Hello Piet Potlood
Baie dankie vir hierdie terugvoer van jou kant af en die bevestiging dat die vraag in die lig van dit wat in Ons Mense, op kykNET aangebied was.
Dit was ’n baie goeie reeks en verblydend dat drie werklike intelligente mense hard gepoog het om sin te maak van die omstandighede hier en hoe daar diep in die verlede terug gegaan is en die kalmte waarmee dit gedoen was. ’n Reeks gesprekke wat met gemak aanbeveel kan word.
Indien dit die agtergrond van jou vraag was, dan sal ek my antwoord aan jou soos volg wil uitbrei. Daar was ’n vorige geleentheid waar die vraagstuk oor die aard van die intellektueel bespreek was en ek na die werk van Václav Havel verwys en die antwoord wat hy op die volgende vraag gebied het.
Die vraag is soos volg:
Where do intellectuals stand in relation to politics?
Die antwoord volgens Václav Havel:
The intellectual – those who are mindful of the ties that link everything in this world together, who approach the world with humility, but also with an increased sense of responsibility, who wage a struggle for every good thing - such intellectuals should be listened to with the greatest attention, regardless of whether they work as independent critics, holding up a much-needed mirror to politics and power, or are directly involved in politics.
I am deeply convinced that the more such people engage directly in practical politics, the better our world will be. By its very nature, politics induces those who work in it to focus their attention on short-term issues that have direct bearing on the next elections instead of on what will happen a hundred years from now. It compels them to pursue group interests rather than the interests of the human community as a whole, to say things that please everyone and not those which people are less happy to hear, to treat even truth itself with caution.
But this is not a reason to deny intellectuals a place in politics. It is instead a challenge to draw into it as many of them as possible. After all, who is better equipped to decide about the fate of this globally interconnected civilization than people who are most keenly aware of these interconnections, who pay the greatest regard to them, who take the most responsible attitude toward the world as a whole?
Noam Chomsky het ook weer onlangs oor hierdie onderwerp geskryf en die opstel kan hier gevind word met die titel van die opstel, “The Responsibility of Intellectuals, Redux: Using Privilege to Challenge the State”.
Dit is ’n gewigtige opstel en word net die volgende uitgelig.
The concept of intellectuals in the modern sense gained prominence with the 1898 “Manifesto of the Intellectuals” produced by the Dreyfusards who, inspired by Emile Zola’s open letter of protest to France’s president. The Dreyfusards’ stance conveys the image of intellectuals as defenders of justice, confronting power with courage and integrity.
Twee swaargewigte, Václav Havel en Noam Chomsky as aanvulling tot die drie deelnemers van Ons Mense.
Dit antwoord as sodanig nie, wie ’n intellektueel is, alhoewel ek aanvoer ’n ingeligte persoon sal ’n intellektueel gou kan eien, die waarde van bogenoemde verwysings is om as ’n rigtingwyser te geld van wat “ons” van die intellektueel kan verwag en is daarom waardevol vir verdere ontwikkeling.
Baie dankie
Wouter
Brief verkort. – Maggie