved them ought to be abstractions.
>>
>> I know you well enough to know that you're not on the side of that
>> distancing. You made a dumb, offensive suggestion. We all do that,
>> especially under the kind of stress we're all under. Let it drop.
>>
>> Once the juggernaut starts it's hard to derail it. The American war
>> in Vietnam began in 1950, when we began supplying the French as our
>> surrogate. By the end of thge French phase we were paying 80% of the
>> bill. Resistance in the US began, if memory serves, in 1966. The US
>> withdrew its forces in 1973 and most of its money in 1975. Why did it
>> take so long? I hate to think that all of my facing nightsticks and
>> tear gas had no effect on the war, but US forces were on the ground
>> for five years after Lyndon Johnson threw in the towel. The present
>> war would stop today if it were a matter of the people's will. So
>> I'll keep on protesting, but I have limited faith in the efficacy of
>> my presence as theater, no matter how offensive I were to make
>> myself. What pressure we can exert, and it's what will get us out of
>> Iraq, is at the ballot box. We're only delaying the unrestrained
>> bloodbath that will almost certainly ensue--removing the apex from a
>> pyramidal power structure without a replacement on hand is usually
>> disastrous, no matter how vicious the apex is. But it's not going to
>> be fun to watch the results of what our leaders have wrought in our name.
>>
>> Mark
>> At 05:55 PM 7/29/2007, you wrote:
>> >As you rightfully point out, Ken, those who are dead by State means 
>> >(mainly
>> >war), they are constantly with us. The dead person is not a sole, 
>> >private
>> >family matter. I remember well the way in which the right wing in this
>> >country protested and resisted the creation of the Vietnam Memorial - 
>> >which
>> >brought the names of America soldiers back into the public light of day. 
>> >The
>> >right did not want us - as a nation - to cope with the origins and 
>> >terrible
>> >consequences of that miserably conceived war.
>> >
>> >Such will also be true of the dead in Iraq. (Pity the well paid
>> >mercenary/contractor/ soldiers who don't get no acknowledgement).
>> >
>> >It is an interesting query to wonder if the dead are ever completely
>> >released from their public contract into a purely family matter. Say 
>> >whether
>> >German, Israeli, Cambodian, American, Iraqui, Palestinian - I am sure 
>> >most
>> >of know the 20th Century list of offenders and offended.
>> >Greek plays wrestled with this often enough.
>> >
>> >
>> >I am not sorry, Ken, if my proposal blew it all back up in your face, or 
>> >if
>> >it gets in the way of removing yourself from 'outrage fatigue.' Such as 
>> >it
>> >is for those of us who might want to pretend we are not implicated in 
>> >all of
>> >this, and somehow can gratuitously disengage from this or any other
>> >disaster at will.
>> >
>> >No matter how silent, inevitably, we remain implicated
>> >
>> >Stephen V
>> >http://stephenvincent.net/blog/
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> > > Stephen Vincent wrote:
>> > >> Dear Ken and Laura:
>> > >>
>> > >> It's curious, Ken, that the first image your mind is a 'Swastika'! 
>> > >> It does
>> > >> not surprise me, or I find it 'predictable", as I suggested,
>> > that you would
>> > >> confuse or equate an act of compassionate acknowledge for the Iraqi 
>> > >> dead
>> > >> with Nazi behavior on my part. I would go a little deeper into your
>> > >> 'analytical well' before making such a knee-jerk, offensive 
>> > >> assumption.
>> > >>
>> > >
>> > > Fine.  Temporary or permanent, what is the qualitative difference
>> > > between Krylon and envelopes.  Both acts are incredibly 
>> > > disrespectful.
>> > > Next step: I would never have gone to Bitburg the way that
>> > > jellybean-fressing moron in the White House did back in the 1980s.  I
>> > > would not treat their resting places as sacred ground in the sense I
>> > > would the unmarked graves of Dachau or Buchenwald.  But neither would 
>> > > I
>> > > use those graves to make some political point.
>> > >> The war is the real outrage - and so many of us - among the dead and 
>> > >> the
>> > >> living - have been silenced. How to make art and poems that move
>> > beyond the
>> > >> silence is the issue.
>> > >>
>> > >
>> > > Yes, it is an outrage, but to be perfectly frank, I am
>> > > outrage-fatigued.  If you have any left, fine.  I don't.
>> > >
>> > > k
>> > >
>> > > --------------------
>> > > Ken Wolman                rainermaria.typepad.com
>> > >
>> > > There's a lot of wisdom here among the employees,
>> > > Some of us have street smarts and some have Ph.Ds.
>> > > We're all bored and tired but we've all learned ways to cope
>> > > Some of us drink after work, the rest of us smoke dope.
>> > >     --Austin Lounge Lizards, "Industrial Strength Tranquilizers"
>>
>
>
> -- 
> My Stuff: http://www.badstep.net/
> "In peace, sons bury their fathers. In war, fathers bury their sons."
> Roman Proverb
>