A Modest Proposal (was RE: Guthrie to Maggie and Max)

Max Sawicky sawicky at epinet.org
Sat Mar 6 12:53:32 PST 1999



> Max writes back to Woody Guthrie & Carrol:


> >Also, I don't go for this lame injection
> >stuff; hanging or electrocution would be
> >better. (My understanding is that firing
> >squad and guillotine are actually pretty
> >humane since death is so sudden.)
>
> Why stop at hanging and electrocution? You have a very impoverished
imagination for 'retribution,' don't you?>

No, you equate retribution with lunacy, except in the context of your insurrectionary fantasies (e.g., riots in shopping malls).


> If you want to be reactionary, why not go mediaeval?

Because I am not consumed by bloodlust, or TV lust for that matter.


> Why not drawing & quartering? Burning at the stake? Skinning? Gouging the
eyes out? Cutting off the nose and ears? An Iron Maiden? Branding? Boiling? Disemboweling & forcing the condemned to eat his own entrails? Cutting off the cock and balls and stuff them up his ass? Leaving the tied-up body to be eaten alive by hyenas or sharks?>

Sounds like a fun date.


> If I had my way, the pro-death penalty individuals would be forced to not
only become executioners but also clean up the mess after each execution.>

In Utah or Nevada, I forget which, they staff (or used to) firing squads with volunteers, and there are always more volunteers than slots. So no problem there. RE: cleanup, there is a vibrant market for human body parts and/or carcasses for medical education, so that's covered too.


> Max again:
> >The key thing about this song and all the other
> >stuff like it is that the victims of whatever
> >crime was committed do not exist. Even the
> >question of a crime is not broached. Much
> >like abortion, where the fetus (whatever its
> >state of development) does not exist,
> >hence has no question of rights, which allows
> >us -- by definition, rather than by argument --
> >to define the rights of the woman as exclusive.
>
> It is a melancholy object . . .

. . . to be equated with racism, classism, and intolerance of all varieties, merely by extension of an intolerance for those who commit heinous crimes (some of which are the more heinous because they are committed out of prejudice against minorities, women, gays, etc.)

Just a product of my environment,

mbs



More information about the lbo-talk mailing list