On Oct 21, 2007, at 3:59 PM, joanna wrote:
> I read the inteview Yoshie sent along and found Satrapi's observations
> quite sensible. I would prefer to discuss those remarks on their own
> merit without dragging Satrapi's current residence into it.
Nothing Satrapi said made her residence relevant - it was Yoshie's typically preachy and annoying headnote that did.
Years ago, I had a discussion with some woman at the Brecht Forum who went on and on about how wonderful Africa is and how the USA sucks. I asked her why she lived here and not in Africa. She got all pissy and declared that irrelevant. Well it's not. The choice of residence means you find something attractive or valuable about the society you live in rather than the one you praise to the skies from a safe distance and you should admit that. There's a lot to be said for bourgeois wealth and liberties, and not to concede that is dishonest. For a self-described queer woman to praise a country that could well put her to death while living in one that tolerates her is, well, I almost said "horseshit," but instead I'll be polite and say "problematic." I have no problem admitting that there are progressive aspects to capitalist societies that go along with their repressive and alienating aspects. I have no problem admitting that one of the good things about American life in particular is that it's relatively welcoming to outsiders - a stark contrast with Japan and much of Europe. There are many brutal and hideous things about American life too. But as Adorno said somewhere, sometimes the most radical thing you can do is take the promises of bourgeois society - about freedom and self-development - seriously. A lot of the time bourgeois society crushes those promises, at home and especially in its colonies. But that's no reason to throw freedom and self-development out the window in the name of some excruciating traditionalism.
Doug