Comments on: Don’t Mention the War

By: rb

rb — Wed, 19 Jan 2005 20:29:27 +0000

thanks Harry. some reactions: I know that right-thinking English folk make it a point of principle to despise the royals, and not to pass up any opportunity for whaling on them. Fair enough. But as a Canadian, at a safe remove, it seems clear to me that their main function now is to make up for slow days at the Daily Mail, which function Harry is fulfilling admirably. So why not just enjoy the sideshow? I suppose hysteria is the media’s way of enjoying it, but I’m puzzled at the number of sensible people who are letting their chains be yanked. All that’s really been demonstrated is that Harry is a fool surrounded by fools, and fortunately in his line of work that doesn’t seem to be a problem. Now to the interesting question. You say: There was nothing morally wrong with his choice of costume. and I [if I did the same] also would know that some people would take great offence, and they would have reason to take offense. But then you add: Would that make it morally wrong? No. Now: what exactly is a good reason to take offence at something that isn’t morally wrong? And why should the person who isn’t doing anything wrong care about any offence taken (apart from prudential reasons which one might legitimately on reflection choose to ignore)? I think these are actually pretty hard and important questions. I don’t have answers. Instead, two preliminary comments: 1. I pretty sure I don’t want to live in a society in which the simple fact of giving offence (whether taken with good reason or not) is in itself taken to be wrong. Canada, the US and the UK are all moving in that direction. 2. There is such a thing as bad taste which is ‘offensive’ but not in a (genuinely, deeply) ‘wrong’ way. In fact, I can remember when this kind of bad taste used to be a badge of the intelligentsia. Bands with names like the Dead Kennedys and Shoot the Pope (that was before anyone shot the pope, needless to say), the crucifixion scene in Life of Brian… it was all of a piece with punk and new wave and everyone expecting to die young in a nuclear war. In high school I gave a fancy dress party on the theme of ‘Decadence’ (ok ok, I was sixteen), and two of my friends came dressed as “gay SA members in love, just before the purge”. They’re both now politicians on the progressive side—perfectly well-informed, well-intentioned people, and they were then too. That’s who needs bad taste. I suppose I was in some weak sense shocked or ‘offended’ by the costumes—that would be why I remember them, and not what anyone else wore—but, thank god, we didn’t really have the concept ‘offensive’ back then. So I just thought they were in bad taste, deliberately so—a kind of bad taste which sophisticates then cultivated, which generally does no harm and expresses no moral viciousness, is arguably part of a noble epater la bourgeoisie tradition and sometimes (as whenever the Pythons did it) can be very very funny. Harry is I’m sure a different kettle of fish. But I’m glad that no one has photos to blackmail my guests with, and very glad I had my own adolescence before ‘offensiveness’ came to be treated as the only socially recognised cardinal sin.

By: Uncle Kvetch

Uncle Kvetch — Wed, 19 Jan 2005 20:01:18 +0000

If I dressed up as a Nazi for a costume party I think I’d be setting myself up for a lot of fun-making, at the very least. I also would know that some people would take great offence, and they would have reason to take offense. Would that make it morally wrong? No. But at the very least it would make me a figure of fun. It would also signal to all concerned that you were an asshole. Now, whether that’s the same thing as being “morally wrong,” I’ll leave to the philosophers. But I don’t see how showing up in a costume that you know in advance will cause “great offense” to at least some of the attendees is morally neutral.

By: harry

harry — Wed, 19 Jan 2005 15:15:09 +0000

rb, Two quite different things going on. First there are the people who want to make a point about racism, and infer that there was something wrong about what Harry did. I agree with you. There was nothing morally wrong with his choice of costume. Second there are people (like Keiran, like Dennis Skinner, and other people with a sense of humour) who think the whole set of people involved in the royal family are as ridiculous as the institution itself and are having a bit of fun at their expense. If I dressed up as a Nazi for a costume party I think I’d be setting myself up for a lot of fun-making, at the very least. I also would know that some people would take great offence, and they would have reason to take offense. Would that make it morally wrong? No. But at the very least it would make me a figure of fun. Part of what is going on, though, is that most of us don’t know people who go to ‘Colonial and Native’ themed parties in coutnry houses, and those of us who have had some contact with such people have reasons to doubt the whoelheartedness of their commitment to ridding the world of racism, unearned privelege, colonialism, etc. Harry manages effortlessly to give the general impression of somone without deep moral principles. Possibly, we all suspect, the kind of person who would have been with Halifax rather than Churchill. If there’s anyone on this site who wasn’t sufficiently self-aware at 20 that this would be their fate they were, frankly, morons, and I think it is incredibly condescending of them to suppose that Harry is any different. Maybe he is: if so then he deserves a hard time.

By: Bob B

Bob B — Tue, 18 Jan 2005 22:40:15 +0000

An instructive insight into all this is that in mainstream media, at least, the only exculpating comments about Harry, and that heavily qualified, seems to have to have come from his aunt through marriage, the Duchess of York, who was a friend of Princess Diana, Harry’s mother: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4173453.stm The clear intention of the Duchess of York is not to justify Harry but rather to move the media spotlight off him. Otherwise, the familiar band of royalist supporters has kept a very low profile in this. Michael Howard, the Conservative leader, was pressing for a personal apology from Harry when the Prince of Wales, Harry’s father, for obvious reasons wants to leave it at the official written apology.

By: rb

rb — Tue, 18 Jan 2005 15:05:37 +0000

I read the article. And it wouldn’t surprise me in the least if Harry’s a twit/a lout/so thick and ignorant that he’s not clear on what Nazism really was. All I’m saying is that, pending some actual moral reasoning from someone on the subject, I don’t take this action as by itself diagnostic for any of those things. Dressing up is just not that straightforwardly interpreted. I’m sure in the red states there are parents who won’t let their children be witches for Halloween, but I wouldn’t want to think that way myself.

By: Dan Hardie

Dan Hardie — Tue, 18 Jan 2005 13:53:43 +0000

Just to clarify something I only realised when reading Henry’s private email: I don’t think and didn’t say that Kieran is a Nazi, soft on Nazism, or one of the Republican ghouls who celebrate Nazi collaborators like Frank Russell or Sean Ryan. If people think I’ve said that, they’ve misread me pretty seriously. Otherwise, I stand by what I’ve already said: if Kieran wants to do a bit of slagging off, that’s fine, and it’s fine to respond to him in kind.

By: Bob B

Bob B — Tue, 18 Jan 2005 00:07:17 +0000

May I suggest reading the report in one of the links I posted earlier? The lead para is: “The Prince of Wales has been warned by one of his senior advisers that he must act urgently to separate his sons from a ‘social scene that thinks racism and bigotry quite funny’, The Independent on Sunday has learned. . . ” – from: http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/this_britain/story.jsp?story=601397

By: rb

rb — Mon, 17 Jan 2005 23:54:18 +0000

I’m baffled, not only by this thread but by the whole fuss. Since when has wearing a costume to a fancy dress party been understood to signify an endorsement of whatever that costume represents? What about all the kids who must have gone dressed up as burglars and vampires and cardinals and Paris Hilton? I would be very interested (truly – I’m not just being contrary here) to hear someone articulate precisely what they think Harry did that was morally wrong. If the answer involves the claim that Harry was somehow promoting or expressing Nazism, then really I think you’ve got the semiotics of fancy dress a bit mixed up. If instead it involves something about ‘bad taste’, then we’re going to need a criterion for distinguishing the genuinely morally wrong kind of bad taste from the kind that even the most decent 20 year olds find entertaining.

By: Bob B

Bob B — Mon, 17 Jan 2005 23:33:06 +0000

In case it is of interest to readers here, Sir Martin Gilbert, one of several historians who have written biographical studies of Churchill, has a long essay on the BBC website relating Churchill’s responses and actions as Britain’s prime minister during WW2 as the scale of the holocaust became evident to him through incoming intelligence and reconnaissance reports and, eventually, through the discoveries of allied troops as they came across concentration camps on their advance through Germany itself towards the end of the war in Europe: http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/war/genocide/churchill_holocaust_01.shtml Is should make instructive reading for Prince Harry and his social circle.

By: Henry

Henry — Mon, 17 Jan 2005 22:13:46 +0000

Dan – I just replied to you by email before seeing your follow-up comment. I don’t see myself how my comment could be read as accusing you of racism (could be just that my brain is having serious difficulty parsing ‘I wasn’t arguing that you had no evidence that I wasn’t racist and Orangeist’), but am happy to accept that this is how you read it. The football-chant comment was a reference to what I saw as a fairly belligerent nationalism – if you slag off the Royals I’ll slag off Ireland – but there’s a very important difference between nationalism and racism. I’m happy to accept your clarification, and to state for the record that I certainly don’t believe that you’re a racist.

By: dan hardie

dan hardie — Mon, 17 Jan 2005 21:59:07 +0000

Just off for the night. A minor point: it’s not worth all these thriller-style tough-guy remarks like ‘got it’. I have actually just sent you an unsolicited, but polite email. To recap one point I make in it: on re-reading, I was not 100% sure if you were or weren’t accusing me of racism and (what is not necessarily identical to it, but often is) Orangeism: there are a couple of phrases which might mean that or might not. The first in particular did strongly seem to mean that. I would never use the racist charge as a rhetorical device: it is too serious for that. You say ‘By substituting sottish football-chant-nationalist ranting for argument,’- and that to me sounds like a pretty clear accusation of Orangeism and anti-Irish racism, since the English and Scottish football chants about the Irish tend to be both. But if it isn’t such an accusation- great. I’ve just re-read ‘Ditto, lack of evidence for me accusing you of Orangeism, anti-Irish racism etc.’ Now I’m glad to have your assurance that this isn’t an accusation of racism, but to be honest, I wouldn’t otherwise have known. Remarks about ‘lack of reading comprehension’ won’t cut it: this phrase is a pretty classic example of what I remember from my logic classes as ‘phrasal ambiguity’. It could mean that I wasn’t arguing that you had no evidence that I wasn’t racist and Orangeist; or it could mean that I had no evidence that you were saying that I was racist and Orangeist. It’s not a clear remark, and given the ‘football chant’ gibe, I interpreted it as an accusation of racism. If you assure me that you’re not calling me racist and/or Orangeist, that’s good and I accept that. There is no ‘self-pity’ here: racism is a serious charge and so should only be made seriously. I wouldn’t say ‘x is calling me racist’ because it seemed like a neat point to score: I said it because that is what you seemed to be saying, and because that is one charge I will never accept. I did say, writing to you privately, that I would be glad to withdraw any remark that seemed racist. I wasn’t talking about racism as a rhetorical device: I meant it, and I wanted to clear it up with you, which is why I emailed you personally. It’s good that you’re not making this charge, and I apologise for having read you as making it. In retrospect, perhaps I should first have sent you a private email saying ‘is this saying what I think it is, and if so apologise’. Again, this is not a rhetorical move: I am afraid you will need to accept some of the responsibility, since your posts to me were so poorly expressed that you did seem to be a possible charge of racism or Orangeism. Football chants against the Irish are racist, and the second sentence I’ve quoted re racism is hard to follow. Some discussions need a lot of care. I don’t think this is anybody’s finest hour.

By: Henry

Henry — Mon, 17 Jan 2005 21:20:46 +0000

I said I wouldn’t respond – but since you’re repeating and making stronger a fairly nasty accusation, you’ll get this one reply. You have said, without providing any evidence, that I’m accusing you of racism, Orangeism etc. I haven’t said anything of the sort. Now you’re retreating into self-pitying demands that I apologize for an accusation that I manifestly haven’t made. I’m still trying to figure out quite how you manage to interpret bq. You imputed, without bothering to provide any evidence (because there isn’t any) that Kieran was a bit soft on the Nazi issue himself – “Thanks to Kieran for telling us that Nazism is a bad thing but not bad enough to, like, declare war against.” bq. (c ) Ditto, lack of evidence for me accusing you of Orangeism, anti-Irish racism etc. as an accusation of racism. It’s not, as anyone with even minimal skills of reading comprehension should be able to figure out. I’m accusing you of making sloppy, nasty claims about what other people are saying without any evidence to back them up, in order to distract from your own lack of arguments. Got it?

By: Dan Hardie

Dan Hardie — Mon, 17 Jan 2005 20:34:15 +0000

In jumbled order: d)It’s true that there hasn’t really been an argument on this thread, since Healy’s post contained no discernible thesis, and my response was merely a response to his. But if you didn’t lose a non-occurring argument you certainly made a bit of a tit of yourself when you defended a post concerning the words ‘My family are all German anyway.’ with the following statement ‘why the fuck are you making the bizarre claims of guilt by association-of-national-identity that you’re making?’ is self-defeating. ‘Guilt by association-of-national-identity’, eh? Like ‘My family are all German anyway’? a) If Kieran wants to publish something entitled ‘Don’t Mention the war’, about a dumb aristo wearing a swastika, I’ll mention the war myself, mentioning a dumb Graves Association honouring a fascist, for example. Don’t like it? Tough. c)Re the Royal Family: I don’t like them, but would probably keep them for want of anything better, albeit with higher tax rates. Kieran’s comments on them were ‘robust’ if that word means ‘childish, hackneyed and borderline-racist jokes about Germans’. I’ve written this already but reading is not your strong suit. d)Re Orangeism, anti-Irish racism: my mother’s Irish- as I’ve said, and as you’re not capable of reading- and oddly enough I don’t regard her with racial hatred. If I lived in NI I would vote SDLP or maybe Alliance; it would certainly puzzle my Catholic relatives if they could hear the juvenile and unsupported accusation that you have made. I suspect and hope there will be a United Ireland sometime in this century: so long as it is by democratic consent, that would make me very happy. And you call me ‘Orange’? You lying fool: you don’t know what the word means. And there isn’t a racist sentence in any of my posts: you seem to think it’s enough to make the accusation without coming up with evidence, which on a charge of that gravity is contemptible. But you don’t, in any case, believe me to be a racist: you have in any case banned racists from posting on CT- eg ‘Modern Crusader’- and quite rightly so. You won’t ban me- rather you just want to chuck a nasty word at me, because I’ve said rude things to you and your mate. If you had something resembling a conscience you would apologise. You won’t apologise. I hope that you never find yourself in a situation requiring either courage or honesty, because you’re short of both.

By: Henry

Henry — Mon, 17 Jan 2005 20:12:14 +0000

Dan – I don’t think that there’s much point getting involved in an actual argument with you, since you’re clearly a bit of a nutter. But for the benefit of the gathered spectators, a short response (I won’t be responding to any further comments of yours – waste of time). (a) Contrary to your comments, Kieran didn’t at any stage attack dumb Brits – his very specific target was the “fundamental uselessness of the Royal Family, other than for entertainment value.” As rs has said, you did indeed introduce the Brits versus Irish thing. And you’ve kept on harping on it by continually claiming that Kieran’s post is an attack on the British, rather than the British Royal Family. Basic element of reading comprehension, I’d have thought. (b) Your response to Kieran’s admittedly robust comments about the British Royal Family wasn’t to argue back. It was to claim through some bizarre and asyet-unexplained logic that Kieran wasn’t in any fit position to criticize the British Royal Family, because some Irish people at some stage, who have no obvious connection to Kieran, had dodgy Nazi connections themselves. You imputed, without bothering to provide any evidence (because there isn’t any) that Kieran was a bit soft on the Nazi issue himself – “Thanks to Kieran for telling us that Nazism is a bad thing- but not bad enough to, like, declare war against.” (c ) Ditto, lack of evidence for me accusing you of Orangeism, anti-Irish racism etc. The sottish comment btw wasn’t to imply that you were drunk when you were posting – it was to state that you might as well have been for all the sense your comment made. (d) You claim that I’ve lost the argument in a comprehensively humiliating fashion. Wrong – there’s no argument here to win or lose. For an argument to happen, both sides need to be arguing. You’ve yet to begin – you may find tossing around slurs, distortions, ad hominems and bizarre irrelevancies entertaining, but it surely isn’t arguing. A lot of sound, fury and bluster – but I still don’t see that you’ve any point to make.

By: Dan Hardie

Dan Hardie — Mon, 17 Jan 2005 18:11:05 +0000

Shorter Rs (1): Kieran Healy’s post, contrary to Dan’s statement, makes no mention of Nazism, of the evils of Nazism or of the weaknesses of the British constitution. Shorter Rs (2): Kieran Healy’s post, as per Dan’s statement, makes 3 mentions of Nazism, and one mention each of the evils of Nazism and the weaknesses of the British constitution. I’m wrong but it is all Dan’s fault, him and his ‘overliteralism’ (sic). Mum, can I play with my Lego now?