Still influenced by him I hope 
How strange to hear such a collectivist argument made by one who despises all collectivism and fancies himself above the herd and its vulgar mentality.
Until those better things are born, however, it sure seems like your “support” of your “family” is basically just a way for you to hang yourself on the coat-tails of Shakespeare and James Joyce, and assert your own superiority by associating yourself with their culture (proclaiming them to be your “family”), thus obscuring the fact that your own real contribution to that culture has thus far been nil. Much like a five-year-old kid might argue that he is better than you because his dad can beat up your dad.
Well, in this case my dad can and does frequently beat the shit out of people. Besides, what’s wrong with being proud that your dad is strong? Also, I didn’t choose Shakespeare and Joyce, in the context here, they’re simply what the highlights of European civilisation.
How strange to hear such a collectivist argument made by one who despises all collectivism and fancies himself above the herd and its vulgar mentality.
I’ve never said these things.
You remember your first thread Sil? The one about elitism, and how you’re elite? Ringing a bell?
That kind of “pride” is really about its subject, not its object. It’s an attempt to glorify oneself by attaching oneself to other people’s accomplishments without playing any part in them. Even when kids are five years old, they only resort to bragging about how their fathers can beat up other kids’ fathers when they themselves can’t beat up the other kids.
Holy shit, SK, I had been thinking that there was some archetypal, petulant comment that exemplified Sil’s thinking, and I couldn’t think of it until now. That’s it, the “My dad could beat up your dad,” argument.
Just for the record, this doesn’t go away at five; the last tournament I went to, someone informed me that even though I defeated him, his sensei was stronger than mine. Which really wasn’t true, it turned out, as they ended up having a match, but that’s not really the point. The point is that it’s a petulant, almost infantile tendancy to hide behind the shield of another when you are found lacking. Because Sil’s great European Cultural Monument is a bunch of egotistical, not to mention moronic, posts on a message board about roleplaying games, which aren’t even argued very well whatsoever, he chooses t ocling to the Dead Icons of Culture as akin to himself. He needs to believe European culture is superior because he needs to believe he is superior, and having no accomplishments of his own to sate this need, he clings with white knuckles to his ethnicity in some imaginary bond that association to them grants him their achievements.
SK and Arac win.
You guys are negative nancies.
That kind of “pride” is really about its subject, not its object. It’s an attempt to glorify oneself by attaching oneself to other people’s accomplishments without playing any part in them.
What pride isn’t about its “subject”, in your terms? And I’d love to hear about these accomplishments of yours that are going down in the history books. Whoever goes down in the history books but the very best artists, scientists, and political figures? I don’t even think Alexander the Great had “accomplishments” at the age of twenty. Its important for a young person (and older people too) to reach for the best and to have his particular role models. If he doesn’t, he’s a negative nancy. There are enough wonderful things in the world that there shouldn’t be a problem with well-placed enthusiasms.
Dead Icons of Culture
Who are these?
It’s amazing how one word can shame a man. I retract my prior statement. It is not awesome.
Alexander had beaten Athens and Thebes at the age of 20. It’s hard to beat being a son of god(s), right? Not that it matters…
Well-placed enthusiasms, yes. But you don’t have “enthusiasms.” Nearly all of your posts make reference to great artists or cultural landmarks. However, invariably, all of this great culture has one and only one function in your hands: as a way for you to bludgeon your perceived “inferiors.” You occasionally pay lip service to the idea that great literature is psychologically deep or transforms the reader, but this only ever occurs as a kind of window-dressing on some assertion about how some other culture is inferior to yours. In your posts, great literature has no themes, no content. You’re obsessed with how superior it makes you, but you aren’t really interested in what it says.
I pledge my love for SK in this thread, by the power of this post and with the strength in my fingers, that strength that is the inheritance of my proud viking forefathers, who cracked the skulls of YOUR proud forefathers, a strength also inherited by my being born in the city where a glorious rebellion rose in the 15th century, led by Gustav Vasa to free Sweden from the rule of Christian the Tyrant of Denmark - discrediting the fact that neither branch of my family was originally from there. :kissy:
BOW BEFORE ME, DAMMIT.
As an aside I’ve read Joyce’s <I>Ulysses</I>, and I found it to be pseudo, wannabe-intellectual tripe about men sitting about masturbating in public before going off getting high and dreaming about getting spanked by prostitutes. A lot of other things happened, I’m not denying that, but he sure seemed to like those parts. In between that, all I saw was people talking and talking and nobody listening to what anybody else was saying.
That is my opinion as a literature student. Thank you and good day.
We live in two different worlds, SK and I.
SK in the world of big noses where every thing ever thought and said extracts a blood price from an innocent indiginous child. And I in the world where the tulips brush your ankles, with Oscar, James, and Will.
In case you guys are still reading this, I wanted to tell you what I like about James Joyce’s <i>Ulysses</i>. For those of you who haven’t read it, the book basically describes a day in Dublin, Ireland around the beginning of the 20th century. The narrative focuses on two people, named Leopold Bloom and Stephen Dedalus. The novel revolves around them, so let me briefly describe them.
Leopold Bloom is a middle-aged loser with a shit job at an advertising company, where he is not especially liked or respected. He is also impotent and his wife regularly cheats on him. His daughter lives away from home and also enjoys having flings with young men. Bloom is educated, and he could be called “introspective” in the sense that he thinks a lot; however, his thoughts usually consist of personal reminiscences and sexual fantasies, when they are coherent at all.
Stephen Dedalus, on the other hand, is a very highly educated and well-read young man. He reads a lot and enjoys pondering weighty philosophical concepts. Every action he takes is symbolic. For example, he refuses to bathe, as a kind of artistic statement. Even when he gets drunk at a brothel, it’s presented in overblown dramatic form, like the fate of the world depends on it. He also has a shit job, but in his case it’s meaningful because it shows how society doesn’t appreciate him. Girls don’t like him very much.
The book illustrates the thoughts of these two characters as they travel through Dublin and eventually meet. This process is described in numerous styles of prose, including dramatic script, ancient Anglo-Saxon poetry, tabloid-style articles, and so forth. This stylistic variety is what gives <i>Ulysses</i> a reputation as a “difficult” book.
However, once you start reading it and getting past the “difficult” parts, you come to a fascinating conclusion. Even though Leopold Bloom is a loser by the common standard, he still comes across as a more or less decent and sympathetic character. On the other hand, even though Stephen Dedalus is highly educated and vastly more well-read than most of his contemporaries, his preening manner is insufferable, and his intellectual references exist to conceal the aimless vapidity of his life. He evokes no sympathy, because he does not express any towards Bloom or anyone else. Actually, he’s just dull.
See, this kind of observation is the reason why it’s good to read great literature. It really teaches you a lot about how important it is to constantly think about which cultures are superior and which others are inferior.
SK: 2 , Sil: 0.
(That was fucking awesome; GAP, you need to look at the bright side of things, read what SK said. It validates the creation of this thread. It is also amusing to see Weiila speak with such vulgarity and aggressivity).
Here’s how I work; I can sit here with all my misanthropy and elaborate on what drives my hate for the world and acknowledge various possible biases that drive my perception and what potential effects they might have on conclusions I might draw; this then leads to an adjustment of my interpretation of what I observe to ensure a more realistic perception of what it is I hate. This allows for better acquisition of data and further fine tuning of my general understanding. Even if the end point is ultimately flawed, what matters is its applicability and predictive value, which is never 100% in anything in existence anyway.
This contrasts to Sil. Sil’s purpose is not to have a greater understanding of how something works but to live in an imaginary world that will fit his biases as a means of satiating his fragile ego. Instead of trying to ascertain facts, he dictates the truths he wishes the facts would tell him and brings in unquoted and unspecific, obscure material people will not really identify in attempt to unconvincingly justify his point. But that doesn’t matter because he feels justified doing so and as as long as he pulls it out of his ass, he feels he is unbeaten because what he ascerted wasn’t disproven, when in fact the burden of proof was on himself. When he is beaten, he makes awkward retreats that often contradict previous things he’s said before and finally dismisses those who critique him as inferior for not agreeing to his unquestionable superiority.
The one thing that Sil got right is that he and SK do live in different worlds only that the flowers around his heels are in his imagination.
SK: Wow, now I actually want to read the damned book. All of my professors and fellow English/Creative Writing students said of Ulysses was that it was intensely difficult and had absolutely no point. Yeah, English professors told me this, especially my literary criticism professor. Maybe you can tell me the point of literary criticism as well, because he sure can’t.
Sin: Point taken, and I suppose I just missed what was awesome about this thread.
The best literary criticism has a purpose not unlike the best literature, in which we come to understand and tolerate ourselves through making the implicit explicit. Samuel Johnson, Emerson, Freud, and Harold Bloom, among others are my favorites of this school, of experiential critics rather than the more technically concerned.
SK, you’re a real asshole. You’ve exapolating two or three instances of my using the west’s artistic traditions to support the idea of western society, and turned this somehow into the overriding concern of my life. In the second post in this thread, people were already disparaging the history of European civilization, and I thought it fitting to respond. What else makes the West great besides its art? Certainly, I don’t think our superior ability to annihiliate other peoples and make money is the justification of the enterprise.
Also, what does it say, when Dedalus is the self-portrait of Joyce?
That’s the greatest thing I’ve ever read in my life.
Being an adolescent is awesome!!! Where all da counter culture boiz at? 
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FLYING AROUND HAVING FUN AND THEN-
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BEATING UP THE BAD GUYS SAVING THE WORLD, DOING ALL KINDSA COOL STUFF-
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RUNNING THROUGH THE FOREST IN-
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