World War I: Extra Credit Part II

We most often hear talk of socialism to describe government involvement in business. Early socialists, though, had a wider view of themselves than just advocates of government involvment in business. Much of the socialist movement both in Europe and America was predicated on the beleif that all workers were brothers and that wars started by those wealthy and greedy men who ran government. Since all workers were brothers they oppossed all war as a tool of the rich and empowered.

When war broke out in the Europe socialists did a funny thing. They betrayed their principles and took up arms against their brethren in other countries.

In the United States, this was less the case. Many socialists stuck to their principles and refused to enlist or fight on behalf of the government. Eugene V. Debs, a well known socialist leader, would go to jail and later run for president from his cell.

But there was another notable socialist and she was quite well known too. She wrote this to Debs:

Of course, the Supreme Court has sustained the decision of the lower court in
your case. To my mind, the decision has added another laurel to your wreath of
victories. Once more you are going to prison for upholding the liberties of the
people.
I write because my heart cries out, and will not be still. I write because I want you to know that I should be proud if the Supreme Court convicted me of abhorring war, and doing all in my power to oppose it. When I think of the millions who have suffered in all the wicked wars of the past, I am shaken with the anguish of a great impatience. I want to fling myself against all bruite powers that destroy life and break the spirit of man.
In the persecution of our comrades there is one satisfaction. Every trial of men like you, every sentence against them, tears away the veil that hides the face of the enemy. The discussion and agitation that follows the trials define more sharply the positions that must be taken before all men can live together in peace, happiness and security.

She was blind and deaf and we most often her of her in connection with the play "The Miracle Worker". Her name, of course, is Helen Keller.

We often forget that historic personalities have more than one dimension. Woodrow Wilson, the great idealist, was a racist (and so was Abe Lincoln). Thomas Jefferson the man who wrote the Declaration of Independence and claimed that all me were created equal owned slaves.

And Helen Keller was a socialist.

This is where your extra credit lives

Most of you probably know Joyce Kilmer for his poem "Trees":


While poetry is often a beautiful expression of the human experience it can also convey the deep sadness and terror that accompanies war (see one of my earlier posts on poetry and war). When the United States went to war in 1917 Joyce Kilmer enlisted and found himself in the "Fighting 69th" (also a song covered by the Dropkick Murphys). During his service he wrote the poem "Rouge Bouquet" about the loss of young men during the war. Take a minute and peruse these poems, what images come to mind. What mood or tone does he write in?

If you contrast this poem with "Dulce et Decorum Est" by English poet Wilfred Owen you will find it much different in tone. Based on these two poems we can begin to see that there might be a difference in how the two men experienced the war--indeed Americans may have experienced the war much differently than Europeans did...

Unfortunately, Joyce Kilmer was unable to write his recollections of war for us. In 1918, while leading a scouting party, Kilmer was killed--another casualty of the Great War.

War is equally unmerciful in its treatment of poets, artists, workers, mothers, fathers, sons, and daughters.

The Fragility of Information

10 years ago I was sitting and chatting with my room mate and his mother. There is very little about most conversations that I remember clearly, but I did remember this: the more sophisticated our means of storing information, the more fragile it becomes. Cave paintings have endured the ravages of time for thousands of years while the paper in books will have turned to dust long before. Even books though last for hundreds of years.
Data stored on disk though, that is truly short lived. Even if you are quite fastidious in keeping track of your files. The will disappear much sooner than their hard copy formats.
When I first started using computers in third or fourth grade they used 5 1/4" disks. By the time I was in high school I was using a 3 1/2" disks with CD-ROM coming in. Now computers are no longer sold with floppy disk drives (unless you ask).
Even on popular storage mediums such as CD/DVD digital deterioration is an issue. Especially, when preserving digital history.
And what guarantees will there be that the operating systems of 10, 20, or 100 years in the future will even be able to access today's important data. The books on the shelf will remain.
How will we preserve our own histories? I'm not talking about the big stuff in the Library of Congress, but our personal memories--our digital photographs, movies, and diaries/blogs? How do we preserve our histories for our later generations of our families?

War & Poetry

I'll throw this one out there for my first follower. Since poetry is her thing I thought I would contribute a little something her way. The fascinating history of war and poetry.

Normally, when one thinks about poetry--you think about girly verse or maybe beatniks in black turtlenecks and berets snapping there fingers to bad jazz poetry. Well friends, this isn't necessarily so. In fact some of the most poignant image of warfare come from poetry. For example there is this classic from 1945:


The Death of the Ball Turret Gunner
Randall Jarell

From my mother's sleep I fell into the State,
And I hunched in its belly till my wet fur froze.
Six miles from earth, loosed from its dream of life,
I woke to black flak and the nightmare fighters.
When I died they washed me out of the turret with a hose.

Notice how the "S" in State is capitalized? Interesting, eh?

Go back in time a little further to WWI and we get a whole generation of war poets. It is here that Wilfred Owen displays his mastery of imagery as he relates the horrors of chlorine gas in Dulce Et Decorum Est.

If in some smothering dreams you too could pace
Behind the wagon that we flung him in,
And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,
His hanging face, like a devil's sick of sin;
If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,
Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud¹²
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues,
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest¹³
To children ardent¹⁴ for some desperate glory,
The old Lie; Dulce et Decorum est
Pro patria mori.¹⁵


Soldiers write poetry too... here is one example.

The power of poetry is obvious if you take a look at the US Army Soldier's Creed, it is written as poetry. It has also been set to music and used relentlessly in recruitment advertisments.

When you read the pieces what do you see in your mind's eye? What you feel in your gut? And what do you think the author meant to communicate to you?

The Emancipatory Project

Technology is generally good. However, it is only at its best when it supports the project of humanity. If we use it to push us forward--for purposes of human liberation, we can truly address some of the great injustices in this world.
If we remain stagnant and treat it like an opiate to pass away the time in indolent decadence then it shall more likely become a tool for domination and enslavement.
History is the story of human liberation fighting against dominion.