Subj : The Game
To   : Frank Masingill
From : Curtis Johnson
Date : Fri Oct 20 2000 04:05 pm

 P.> Man!!  Talking with you is like getting hit in the head with a
 P.> history book.  Now we've got to go out in search of a "Melian"
 P.> and learn about his/her/their/its "Dialogue."  :-)  Then we'll
 P.> have to track down Roosevelt and Churchill and ask them about
 P.> their "Four Freedoms" program and see if it's worth watching.
 P.> (On second thought, maybe this old Fleetwood Mac video will
 P.> do.)
 
 CJ> Now, Frank, how many people here do you think would really
 CJ> have recognized that reference to _The Peloponnesian War_,
 CJ> Thucydides? (IMHO, this book should have been required reading
 CJ> for all U.S. college students during the Cold War.)

 FM> Well, I suppose that in time and with adequate instructions
 FM> from you and Todd Henson I may learn how and what to write in my
 FM> posts here. I probably SHOULD just keep silent until I KNOW that
 FM> what I write will meet the approval of a variety of different people
 FM> with different experiences.  I stand, like a child, admonished and
 FM> corrected.

	False modesty sarcasm is even more irritating when it is 
misdirected.  While it certainly is true that someone should explain
or not explain their allusions with regard to the knowledge base of
the audience (you do know that, don't you?), the gibe was aimed rather
at the low level of the knowledge base of the participants here 
regarding classical texts or recent history.
	After all, my above shows not only that I caught the allusion,
but thought that it is a shame that it is not more widely recognizable.




--- Blue Wave/DOS v2.30 [NR]
 * Origin: America's favorite whine - it's your fault! (1:261/1000)

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