Legal Reasoning

[denna]

tag

Mata Hari 1932

[raspberry reich]

According to Nietzsche, Christianity so totally suppressed the body's vital impulses that humanity lost its creativity. Nietzsche taught what Jung was later essentially to repeat, that the irrational factor must neither be eliminated nor thoroughly tamed by order-seeking reason, but somehow integrated into our lives.

Well, it seems someone is connecting the dots in this thread; reason, too much of it as exemplified in the legal reasoning method, and Nietzsche with the irrational factor to be stressed upon, on the other hand ...

As Fromm notes,

Mystics are the really free people. They nourish their freedom. They are in no way afraid of being free. They learn to trust their self. For in their eyes the self is nothing but a gateway to the higher Self. Behind and beyond our self can we  learn to know that Divine Self that is the basis of everything. If we come into contact with that deepest Self, our freedom will no more intimidate us. That very freedom will establish a basis for real self-confidence. Only then are we really free. Only in God can we be really free, as the wisdom traditions teach us.

After writing Escape from Freedom in 1941, the developments have speeded up in rapid pace. Especially since the sixties and seventies man and society have become even more individualized. Fromm's book certainly made a contribution to that development. In the sixties the book was on the shelf of each self respecting intellectual.  It has been a major factor in shaping our culture. In the book he described the psychological and cultural pathologies that were caused by a constantly growing freedom for the individual in our modern society. Even now we are still haunted by these pathologies. But in the future these pathologies can become healed. Then man will dare to be really free. Recent developments, as well in science as in society, make us hopeful. In psychology more attention nowadays is being paid to investigation into religious experiences and their effects on our psyche. One strives to combine the experiences of many cultures and traditions in an integral embrace. Humans of today are more conscious of their selves than a number of decades ago. This is an ongoing development that can make us hopeful about more future evolutionary growth of our consciousness.

[ratrace]

tag

Mata Hari 1932

I don't get all this passion for this woman ... I mean, here it is the truth about this "superstar":

The lady on top of you is the infamous Mata Hari. Lips don't come much looser than hers. The name means, "Child of the Dawn" in Hindi, or "Eye of the Dawn" in Malay. She was, they said, the daughter of a Brahmin and an initiate into the rituals of sacred Kandiswami dance. The Follies Bergere nearly had drool ditches cut into the floors for the Frenchmen gathered in mobs to admire her... cultural diversity. They apparently thought she was pretty OK, even though she shaved her armpits. Who says the French are intolerant? She arrived in Paris with nothing but her clothes. And, hearing once that 'Less is More', shed those, along with her previous identity. After that, she wanted for absolutely nothing in life (except a good source of contraception, a steady supply of "Indian Teak" body stain, and a strong dose of Penicillin now and then). Eventually, WWI started, and Mata found out that she had a uniform fetish; and the more stars, bars, ribbon and doodads on it the better. Her boudoir became the hospitality suite of French High Command. The German army showed Mata how her hunger could be turned from fun to profit, and soon her vast range of pillow talk became military intelligence for the Kaiser.

Dutch spy Mata Hari wasn't as important as everyone seems to believe. Accused of being a double agent for both the French and German army during the Great War, Mata Hari was executed in 1917 by a French firing squad.

She was born in the northern Dutch town of Leeuwarden as Margaretha Geertruida Zelle. She moved to France where she started a career as a nude dancer where she became famous and moved in the highest circles of Europe. So, the French Secret Service asked Mata Hari to mingle with the Germans. However, during her first mission something went wrong and she was arrested by the British intelligence service. For a long time, historians have thought her arrest was mere coincidence. But the British kept Mata Hari under close surveillance from 1915 on. In the meantime, the French too got suspicious. Mata Hari had lovers on both sides of the border.

It also became clear that German army officers were paying her. Officially, it was to keep them company but the French intelligence office wasn't so sure about that. What if she was paid for passing on sensitive information? When she tried to cross into France to visit one of her lovers, Mata Hari was arrested by the French Secret Service and interrogated. During one of these long sessions, she succumbed and confessed to being a German spy, known under the pseudonym of H21.

The trial that followed was nothing more than a showcase trial. The French were convinced she was "one of the greatest spies of the century, responsible for the deaths of tens of thousands of soldiers". Mata Hari was deemed guilty and condemned to death. In 1917, she died in front of a firing squad despite her desperate claims that she was innocent. The Dutch Mata Hari Foundation however, still sees possibilities to rehabilitate her with the help of several newly released MI-5 documents. They still think there may be chance that Mata Hari was indeed innocent.

[mh]

Well, I read this thread very attentively and I just don't get why all the "surprise" by the whole law school experience ... I mean, law school is  not  a mere continuation of one's undergraduate (or even graduate) studies -- I think it more akin to "boot camp" where, in addition to certain substantive subjects and professional skills, one becomes "re-socialized," learns to "think like a lawyer," learns to cope with stress and many other things collateral to learning law, but not collateral to "lawyering." Like boot camp (or virginity's loss!), when you enter law school, your life turns a corner past which it can never again pass. Don't get me wrong, I do not regret the trip ... but it brings a permanent change. So, those of you who still have the chance, enjoy the virginity -- law school will bring a permanent change!

[Sweeny03]

weird thread, will have to finish reading later

[emc]

please post it in english, we love poetry but it has to be in english for us to appreciate its magnitude of greatness

Exactly!

[terapist]

I think it has to do with a man at an intersection that disregards a red traffic light. A traffic policeman says him he's not supposed to do it. The man says that he can as there were no cars and that sometimes the traffic light is green but there are cars going thru and he can't cross the road. The traffic policeman becomes confused and the man crosses the road seeing that the policeman can't even say a word. That's what it says in essence.

Le visage en feu
 
J'arrive à un carrefour,
le feu était au rouge.
Il n'y avait pas de voitures,
je passe!
Seulement, il y avait
un agent qui faisait le guet
Il me siffle.
Il me dit
- Vous êtes passé au rouge!
- Oui ! Il n'y avait pas de voitures!
- Ce n'est pas une raison!
Je dis:
- Ah si! Quelquefois, le feu est au vert . . .
Il y a des voitures et . .
je ne peux pas passer!
Stupeur de l'agent!
Il est devenu tout rouge.
Je lui dis:
- Vous avez le visage en feu!
Il est devenu tout vert!
Alors, je suis passé!

Raymond Devos

[ae]

Thanks terapist for the interpretation. A fairly simple story, but with such a great message!

[qui tam]

Indeed, ae!!!

[arrogantbastardofahunk]

Awesome thread overall!