Apparently, my critic and I share a few beliefs-- that morals are relative, and that morals and ethics should be essential guides to an individual's actions. We apparently disagree, however, as to the extent of knowledge which is needed to make informed moral judgments on any matter. Finally, if I read my critic correctly, we agree that "experts" are the bane of the knowledge-seeker. Specifically, for myself, I would say that the real bane is in "charismatic institutions" not (usually) the particular experts associated with them. Alhough this is important to my general position, I will not try to clarify this point here, but say only that my usage (of "charismatic institutions") corresponds, but not precisely, to one of the distinct concepts in Max Weber's formulation of "the charisma concept." Interested parties are directed to Weber's corpus, with the advice that his monolithic life's work should be looked upon as a whole, rather than as a group of self-contained chunks.

Where my critic and I seem to differ greatly, however, is in our comprehension of the scholarly process. I have advocated that the issue at hand be debated by knowledgeable scholars, not so that people can learn from the individuals, but rather for the learning that will come from the debate itself. As Robert Redfield once put matters so well: "What we need is not balanced books, but rather balanced libraries."

With this I turn to the specific point of criticism leveled. My critic says that he has not seen one case where there is an argument for the moral imperative of keeping mascot names. If this is his true opinion, he has clearly missed a great deal in this discussion. Whether stated explicity or not, a number of people have argued from moral imperatives which see a "unified" national state, concerned with the rights of minorities, however defined, as a morally superior situation to the moral imperatives of tribalism, ethnicity, and so on. If this is not a satisfactory explication for my critic, it is very likely, I think, that he need only wait a while and there will be ever more strident arguments explicitly formulated in terms of such moral imperatives.

Here I raise, but only raise and do not seek to justify, some of the points which are almost certainly crucial to any real understanding of what is likely going on in regard to the mascot issue. The formulations which exist in academe which are really relevant to this are almost all quite limited in their investigations of source material, or based simply on the accomodation of a usually (but not always) small body of data to a "buzz word" concept, rather than real conceptual clarifications following from the data. I mention only two examples, so that my point may be at least partially understood. Charles S. Maier's formulations on "territoriality"-- the subdivision of modern states into ethnic or other divisions-- seem to me to be little more than the application of historical data to formulations of the philosopher Deleluze. And much as I admire the great Myron Marty as a scholar, the apparently vast sums of money spent on the fundamentally flawed "Fundamentalism Project" was, to my mind, a waste of resources.

Anyone with more than the slightest concern with what is going on beyond their block should be able to understand at least something of what is at hand now. The best short introduction to the situation I have sen is in Eric Foner's recent discussion of "American Freedom" in the American Historical Review. This is a well reasoned, and stimulating piece which gives real insight should one look for it, and provides not only an American context, but just criticism of scholars who might be characterized as "hyper-globalizers." This is the context which Americans need to understand, and understand now.

Simple analogies are almost always misleading (and usually, I think, in very significant ways). At the time, for instance, it was quite common to compare F.D. Roosevelt with Hitler and Mussolini. Too much should not be made of analogies which are only suggestive. And, too, I am forced, here, to fall back on terminologies which do not adequately express my positions. Simplifying in this way, the "peripheries" (which includes many American Indian reservations) are likely simply to decline into insignificance. Yet is also likely that not "all things will remain equal" should this occur. (There are always options for governments or individuals.) Besides Muslim fundamentalism which has ben of concern to American policy makers, the coalition BJP government of India, and even President Bush's exploitation of charismatic Christianity in this country, should give much food for though to the contemplative. Indeed, if nothing else, people who are concerned about structure should have observed, and "learned from", the clear "backlash" against affirmative action.

Contrary to the views of my critic, structural change can come very quickly. Who in 1925 could have imagined the Germany of 1933-1945? How can anyone who has the least understanding of how things actually happen in the world seriously put forward a propositon depending on faith in "human nature?" (whatever that is). How can anyone believe that "sensitizing" people, to change their psychology, can have any effect in a world of overwhelming economic and technological change? Yet my critic is so audacious that he claims he is concerned with "practical decisions." There is no need to comment further on this claim.

Yet one further point must be raised. The ignorance of Indian history is so vast amongst both Indian/Native Americans and others that it is extremely difficult, now, to carry out a rational discussion with a "true believer" of the recent schools that hold that "everyone's opinion is equally valid." The great world has been at hand for American Indians since the arrival of Columbus (and even before, perhaps, at least to some degree in the limited Viking settlement). And contrary to the nonsense being propagated primarily by political activists, the Indian ethnic groups we know today do not go back to "time immemorial" but were formed in the context of their interactions with non-Indian groups. The fantasy world of primordial tribes which have always existed, and will always exist, not only distorts past reality, but hampers real scholarship, and almost certainly provides impediments to the establishment of the real equality which at least some American Indian activists want.

I do not take offense at the implicit slurs offered by my critic in at least three communications to this discussiion, although I am named only twice. I object only to his distortion of my intellectual outlook, where he says explicitly that my arguments suggest that American Indians bow to the powers-that-be to get the dribblings which these people might condescending bestow. This is a truly laughable formulation of my views, especially as, much earlier, I had pointed out that the powers-that-be clearly have no interest in what Indians consider to be their vital interests. Indeed, in my opinion, the American Indian activists who fight battles where no structural results are likely to be obtained will ultimately be recognized as the unwitting (but in some cases willing) stooges of the American power structure.

-- Melburn D. Thurman (posted 4/13, 2:20 p.m., U.S. Eastern time)

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