Tutti frutti requires fruit, but "folk soul" doesn't require Hitler

[imomus]

Thursday's edition of BBC Radio 3 review programme Night Waves started with a conversation between Matthew Sweet (the man who called Baudrillard "the greatest fool of his age") and Gary Valentine Lachman, who once played bass with Blondie and Iggy Pop, but has now written a book about Rudolf Steiner.

Sweet and Lachman chatted awhile about the anthroposophist guru, then Sweet -- disguising provocation as sensitivity -- played the race card:

Matthew Sweet: But he also wrote about ideas like the one he called "the rejuvenating power of the German folk soul", didn't he? This is a problematic area for us now, isn't it? Do you think his reputation has suffered because of his association with these kinds of ideas?

Gary Lachman: Well, I think this is the sort of thing that gets cherry-picked out... We live in a very sensitive, politically correct time and it's difficult to talk about these sorts of things without alarm bells going off. I don't think that's a central theme in Steiner. I talked earlier about my initial interest in Steiner coming from seeing pictures of the Goetheanum, this fantastic building which unfortunately was burned down -- there has been suspicion that it was arson that burned it down, possibly by proto-Nazi groups who saw Steiner as a rival to Hitler at that time. But in any case, when the Goetheanum was being built, this was a multi-national -- in our jargon, "multicultural" -- multi-racial effort, at the time when World War I was going on. People from all the warring countries, and other countries involved, were there in Switzerland building this fantastic building. So I think you can cherry-pick and say yes, Steiner was a racist in some sort of way, but at the same time, if you actually look at his career I think his actual actions overrode these sorts of things."



Lachman's defense of Steiner is pretty wobbly; it uses a lot of little arguments when it should use a big one. He concedes to Sweet's highly dubious parallel between talking about a national "folk soul" and racism. He just thinks emphasis on that side of things is out of proportion. Others -- like Carl Jung -- spoke in similar terms, he says. We have a different take on these things today, the Nazis didn't like Steiner, and Steiner's philosophy led to a multi-cultural building effort in Switzerland, so we should look at his deeds rather than his words. This defense is feeble, scattershot and piecemeal.

The big argument Lachman should have used is this. The idea of cultural particularity ("the German folk soul", for instance) is not opposed to the idea of multiculturalism at all -- they're two sides of the same coin. Saying there could be multiculturalism without individual cultures is like saying there could be tutti frutti ice cream without individual fruits. It makes no sense. Multiculturalism is not a call to people to abandon individual cultures, but to harmonize them more effectively.

So it's completely pointless to make a binary opposition between multiculturalism, on the one hand, and a national or racial "soul" on the other. These ideas create each other, and need each other. Tolerance which depended on the eradication of difference would not be tolerance at all, multiculturalism which depended on the eradication of specific cultures would not be multiculturalism, and tutti frutti ice cream which contained no fruit could not claim to be tutti frutti.

But wait, couldn't there be tutti frutti ice cream without actual distinct fruits in it? Maybe there could. We'd have to imagine some big multinational food company which makes a gloopy substance it calls "tutti frutti ice cream", but doesn't use any real fruit or mix any actual flavours together to make it. Instead, it has simply made an indeterminate flavour it calls "tutti frutti" by chemical synthesis in the lab. It's got the idea of "mixed flavours" and "fruits" without mixing any actual flavours or using any fruits. Both the company and the people eating the product have lost touch with what fruit actually is. We're talking 1960s-style bland, processed food here. Later, as we know, there'll be a return to real ingredients and specific flavours.

This food company would resemble the US today -- an atypically synthetic state in which successive waves of immigrants have lost much of their original "national folk soul", their flavour. What they've particularly lost is the connection between blood and nationality. But only Hitler cares about that stuff anyway, right?

This loss is seen as a big advantage, and it's one many Americans want the rest of the world to discover for themselves. For these people -- who think of themselves as liberals, believe in progress and pluralism, but also believe they're just a little further down the road to these things than other cultures -- the very idea of a specific, individual type of fruit with its own distinct flavour sets off alarm bells, especially when the ethnicity in question is not seen as a marginal or powerless one. The US is a state which demands something impossible: multiculturalism without cultural difference. It's also prepared to steamroller existing cultural differences to achieve this impossible form of "pluralism" (monocultural multiculturalism, we could call it). The current administration has shown itself quite prepared to use military force -- and impose human suffering -- to do it.

Where does this tragic and paradoxical behaviour come from? I think it lies in the difference between "normal" and "normative". The US is highly atypical in its racial and cultural diversity, but it sees itself as normal. Not normal in the sense of being an average nation, but normal in the sense of setting norms worldwide. This is, of course, a sort of ethnocentricity; your nation may be weird, an outlier, but you think it's normal, first past the line, with everyone else behind. What you probably mean is that you think of your nation as normative. You think it's okay for your nation to prescribe its norms for others. If you think your norms are "the best in the world", you obviously think you're doing people a favour, giving them an opportunity.

This paradox -- that a nation which wants to set norms can be an outlier in terms of actual statistical norms, and that a nation with so many ethnicities can become tremendously ethnocentric as a result, seeing its own way of doing things as both atypical and correct -- can be illustrated by some points that came up in a recent debate on Neomarxisme.

Marxy was intent on proving that Hitler was cool in Japan. He did this by showing various incompletely or incorrectly contextualized photos -- a copy of "Mein Kampf" in bookstore Village Vanguard and a picture of a manga robot with "Mein Kampf" written under it. This being the internet, these two Hitler threads ran and ran. The blog's one regular Japanese poster got furious.

One commenter called Neogeisha stated that Japan was "notorious in its provincialism... notorious to people who have visited countries that have birth, rather than blood, requirement for citizenship". Another called M-Bone deftly indentified this as a Debito Fallacy, and referred Neogeisha to this essay on Japan Review.

Born David Aldwinckle in California, Debito Arudou's basic enterprise is as flawed as Marxy's. He wants to steamroller Japan into accepting him as Japanese by means of that most un-Japanese measure, litigation. In other words, he wants to be wholly Japanese without ceasing to be wholly American. He will become Japanese by changing Japan's definitions of Japaneseness to something more like America's definitions of Americanness, using American techniques relying on American framings of the problem.

He thinks, though, that American framings are universal ones. Debito has stated that "because Japan’s citizenship laws are jus sanguinis only those with blood ties to Japan may be Japanese -- as opposed to just about every other developed country, where if you are born there, you are automatically a citizen". (That's known as jus solis, citizenship by birth.)

Japan Review's Paul J. Scalise and Yuki Allyson Honjo set out to check Debito's claim that Japan's policy on naturalization was outside international norms. They found that Japan is not an outlier at all -- most states worldwide do not offer automatic citizenship by birth. In fact, jus solis-conferring states are only prevalent among the Organization of American States. What's more, the trend in developed countries is currently (for better or worse) away from American-style jus solis and towards Japanese-style jus sanguinis.

Marxy's attacks on Japan's ethnocentrism might be more convincing if they weren't fatally undermined by their own ethnocentrism -- an ethnocentrism much more dangerous than Japan's because it's American. The US is manifestly willing and able to impose its own norms militarily... not decades ago, but today and tomorrow, anywhere in the world, on multiple fronts in a "long war". America is currently normative -- seeing its own norms as universal ones -- Japan is not. This makes American ethnocentrism much more toxic than Japan's.

In this context, the eternal, mindlessly reflexive association of terms like "folk soul" with Nazism, and therefore with a form of evil everyone agrees upon, becomes banal indeed. The idea of "folk soul", like the idea of citizenship defined by blood rather than place of birth, may indeed be alien to English-speakers. This doesn't make it inherently Nazi.

The idea of a "folk soul", shocking and evil though it may appear to those who can only see it through the eyes of the dead Hitler -- a man not exactly known for squeezing anything good out of difference -- is, in fact, a necessary part of the whole enterprise of multiculturalism which, like tolerance, means nothing if the idea of difference is removed. Are you only tolerant of people like you? Is multiculturalism only welcome in a monoculture? Does tutti frutti ice cream really require us to forget individual fruit flavours? How does that work?

It's time to stop stamping on difference. It's time to stop being normative. It's time to stop associating phrases like "folk soul" -- or correlations between blood, culture and citizenship -- solely with the mistakes of the past. Ideas like these have as much to do with a utopian future as a discredited past. Hitler did not invent "folk soul". What he did invent was a particularly nightmarish way different types of volks could fail to get along. That does not tarnish the idea of racial difference, though. Racial and cultural difference -- and the permanence of racial and cultural difference, and the correlation between racial and cultural difference -- is a beautiful idea. Please never forget that it's the idea at the basis of multiculturalism. It's much bigger than that wanker Hitler, and will persist long after he's forgotten.

To equate all talk of "folk soul" with Nazism is not only lazy thinking, it shows a fundamental misunderstanding of semantics, multiculturalism, the future... and fruit-based ice cream.

Comments

[wingedwhale.livejournal.com]

I somehow can guess you're not a fan of the "melting pot" hypothesis.

Glad to say, here in San Francisco, California, there's more an attitude of "family quilt"; we're united but retain our cultural flavors.

Sadly, in much of the rest of the US, "melting pot" prevails and pervades. Think about potential 2008 president Barack Obama, the black American who speaks standard Midwestern English. People from non-dominant cultures are only considered acceptable when they conform completely to the dominant one.

I suppose Bush got away with that twang.

[mcgazz.livejournal.com]

> we should look at his deeds rather than his words

Right-wingers always seem a lot more concerned with what people say than what they actually do.

[imomus.livejournal.com]

It's no accident that my American album is "synthetic folk"! I won't say I didn't find the idea liberating for a while. Hey, I can be anything I want to be! As long as it's plastic!

It's when it turns into "Hey, the rest of the world can be anything we want it to be!" that it gets scary.

[rodebrecht.livejournal.com]

Great article, thanks for writing it

[ex-newironsh15.livejournal.com]

I agree somewhat -- but at the same time, in our personal lives we don't seem to be doing much to preserve the distinctness of the "fruit". You're not doing much for Scottishness or Japaneseness, and by associating with anglophilic french girls, I'm not doing much for that "fruit" or for my Anglo-American one.

Maybe it is comparable to the drop in bio-diversity from agriculture, or GMO crops. Or perhaps the overall effects are so minor it's more of an evolution than an assimilation. From what some evolutionary theorists are suggesting I'm not too reassured. -- http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/6057734.stm

[wrayb.livejournal.com]

That synthetic tutti frutti flavor has been for sale for a long time here in the US.

OMG. Arudou. That's all I can say, although some of his little crusades are worthy but he is a full time crusader.


I am on board with you on "folk soul" being important for all culteres but there are times I can't help but bristle when in the context of "folk soul" someone hits me with "you white people" when what they should be saying is either "modern corporate consumerism" or "provincial people of the USA" (the latter term just isn't catchy is it).

Sorry. In the future I'll try to be more coherent.

[imomus.livejournal.com]

You're not doing much for Scottishness or Japaneseness, and by associating with anglophilic french girls, I'm not doing much for that "fruit" or for my Anglo-American one.

But there's the argument that it's precisely in my relationship with a Japanese person that I discover my Scottishness!

[(Anonymous)]

Alright, you don't like (what you perceive is) the US idea of dealing with differences. That much you have made clear repeatedly, no need to spend 1k words on it yet again.

Harder than attacking your favourite strawmen would be to offer ideas on how to deal with the real conflicts of multiculturalism in the age of global migration. Within one country, different laws for different cultures (membership of which is determined by DNA sampling)? How do you celebrate your difference with a culture that don't like differences? Etc etc.

der.

[(Anonymous)]

And another thing, so you would prefer to see all those nice and friendly Turks that provide the flavour to your adopted Kiez / fruit-based icecream continue to be denied the rights that come with citizenship in the country they were born in?

der.

Never mind Hitler...

[electricwitch.livejournal.com]

What´s Jeremy Irons doing there?


PS: you´re wearing this icon out.

PS:

[electricwitch.livejournal.com]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C6IEn3hvAYM&NR=1

[mandyrose.livejournal.com]

I couldn't agree more with this post, and I'm American.

Also, it's not only blood ties that matter, but land ties, soil ties. The mainstream American mindset doesn't care about that either-- after all, we picked up and landed "over here" and never cared about what was already here. Now we're making everywhere look like anywhere. The mindset we've established won't stop until all the arable land worldwide is depleted by the extractive capitalist machine, rendering local economies everywhere unable to grow food and support "folk soul". All the while clinging to our political correctness and "fight for freedom".

Folks today can't even handle Steiner, particularly most Americans. He's like 17 geniuses in one body.

And I hate when people use words like "provincial", "hicks", or "corny" to describe the very (rural) people who get the most fucked by this mindset, worldwide. Farmers in particular.

[mandyrose.livejournal.com]

By the way, someone on my local forum likewise referred to the Kakegawa article I linked to as a "straw man". I feel the need to Wiki here:

A straw man argument is an informal fallacy based on misrepresentation of an opponent's position. To "set up a straw man" or "set up a straw man argument" is to create a position that is easy to refute, then attribute that position to the opponent. A straw man argument can be a successful rhetorical technique (that is, it may succeed in persuading people) but it is in fact a misleading fallacy, because the opponent's actual argument has not been refuted.

[(Anonymous)]

Of course, the cultural flavor of San Francisco being beige, coffee house yuppie. That flavor San Francisco is quite good at retaining, you're right.

[anglerfish96.livejournal.com]

Sure, Bush and his followers are misguided in almost every way, but I don't think the cheering on of monoculture has to be the way you are framing it (or the way they frame it). I think it is inevitable that the world's cultures are merging, because of the way information and destination becomes more and more available every day. I think it's possibly a good thing. I like to think of it positively.

On the other hand, when I think of tradition I see little value other than as entertainment for those privileged enough to be entertained and those rich and smart enough to exploit it. Bush and company are certainly part of a tradition, or would like people to think they are, and they're the perfect example of this.

Who's to say that monoculture has to be dull? Because of a stupid ice cream metaphor, we're supposed to be convinced? This is how I see it; when established cultures break down, the individual is forced to cull from their own experience of the world, and that is where monoculture has more potential to shine than any age-old tradition could ever hope.

[(Anonymous)]

I like Matthew Sweet. "Girlfriend" is alright. "Altered Beast" isn't so great in hindsight, but "100% Fun" is still 100% fun.

Marxy

[(Anonymous)]

"He did this by showing various incompletely or incorrectly contextualized photos"

I described the context - Mein Kampf sitting next to books about pot smoking, Che Guavara, and Malcom X and no other books about WWII or Nazism - and this was later confirmed by a non-supportive commenter. Since you've not seen the actual site of the book, how can you personally state it's "incorrectly" or "incompletely" contextualized? Everyone who argued this did not actually go to that Village Vanguard to see the book in action, and again, VV itself is not an intellectual book shop, but a hipster junk shop for kids that has hipster books. My main problem was just seeing Mein Kampf - of all possible books about WWII, Nazism, or Hitler - as the single book offered in its particular context.

Marxy

[(Anonymous)]

"It's time to stop being normative"

This starts with the man in the mirror, of course. Stop questioning my ethnocentric beliefs in Universalism, since it is clearly part of my un-malleable "folk soul."

For all your aspirations of being a Japanese girl, you sure are caustic and critical like an Anglo-Saxon male.

Marxy

[mandyrose.livejournal.com]

I don't have a problem with things blending together. I have a problem with the relentless quest for innovation and the cutting-edge. See where it's gotten us so far. And monoculture will be by definition dull, because it is only one thing, devoid of connection to any place. As I've said before, "culture" and "cultivate" come from the same root word.

As for what can tradition do, ever read any of this guy? I challenge you to read through a whole book of it. He's got a real brain, and amazingly enough, doesn't smoke pot or wear patchouli!

Nothing will ever get solved if people who are too cool for school just stand around rolling their eyes at people who want to make things better.

[mandyrose.livejournal.com]

http://home.clara.net/heureka/art/berry.htm

[anglerfish96.livejournal.com]

I like what Berry says... it gets me to thinking further on my point.

Obviously, we can't just ignore the past, nor inherent difference. But as there are differences in place, race, and time there are differences within individuals. That is what I'm driving at.

The argument that monoculture is inherently dull ignores the fact that there are always those who stand out due to their skills or innovations. The future is a meritocracy, or something to that effect.

When you say 'where it has gotten us so far' I say that war is on the decline-- that's part of our progress. There is more opportunity for people to gather information than ever before, no matter where they are. That is a direct result of progress and innovation. The fact that we are discussing this topic at all is a result of progress and innovation.

I don't think Nick even really believes what he's saying. He's an individualist and a believer in innovation and technology-- there's no doubt about it. He's just trying to sucker people like me into a dialectic to up his hit quotient.

Those points of Berry's... they are an idealized version of what tradition could be. I don't think it reflects history at all. It just really does remind me of the European movements which led to fascism, I'm afraid; glossing over the inherent problems in imposing a generalized attitude toward life (ignoring multiplicity in individuals for the benefit of multiplicity among cultures). Even if he means well, which I'm sure he does.

And but difference is fine, okay... I'm just trying to say that there's room for difference in other ways. Get a bunch of people spouting off ideals and you get, on the one hand, Hitler, on the other Stalin and Mao.

I am starting to lose coherence.

[cheapsurrealist.livejournal.com]

beige is a color

[niddrie-edge.livejournal.com]

Ha ha.. and our Hero released Young Americans as his version of "Plastic Soul", a scene which the Beatles more traditionally referred to as Rubber.

Folk Soul was big with the late 90s hybrid London soul/jazz scene was it not? All that Terry Callier, Minnie Ripperton and early 70s Isley Bros. Then theres the late Tim Buckley.

The Steiner school in Edinburgh used to inspire a horrid derision from some art students describing the Steiner students there as "autists".

A good read today. I loved licking that cone.

[ataxi.livejournal.com]

"The US is a state which demands something impossible: multiculturalism without cultural difference. It's also prepared to steamroller existing cultural differences to achieve this impossible form of "pluralism" (monocultural multiculturalism, we could call it). The current administration has shown itself quite prepared to use military force -- and impose human suffering -- to do it."

How would you feel about a state that achieved a bland monocultural uniformity from a starting point of many individual cultures without oppression, authoritarianism or human suffering?

Example: there was considerable anti-Irish, anti-Catholic sectarianism in Australia pre-WWII. Now, most people, and especially the youth, barely understand there's a difference between an Australian of Irish Catholic extraction and an Anglo-Scottish Presbyterian type. The more other Others of the post-war period - the immigrants from the Mediterranean and then from east and SE Asia - gradually silenced the chorus of minor differences that had seemed so significant to that point in this country. But there was no heavy-handed enforcement of that mutual assimilation.

(NB: clearly Australia is not a perfect haven of multiculturalism by any means. Especially seeing as we have vanishingly small minorities of ethnicity other than the mainstream by comparison to the US.)

Sometimes cultures change, and distinctions are lost or emerge, separate from social trauma. The point to me is that people should live happily and celebrate those differences which mean something to them, not that preserving living cultural difference (as opposed to an academic / historical understanding thereof) is an end in and of itself. Two or more cultures intermingling without snuffing each another out is a beautiful thing, but not a human necessity.

[akabe.livejournal.com]

> Everyone who argued this did not actually go to that Village Vanguard to see the book in action,

that's just not true, everyone either knew the shop or the kind of shop, and even not seeing that particular edition of MK there they could still form a clear picture. the picture you posted also helped. then the one japanese commenter and myself , possibly having spent more time in second hand tokyo booksops than others, have also pointed out that what you found so outrageous was not at all uncommon.

in this kind of arguement sticking to one's initial ideological position rather than to the point is counterproductive and annoying.