[PEN-L:1895] Fwd: Re: Fwd: Re: Fwd: Re: Vicious Holiday Silliness boundary="part0_914870452_boundary"

[Nativejmc@xxxxxxx]

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In a message dated 12/28/98 10:24:01 AM Pacific Standard Time,
jdevine@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx writes:

<< I was wondering: is the word "philistine"  a version of the word
 "Palestine"? (That's why I put this negative term in quotation marks.)

 Jim Devine jdevine@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx &
 http://clawww.lmu.edu/Faculty/JDevine/jdevine.html >>

Response: Indeed it--the term "Philistine"--is the origin of the modern
Palestinian just as the ancient Philistines are considered descendants of the
modern Palestinians who stood versus Caananites in various Biblical accounts.
The perjorative aspects of the term "philistine" and the slurs associated with
the term to the point that the term "philistine" itself became a slur
embodying--as a kind of shorthand--a set of other slurs (mercenary, pecuniary,
lacking in good taste and graces, crass materialistic etc) go way back. But
suffice to say that many Palestinians--and non-Palestinians--know the popular
or vulgar use and know that most who use it are unaware of the ethnic
orgins/implications, but nonetheless feel that it can be likened to terms like
"Jewing down", "Gypping or Gypped",
etc. After all, no one says "Caananite capitalists" or "The Pawnbroker 'Anglo-
Saxoned me down from the price I should have got.

Just as a point of history and clarification in response to your question and
in no way intended as a criticism off use of term quite obviously used with no
intent to slur any group

Jim Craven

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Date: Mon, 28 Dec 1998 10:16:43 -0800
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From: Jim Devine <jdevine@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
>Subject: [PEN-L:1894] Re: Fwd: Re: Fwd: Re: Vicious Holiday Silliness
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I wrote: > Scrooge represented the narrowest of the grasping capitalists, the
> narrow-minded "philistine,"  at least to Dickens.

Jim Craven writes:
>Exactly. Just as the title might suggest an invitation to parody or a la
>critical thinking, maybe Scrooge in addition to being a metaphor for the
>greedy and philistine exploiter capitalist, as also not much of a hypocrite
>about it--screwed people for 365 days a year without taking a couple of days
>off for some commercialized-albeit "sacred"--event or holiday.

good point.

I was wondering: is the word "philistine"  a version of the word
"Palestine"? (That's why I put this negative term in quotation marks.)

Jim Devine jdevine@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx &
http://clawww.lmu.edu/Faculty/JDevine/jdevine.html


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