On Thu, Feb 26, 2009 at 7:29 PM, C. G. Estabrook <galliher at uiuc.edu> wrote:
> Baker assembled a mosaic of contemporary quotations to show --
> devastatingly, I
> thought -- that it was necessary to redress the balance of responsibility
> for the outbreak of war, for crimes during the war, and for continuing the
> slaughter. --CGE
>
>
>
> Max B. Sawicky wrote:
>
>> I'm not a pacifist. I would have supported U.S. entry into WWII, with or
>> without Pearl Harbor, though I do not see Imperial Japan as a book-end to
>> the
>> Nazi/Fascist coalition.
>>
>> I think you can read the book in two different ways. One is as a brief for
>> pacifism. A second is as a sad rumination on the failure of humanity to
>> renounce violence and embrace pacifism.
>>
>> Re: WS's point, the book begins with WWI, in effect finding the roots of
>> WWII
>> in the prior conflict. I think this supports His point.
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> -----Original Message----- From: lbo-talk-bounces at lbo-talk.org [mailto:
>> lbo-talk-bounces at lbo-talk.org] On Behalf Of Wojtek Sokolowski Sent:
>> Thursday, February 26, 2009 10:04 AM To: lbo-talk at lbo-talk.org Subject:
>> Re:
>> [lbo-talk] Human Smoke
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> ----- Original Message ---- From: Max Sawicky <sawicky at verizon.net>
>>
>> There's stuff like this on every page. Every paragraph, really. For
>> those
>> who don't know, the whole book is a series of these disconnected bits, but
>> as
>> you go along they weave themselves together. All meticulously documented
>> in
>> citations and footnotes. Amazing book. I've got to get me some more
>> Nicholson Baker.
>>
>> [WS:} I ordered the book (used, as usual) on Amazon.com, and while doing
>> it I
>> read some of the reviews, which were pretty thoughtful, imho, if not
>> always
>> favorable.
>>
>> The main criticism was that pacifism that Baker advocates would not work
>> with
>> Hitler. It is posture easy to take by Westerners who were for the most
>> part
>> spared Hitler's atrocities, but those who experienced it first-hand
>> (mainly
>> Eastern Europeans) have a very different perspective.
>>
>> I have not yet read the book, so obviously I cannot comment on its merits
>> or
>> demerits, but based on what I read in the reviews it appears that
>> interpreting Baker's view as simplistic Gandhian pacifism of
>> self-sacrifice
>> and "turning the other cheek" is not the only one that is possible. If I
>> were to argue the case of pacifism in the WW2 era, I would point out that
>> it
>> was the whole series of events, tit-for-tats, hyper-nationalism and
>> bigotry,
>> rabid anti-communism, and machiavellian geo-politics (i.e. "we" will take
>> a
>> piece of land for the sole reason of preventing "them" from taking it,
>> which
>> "we" are sure "they" are planning) that led to the war. It is not that
>> important who fired the first shot in the game - it happened to be Hitler,
>> but if it were not him it would be another villain playing this game.
>>
>> In that context, teh argument for pacifism is not for refusing to fire the
>> second shot (and "trun the other cheek"), but to stop playing that game
>> before it escalates to a point when firing shots is anything but
>> inevitable.
>> If that is what Baker implies in his book - I am all for it, but it it is
>> simply "turn-the-other-cheek-ism" - I am not buying.
>>
>> While we are at that, I think that labor and most affiliated parties bear
>> their fair share of responsibility for the two World Wars, because they
>> jumped on the bandwagon of nationalism (e.g. German social democrats) and
>> few
>> were willing to sabotage the war efforts of their national governments
>> (Rosa
>> Luxemburg was a commendable excpetion.)
>>
>> Wojtek
>>
>>
>>
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