GNR Women's Discussion - Part 2

[Andy14]

@Oldest Goat Shakespeare? I feel like back at school 

Anyway, I'm for more international literature, there are great works in French, German, Italian, Spanish, Russian, etc. It can help us all understand another culture. 

[Lio]

1 hour ago, Tori72 said:

Book discussions shouldn't be about convincing someone. It is about discussion and exchange of reading experience, philosohpie etc. You cannot become a communist after reading Marx, where's that coming from. Regarding Hitler, I simply cannot stand his - how can I say that in english, limited vocabulary - hatred for humans and for jews in particular. It makes me sick, mentally, physically. I do not need to read the words of this ... person. I simply read history books, watch documentaries, read novels on the holocaust, etc. And I've done that a lot.

Whatever you want to read, feel free. If reading Hitler I suggest reading Anne Frank or watch a documentary of the Nuremberg Trials, or even Shindler's list.

Also, @Padme, what you're referring to might be Stalinism, or Lenin's influence on Russian politics. It's quite a dfference. Marx is more a philosophical examination of 19 century England and thus gained political weight. It is not a manifest of what to do. Especially not in 20th century Russia (or other countries). Marx is a basic understanding of capitalist economy and how it effects everyday, private lives, manifests class system etc. at his time.

It's not about convincing people in the first place to me, but about understanding. I don't think Germans were naturally more evil than others. How could Hitler get so much support? That's what interests me. Same goes for Trump, for instance. Hitler was just an example. 

Were all the people who supported Hitler/Trump... evil or stupid? I don't think so. Something made them become like that. That's what interests me.

Reading Anne Frank, watching documentaries or visiting the camps won't teach me that.

It's too easy to call all nazis monsters.

All this I mean in a broader sense, it's not just nazi Germany or whatever. It goes for whatever book of work by a questionable author.

 

[Tori72]

3 minutes ago, Andy14 said:

@Oldest Goat Shakespeare? I feel like back at school 

Anyway, I'm for more international literature, there are great works in French, German, Italian, Spanish, Russian, etc. It can help us all understand another culture. 

I wanna like this several times. I think we can choose what to suggest for reading in the book thread. Also I'd like to read more contemporary stuff. What @Oldest Goat listed was not a curriculum, just a suggestion. That's how I understood it.

I do love Shakespeare though. Even though it is rather difficult for me to understand because non-native and old english etc.

[Tori72]

9 minutes ago, Lio said:

It's not about convincing people in the first place to me, but about understanding. I don't think Germans were naturally more evil than others. How could Hitler get so much support? That's what interests me. Same goes for Trump, for instance. Hitler was just an example. 

Were all the people who supported Hitler/Trump... evil or stupid? I don't think so. Something made them become like that. That's what interests me.

Reading Anne Frank, watching documentaries or visiting the camps won't teach me that.

It's too easy to call all nazis monsters.

All this I mean in a broader sense, it's not just nazi Germany or whatever. It goes for whatever book of work by a questionable author.

 

I get you and I didn't think that you thought all Germans are evil per se.  

I just think understanding the nature of evil - you won't find that in Hitler's writing. YOu might find that in Hannah Arendt, for example. She is a philosopher and examined just that. If you want the understand what stupidity and what evil looks like and how people can do it (if I understood you correctly) - study the Holocaust, obviously, as well as so many other terrible crimes/genocides people inflicted on each other. Regarding Nazi-Germany, watch Nuremberg Trial - that is Adolf Eichmann's process. It was this documentary that made me understand finally, how the evil, stupid, non-aware and hateful system worked. It is really hard to watch though, really hard.

Edited January 8, 2018 by Tori72

[killuridols]

I understand a new edition of Hitler's manifest was released last year and it was pretty successful in sales. It's actually an edition that contains hundreds of footnotes by academics that help the reader understand the context and it was done with an educational purpose of guiding the reader so that they would not take it "the wrong way".

I bought it a couple years ago (the regular edition) and I couldn't finish it because I ran out of spare time. I was always curious about it and I wanted to know his vision of the world, without filters and without someone else telling me how I was supposed to take his words. However, I am an scholar and I also have strong moral - ethical values that "protect" me from getting confused or influenced by it.

I can see why some people in Germany was concerned about its re-edition because you never know what kind of person can grab the book and get "touched" by it. But censorship is not the answer to this, the more you forbid it, the more people want to read it, so I am okay with what they did, this new edition that includes a critical view of it.

As for 'Catcher in the Rye' book, I read it not so long ago and I did like it but I'm not blown away by it. I find it pretty similar to 'The Bell Jar', by Sylvia Plath. I read that one before 'Catcher', even though I know it was published almost a decade after and I must say that one book really got into me. However, I think this is because the character is female and I could relate to her much more than with Caulfield.

Holden, he is very much like me in some ways, but in others he's completely different. I don't feel much empathy for him. I think he is a phony as well, he is very hypocrite with people all the time too but everything he says it only happens inside his head and he rarely acts upon his thoughts. Caulfield complains about the system  constantly but he can't get out of it, really. Not his fault, though. Im not sure one can live outside the system completely. Or it is very hard to do so.

Axl wanting to ban this book is crazy.... I don't understand why he would want that. I know what he said about it but I don't get it. He doesn't explain it clearly either. If it's because of fear of the book influencing someone to murder, that sounds very ignorant of his part. Books don't do that. Society does it, media does it, your upbringing and family and education puts you in that place. He should know better...  

[GuitarFanfromNYC]

I like the process suggested by @Oldest Goat where 5 people would suggest a book and then we'd vote on the one we want. For our first book I might suggest we consider something more directly related to rock n roll.

[MillionsOfSpiders]

Did Axl want the book completely banned or just kept out of schools? 

I couldn't be bothered to read his explanation.

So, he wants nobody to read it or just it isn't part of school education? 

Edited January 8, 2018 by MillionsOfSpiders

[Gabrielaerojas]

1 minute ago, MillionsOfSpiders said:

Did Axl want the book completely banned or just kept out of schools? 

I couldn't be bothered to read his explanation.

So, he wants nobody to read it or just it isn't part of school education? 

Great questions we should ask on Twitter... 

[MillionsOfSpiders]

7 minutes ago, Gabrielaerojas said:

Great questions we should ask on Twitter... 

Ask Dexter. 

[Blackstar]

6 minutes ago, MillionsOfSpiders said:

Did Axl want the book completely banned or just kept out of schools? 

I couldn't be bothered to read his explanation.

So, he wants nobody to read it or just it isn't part of school education? 

He talked only about schools.

[killuridols]

12 minutes ago, MillionsOfSpiders said:

Did Axl want the book completely banned or just kept out of schools? 

I couldn't be bothered to read his explanation.

So, he wants nobody to read it or just it isn't part of school education? 

Schools... but I guess that's when most people do a lot of reading as by adulthood many drop it because of different reasons.

So banning it from schools is really silly, especially because it is at school where you could have a support system to help you understand it or not take it "the wrong way", as opposed to reading it all by yourself and staying with your own interpretation of it.

 

[MillionsOfSpiders]

13 minutes ago, killuridols said:

Schools... but I guess that's when most people do a lot of reading as by adulthood many drop it because of different reasons.

So banning it from schools is really silly, especially because it is at school where you could have a support system to help you understand it or not take it "the wrong way", as opposed to reading it all by yourself and staying with your own interpretation of it.

 

They also have metal detectors at schools to check kids for guns and knives. 

I haven't read CITR myself, so can't comment on what's so wrong with it and probably what Axl says is silly, I don't know. 

I do know what they teach kids at school leaves an impression. My kids go to different schools, one is only a class year behind the other but the difference in what they've been taught is really strange to me. 

I'm not trying to start an argument here, but I do think they need to be careful what they teach/give kids to read in schools. 

Im sure they think a lot about what they give pupils to read, though. Especially if it is part of assignments.

[Padme]

2 hours ago, Lio said:

It's not about convincing people in the first place to me, but about understanding. I don't think Germans were naturally more evil than others. How could Hitler get so much support? That's what interests me. Same goes for Trump, for instance. Hitler was just an example. 

Were all the people who supported Hitler/Trump... evil or stupid? I don't think so. Something made them become like that. That's what interests me.

Reading Anne Frank, watching documentaries or visiting the camps won't teach me that.

It's too easy to call all nazis monsters.

All this I mean in a broader sense, it's not just nazi Germany or whatever. It goes for whatever book of work by a questionable author.

 

Well in Germany the issue of the Jewis started way before Hitler. In fact there were place were Jewis were not allowed to go. You could make the argument that there were ellite places were few people had the privilege to be allowed in.

Then after WWI the German empire fell. And there were anarchists and commutists rioting almost 24/7. The economy went to hell. They had very high inflation and unemploment. Horrible situation, but a perfect one for people like Hitler to take advantage of.

Now the Trump thing, I can't figure that one out. I think one of the issues is lack of participation on election day. I guess only the die hard voters from both sides went to the poll. And the Trump die hard people were more, specially in rural areas around the U.S.

[killuridols]

51 minutes ago, MillionsOfSpiders said:

They also have metal detectors at schools to check kids for guns and knives. 

I haven't read CITR myself, so can't comment on what's so wrong with it and probably what Axl says is silly, I don't know. 

I do know what they teach kids at school leaves an impression. My kids go to different schools, one is only a class year behind the other but the difference in what they've been taught is really strange to me. 

I'm not trying to start an argument here, but I do think they need to be careful what they teach/give kids to read in schools. 

Im sure they think a lot about what they give pupils to read, though. Especially if it is part of assignments.

Yeah, also the education system in different countries is.... different, lol. This Catcher thing was never given in my school when I was a student. Instead we read The Little Prince and some other really cool latinamerican literature.

I have no friggin' idea on why this was an obligatory reading in the American schools but if the reading was accompanied by debate and discussion of the ideas presented by the author, then I think you can make it a positive experience.

Of course, this requires a really good teacher to analyze a book like this and be able to put the children in a critical view of it....Not to be against the book either, just to be wary of it, to be able to see it from different angles and perspectives. What's the good and what's the bad that we can get out of it? And never forgetting that it is fiction.

----

Schools are rotten nowadays, I think most education systems in the world are failing badly and that's why there's so much violence in the classroom. Also, family is being transformed, kids dont have where to go when they feel bad, as parents also suck.

There was a real Holden Caulfield in 2012. This kid named Elliot Rodger, he wrote a manifest that sounded pretty much like Salinger's book. He was a hater and a mysoginist and he killed a lot of people his age based on his hatred of them.

I read his manifest, its called "My Twisted World". Pretty rotten putrid stuff. I could see what a bad seed he was from the beginning but I also wondered where all that came from. Can't be a book.

 

[Andy14]

I've just checked the list and haven't found my name there @Oldest Goat 

I know you may be surprised, but I can read too...

(and have read most of the books you've suggested)

[GuitarFanfromNYC]

@Oldest Goat, please add me to the book club list! 

[Alja]

The worst thing they did to Little Prince is that they made it required when we were 10. I was lucky that in my late teens they picked parts of he book and made it a summer camp game. I started to love the book and now is one of my all-time favorites. 

From required classics I enjoyed the most was Dostoyevsky`s Crime and Punishment. The book I managed to borrow was in archaic Czech, so I had borderline foreign language experience with it. My all time favorite was All Quiet on Western Font. I love books rich on words in my native languages (or English, still does not work that good, but it`s getting better and I`m fascinated with richness of English vocabulary with all that influences it absorbed). Some words are beautifully sounding and colorful and unusual metaphors. 

I love fantasy (but never managed to finish Harry Potter, didn`t fit me from beginning, it went south after 3rd book) and fell for biographies recently. I`m heading to Bob Dylan, I love his poetry. I read mostly when I travel, so more I travel, more books I read. 

2 hours ago, killuridols said:

Schools are rotten nowadays, I think most education systems in the world are failing badly and that's why there's so much violence in the classroom. Also, family is being transformed, kids dont have where to go when they feel bad, as parents also suck.

There was a real Holden Caulfield in 2012. This kid named Elliot Rodger, he wrote a manifest that sounded pretty much like Salinger's book. He was a hater and a mysoginist and he killed a lot of people his age based on his hatred of them.

I read his manifest, its called "My Twisted World". Pretty rotten putrid stuff. I could see what a bad seed he was from the beginning but I also wondered where all that came from. Can't be a book.

 

It`s questionable how much it`s school failure, there are many more factors included, beginning with biology and upbringing and ending with weapons availability. Book can be a trigger, the last drop in sick mind; it`s like that thing that someone expressed it before you, which somehow legitimates your course of mind. Like a dark, heavy, unnamed cluster and whoa! there is something, which kind of describes that cluster (and, borrow that Axl`s metaphor of broken TV in CITR interview...) If the ground is ready, it does not matter what`s actual trigger. The dangerous is the force behind, the target it hits is irrelevant at the end. There would always be any. 

Neither philosophy, psychology or neuroscience is sure how mind/brain creates conscious contents and which processes go behind in subconscious level, but have influence (see like binocular rivalry experiments).

Suicidal kids often read Charles Bukowski and Nietzsche. It leaves grounded personality intact, but it can severely hurt predisposed teenager (first time wildly exposed to existentialism). How many adults they can actually openly discuss? Few. How many of teenagers have actual courage to talk - even with friendly, not-related adult? There is well described series of suicides after The Sorrows of Young Werther was published in 1774. People do relate their lives and feelings and sometimes solutions to fictional characters.

[MyPrettyTiedUpMichelle]

I would normally love to take part in the book club but I know I can't commit right now with my work situation so full on lately.  I've a TBR pile that is already very high.  

Am about to dive into Nikki Sixx's Heroin Diaries.  I've only glanced at it casually so far and I can tell it's going to be very dark.  Dark as in disturbing. I don't think this will be like Duff's or Slash's at all.  Slightly worried about it. lol

[Gabrielaerojas]

I’m bored. Can we ask something on Twitter? 

[Alja]

7 minutes ago, MyPrettyTiedUpMichelle said:

I would normally love to take part in the book club but I know I can't commit right now with my work situation so full on lately.  I've a TBR pile that is already very high.  

Am about to dive into Nikki Sixx's Heroin Diaries.  I've only glanced at it casually so far and I can tell it's going to be very dark.  Dark as in disturbing. I don't think this will be like Duff's or Slash's at all.  Slightly worried about it. lol

For someone that almost died two times, that guy ended up good and the co-writer did a lot of work to find people from that time to explain thngs - book is dark, but optimistic, no worries. 

Janis Joplin was one sad, sad story.

Edited January 8, 2018 by Alja

[killuridols]

8 minutes ago, Gabrielaerojas said:

I’m bored. Can we ask something on Twitter? 

Has your record broken?

[killuridols]

Izzy looking like 'El Chavo'

 

[Gabrielaerojas]

17 minutes ago, killuridols said:

Izzy looking like 'El Chavo'

 

OMG 

[Rocketqueen76]

9 hours ago, Padme said:

Well in Germany the issue of the Jewis started way before Hitler. In fact there were place were Jewis were not allowed to go. You could make the argument that there were ellite places were few people had the privilege to be allowed in.

Then after WWI the German empire fell. And there were anarchists and commutists rioting almost 24/7. The economy went to hell. They had very high inflation and unemploment. Horrible situation, but a perfect one for people like Hitler to take advantage of.

Now the Trump thing, I can't figure that one out. I think one of the issues is lack of participation on election day. I guess only the die hard voters from both sides went to the poll. And the Trump die hard people were more, specially in rural areas around the U.S.

Being military personnel I can’t say very much about Trump....but I will say there was some shady shit going on that got him the seat.

[MillionsOfSpiders]

It's good to see Izzy out and about.  Wonder if he went to the film festival with Matt or they both just happened to be there.

 

 

Edited January 9, 2018 by MillionsOfSpiders