You certainly have the right to speak about whatever you see and feel and think, but less about what I think and feel and see, in the sense of defining what I mean or mean to say or what I am 'really' saying. What often happens here in this space is that what a person means is restated by some other in some other way and then their restatement is made the topic of conversation. It is better I think to really try to find out what another means. But, and you should know this, what I say, given that I take very strong positions 'against' certain people and certain idea-structures and perspective-structures within this space, will ever be entertained or accepted. I know this. 'People' seem to deal in their deliberate mishearings, and you in this instance, I think, are doing the same thing.Pye writes: But Alex, this is exactly the crust I'm talking about - crust built up around a valuable thing and assumed withheld from others, these 'untouchable' fruits.
I am not speaking about 'constitutional incapacity' and I also recognize that, in this sense, the 'Library' (center of learning) is the place to be. Again, it is all about coming into contact with the best of the best, interacting with it, and acting in the world while that fermentation is occurring. 'Elitism' comes into play with levels of commitment, with internal decisiveness, and also with talent: dispensation. I would never say that someone or some class of people are 'constitutionally incapable', but I would definitely say that those men (and women) who live in and take in and embody 'the best of the best' represent an elite. We---on in any case I---value them in a different way, appreciate them in a different way. When for example one reads a compendium of wise thoughts on certain subjects, by men who have sacrificed their time and energy to those pursuits, what is there it is seen and understood very differently from that of men (and women) who have not made those sacrifices to knowledge (or art, or poetry, etc.) In my experience, it is the great men who quite strongly set the tone and move the world. It is in that sense I would use the term 'elitism'. But it is just those men (and women) too who know how to listen and to see and appreciate and value persons who are, say, completely illiterate. A very common theme in Russian literature, say Turgenev or Chekov or Korolenko or Solschenizyn, is to be able to 'see' into the beauty of people, where in fact the 'vulgar man' might not at all.