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Ineffectual dialogue understood as Ineffectual intercourse
Infertility as a Metaphor Heralding Global Collapse (Part #7)
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It can be readily asserted that the capacity for effective global dialogue of relevance to any remedial response to global challenges is now highly questionable. Examples of relevance include conflictual conditions with respect to the Middle East, North Korea, Russia, China, and many situations more specific conflicts within and between countries. The challenge to dialogue is also evident in the relations between male and female, recently highlighted by incidences of sexual abuse.
Claims to the contrary are of course a feature of the times, notably framed in terms of appeals for dialogue as a means of resolving such conflicts. Ironically, however, there is little consensus on what constitutes meaningful dialogue. Curiously the challenge extends increasingly to interpersonal relations -- exemplified in a further irony by ambiguity between use of "dialogue" and "intercourse", as discussed separately ("Human Intercourse": "Intercourse with Nature" and "Intercourse with the Other", 2007; Beyond Harassment of Reality and Grasping Future Possibilities: learnings from sexual harassment as a metaphor, 1996).
The issue can be succinctly framed by questions such as the following, many raised elsewhere (Documents relating to Dialogue and Transformative Conferencing):
- What constitutes fruitful global dialogue?
- Where is fruitful dialogue exemplified and cultivated?
- Why is high quality dialogue not recognized, cultivated and rated -- in contrast with the culinary arts, their appreciation, and the assumption that these enable fruitful intercourse?
- Can "soulless" dialogue be compared with "soulless" intercourse as an indication of infertility?
- How is the outcome of fruitful dialogue to be recognized -- beyond the feel-good effect typically analogous to many forms of sexual intercourse?
- As with sexual intercourse, do explicit claims for its high quality typically disguise any perceived inadequacy in its quality?
- What is prematurely designed "off the table" in any dialogue, and how is that to be recognized?
There is a curiously poignant equivalence to the effort of couples to "keep on trying" (in the hope of producing a baby) with that of global dialogue initiatives. These are also optimistically framed in terms of the need to "keep on trying" -- in the hope of achieving global renewal.
The tragedy of infertility for many is however no indication of global infertility -- as indicated by current global fecundity and the ever increasing global population. This obscures the greater tragedy of progressive global psychosocial infertility. In that sense global fecundity is increasingly incapable of reversing the trend to global sterility -- namely the incapacity for sustainable renewal of civilization, globally understood.
| "Getting it up"? "Being great again"? "Talking it up"? "Premature ejaculation"? (We are Our Own Metaphor !) |
Trump's 'Mission Accomplished' tweet, and the premature declaration that haunted George W. Bush Trump fails to see risks of premature exit in Syria Trump's Bombing of Syria Spells the Premature End of Détente President Trump talks up dollar in Davos Talking It Up or Talking It Down? Green Economy: Everyone's talking it up The Limits to Growth Around the globe, they are trying to master nuclear fusion...but none can hold it steady for as long as the team in Anhui. |
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