From: glad@Csli.Stanford.EDU (Clayton Glad)
Subject: Re: Ray Shea Goes Ballistic (was Re: Top 10 bands of all time)
Organization: Stanford University CSLI
Date: Sat, 21 Nov 1992 07:42:55 GMT

dmb@xbar.ai.mit.edu (David Baggett) writes:

>I don't miss that point at all; I just don't think it gives him the
>right to spew his nausiating attackings on people with opinions that
>differ from his.  O Superior Ray's opinions, particularly on as stupid
>a topic as "The Top 10 Bands," have just as much validity as anyone
>else's.

Hey, just why is the Top 10 Band thread so "stupid"?  It may just
happen to be the opinion of that thread's originator that this is
among the most important and sublime topics ever to grace this forum.
We'll thank you to respect others' opinions by contemplating their
inert wholeness and allowing them to stand in unquestioned glory.

>But because you (pl.) seem to view him as knowing something
>about music (and I'm *sure* he's quite alone in that), you exempt him
>from common courtesy.

Huh?  We view him ... *he's* alone in ... what??  Ray's knowledge of
music and willingness to fortify the content of his opinion with 
reference to things that are of interest to the rest of us doesn't
make him a *privileged* character -- those are the requirements for
occupying any kind of coherent place in this sort of discourse.
Silverman's folly isn't having taste in music which offends anyone's
knowledge or sensibilities.  (I, for one of many, won't sleep better
or worse for knowing that some blip on the screen in the vicinity of
Peoria likes or dislikes this or that arenarocker.)  The difficulty
is that he and others want it both ways: they want us to know just
how they feel, yet feel they don't need to say what they know.
These lists coupled with refusals to consider the values behind them
aren't *opinions* in any interesting sense.  They're the electronic
equivalent of ringing the doorbell and running away.

If you'll go back and look at the history of the Silverman saga you'll
see that Ray hardly threw the first flame.  What he *did* do was to
inject some content into an otherwise void thread.  He asked why it
was that popularizers of reggae should be more "top" than its creators
and, more generally, why Black music was so poorly represented on 
these lists -- something which seems absurd to him (and to me) given
the overwhelming importance of Black culture to American popular 
music.  The only answer forthcoming was that young Silverman just
hadn't heard much of the music to which Ray was referring.

IMHO (just for you, Dave), an opinion on so broad a topic formed in
such narrow consideration is not only uninteresting, but valueless.
What's worse is that the belief that opinions all have equal standing
derails the discourse.  Ray says that you ought to know something of
the roots and history of rock and of related forms of music to discuss
it with any intelligence; Silverman says nay.  So what happens?  Well,
what's happened so many times before: the young white men cry reverse
discrimination before heading back to the dorm and one last listen
to DSOTM.

>The point *YOU* seem to miss is that there exist people who have been
>reading this group for a long time without feeling the need to post
>their personal musical resumes, but who are getting pretty sick and
>tired of the lack of decency and civilized discussion here.

Again, it's not a question of status or musical resume, it's a question
of content.  Ray's opinions, regardless of what you think of his style,
are always informed and considered, and it seems to me that he and
Jim Hori are the *only* ones who have rescued some substance from this
thread.

I wonder about you, though.  You're a long-time reader but haven't
posted anything aside from an extended critique of the personalities
of the group's most valuable posters?  Let me make a suggestion:
spend some time writing about music, the way we bile-filled villains
do.  Not only will that add to the content of the group but it'll 
also moderate the image you've created for yourself as a couch potato
too stupid to change the channel.

-- Clay
  		     "Das Nichts selbst nichtet."
 				    -- Niel Peart