Received: by alpheratz.cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk id MAA27432 (8.6.9/5.3[ref pg@gmsl.co.uk] for cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk from fmb-bounces@mmu.ac.uk); Wed, 3 Oct 2001 12:55:17 +0100 Message-ID: <2D1C159B783DD211808A006008062D3102A6D05C@inchna.stir.ac.uk> From: Vincent Campbell <v.p.campbell@stir.ac.uk> To: "'memetics@mmu.ac.uk'" <memetics@mmu.ac.uk> Subject: RE: state of memes Date: Wed, 3 Oct 2001 12:50:41 +0100 X-Mailer: Internet Mail Service (5.5.2650.21) Content-Type: text/plain Sender: fmb-bounces@mmu.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
Hi Joachim,
Welcome to the list.
On TV in the UK last night was the first in a three part documentary about
the serial killers Fred and Rosemary West, that used taped recordings of
police interviews with Fred West. Anyway, on hearing this man's very flat
and largely unemotional description of cutting the head off the body of one
of his daughters (who he'd raped, tortured and murdered) so she'd fit in the
hole in the back garden he'd dug, I got a sense of what I believe has been
referred to as the banality of evil.
You're quite that the demons of our modern world, be they serial killers,
members of genocidal regimes, or terrorists, are usually banal, everyday
people outside of the acts they commit, able to hold down jobs, have
families, friends etc. etc.
Memes are a gloriously interesting starting point for many our list
discussions, and honestly we do try to stick to memetics at least some of
the time. The trouble with a multi-discipinary subject is that there's lots
of ground to make up between all the different contributing disciplines, and
that does lead us off topic on occasion.
Vincent
> ----------
> From: Joachim Maier
> Reply To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
> Sent: Wednesday, October 3, 2001 10:00 am
> To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
> Subject: Re: state of memes
>
>
> >Care to explain who HAMAS and HizbAllah are? Nice people one would invite
>
> >over for tea?
>
> Very likely they are. The top Nazis apparently were very charming company.
>
> I just talked to a former foreign service employee who told me that a top
> guy responsible for the Tutsi massacre in Rwanda was at her house for
> dinner shortly before the massacre began. She wondered out loud how he
> could have been so at ease plotting the slaughter of hundreds of thousands
>
> of people.
>
> Schwaeble
> PS
> I'm new to this list, and new to the idea of memes. This is very
> interesting stuff :)
>
>
>
> ===============================================================
> This was distributed via the memetics list associated with the
> Journal of Memetics - Evolutionary Models of Information Transmission
> For information about the journal and the list (e.g. unsubscribing)
> see: http://www.cpm.mmu.ac.uk/jom-emit
>
===============================================================
This was distributed via the memetics list associated with the
Journal of Memetics - Evolutionary Models of Information Transmission
For information about the journal and the list (e.g. unsubscribing)
see: http://www.cpm.mmu.ac.uk/jom-emit
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Wed Oct 03 2001 - 13:00:33 BST