ok, so yeah i am a little annoyed. i have heard for a long time that 'a brave new world' is a good book, but i have found it unpleasant. huxley is thoroughly unoriginal and disgustingly acute. he names characters along the lines of Marx and Lenina. when an author has to bludgeon the reader with something like that i find it offensive.
in other news, go france! i love how they refused to allow sharon to visit.
people like to stereotype. finding 'norms' or commonality among groups helps humans to understand the world around them. sadly this dulls us and causes prejudice, and that in turn causes problems in understanding. the new anti-semitism that is springing up in places like france is driven by the actions of israel, which has long been considered the stereotype for jews. unfortunately, israel's actions are reflecting negatively on the rest of the jews worldwide. of course, there are those that would propose that israel is defending itself against terrorism. though i doubt they would be brash enough to say that hiring lebonese soldiers to shoot palestinian children from watchtowers is an act of national security. in our world, the new david is a poor young boy with a stone, and goliath has become a rumbling tank. perhaps this revision of myth is not beneficial.
