--- In [email protected], TurquoiseB <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > --- In [email protected], "jim_flanegin" <jflanegi@> wrote: > > > > --- In [email protected], TurquoiseB <no_reply@> wrote: > > > > Isn't this forum open to all for public discussion? > > > > Yet you go out of your frame constantly. Saying: > > > > 'Fuck off and die' claiming this to be just a nice > > > > american idiom. > > > > > > Contrary to what Judy told you, it really *is* a > > > fairly innocuous American idiom. > > > > You really do the culture here an injustice by your statement > > above. No one I've ever known uses such a statement like this > > innocuously. > > You live in a very protected neighborhood then. :-) > > Working on Wall St. in New York, in offices filled > with well-educated stockbrokers, traders, and pro- > grammers, I would estimate that I heard this phrase > a dozen times a day. That's where I developed a > liking for it (along with "Go figure."). It conveys > the idea of "go away and stop wasting my time and > yours" better than almost any other, and with a > remarkable economy of language.
"Fuck off" by itself accomplishes that with two fewer words. The significance of an expression in a small, rarefied subculture, such as Wall Street, can obviously not be extrapolated to the country at large, where "Fuck off and die" is *extremely* hostile. <snip> > > Anyone I know, myself included would be very offended by > > the use of such a term directed at them. > > Maybe you need a period of time in New York to work > out that fear of language thang, eh? Notice how Barry turns "offense" into "fear" (two very different reactions) to make it easier to come up with a putdown. In fact, he tends to style *any* reaction he doesn't like as "fear" of something, simply because it takes less thought to put down fear. <snip> > This phrase may not be common everywhere, but it > certainly has been in several places I've lived. I > won't say otherwise just because you want people > to beleive that America is a better place than it > really is. Of course, Jim wasn't claiming it's not common (creating straw men is another of Barry's putdown tactics). > Not everyone is afraid of words, Jim. Interestingly, > I've found that those who believe in the "magic beans" > theory of mantras often also believe that certain > common curse words are "dirty" or inappropriate. I > don't believe in either theory, so I'll use language > as I please, thanks. Another straw man. Jim wasn't saying Barry couldn't use the phrase. He was objecting to his characterization of it to Michael as "innocuous." > It WASN'T polite, but with regard to Michael, I think > it was necessary for him to get the point that I really > DON'T have any interest in conversing with him in the > future. It's very important to Barry that he convince Michael that he has no interest in conversing with him. Oh, wait--Barry claims he's never trying to convince anybody of anything... Actually, probably the very most effective way to convince somebody you're not interested in conversing with them is, you know, not to converse with them. Every few months he pops up and tries to get > me involved in his attempts to prove his beliefs "right" > and mine "wrong." Not, of course, what Michael was doing *at all*. Another straw man to give Barry an excuse for a putdown, rather than actually deal with Michael's point: that IF MMY actually believed he had had a vision of Guru Dev telling him to teach, he wouldn't, in his own mind, have been going against Guru Dev's earlier instructions--*whether or not* he had really been visited by a discarnate Guru Dev. It's a noncontroversial point, one Barry could have accepted on its own terms. Obviously we cannot know whether MMY believed he had had such a vision or whether he made it up as an excuse, so there isn't any basis for argument. Barry could still have maintained his opinion that much of MMY's behavior stems from guilt at having disobeyed Guru Dev by claiming MMY made up the vision. Michael's story didn't affect Barry's stance one way or another. I just don't care about that shit, > and in the past (long before FFL) when I've tried to > tell him that he Just Doesn't Get It, and tends to > consider my attempts to tell him that I have no > interest in arguing with him as invitation to argue > more. He's a lot like another poster here in that > respect. And just as with that "other poster" (moi), Barry often manufactures arguments out of thin air to give him an excuse to dismiss what a poster is saying by claiming he has no interest in arguing. To subscribe, send a message to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Or go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/FairfieldLife/ and click 'Join This Group!' Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/FairfieldLife/ <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
