James M. Blaut wrote: > I appreciate and support your appeals for civility. And I can't object to > your chiding me when I get tetchy. But there is this one person on the list > who persistently attacks left views, leftists, and the left, and I think it > might be useful to chide this person a little more than I've seen you do > (during my one week tenure on Pen-L). IMHO, this shit is simply not > acceptable in left discourse. __________________ Since I have been so swamped with uninteresting work that i have largely missed this great debate. And i do not know what kind of stuff Woejeck (sp?) has been writing. But it seems Woejeck is putting forward what would be considered a minority voice on pen-l. I usually oppose any attempt to smother the minority voice. I think minority voices do a great service to the majority voices by at least forcing them to sharpen their arguments. Furthermore, i think the onus of being polite and civil lies more on the majority voices than the minority voices (if you have been a minority voice then you know how it feels!). My general criticism of Michael's moderation is that he usually supports the majority voice on pen-l and shows a lack of sensibility in handling the minority voices. Pen-l is a virtual community, and if the majority of its inhabitants are supposedly the champions of the minorities and the poor 'third world', then they should show by their action how they treat a minority voice amongst them. Cheers, ajit sinha >
