From: steve (steve365@btinternet.com)
Date: Sun Jun 02 2002 - 17:17:33 MDT
----- Original Message -----
From: "Olga Bourlin" <fauxever@sprynet.com>
To: <extropians@extropy.org>
Sent: Sunday, June 02, 2002 4:54 PM
Subject: Re: ethnocentrism and extropianism?
> That was a great example, Damien. That particular Kipling poem was one of
> the main literary examples featured in a tome of a book I read a few years
> ago entitled: "The Arrogance of Faith" by Forrest G. Wood. The lines
that
> etched themselves into my brain were: "Half devil and half child." Wow,
> what an incredibly arrogant perspective. For those who may be interested,
> I've reproduced the entire poem below. Read it and weep.
Couple of things about this poem. It's about American imperialism. Kipling
addressed it to the U.S., urging them to 'join the club' so to speak. A
common sentiment among British imperialists at the time, e.g. Cecil Rhodes -
hence the Rhodes Scholarships, intended to produce an Anglo-American elite
to rule as much of the world as possible. Secondly, Kipling's message, if
you read it is something like "Well you to have to do this job of bringing
civilisation and the rule of law to the backward folks but don't expect any
thanks - they won't like you". Third - this exact message is becoming very
popular these days in certain U.S. and British circles. My view - don't go
there! Bag of worms.
Steve Davies.
>
> Take up the White Man's burden--
> Send forth the best ye breed--
> Go, bind your sons to exile
> To serve your captive's need;
> To wait, in heavy harness,
> On fluttered folk and wild--
> Your new-caught sullen peoples,
> Half devil and half child.
>
> Take up the White Man's burden--
> In patience to abide,
> To veil the threat of terror
> And check the show of pride;
> By open speech and simple,
> An hundred times made plain,
> To seek another's profit
> And work another's gain.
>
> Take up the White Man's burden--
> The savage wars of peace--
> Fill full the mouth of Famine,
> And bid the sickness cease;
> And when your goal is nearest
> (The end for others sought)
> Watch sloth and heathen folly
> Bring all your hopes to nought.
>
> Take up the White Man's burden--
> No iron rule of kings,
> But toil of serf and sweeper--
> The tale of common things.
> The ports ye shall not enter,
> The roads ye shall not tread,
> Go, make them with your living
> And mark them with your dead.
>
> Take up the White Man's burden,
> And reap his old reward--
> The blame of those ye better
> The hate of those ye guard--
> The cry of those ye humor
> (Ah, slowly!) toward the light:--
> "Why brought ye us from bondage,
> Our loved Egyptian night?"
>
> Take up the White Man's burden--
> Ye dare not stoop to less--
> Nor call too loud on Freedom
> To cloak your weariness.
> By all ye will or whisper,
> By all ye leave or do,
> The silent sullen peoples
> Shall weigh your God and you.
>
> Take up the White Man's burden!
> Have done with childish days--
> The lightly-proffered laurel,
> The easy ungrudged praise:
> Comes now, to search your manhood
> Through all the thankless years,
> Cold, edged with dear-bought wisdom,
> The judgment of your peers.
>
> > Take up the White Man's burden,
> > And reap his old reward--
> > The blame of those ye better
> > The hate of those ye guard--
> >
> > Kipling, in other words, was an old tub-thumping ethnocentrist. I
imagine
> > he would have thrashed you with his horse whip, even at the age of 70,
if
> > you'd had the stupid temerity to call him a Nazi.
> >
> > >I'm no fucking patriot,
> > >which should have been real clear from the terms I was using.
> >
> > Okay. I misunderstood your references to honor, and
> >
> > < a specific cultural
> > background, [...] a scource of strength, honor,
> > and integrity you can use to help make difficult decisions
> > when your own abilities seem inadequate to the tasks
> > before you...
> > the ideal of family relationships, extend[ed]
> > outwards in a manner consistent with the other
> > larger groups relationship to those family bonds... >
> >
> > I assumed that the heart of this honor was military service, which is
> > usually in the *service* of a *nation*--even if it's often a family
> > tradition and one creating its own internal bonds of `elective family'.
> > This sort of thing:
> >
> > Take up the White Man's burden!
> > Have done with childish days--
> > The lightly-proffered laurel,
> > The easy ungrudged praise:
> > Comes now, to search your manhood
> > Through all the thankless years,
> > Cold, edged with dear-bought wisdom,
> > The judgment of your peers.
> >
> > >And as for *un-extropian*... well perhaps you should muster
> > >a meeting of the Committee! :P
> >
> > Not me, sport. I'm not an extropian, just an interested bystander. But
I'd
> > be surprised if those who are would declare ethnocentrism an extropian
> virtue.
> >
> > >I like people who
> > >like science as well, but it's not like I'd call them to help bury a
> > >body :)
> >
> > When I have occasion to bury my father's body (I hold his power of
> > attorney) sometime in the next few years, I'll call his funeral
directors.
> > Incredible as it might seem, I don't expect to have to kill anyone and
> > dispose of the body furtively with the help of kin. I know it sounds a
bit
> > bizarre, but here in Melbourne that's how conditions are.
> >
> > Damien Broderick
>
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