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Pastimes : Let's Talk About Our Feelings!!! -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Jacques Chitte who wrote (41587)	6/22/1999 11:25:00 PM
From: Dayuhan	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 108807

It is not an easy word to pin down, and it probably isn't worth trying too hard. Largely a matter of personal opinion; it would be hard to find two people who agree on all of the details. Instead of trying to pin the concept down I would look for areas where individual concepts overlap. I think that most of us (clearly not all) would say that a civilized society ought to make at least a reasonable effort to ensure all of its members a reasonable opportunity to improve their lot. This is a relatively new concept, but it has become quite a prevalent one. The same might be said of respect for basic human rights.

To: Jacques Chitte who wrote (41587)	6/23/1999 3:47:00 AM
From: nihil	Respond to of 108807

I agree. Its one of those words that humanities professors like to use. Like Germany before World War I was "one of the most civilized countries on earth." We don't speak of Ancient Jewish Civilization -- too few rocks standing on one another. Athenian civilization --- that's okay , lots of rocks, boring comedies, creepy tragedies, and they killed their greatest man. That's civilized! We don't talk about Aztec Civilization --- nice calendars but too damned much blood! Someone said a civilization is judged by how it treats its most unfortunate members. We don't rate very high by this benchmark. I prefer to judge a civilization by the way its best members behave. Socrates and Jesus were really good guys (and paid the price). I don't know anyone in Rome that I consider wholly admirable. Just ignorance I guess. Washington, Franklin, and Jefferson were almost flawless. The last half-18th century in America was a great creative, human history changing flowering of a civilization with one terrible defect that destroyed it in time.