Dear Chomskyians,
I am forwarding this message, originally in reply to Margaret Tarbet,
in the hope some misuderstandings be cleared up.
Hear, hear!
What Margaret Tarbet writes cannot possibly be
overemphasized. I repeat, what are we doing on this list?
Just chatting as we were having five o'clock tea. I see no
propositions to set something into action and submit them to
discussion.
My own posts about maternal care have been ignored [and now
misconstrued] when they did propose a series of complex material
actions to be considered, at the very least; since whatever
organization we may find fit to make our lives better will inevitably
be carried out by humans, and we can't have mentally deranged
persons occupying crucial social positions in a truly democratic
society.
As to how this should be implemented, it is an open question, a
matter of debate, a matter of seeking the opinions of the few
specialists we have left, after the general corruption in
psychology during the last 2 decades razed what had been started in
the sixties.
We need to organize multidsiciplinary groups, to set the bases of
strategies with the aim to give rise to social change.
[This last paragraph has been especially ignored]
JC Garelli
PS: as an aside, implementing enhanced maternal care would make sense
only if means could be found to reach the world population, or at
least most of it. Much as if we were to devise a campaign against
AIDS, smoking or tuberculosis.
PSS: this is only a small, albeit important, contribution, not the
solution to all our problems.
-------------------------------------------------
In a message dated 2 May 97 at 12:54, Margaret Tarbet says:
On 2 May 97 at 7:00, Juan Carlos Garelli wrote:
[...] Thus, this tends to become a repository of wishful thinking
without any influence on our ways to see life from Chomsky's
perspective. [...]
I'm _very_ glad you said this, Juan Carlos. I suspect that many of
the folk who have left this community did so because they expected
different content than has so far appeared.
With all respect to other members here, i've been disappointed to
find that most posts have been on ...mmm, let's say less-important
aspects of NC's thought. He emphasises political organisation as
the only possible way to create change. Without change, any
discussion is at most preamble and at worst a way to drain off
productive energy. Yet so far we're not talking much about the
bread-and-butter issues.
NC holds up the candle to light our path, but it is we who have to
walk it. And we can't take our first steps sooner than now.
If the health of a society is measured by how well and sparingly it
meets the non-pathological needs of all its members, i cannot think
of one major society today that qualifies as healthy. Most seem to
me to be "cancerous": the wellbeing of the whole body being
sacrificed to the (temporary) wellbeing of a few out-of-control
"cells". I'd love to be shown wrong: it would give us a model to
follow. Anyone know of one?
Anyone care to start the ball rolling toward a description of
change that we might actually be able to successfully promote? I
would urge that we avoid proposals that would require people to
suddenly undergo significant personality changes in adulthood.
Whatever we do has to account for self-interest, greed, willful
ignorance, stupidity, and sloth.
=margaret
....................................................................
Margaret Tarbet / [log in to unmask] / Cambridge Massachusetts USA
....................................................................
If I am not for myself, who will be for me? But if I am only for
myself, what am I? ... And if not now, when?
-- Rabbi Hillel, called The Babylonian (ca. 60 BCE)
Juan Carlos Garelli, M.D., Ph.D.
Department of Early Development
Attachment Research Center
University of Buenos Aires
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