On Thu, 24 Apr 2008 05:55:54 -0400, Warp wrote:

> Jim Henderson <nos### [at] nospamcom> wrote:
>> On Wed, 23 Apr 2008 19:11:06 -0400, Warp wrote:
> 
>> >   The history of a person started when he was born.
> 
>> Gads, I smell another semantic battle coming up here, so I'll bow out.
> 
>   No, it's not about semantics.

Sure it is.  My history is not limited to events that happen to me - I 
was not talking about a personal history, I was talking about collective 
history, which is the most common usage of the word "history" in the 
English language.

>   You claim that a person's history consists of his ancestors' history
> besides his own life. I disagree. Why should it have any effect on your
> actions what your ancestors did or didn't do? Why should your own
> ancestors' actions have more effect on yours than the actions of someone
> else's ancestors?

Because the mistakes made by those who came before me (whether related by 
blood or not) are mistakes I personally would care not to repeat.  
Similarly, in my role here at work, I try to do things that don't counter 
decisions made by the people who came before me - unless those decisions 
were, in my judgement, bad decisions to begin with.  Then I fix them.

I can't just come in and say "right, everything we did before is null and 
void, I don't care who promised you what, we're starting over from 
scratch".  If we did that on a national/global scale every generation, 
we'd never get anywhere, and we CERTAINLY wouldn't make any progress.

>   And in this thread in particular: Why should the social status (in
>   this
> case being an immigrant) of your distant ancestors have any effect on
> your own social status or your opinions? You are not your ancestors. You
> are not what they were. You are you, and what you are depends only on
> what you have done.

No, that's simply not true.  That the families that came into the US (for 
me about 4 or 5 generations ago) were permitted to enter this country, 
even though they didn't speak English (well, some of them did - they came 
from England) and were welcomed (generally) without people saying "Hey, 
<derrogatory term>, why don't you learn some goddamned English?  YOU'RE 
IN AMERICA NOW, SPEAK ENGLISH YOU FRIGGIN IDIOT!" does inform my opinions 
on matters like this.  As well it should.  Doesn't mean I'll always agree 
with them, but that past informs my decisions and opinions in the current 
world situation.

Oddly enough, most of my friends describe my attitudes as being more 
European than American as a result.  Seems I'm not alone in thinking this 
is the right way to approach decision making about matters of public 
policy.

Jim

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