Ernie : Your observation-- "Building a shared worldview of basic historical *facts* -- never mind values -- is an extremely difficult but essential task, and something I fear nobody has really seriously thought through." OK. I could not agree more, as a matter of fact. Now what ? To use just a couple of examples out of several hundred of which I have direct knowledge, how do you --anyone-- bridge the gap between people who regard everything that Israel does as Good, with anti-Zionists ( including a large % of Palestinians ) who regard everything Israel does as Evil ? Each side has its own textbooks , periodicals, TV programs, etc to support their case. Or contrast BJP Hindus with Congress folks and the Bangalore crowd. Each side sees only some of the facts that the other side regards as crucial. Meanwhile each side emphasizes its pet facts to some Nth degree. For one, I think that there are objective standards. That some facts are objectively far more important than other facts --and that some purported facts aren't really facts at all, but propaganda. Where in hell do we begin ? Billy ------------------------ In a message dated 6/16/2009 11:37:31 A.M. Pacific Daylight Time, [email protected] writes:
Hi Billy, On Jun 16, 2009, at 9:35 AM, [email protected]_ (mailto:[email protected]) wrote: Obama was right to demand that Israel cease expanding or thickening its West Bank settlements. He is right, too, in acknowledging Palestinian aspirations and the wound that was opened in the Arab world by the creation of Israel -- the nakba, or catastrophe. But the toleration of the vilest kind of anti-Semitism is not a precondition for peace, only a warning to Israelis that the past can be prologue. If Arab leaders do not attempt to rebut and eliminate the hatred of Jews that is poisoning their societies, they will find that the peace that most of them undoubtedly want will not be possible. James W. von Brunn was quickly segregated from the American mainstream and designated the crackpot he is. In the Middle East, though, he would be no such thing -- not some sort of reptilian vestige of the past but an ordinary man and therefore an extraordinary threat to the future. Yeah, although anti-Semitism is hardly an isolated case. There's a lot of anti-American and anti-Western conspiracy theories that are considered "gospel truth" not just in the Middle East, but throughout Asia. Building a shared worldview of basic historical *facts* -- never mind values -- is an extremely difficult but essential task, and something I fear nobody has really seriously thought through. -- Ernie P. = _______________________________________________ Centroids mailing list: [email protected] http://radicalcentrism.com/mailman/listinfo/centroids_radicalcentrism.com Archives at http://radicalcentrism.org/pipermail/centroids_radicalcentrism.com/
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