From: Ant McWatt (antmcwatt@hotmail.co.uk)
Date: Thu Oct 13 2005 - 19:51:00 BST
Platt Holden stated October 13th:
>Yes, and in the revolution Marx promises to abolish private property.
Ant McWatt asks:
Did he? In which specific text was that?
Platt Holden continues:
>All power is granted to the "Giant, unforgettably described by Pirsig:
>
>"Later he saw there was: this Giant. People look upon the social patterns
>of the Giant in the same way cows and horses look upon a farmer; different
>from themselves, incomprehensible, but benevolent and appealing. Yet the
>social pattern of the city devours their lives for its own purposes just
>as surely as farmers devour the flesh of farm animals. A higher organism
>is feeding upon a lower one and accomplishing more by doing so than the
>lower organism can accomplish alone." (Lila, 17)
>
>Maybe Arlo finds the social patterns of the Giant appealing, but to me
>they mean one thing -- you guessed it -- gulags, as was demonstrated when
>intellect put the Giant's patterns into practice on a grand scale.
Ant McWatt comments:
Considering the above quote was referring to New York, I have to say Platt
has an odd notion of a Marxist society. And talking of Gulags, what about
the increase of a private prison system both in the US and UK over ten last
years? The UK now has the largest prison population in Europe and because
there is little done in the way of rehabilitation, there’s now literally no
more room for any more prisoners. Moreover, what about that illegal
Guantánamo Bay prison camp in Cuba which is holding an unknown number of
children between the ages of 13 and 18?
Serious concerns have been voiced by Amnesty International (sorry Platt,
Amnesty is relatively a non-partisan CREDIBLE, high quality information
source), that child prisoners at Guantánamo Bay may be being subjected to
conditions that approach torture. They have been repeatedly interrogated and
held in restricted isolation over very long periods. Among those still
detained is Omar al-Khadr, a Canadian national, now 18, who was a minor when
he first arrived there at the age of 15. If any of these children did
participate in fighting in Afghanistan or elsewhere, they have already been
victimized as child soldiers. Now they are being victimized by adults again
by being held in the same legal limbo and difficult conditions as the other
so-called "illegal combatants" being held there.
More than 650 detainees from over 40 countries are being held without charge
or trial in Guantánamo Bay. Although most were captured during military
operations in Afghanistan, they have been arbitrarily denied prisoner of war
status. None of the detainees have been granted access to lawyers or
relatives, nor have they had the opportunity to challenge the lawfulness of
their detention in a court of law. They face the prospect of indefinite
detention in small cells for up to 24 hours a day and the possibility of
trials by military commissions with the power to hand down death sentences
with no right of appeal. Neither Omar, nor any other detainee, knows when,
or even if, they will be released.
For more details of Cuba's least favourite holiday destination, see:
http://www.amnesty.ca/realsecurity/Afghanistan2.php
.
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