Comments for Khrushchev in love

Comment on Lists in Report on Probability A. by alzheimersisawesome

alzheimersisawesome — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 21:37:34 +0000

your quote from gogol is one of my favorites. he encapsulates in fantastic fashion society’s eternal disdain for the leisure classes.

Comment on Adorno: gay by Kalevi

Kalevi — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 15:22:57 +0000

Here’s my reply to spinoza1111 in his own blog (it has not passed moderation yet):

What I find fascinating about your defence of Adorno is that you on the one hand apologise for his attack on homosexuality and on the other hand reproduce the attack. You excuse his bleak mythology of homosexuality by pointing out that it was culturally normative at the time, then revive that mythology in the form of “closet case” Nazis and bully boys.

So which is it? Was Adorno wrong to postulate the mysterious connection between fascism and homosexuality criticised by Krushschev in Love, or was he merely reacting to an actual homosexuality of fascism?

My diagnosis of the vapid homophobia among the leftist intelligentsia is simply this: in the figure of the homosexual fascist the left discovered a means of legitimising its own oppressive tendency towards homosexuals. The figure of the homosexual fascist in other words provided a way to conceptualise left totalitarianism as the very opposite of totalitarianism, as legitimate opposition to totalitarianism. Never forget that Hitler used the same smoke and mirrors to portray the Jew as a legitimate target for persecution.

Comment on Return to Report on Probability A: The Hireling Shepherd by khrushchevinlove

khrushchevinlove — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 16:10:53 +0000

You’re right, pedant, it’s “it’s”, not “its”. “Damn”, though, is fine in colloquial English. Really, though, I fail to see the similarity between a typo and making bad art. Or were you pointing out my typo (and supposed misuse of English) in order to make me look unintelligent? Were you perhaps trying to suggest that anyone who might leave a typo uncorrected should be ignored because anything such a person might say is clearly not worth considering? Really?

Comment on Return to Report on Probability A: The Hireling Shepherd by Sean Vrenna

Sean Vrenna — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 02:49:05 +0000

First of all, it’s “damned”, not “damn”, and “its” requires an apostrophe. Perhaps you might clean up your act before criticizing others’.
(Yes, the apostrophe comes after the ’s’)

Comment on Not dead. by Chris

Chris — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 05:58:41 +0000

Prove it! Talk about Deleuze and Nietzsche!

Comment on Adorno: gay by khrushchevinlove

khrushchevinlove — Sun, 21 Jun 2009 19:18:23 +0000

Once again, you’re misstating my “tactic” which, here (as with you), simply amounts to a question as to where I have supposedly made the relevant assertion. The things that the two of you claim I have said were certainly unintended, if what I’ve written supports them at all. So I’d like to see where you two see it.

Comment on Adorno: gay by spinoza1111

spinoza1111 — Sat, 23 May 2009 14:19:00 +0000

Nikita, you’re playing a silly game with bigmouth that you played with me in which your tactic is to reply “I do not see how concept x is related to concept y, or what I have written considered as concept y”.

I’d say that OF COURSE “frohlich”’s connotations would be quite germane.

But more than this, everything has everything to do with everything else, and the question reduces to how much or in what way…perhaps not even “how much” because that would quantify a qualitative assertion. To say “I do not see the relation” is a dullard’s reply masquerading as an (unearned) skepticism.

Comment on Adorno: gay by khrushchevinlove

khrushchevinlove — Sat, 23 May 2009 02:41:56 +0000

I’m not sure how your concern that “‘fröhlich’ actually has a comparable [sexual] connotation” is related to what I’ve written. Could you point out where I’ve made that etymological jump?

Comment on Adorno: gay by bigmouth

bigmouth — Sun, 03 May 2009 07:09:05 +0000

well, you are not “working with a shared subset of meanings”, but with a connotation only the English word has imho. to me, Kaufmann seems to be wrong on 2 different topics:

a) gays chose (if there actually was an act of choosing, I’m not sure) the word gay not so much because of “light-hearted defiance of convention”, but because of it already established sexual meaning

b) that “fröhlich” actual has a comparable connotation. and it doesn’t, at least not for me, and German is my birth language. I’d say that “merry” or “jolly” would be a better translation

Kaufmann and other translators obviously arrived at their error because Nietzsche uses the provencial (or french?) subtitle “la gaya scienza” – which makes picking out “gay” as a translation obvious. but it’s still not a very good one

Comment on Adorno: gay by khrushchevinlove

khrushchevinlove — Sat, 02 May 2009 17:55:27 +0000

bigmouth,
Is your argument that because ‘gay’ and ‘fröhlich’ don’t have identical sets of meanings, one cannot legitimately translate from one to the other, working with a shared subset of meanings? Because that seems obviously problematic for translators everywhere.