hmmmmmmm....
ungressing, i've a hungarian uncle who's been in the u.s. for twenty years, and escaped his military service and i suspect something roughly equivalent to an arrest warrant for black marketeering some time earlier by swimming across some deep, cold lake or other. wears his ethnic hatreds on his sleeve (though he has the frequently fortunate gift of almost complete unintelligibility in english). an otherwise peaceful person and a very talented artist and woodworker, there is nevertheless the not-so-occasional diatribe about gypsies and other groups of whom i know little. (he's a magyar himself, i think.)
fureliseful...
not surprised. most people in that part of the world will tell you:" i am not a racist, but those gypsies should be kept isolated in some reservations or expelled altogether!" where to, i do not know. even people that i otherwise view as intelligent and in all other respects tollerant have scary stereotypes against them. i worked with gypsies for a few years myself, it very sad, frustrating and aggravating. and, sigh, no sign of things getting better anytime soon.
It isn't just them. I think he's also frequently on about the Romanians (whichever ones aren't Magyar, at any rate), though he might be saying "Romani" and I'm mis-hearing.
Haven't seen him in a few years, now that I think about it. Different parts of the country now. (And not a bad guy, for all that, though I think he'd have been happier, though much poorer, if he hadn't been chased out of Hungary.)
Yup, many old men are disgruntled about this and that. My father, a wonderful wonderful, intelligent and most kind, tolerant person on earth i can think of. But we have mighty long disputes about gay marriage or legalized partnership. He just cannot bring himself to see it as something tolerable or desirable. But he will fight practically for any discriminated against minority group in the universe. My brain stops, I don't understand why it is so, but I will still claim I do not know a more respectable fellow under the sun. So I can very well see how your uncle may be an interesting and not unwise feller, who unfortunately had a heavy cross to carry on his shoulder. that is bound to do nasty things to people's minds.
Hey, I've got a cross to bear, too: the guilt of having everything handed to me on a silver platter.
Anyhow, good luck on the dissertation. Sounds fascinating (and aggravating and heart-breaking). Just meant to bring up an example of a simmering ethnic aversion (in Eastern Europe, in this case) that didn't so much go away during Soviet domination as go to the back burner. Peoples are just peoples, after all. (Even avoiding this month's feature news story...)
you are right, patio. that is a cross to bear. especially if one is true to his/hers moral convictions of equality of human beings. I must find this one article, i believe it was by Peter Singer, who just sent my head spinning. His argument suggested that we, westerners, who believe in the basic principles of liberal (in the old, or European sense of the word) and enlightenment ideas, have the moral obligation to give up our earthly posessions, anything beyond what we need for mere survival, and share the excess we make via our jobs, or other earnings, with the poor people of the third world. I will not even try to follow his line of justification, I would just make a fool out of myself. Instead, I will try to hunt the article down and post the link, maybe I can send some other heads spinning, too!
oh good - spinning headses! bring 'em on!
'tis too early in the morning for me to think - and I have not yet had my coffee...
Found it. Now it is a heavy read and surely would be more suitable for some other thread, but if anyone despite of that manages to read it, tell me you're not as confused about 'who we are and where are we going as a mankind' kind of things as i am. for i am. confused, that is. sheeesh, off to a hairdress, hopefully they can set my head straight there!
Famine, Affluence, and Morality
Will bookmark and read at a later date, though I think I can predict the line of reasoning. (Being something of a misanthrope, though, I kind of align myself with whomever it was who said -- and I paraphrase -- "The only choice is whether or not to kill oneself." I can come up with no line of thought, based on the prospects of my life, that says that my life will benefit mankind more than my death. Biological imperative, though; I'm very happy to be alive, and intend to stay that way.)
Crikey.
Anybody got a good joke?
I read a recent article by Peter Singer on the moral matters involved in being a vegetarian or not. Sadly, I cannot now reference it. It did go on and on and on with lots of pros and cons as he wound his way through the thicket to what he thinks himself, for now.
Personally, I am thinking this morning that I had better hurry up and find my tax papers, all piled together in a stack, but...where? Not where I thought they were. Scurry............
thinking nuthin! (............................)
Osso - is that avatar dawg Pacco, the wonder dog?
Yes, that's wonderdog himself! whaddya think?
He is a he. Well, a neutered he, but manly just the same. He was found sauntering down highway 101 at the place where the fields along the shore turn into our town's entry stretch of KMart type stores...and did a monthlong stay at the Humane Society. His picture was in the paper, and I called about him. Love at first sight. I named him Pacco, which is italian for package..as I think of him as my gift package, today and other days.... Um, not to get sickeningly sentimental or anything.
Awwwww!!!! That's just so sweet :-D
