David, (and others that I seem to have riled)
>
>"Jane, I agree that offending a majority is not "equivalent" to offending a
>minority.  There is no question that offending, insulting, provoking,
>hurting, or attacking a minority group constitutes bullying--in addition to
the offense per se. ... And what do numbers have to do with anything,
>anyway?"

I think you have answered your own question there. In my experience
being a member of a minority group is a qualitatively different
experience to being part of a majority group, so in that respect the
numbers do count. (in fact there was an interesting documentary on tv
last night which argued that being a black man in the UK (i.e. a member
of a minority which is discriminated against both passively and
activiely) is a sufficiently harming experience in intself to cause
psychotic episodes and mental instability. - Being a black man in the uk
can drive you mad. literally.

>"Why is it necessary, desirable, or justifable to
offend anyone?"

Where a majority's cultural identity and pattern of behaviour rests on
unquestioned beliefs as to the relative importance of their own group in
relation to other groups, as here where people still unconsiously act as
though all black men are criminals, then I think that an artist, or
whoever is perfectly justified in challenging those beliefs, even if
they do risk offending some people's sensibilities.

I wouldn't argue that it is automaticaaly a good thing to offend people.
BUT I would support the challenging of entrenched beliefs. Obviously I
wouldn't set out to personally upset individual members of a group, but
where the dominant culture offends, hurts, damages, restricts,
infringes, constrains, pathologises members of minorities for their
religious, cultural, political beliefs or for manifesting different
cultural traditions or ways of life, with no consideration for the
impact that has on the individual in a minority, I'm not going to
precious about the offender getting upset in return.

This was a general point I was making, I was not saying that it would be
a good thing if some lone god-fearing christian went to see the
exhibition and was offended. - But then I am regularly offended by the
portrayal of women in art and nobody seems to bothered about that.
Curators could post a warning outside this exhibition to warn christians
that they might find it blasphemous, but perhaps they should also
consider advance warning on all the other offensive things being
exhibited?

>"No one deserves to have personal
>beliefs or religous symbols attacked, parodied, or assaulted just because
they are shared by a large group."

I would have to say that it would depend on what they believed. We live
in a so-called democracy where people believe they have a right to free
speech. I'm not some sort of crazed individual who wants to go round
offending people just for the sake of it, but where a challenge is made
with good ground and in a fair way - aimed at the belief and not the
individual, I do not think that is unreasonable. Just as we have the
right to believe whatever we like, others sureley also have the right to
>challenge us if they do not agree with us -as you have to me.
>
>"As far as the size of the group is concerned, moreover, this is relative to
your point of reference."

Most things are.

>" Western culture may indeed be "Christian-dominated"
>insofar as heritage, tradition, and customs are concerned, but even true
>Christians, and more specifically practicing Catholics, themselves constitute
minority groups within this very secularized culture."

Indeed, and I would not want to see practicing Catholics having their
rights constrained any more than I would want to see them constraining
the rights of others.

>" Nor does any claim that an artist is actually a member of the group that he
is provoking justify an offense or make it any easier to swallow."

As far as I am aware, there is a long tradition in art of pushing the
boundaries, of looking at things in new ways, of examining and
questionning and challenging, and thus also sometimes offending the
position of the group to which they belong. That is what questionning
minds do - they examine that which is important. If art is not allowed
>to have offended, perhaps we should also withdraw Monet and Picasso...
>
>"All that having been said, I'll still defend any artist's right to
>self-expression.  I may question his motives, but I won''t condemn them.  I
>question Giuliani's motives, but I also question the Brooklyn Museum's
>motives.  Perhaps all art is political, but this whole episode seems to be
much more about politics than art, and it smells bad."

Out of curiosity, did the exhibition "smell bad" (if you'll excuse the
pun) before Giuliani became involved, or has it just become distasteful
>now that politicians have pulled culture into the political realm?
>
>"But, to return to my original point, I think the notion that only minorities
should be immune from offense and insult stinks."

I don't think I ever said anyone should be immune, and if a minority was
actively setting out to offend others (fascists are the easy example)
then I have no problem with them being offended to - or silenced where
they would wish to silence others. I was simply scommenting that in my
experience offending majority beliefs was not equivalent to offending
minority beliefs, a point which you agreed with at the beginning.

Not being in New York , or knowing any of the people or organisations
involved, I wouldn't like to try and draw too much analysis, as all I
know about it is what people have said on the list, and much of that has
been very partial indeed. consequently, I am only making observations on
that basis.

>Jane
>
>David Haberstich
>
>

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