Date: Sat, 14 Nov 1998 14:14:47 -0800 (PST)
From: "Nicholas C. Arguimbau" <nicka@well.com>
To: Doug Henwood <dhenwood@panix.com>
cc: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK <ppn@csf.colorado.edu>
Subject: Re: Let's continue to keep the "debate" public folks.
In-Reply-To: <l03130318b273655c3b29@[166.84.250.86]>
Message-ID: <Pine.GSO.3.96.981114135714.17311A-100000@well.com>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII


On Sat, 14 Nov 1998, Doug Henwood wrote:

> Nicholas C. Arguimbau wrote:
NA -> 
> >Where did I get the idea that conversations on the Internet were supposed
> >to be civil?  Why don't you guys go out in a dark alley and duke it out?
> DH -
> I think it's really hard to have a "civil" conversation with someone you
> think holds barbaric views. Sorry.
> 
> Don't forget Hegel's characterization of civil society: "civil society is
> the battlefield where everyone's individual private interest meets everyone
> else's."  It "affords a spectacle of extravagance and want as well as of

NA -
Hegel's characterization doesn't work very well on the Internet, where
hundreds of millions of people are capable of meeting each other head on
all at the same time.  The only way to stay unscathed in a gladiator pit
of such enormity is to stay out of it, which doesn't bode well for the
Internet's vast potential for the communication of understanding.  PPN is
more useful is a place to trade information than as a place to yell; I,
for one, will have to unsubscribe if it degenerates into the latter.