[lbo-talk] Hey Mr. bitter expat

Wojtek Sokolowski sokol at jhu.edu
Thu Sep 22 13:48:36 PDT 2005


Andy:
> I find these somewhat related. There seems to be (at
> least in Germany and Czech Rep.) a European
> fascination with titles and academic degrees
> particularly in relation to your job --

Yup. My favorite story is from my DoD days where we tried to organize a union. One Polish guy, a physics professor who defected and worked menial jobs here before coming to DoD, resisted these efforts and when I tried to find why he confessed that he would rather be addressed by the proper title (i.e. professor) for which the union was useless, than having a better pay or promotion opportunity, which the union could help him obtain.
> I'm not so sure about tolerance of freaks, though....
> There seems to be less restraint here on your feared
> lumpens from clobbering a total stranger for having
> bright red dreadlocks (anybody read _This Band Could
> Be Your Life_?), throwing piss at cyclists, or
> inflicting violence on a guy with piercings or
> tattoos. Not that nonconformity is particularly
> accepted in Europe, but you seem less likely to get
> the shit kicked out of you.

I disagree. The Euro hooligans, small town or village thugs - not to mention skins (for whom four walls are three too many) - can be really ruthless. It is all matter of location - urban vs. rural. I generally have no problems whatsoever in B'more and other urban areas, but when we travel in more rural areas, say PA, my American-born wife does most of the talking to waiters, clerks, cops and other service personnel while I keep my mouth shut.
>
> There's also the question of what's more valuable --
> state institutions that are (barely) walled off from a
> superstitious, mostly creationist-tolerating public,
> or a public which wouldn't dream of inflicting
> religion on them in the first place.

Good point - but no country is really safe from religious infestation, so it is important to know how resistant to this scourge public institutions are.


> Yeah, but that's like Mexico having all those vacation
> spots of excellent quality, albeit comparable to other
> places.

The issue of possession is separate from that of distribution. If you do not have to being with, distribution does not matter, does it?

Wojtek



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