[MD] Pirsig confirmed again

[Dallas Van Winkle]

blah blah blah blah blah, all i hear is static social level stuff. :)



On 4/16/06, Platt Holden <pholden at davtv.com> wrote:
>
> Hi All:
>
> >From time to time in the past I have quoted articles from the NY Times
> that confirm Pirsig's observations about reality. In this morning's
> paper his observation about socialism lacking Dynamic Quality was
> corroborated by an article entitled, "Vive La Dolce Vita" by Roger
> Cohen.
>
> As a reminder, Pirsig wrote: "But what the socialists left out and what
> has all but killed their whole undertaking is an absence of a concept
> of indefinite Dynamic Quality. You go to any socialist city and it's
> always a dull place because there's little Dynamic Quality." (Lila, 17)
>
> Following is the gist of the article backing Pirsig's point:
>
> "This unease has been evident in Europe of late. French youth, invoking
> revolution in the cause of stability, spent weeks in the street to
> protest and ultimately overturn a law that would have given them jobs
> at the price of losing existing guarantees against the abrupt
> termination of employment.
>
> "The proposal smacked too much of "precariousness" for the French. That
> is to say, it smacked too much of the market, of capitalism, of
> globalization, for it is in the nature of all these things to be
> changeable, dynamic and ultimately precarious. They opted, in short,
> for security over risk, a choice many Americans find puzzling.
>
> "Italians, too, are unhappy with the advance of "precariousness." This
> is still a society where a central goal is to be "sistemato" - secured
> in a paid position, preferably not too labor intensive, that can be
> held for life and, if possible, passed on to the children.
>
> "But is such deep attachment to stability tenable? The general
> consensus is no. For Italy to survive in a global economy, now that it
> can no longer devalue the lira to boost its exports, it must become
> more efficient, more flexible, more precarious. It must dislodge the
> "sistemati" or get them to work harder. The same is true in much of the
> rest of Europe.
>
> "Such stasis is anathema to Americans, for whom risk, movement and
> personal ambition are fundamental. Immigrants, who propel constant
> shifts, protested, too, in recent days, but their banners, saying "We
> Are America," proclaimed an essential truth: The United States is about
> the endless possibility of self-reinvention through hard work. It is
> inseparable from change."
>
> You can read the entire article at:
>
> http://www.nytimes.com/pages/weekinreview/index.html
>
> Platt
>
>
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