tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5687347459208158501.post1779350983568536312..comments2024-03-28T06:07:03.667-04:00Comments on The Philosopher's Stone: MEMOIR VOLUME THREE CHAPTER FOUR SECOND INSTALLMENTRobert Paul Wolffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11970360952872431856noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5687347459208158501.post-76149691214702083362010-06-29T11:09:43.113-04:002010-06-29T11:09:43.113-04:00Well, the simplest answer to your rather heated qu...Well, the simplest answer to your rather heated question is that my description contains a good deal less judgmental language than yours ["liberated" is really the only loaded word in my sentence], and thus allows the reader to visual what happened and to draw his or her own moral conclusions. Remember, I wasn't there. I was telling a story that had been told to me, and I had no clear idea who the White students were and how they responded to the Black students' demand. Notice, by the way, because it is actually an important fact about the political position of the members of the department, and also of their students, who very much took their lead from the faculty, that no attempt was made to declare the space a "Blacks only" space. White students, and later on, White faculty, were welcomed into the classrooms and the department.Robert Paul Wolffhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11970360952872431856noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5687347459208158501.post-20189834167530108962010-06-29T10:51:48.926-04:002010-06-29T10:51:48.926-04:00“The Black students barricaded themselves in the d...“The Black students barricaded themselves in the dorm, told the White students there either to join forces with them or get out, and liberated the building, declaring it to be their space.” <br /><br />I am genuinely curious, why do you prefer that formulation to something like: “Chased by a band of White racists, the Black students took cover in the dorm. They then kicked all White students – racist or not – who weren’t on board with their brand of political activism out, and took the building over.” <br /><br />Is it because (a) you think the Whites who didn’t want to join forces deserved, for that reason, to be evicted, (b) telling the story in your way highlights that the Black students were engaged in a revolutionary struggle, to which the moral concepts we ordinarily use don’t apply (but if deserve ain’t got nothing to do with it how <i>should</i> one evaluate (actions in?) a struggle – eschew individualistic moral language altogether? Or is there no non-political, Archimedean perspective from which to answer that question?), or (c) something else (e.g. it makes for a better story)?Angushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11692562500798180624noreply@blogger.com