From: bobsarv@microsoft.com (Bob Sarver)
Subject: Re: To Laura
Date: 15 Sep 92 00:28:21 GMT
Organization: Microsoft Corp.

In article <1992Sep03.193449.227@microsoft.com> bobsarv@microsoft.com (Bob Sarver) writes:
| 
| 
| The Arab student going to college gets more acceptance than the militant
| pan-Arab socialist.  Once you get to know an Arab student, it becomes
| very hard to crack "camel jockey" or "sand nigger" jokes; the cognitive
| dissonance in your mind prevents you.

(fritzs)
/The presence of many "normal-looking" Jews in Germany did not prevent the
/Holocaust.  

What Hitler and his thugs did is not exactly the same as what the
average German did.

Many Germans and French risked their life to defy the Nazi regime.  
I suspect that many of these brave souls took such actions because they
had met Jews, had Jewish friends, and recognized that the govt was wrong.

By knowing people, it becomes very hard to look them in the eye and
then discriminate against them.



(fritzs)
/The large German-American population did not prevent 
/incredibly-vicious anti-German-culture propoganda in the US during WWI.
/Middle-class Japanese-American communities did not stop the amazingly-
/racist Hollywood movies during WWII.  

What a govt does under wartime, whipping the people up, is not quite the
same as what I am talking about.  Straw man.



(fritzs)
/The presence of large numbers of Poles do not stop Polack jokes.  
/People seem to cope quite well with cognitive dissonance, thank you.


This should be fun:

So it is your assertion that personal knowledge of a member of a minority
has _no_effect_whatsoever on how that minority is viewed or treated?

Dig yourself out of that one, Fritz.

And, since you can't legislate a change of heart, what do *you* think 
was the point of all the cross-cultural US-Soviet exchanges of the 1980s?
The ones that were meant to remove the boogieman of the "evil Russians"
from the minds of Americans?  Did those exchanges have any real effects 
at the one-on-one level, or not?




(me)
| By "negative stereotypes", I do not mean a man who is naturally
| soft-spoken, gentle, or effeminate.   And I don't mean a woman
| who is confident, outgoing, or masculine.


/(fritzs)
/What do you mean by "naturally"?

Unfaked.  Unpracticed.  Would act that way no matter where they grew
up, under whatever conditions.



(me)
| I am not really concerned about the degree to which a person is
| _naturally_ feminine or masculine.  As has been correctly point out, those
| are probably fixed traits, and there is not much we (as people)
| can do to change what God has given us - - nor should we try.

(fritzs)
/I disagree about how much such traits are fixed -- we are greater
/artists than we give ourselves credit for.

From what I have read recently, much more is genetically determined
(personalities, fears) than we ever knew.  Timid personalities tend
to be passed on genetically; artistic skills also; same for boisterousness
and quiet-natured.



(me)
| What I am talking about is the rehearsed, practiced campy acts that
| many gays seem to thrive on.  This is _not_ a personality trait; it is 
| practiced, and rehearsed.  By definition, personality is not practiced--it
| is natural, needing no practice.  

/(fritzs)
/Huh?  What definition are you using, Bob?  I don't know about you, but *my*
/personality is an ongoing artwork.  I was a nasty, sarcastic son-of-a-
/bitch in my 20s.  

News for you, Fritz.  Fermentation hasn't sweetened you . . .

:-)



/(fritzs)
/Look around you on the net -- the personas you "see" in this virtual
/space are well rehearsed.

Of course.  This net is filled with alter egos.  What does that prove
(except to reinforce my point)?




(me)
|   The gay movement is decades
| behind the rest of the similar freedom movements.

/(fritzs)
/No.  A decade and a half.  Around 1980, gay political groups were poised
/to be significant political forces in major cities on both coasts.  I
/know first hand from the politics of San Diego.  Then people started
/dying.

Whatever the timeline and whatever the reason, the initial point still
stands:  the gay rights movement is behind other similar movements.
The task is to find out why, and see if any of the obstacles are of
our own creation.  

Unlike many on this net, I am not one of those individuals who believe that
they gay movement is doing *everything* right, there is *nothing* wrong
with its tactics, and the problem is obviously *only* with the straights.
Gimme a break.

Hell, any movement as perfect as that should be able to rule the 
fucking world.
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