From
David Still
<ds@davidstill.org>
To
Alfred G Gerteiny
<pinguhot30@hotmail.com>
Re:
Do you know what happened?
MESSAGE
Alfred G Gerteiny wrote: As soon as one exercise one's right to speak, here, it become US bashing. Shame on YOU! Very un-american! Yes you helped free France from Germany, but you owe your existence as a nation because of France. So please have some perspective, and stop being xenophobic! Not becoming at all! >From: David Still >Dear Mr G--it is not about American imperialism--we saved your country, after all, in not one but two wars--and it is not about commercialism--after all McDonalds, though protested by an arrogant farmer have gained acceptance...alas, your answer simply assumes that by saying naughty things about America this will in some fashion vidicate the honor and glory of France! The glory is gone. What is the present universal language of diplomacy? How widespread is the French empire? No, mon ami, Paris isstill wonderful but it no longer has the reputation it once had; and French thinkers though often interesting are all to often merely spitting out nonsense for American humanities academics to reguritate in still more obsfucation; but who pays attention to American academics? In France, at one time, an intellectual was as in Italy a title with great significance--dottore. Today? bah. wasteproducts. I do not mean to upset or to hurt you by my remarks but rather to try to get you to recognize that living off a magnificent past is cold comfort for facing one's status today. Do not therefore withdraw into America bashing as a way of demonstrating... what? If America did not exist, what would the world be like today? If France did not exist... no great matter. Grapes grow all over these days. But sour grapes?