[ilds] NYTimes: Multiculturalism: Nothing New

[Bruce Redwine]

Billy,

You make a compelling argument for enlightened despotism.  I share your views, well stated.

Bruce



On Oct 7, 2014, at 1:22 PM, William Apt <billyapt at gmail.com> wrote:

> Absolutely, Bruce:  the Brits in India is a perfect example. For example, I have no doubt that Montolive's father (who I believe is modeled on Patrick Leigh Fermor's own father), despite his being lost to the East, would likely never, as a white Englishman, dream of sharing his position of power and authority with the "natives". But I also completely forgot about Moorish Spain. Again exceptional tolerance fostered by, and cultural blossoming the result of, a dictatorial foreign ruling class? 
>  
> In the end the fact remains: ancient Greek absolutism created a foundation of tolerance, sophistication and enlightenment that endured until the 1950s.  Egypt may now be free of foreign overlords, but such freedom came at a steep cultural price. It exchanged one form of despotism for another: foreign - or foreign collaborationist - and culturally tolerant for indigenous and rigidly intolerant. Has that pattern not repeated itself throughout the Middle East?
>  
> Were not for the Greek dictators of antiquity, the world that LD, Forster and Haag write about might never have existed. Were not for Napoleon III, we would not have the modern city of Paris. Were it not for Fidel, the goals of gender and race equality that Americans still strive for would not have been reached in Cuba 50 years ago.     
>  
> No question dictatorship is always an unknown quantity and most always a lethal form of governance. But it certainly appears that democracy can be too - and just as lethally ignorant, intolerant and provincial.
>  
> Cheers, BILLY
>  
>  
>     
>  
> 
>  
> On Tue, Oct 7, 2014 at 1:38 PM, Bruce Redwine <bredwine1968 at earthlink.net> wrote:
> Billy,
> 
> I think we agree.  Very interesting comparison with Fidel Castro and his policies.  Wilford’s article in the NYT concludes with a quote from Roger Bagnall, a classical historian:  “But I very much feel that the cosmopolitan Hellenistic culture was comfortable with diversity in its surroundings . . . That’s a world we’ve lost.”  That’s the traditional view of Ptolemaic culture:  diverse, open-minded, tolerant.  Shaw’s article presents a different picture, one you acknowledge by referring to “a ruling class.” one which, in Ptolemaic Egypt, was bent of preserving its identity and hegemony.  The Greeks in Egypt were probably similar to the Brits in India and shared similar attitudes about the “natives.”  The Hellenistic Greeks were not free of prejudice, and to rave about Hellenistic cosmopolitanism is probably a distortion.  At the Durrell Celebration in Alexandria (2007), Durrell came in for this criticism from the Egyptians of Alexandria.
> 
> Bruce
> 
> 
> 
> On Oct 7, 2014, at 11:06 AM, William Apt <billyapt at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
>> Bruce:
>>  
>> Its one thing for a ruling class to foster cultural diversity but another if results in a loss of control by that class. After all, the Ptolemies did not oversee a democracy. Exclusion by racial purity and/or language is a perfect means by which to stretch tolerance as far as possible within the boundaries of absolute dictatorship. 
>>  
>> What about today?  The only progressive dictator I can think of is Fidel Castro. He has rigidly maintained control of but fostered a progressive, sophisticated society not by restriction on racial purity or language, but by restriction on speech and assembly.
>>  
>> Like the Ptolemies, Castro has stretched - even forced - tolerance as far as is acceptably possible within boundaries that do not allow his loss of control.    
>>  
>> BILLY      
>> 
>>  
>> On Tue, Oct 7, 2014 at 11:44 AM, Bruce Redwine <bredwine1968 at earthlink.net> wrote:
>> Thanks, Billy, I shall definitely see the exhibit in New York.  I wonder, however, how multi-cultural and open-minded the Ptolemaic Greeks were.  Brent D. Shaw, a Canadian historian now at Princeton, wrote an article on incest in Graeco-Roman Egypt:  “Explaining Incest:  Brother-Sister Marriage in Graeco-Roman Egypt” (Man 27 [1992]).  He argues that Greeks in Egypt, particularly those in the provinces, often married their siblings.  (He supports his argument with abundant census data/records from that period.)  Why the incest?  To preserve the family fortune and to avoid contact with the “natives,” i.e., the local Egyptians.  Plutarch says Cleopatra VII was the first of her clan to speak Egyptian — prior to that all the Ptolemies spoke Greek.  Alexandria certainly had a very diverse culture, but the Greeks themselves may not have been so diversity-minded, particularly when it came to private matters.
>> 
>> Bruce
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> On Oct 7, 2014, at 6:44 AM, William Apt <billyapt at gmail.com> wrote:
>> 
>>> http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/07/science/when-the-greeks-ruled-egypt-highlights-the-diversity-of-cultures-in-ptolemaic-egypt.html?smid=nytcore-iphone-share&smprod=nytcore-iphone
>>> 
>>> An exhibit in New York explores Ptolemaic Egypt’s embrace of diversity.
>>> 
>>> From today's NY Times. 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> WILLIAM APT
>>> Attorney at Law
>>> 812 San Antonio St, Ste 401
>>> Austin TX 78701
>>> 512/708-8300
>>> 512/708-8011 FAX
>> 
>> 
> 

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