Elogio dellascrittura incomprensibile

The Educational Benefits of Obscurity: Pedagogical Esotericism – Philosophy Between the Lines: The Lost History of Esoteric Writing – Arthur M. Melzer

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I libri chiari ci rendono superficiali, quelli oscuri ci motivano. Solo il lettore frustrato è un buon lettore.

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one must embrace obscurity (of the right kind) as something essential to effective philosophical communication. Naturally, this seems counterintuitive, not to say twisted and perverse.

Note:LA COMUNICAZIONE FILOSOFICA

If it is indeed the case that the practice of esoteric writing is a genuine and widespread historical phenomenon, that is largely bad news for scholars. It means a lot more work.

Note:ALLONTANARE I PIGRI

obscurity is not just an ugly obstacle to understanding, as we have been assuming up until now, but rather something engaging, even charming, and at any rate good for us—an important aid to our philosophical development.

Note:Euro ELOGIO DELL”OSCURITÀ

Take the case of Alexander Herzen, the great nineteenth-century Russian writer and revolutionary. He knew at first hand the evils of czarist censorship, having been arrested several times, and he knew the difficult constraints of “Aesopian language.”… Still, as a writer, he also had a fine sensitivity to matters of rhetoric and persuasion, which led him to the following observations in praise of esoteric writing: censorship is highly conducive to progress in the mastery of style and in the ability to restrain one’s words. . . . In allegorical discourse there is perceptible excitement and struggle: this discourse is more impassioned than any straight exposition. The word implied has greater force beneath its veil and is always transparent to those who care to understand. A thought which is checked has greater meaning concentrated in it—it has a sharper edge; to speak in such a way that the thought is plain yet remains to be put into words by the reader himself is the best persuasion. Implication increases the power of language….

Note:ELOGIO DELLA CENSURA

THE MODERN ETHIC OF LITERALNESS AND CLARITY

we find obscurity hateful. To be sure, there are fields so inherently difficult and counterintuitive that a fair amount of obscurity is unavoidable—as in contemporary physics. The thing we hate is voluntary obscurity.

Note:LA SENSIBILITÀ CONTEMPORANEA

especially we in the Anglo-American world, where philosophy is viewed as something that is—or at least ought to be—an exact and rigorous matter that should not stoop to “rhetoric,” ambiguity, or multivocal speech of any kind. We proudly stand by an ethic of literalness and clarity.

Note:MONDO ANGLOAMERICANO

Yet as obvious and normal as this attitude may seem to us, historically speaking it is quite rare. As soon as one ventures beyond the narrow shores of our modern world—whether one looks to the ancient Greeks and Romans or to the Bible and the Koran or to the traditional societies of the East, of Africa, and of Native America—virtually everywhere one finds the same thing: “The words of the wise and their riddles.”

Note:NELLA STORIA TUTTO È INDOVINELLO

Indeed, classical rationalism at its peak (as distinguished from Enlightenment rationalism) regarded the issue of whether wisdom is teachable at all as a grave and open question. In Plato’s Protagoras (319a–320c), we see Socrates arguing that wisdom and virtue cannot be taught (although they can be learned).

Note:RAZIONALISMO CLASSICO

Compounding this difficulty, classical thinkers were also very much preoccupied with the problem of writing. Can books ever be useful for such education, or must all genuinely philosophical instruction be oral and personal? In Plato’s Phaedrus, this question was answered firmly in the negative by Socrates, who, like Pythagoras before him, eschewed philosophical writing altogether.

Note:SCRIVERE O PARLARE?

Thomas Aquinas in explaining the fact that Jesus—the other great teacher of the West—also did not write, argued that the most excellent teachers must follow the practice of Pythagoras and Socrates, for “Christ’s doctrine . . . cannot be expressed in writing.”

Note:IL METODO DI GESÙ

The movement against ambiguity led by Western intellectuals since the seventeenth century figures as a unique development in world history.

Note:CONTRO L’AMBIGUITÀ… ILLUMINISMO

The whole reorientation of philosophy that one sees in Bacon, Descartes, and Hobbes, especially the harmonist effort to give philosophic reason a new level of power and control within the world of practice, gave new and fundamental importance to certainty and exactness.

Note:ESATTEZZA

Similarly, in the sphere of religion, ascetic Puritanism, with its ideal of sincerity, its dislike of adornment, and its suspicion of arcane, priestly doctrine led to a call for plain, simple, and direct speaking—a kind of semantic prudishness.

Note:IL PURITANESIMO

on the political level, Bacon, Spinoza, Hobbes, and the Enlightenment thinkers emphasized that prejudice and superstition—and the oppressive political and religious powers they support—draw much of their strength from the human tendency to be fooled by obscure speech, by metaphors, rhetoric, poetry, and the other nonrational aspects of human discourse.

Note:VALENZA POLITICA DELLA CHIAREZZA

It seems obvious to us that philosophy should be a pure matter of propositions and arguments, rigorously laid out, as in a contemporary journal of analytic philosophy. But this attitude rests on a premise: the hyperrationalist assumption, inherited from the Enlightenment, that human beings can be addressed from the start as rationalists seeking the truth.

Note:LA RAGIONE CONOSCE E NOI VOGLIAMO CONOSCERE…PREMESSA NECESSARIA

But as the tradition of classical rationalism emphasized, we may be “rational animals” in that we possess the faculty of reason, but we are hardly born rationalists.

Note:CLASSICI: IN NOI IL RAZIONALISMO NON È NATURALE

THREE DANGERS OF READING

With respect to philosophy, there is a real danger that, in the words of Voltaire, “the multitude of books is making us ignorant.”

Note:VOLTAIRE

The first danger of reading books is that it allows you to skip too many stages, shortcutting the proper intellectual development.

Note:IL LIBRO ACCELLERA INDEBITAMENTE L’APPRENDIMENTO

As Socrates argues in the Phaedrus—putting these words in the mouth of an Egyptian god, Thamus, who is rebuking the inventor of writing—through writing “you offer your pupils the appearance of wisdom, not true wisdom, for they will read many things without instruction, and will therefore seem to know many things, when they are for the most part ignorant” (275a–b).

Note:CONOSCENZA SOLO APPARENTE

The false presumption of wisdom, which is generated by books, presents the greatest obstacle to the acquisition of the real thing. Whence the inner logic of Milton’s description: “Deep versed in books and shallow in himself.”

Note:ILLUSIONE DI CONOSCENZA

This same problem is elaborated very powerfully in Emile, Rousseau’s book on education: “I hate books. They only teach one to talk about what one does not know.” And again: “Too much reading only serves to produce presumptuous

Note:ROUSSEAU

Intellectual humility and the keen sense of our ignorance are the necessary starting points for genuine philosophical development;

Note:L’UMILTÀ PERDUTA

But book learning thwarts philosophic education by fostering not only a false presumption of wisdom but also an enfeebling passivity. “Much reading is an oppression of the mind,” remarks William Penn, “and extinguishes the natural candle, which is the reason of so many senseless scholars in the world.”10 As Montaigne puts it: “We let ourselves lean so heavily on the arms of others that we annihilate our own powers.”… Schopenhauer: When we read, another person thinks for us:…

Note:MOLTA LETTURA MOLTA PASSIVITÀ

The solution to this problem is to be found, once again, in employing a salutary obscurity that does not allow the readers passively to rely on the writer’s thinking, but forces them to think for themselves.

Note:L’OSCURITÀ CI RISVEGLIA

Thomas Aquinas, in considering the question of why the Bible often uses veiled, metaphorical language, remarks: “The very hiding of truth in figures is useful for the exercise of thoughtful minds.”

Note:TOMMASO SULLE METAFORE BIBLICHE

Neoplatonist, in discussing why the Greeks shrouded their religious teachings in myth, remarks: There is this first benefit from myths, that we have to search and do not have our minds idle.

Note:FUNZIONE DEI MITI

Still another danger of reading, closely related to that of mental passivity, is the development of an excessive trust and dependence on the author.

Note:PERICOLO DIPENDENZA

To quote Montaigne: We know how to say: “Cicero says thus; such are the morals of Plato; these are the very words of Aristotle.” But what do we say ourselves?

Note:MONTAIGNE

Cicero’s solution was to frustrate the reader’s “unreasonable degree of curiosity” by ensuring that his own final position remained unclear.

Note:FRUSTRARE IL LETTORE

THE PARADOX OF PHILOSOPHICAL EDUCATION

For philosophical education requires not merely that one avoid discouraging the reader in these three ways from employing his own mind, but that one positively motivate him to think and, above all, to think authentically and for himself.

Note:MOTIVARE IL LETTORE

philosophy aims, not at “right opinion,” but “knowledge”: not simply at possessing correct answers but at knowing how and why they are correct.

Note:CONOSCERE E SAPERE

it is only thinking for oneself in this deeply personal sense that produces a real and transformative effect upon the soul.

Note:PENSARE DA SÈ

If this is the character of genuine philosophy, then it really is an open question whether it is teachable. Wisdom cannot be told.

Note:LA SAGGEZZA NON SI INSEGNA

Do not give away the answers. The Socratic teacher leaves the most important things unsaid

Note:IL METODO SOCRATICO NON REGALA LE RISPOSTE

Yet, second, there is also something positive that the teacher or writer can do: he can stimulate the student to think for himself—

Note:STIMOLO A PENSARE PER SÈ

But, third, for this thinking and questioning to maintain an authentic connection to the student’s life, it must be dialectical.

Note:DIALETTICA

A fourth element of the Socratic method—actually, just a further aspect of its dialectical character—is that a proper philosophical education must proceed in stages…The student must not be encouraged to race through these stages to the end,… Our lives do not change as quickly as our thoughts….

Note:PROCEDERE PER GRADI

Tempo is everything. Prematurity—showing the student more than he is ready to understand or digest at the moment—is the great wrecker of educations… “never show the child anything he cannot see.”…

Note:IL TEMPISMO È TUTTO

it highlights what is so terribly problematic about books: they are impersonal and fixed… That indeed is Socrates’s primary objection to writing as stated in the Phaedrus (275d–e)—the univocity of writing….

Note:IL PROBLEMA DEI LIBRI

To promote a genuinely philosophical education, in sum, it is necessary to write esoterically in at least four ways—to withhold the answers, to begin by embracing received opinion, to guide the reader by way of hints and riddles, and to address the different stages of understanding by writing on multiple levels.

Note:LA SOLUZIONE ESOTERICA

THE RHETORICAL EFFECT OF OBSCURITY

Even if it is true that one hinders philosophic education in various ways by telling a student too much, still doesn’t one hinder it even more by saying too little?

Note:UNA OBIEZIONE

Everyone loves a secret. Mystery is alluring. Hide something and we will seek it. This simple fact is the first premise of all pedagogical esotericism.

Note:FASCINO DEL MISTERO

Jesus—who hides his thought in parables—gives this famous literary advice: “Do not give dogs what is holy; and do not throw your pearls before swine”

Note:NON DATE PERLE AI PORCI

according to Nietzsche: The misfortune suffered by clear-minded and easily understood writers is that they are taken for shallow and thus little effort is expended on reading them:

LA SFORTUNA DELLO SCRITTORE CHIARO

As Augustine puts it: All those truths which are presented to us in figures tend, in some manner, to nourish and arouse the flame of love

Note:AGOSTINO

that there is nothing immature or irrational in the power of obscurity to generate philosophical motivations such as these.

Note:MOTIVAZIONE

thinkers. Nietzsche, that master of the coy and aphoristic style, speaks of The effectiveness of the incomplete.—

Note:L’INCOMPLETO

Montesquieu alluded to this same “effectiveness of the incomplete” in his famous remark quoted above: “One must not always so exhaust a subject that one leaves nothing for the reader to do.

Note:MONTESQUIEU

These, then, are the main essentials of persuasiveness; to which may be added that indicated by Theophrastus when he says that all possible points should not be punctiliously and tediously elaborated, but some should be left to the comprehension and inference of the hearer who when he perceives what you have omitted becomes not only your hearer but your witness, and a very friendly witness too. For he thinks himself intelligent because you have afforded him the means of showing his intelligence. It seems like a slur on your hearer to tell him everything as though he were a simpleton.

Note:TEOFRASTO

He particularly admires Thucydides’s pedagogical style: “He reports the facts without judging them, but he omits none of the circumstances proper to make us judge them ourselves.”

Note:TEUCIDIDE

The other ancient historian most famous for his brevity and obscurity is Tacitus. The specific pleasure and encouragement produced by his rhetoric are nicely described by Sir Richard Baker (1568–1645), the English historian and writer.

Note:TACITO

Again, the Roman rhetorician Quintilian recommends that when arguing in court, one speak elliptically and just let the facts silently point to your claim, because then [t]his ensures that the judge himself searches for something which perhaps he would not believe if he heard it, and then believes what he thinks he has found out for himself.38

Note:QUINTILIANO

Boccaccio, in his Life of Dante, declares: “Whatever has been gained by hard work has a certain pleasure. . . . Therefore, in order that [the truth] should be more appreciated by being gained through labor and for that reason better preserved, poets hid it under many details which seem contrary to it.”

Note:BOCCACCIO SU DANTE

Love of the Hidden and Reverence for the Obscure

A second general aspect of obscurity’s appeal is the well-known phenomenon that whatever is veiled strikes us as more alluring and desirable.

Note:L’AURA DEL MISTERO E DEL PROIBITO

A Charm invests a face Imperfectly beheld— The Lady dare not lift her Veil For fear it be dispelled42

Note:EMILY DICKINSON

THE RHETORICAL EFFECT OF THE PROSAIC

The modern rationalist, the believer in literalness and clarity, holds that by writing in a dry, neutral, and rigorous manner one appeals directly to the rational faculties, without any involvement of rhetorical bias. The problem is that such a style is not really neutral, for the prosaic too has a powerful rhetorical effect and not a simply rational or salutary one.

Note:LA RETORICA NON E’ MAI NEUTRALIZZABILE

husbanded. “Silence is a fence around wisdom,” states Maimonides.43 Indeed, Pythagoras was famous for imposing a lengthy period of silence on his students to prepare their souls for philosophy.

Note:SILENZIO

open. For example, Diogenes Laertius, in his account of the notoriously obscure writings of Heraclitus, remarks: “according to some, he deliberately made it the more obscure in order that none but adepts should approach it, and lest familiarity should breed contempt.”

Note:L’ADEPTO

THE BURDEN OF ESOTERIC INTERPRETATION

If past thinkers deliberately wrote their books in the manner suggested, they would impose on the reader the enormous burden of navigating artificial labyrinths, solving elaborate puzzles, and cracking obscure codes—and all of this effort would be needed just in order to arrive at an understanding of what the book’s real argument is. The reader will then scarcely have time or energy left to do the real business of philosophy:

Note:PERCHE’ VESSARE IL LETTORE?

LEISURE AND ESOTERIC LITERACY

Today we labor under the great burden of a philosophic tradition that now stretches back 2,500 years. There are hundreds of major philosophical works to master and—since the rise of modern scholarship about 150 years ago—there are also hundreds of secondary writings devoted to each one of these primary works. Indeed, in our time, it is hardly possible to walk through the stacks of a major research library and not feel, among other things, oppressed by the crushing weight of so many books. The fact is that modern scholars find themselves in an impossible intellectual situation, which, though it is seldom thematically discussed, conditions all of their hermeneutical instincts. It strongly inclines us to dismiss as implausible—because simply unbearable—any suggestion that would increase our already overwhelming scholarly burden. But of course this condition of overload did not always exist.

Note:IL CONTESTO: IERI C’ERA POCO DA LEGGERE E MOLTO DA MEDITARE… E L’INDOVINELLO ALLETTAVA

John Stuart Mill remarks: It must be remembered that they [the Greeks and Romans] had more time, and they wrote chiefly for a select class, possessed of leisure. To us who write in a hurry for people who read in a hurry, the attempt to give an equal degree of finish would be a loss of time.

Note:IL PIACERE DI PERDER TEMPO CON I LIBRI

Tocqueville: One ought to remark, furthermore, that in all of antiquity books were rare and expensive,

Note:POCHE FONTI SU CUI FANTASTICARE

Furthermore, having a taste for literary subtlety and having grown up with a literature that practiced it, ancient readers would have learned the rudiments of esoteric reading almost along with the art of reading itself.

Note:DECIFRARE=LEGGERE (PER GLI ANTICHI)

ESOTERICISM VS. THE MODERN IDEAS OF PROGRESS AND PUBLICATION

the pressure of unread books, the disappearance of a leisured culture of aristocratic understatement, and the want of socialization in esoteric ways

Note:LA PRESSIONE DEI LIBRI NON LETTI

Faith in progress is based on the (very un-Socratic) assumption that wisdom or knowledge can be not only taught but “published” in the modern sense: written down in books in such a way as to be easily and genuinely appropriated, so that the next generation, after a brief period of learning, can begin where the previous one left off.

Note:PROGRESSO=>PUBBLICAZIONI

A second, related assumption of modern progress-philosophy is that intellectual production functions in essentially the same way as economic production: the progress of both results from “teamwork,” from the division of labor or specialization within a group.

Note:PROGRESSO E DIVISIONE DEL LAVORO (LA COMUNICQAZIONE DEVE ESSERE FACILE E LINEARE)

THE ESOTERIC BOOK AS AN IMITATION OF NATURE

Classical philosophical texts were written not primarily for scholars and other workers in a collective enterprise but for the “rare individual,” the person of extraordinary philosophical and interpretive gifts,

Note:SCRIVERE PER IL SINGOLO, NON PER IL GRUPPO

The objection assumes that the deciphering of an esoteric text is a task altogether different from—and therefore obstructive of—philosophizing. It assumes that the puzzles contained in the esoteric book are purely “artificial” and unrelated to the puzzles in reality that occupy the philosopher. But this is not necessarily the case. Indeed, one of the primary purposes of pedagogical concealment is precisely to train the reader for the kind of thinking needed to philosophize. But whether and how it is able to serve this purpose depend on how one understands the true character of philosophy and of the reality it seeks to penetrate.

Note:ALLENARE A DECIFRARE LA NATURA DECIFRANDO IL TESTO

Socrates, for example, who claimed to know only that he knew nothing, was a skeptic in this sense—to adopt here the interpretation of Leo Strauss. For Socrates, philosophy is knowledge of ignorance.

Note:IL PROGRESSO PER SOCRATE

one cannot know that one is fundamentally ignorant without knowing that the world poses fundamental questions to which one does not have the definitive answer.

Note:CONOSCERE LA PROPRIA IGNORANZA

if this is the case, then the puzzle-quality of an esoteric text would not be artificial and obstructive of philosophy but rather natural and necessary, being an accurate imitation of reality. Thus, according to Strauss, Plato wrote his dialogues so as to “supply us not so much with an answer to the riddle of being as with a most articulate ‘imitation’ of that riddle.”53 Similarly, Thucydides’s history “imitates the enigmatic character of reality.”

TOCCARE CON MANO LA PROPRIA IGNORANZA

Contro la discriminazione sessuale nello sport

Contro la discriminazione sessuale nello sport

Against sexual discrimination in sports – Values in Sport: Elitism, Nationalism, Gender Equality and the Scientific Manufacturing of Winners – Torbjörn Tännsjö

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Esistono ambiti sociali in cui la discriminazione femminile si pratica ancora senza alcuna vergogna: per esempio lo sport. Come farla cessare?

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Introduction

Sexual discrimination is a widespread and recalcitrant phenomenon. However, in Western societies, explicit sexual discrimination, when exposed, is seldom defended straightforwardly. There is one remarkable exception to this, however. Within sports sexual discrimination is taken for granted… Even by radical feminists this kind of sexual discrimination has rarely been questioned. This is strange….

Note:NELLO SPORT LA DISCRIMINIZZAZIONE SESSUALE ÈACCETTATA

The thesis of this chapter is that it is not. Even within sports, sexual discrimination is morally objectionable. No sexual discrimination should take place within sports.

L’ECCEZIONE È GIUSTIFICABILE?

The reasons for giving up sexual discrimination within sports, and for allowing individuals of both sexes to compete with each other, is simple. In sports it is crucial that the best person wins. Then sexual differences are simply irrelevant.

Note:RAGIONI PER ELIMINARLA

These are the main arguments for sexual discrimination within sports – some of them, no doubt, striking an indistinguishable (yet false) chord of special concern for women: Sexual discrimination within sports is no different from the use of, say, different weight classes in certain sports, intended to make the result less predictable. We use sexual discrimination because we seek, to use Warren Fraleigh’s term, ‘the sweet tension of uncertainty of outcome’. If women and men compete, and women defeat men, then this will cause violent responses from men. So we had better retain the discrimination. If we give up sexual discrimination in sports, then probably all women will find (because on average they perform poorly in comparison with men) that they are always defeated by some men. This will be discouraging for women in general and for female athletes in particular. Female sports are different from male sports. They represent a unique value, and if we gave up discrimination this unique value would be foregone. A similar argument can be devised with reference to male sports, of course.

Note:ARGOMENTI AVANZATI DI SOLITO PER TOLLERARLA

Sexual discrimination as no different to the use of weight classes?

I have sometimes met the objection that sexual discrimination in some sports is no different to the use of weight classes in, say, boxing. We have such weight classes in order to ascertain that the outcome of a competition is not too easily predictable.

Note:OBIEZIONE DEL PESO

Such classes are constructed with reference to crucial characteristics of the individual athlete, characteristics with relevance for the capacity to perform…Sexual discrimination is different: it takes place on the ground that, on average, women perform less well than men in certain sports. This is objectionable….Perhaps this is a mere statistical accident. Perhaps it is due to socially constructed…And even if the statistical correlation is due to biological sexual differences (more below about sexual differences, and how to define them), and even if it has a law-like character, it is still only a statistical difference….women, who are not (statistically speaking) ‘typical’, perform better than many (most) men do….

Note:LA DIFFERENZA CON LA DISCRIMINAZIONE SESSUALE

It is ‘discrimination’, then, not only in a factual sense (in the way the term is used in this chapter), when a competent woman, who can and wants to defeat a certain man, is prohibited from doing so, on the ground that women in general do not perform as well as men in general. But it is also ‘discrimination’ in a moral sense, and such discrimination is morally reprehensible.

Note:DOPPIA DISCRIMINAZIONE

sexual classes (sex is only indirectly and statistically relevant to winning in boxing).

Note:CONCLUSIONE

Sexual discrimination because of male aggressiveness?

Not only boxing, but also many other sports, are aggressive and involve a considerable amount of physical contact and encounter between competing athletes. Now, if women and men are allowed to compete against each other, and if some women defeat some men, then this would trigger violent responses from these men, or so the argument goes.

Note:I VANTAGGI DELL’AGGRESSIVITÀ: L’UOMO CHE LA BUTTA IN RISSA

it would be wrong to surrender to the argument, for there is another way of responding to the phenomenon of male aggressiveness against women. I am thinking here of the possibility of rendering impossible the aggressive response. This could be done if the rules of the game in question were changed. Aggressive assault on competitors could be punished much more severely than it is in many sports currently.

Note:RIMEDI ALTERNATIVI ALLA DISCRIMINAZIONE

Take tennis as an example. In modern tennis, the service is of enormous importance: an efficient service presupposes a lot of physical strength from the server. At the same time, an effective service tends to render the sport rather boring: it kills the game by taking the elegance out of it. An obvious solution to this problem would be to introduce a rule saying that a service is not successful unless the receiver has successfully returned it.

Note:ESEMPIO DEL TENNIS

Women will be discouraged?

even if it is a good thing from the point of view of sexual equality when a woman beats a man, is it not a bad thing, from the same point of view, when the best women in certain sports find that they cannot compete with the best men? Wouldn’t this fact be disappointing for these women?

Note:DONNE SCORAGGIATE?

This is basically the case in many other fields of society. There are men within certain sciences and arts, such as mathematics and musical composition, who perform better than all women (there is no female Gödel or Bach, for example). Should this be disappointing for women? I think not. I think rather it should be considered a real challenge, for we do not believe that it is because of their biological sex that no women solved logical problems like Gödel or composed like Bach.

Note:MUSICA E MATEMATICA

From Pausanias’ references to dropping women from the side of a cliff if they even observed the ancient Olympic Games, to de Coubertin’s ideal that the goals that were to be achieved by the athletes through participation in the Olympic Games were not appropriate for women (de Coubertin 1912), one can easily see that the place of women in sport has been, for the most part, foreign at best. It is this basic idea, the idea that sport (or sometimes even physical activity), particularly high-level competitive sport, is somehow incompatible with what women are, or what they should be, that must dominate any discussion of the unique issues for women in sport. Philosophies of ideal sport, and ideal women, lie behind discussions of permitting women to compete, of choosing the types of sport in which women can compete, in developing judging standards for adjudicated (as opposed to refereed) sports – contrast gymnastics and basketball – in attitudes to aggression, and competition, and indeed to the very existence of women’s sport as a separate entity at all.

Note:LO SPORT COME COSTRUZIONE SOCIALE

I believe that, if such obstacles are eliminated, if new weight and length classes are introduced in many sports, if the rules are changed so as to render it impossible for aggressive athletes to punish their competitors, and if severe punishments are introduced for violations of the rules, then women can actually compete successfully and safely with men in many sports.

Note:CAMBIARE LA REGOLE

One of my colleagues, who likes to go to further extremes than I do,2 has objected to my argument in the following way. If we should abolish sexual discrimination within sports, he asks, why not abolish species discrimination as well? Why not have men competing with animals? Why not have Carl Lewis running over 100m against a hunting leopard?… However, if the differences between men and hunting leopards were merely statistical, so that some men could beat some hunting leopards, then I am not sure that competitions between men and beasts would seem so outlandish; after all, they used to have such competitions during antiquity….

Note:LEWIS CONTRO IL LEOPARDO

Female sports represent a unique value

It may seem that female sports are different from male sports, and so they represent a unique value. To give up sexual discrimination would therefore be like giving up valuable existing sports. It would be like giving up soccer or baseball, or basketball or hurdles in running.

Note:OBIEZIONE: C’È UN’UNICITÀ DA TUTELARE NELLO SPORT FEMMINILE

to the extent that there is a grain of truth in it, this grain of truth does not warrant the conclusion that we should retain sexual discrimination in sports. Rather, it does warrant the conclusion that many aspects of sports need to be reformed, so that ‘female’ qualities are added to them or, even, so that ‘female’ qualities are exchanged for ‘male’ ones.

Note:FEMMINILIZZARE LO SPORT

To put it drastically, therefore, I think it is fair to say that, in many sports, women compete against each other in masculinity, narrowly conceived. It is hard to find any special feminine qualities in such competitions… I find the fact simply degrading, to both women and men. I also find that, if some women do want to compete in masculinity, why should they restrict themselves to a competition against each other?…

Note:MITO DELLA FEMMINILITÀ NELLO SPORT

there may still be a grain of truth in the saying that women’s sports in some aspects have unique qualities. I think, then, of qualities that are less to do with mere physical strength and more to do with inventiveness, sensibility, cooperation, strategy, playfulness, wit, and so forth. There may be more room for these qualities in women’s competitions. And, to the extent that this is true, I think we are dealing with genuine and unique (female) qualities. However, there exists an obvious and better way of retaining these qualities than to retain sexual discrimination within sports. These qualities should be introduced in all sorts of sport, and they should not only be added to existing qualities but, in many cases, be exchanged for existing qualities.

Note:SE LA FEMMINILITÀ NELLO SPORT ESISTE ANDREBBE CULTURALMENTE ESALTATA ED ESTESA

We tend to think of the possible sports as a somewhat fixed group of those currently available. Yet even basketball and football are of very recent invention. Since women have been virtually excluded from all sports until the last century, it is appropriate that some sports using women’s specific traits are not developing, such as synchronised swimming. (English 1995: 287)

Note:INVENTARSI LO SPORT

Sports without moderation means competition in aspects such as mere strength…The problem with our fascination with strength is that it has a ‘fascistoid’ value basis,…

Note:OGGI TROPPO INTERESSE SULLA FORZA

Genetic engineering, once it becomes possible, will be just as inevitable in sports as doping – unless we can render its application to sports impossible. And a way of rendering the genetic design of winners impossible is to change sports and to allow moral virtues to become crucial, for there are hardly any genes for inventiveness, sensitivity, cooperation, playfulness and wit in sports.

Note:INGEGNIERIA GENETICA E LA FINE DELLA FORZA BRUTA

All this means that, when we admire the winners of reformed (moderated) sports, our fascination for the winners will no longer bear a similarity to fascism, which is certainly an additional gain to be made.

Note:LO SPORT DEL FUTURO

A reductio ad absurdum of sexual discrimination

What are we to test for, when we test whether a certain athlete qualifies as female or male? Three options are open to us. We could test for genitalia, for gender, or for chromosomal constitution.

Note:COME DISCRIMINARE

There are many problems connected with testing for genitalia. First of all, the criterion is vague. We are operating here with a continuum. After all, even if rare, there are examples of hermaphroditism. Second, it is not clear that the test for genitalia is a valid one. In what sense are genitalia relevant? In what sports could genitalia be relevant? I blush when I seek an answer to that question. Finally, genitalia can easily be manipulated with: such tests are bound to be inefficient when it comes to people who (in an attempt to cheat) are prepared to undergo surgery.

Note:PROBLEMA CON IL CRITERIO DEI GENITALI

The problems associated with testing for gender are even more obvious. First of all, this criterion is extremely vague.

Note:GENDER… ANCORA PIÙ VAGO

What, then, about chromosomal tests? These tests are what we rely on today (see Berit Skirstad’s discussion of them in the Chapter 8), and I suppose that, pace Skirstad’s opposition to gender tests as such, if we want to retain a system of sexual discrimination within sports, then chromosomal tests are what we have to rely on even in the future.

Note:IL TEST CROMOSOMICO REGGE

a problem with our sex chromosomes is that, even if most people conform to a typical male constitution (they have the genotype XY) or a typical female constitution (they have the genotype XX), not everyone does. There are individuals with only one X chromosome (they have the genotype X0; that is, they suffer from what has been called Turner’s syndrome), and there are individuals with two X chromosomes and one Y chromosome (they have the genotype XXY; that is, they suffer from what has been called Klinefelter’s syndrome).

Note:NON UNIVOCITÀ

All this means that, if we want to be consistent, and if we want to be true to the rationale behind sexual discrimination, we should go a step further and even introduce new discrimination categories (people suffering from Turner’s syndrome and Klinefelter’s syndrome, and people exhibiting other aberrations such as XYY, to mention just three examples)…However, this may strike most of us as downright absurd….

Note:SPORT RISERVATI AI SESSI INTERMEDI

We could add an even simpler argument to this. If we have sexual discrimination in sports, then (in order to avoid cheating and fraud) we need to have tests for sex…However, it runs counter to a highly plausible idea of genetic integrity that information about a person’s genetic constitution should ever be forced upon him or her (Schneider and Skirstad both seem to agree about this). We have a right not to know our genetic makeup, if we do not want to know it. Compulsory chromosomal tests for athletes violate this right.…

Note:DIRITTO A NON CONOSCERE IL PROPRIO SESSO

Three desiderata of moderation should be met, when interventions in the development of sports take place: Non-moral virtues (such as strength) should be given a less important role, and moral virtues (such as playfulness, inventiveness, sensitivity, cooperation and wit) a more important role, within sports. Sports should be developed in a direction that renders our admiration for the winners of sports competitions more decent. Sports should develop in a direction that makes it possible to abolish without any cost all kinds of sexual discrimination within sport.

TRE MODIFICHE AUSPICABILI

La trappola della bellezza

La trappola della bellezza

Estate, afa, bonaccia, voglia di andarsene.

Il viaggiatore è protagonista assoluto della stagione e i due viaggiatori per antonomasia sono il migrante e il turista: il primo si affida a barconi e ONG, il secondo ad aeroporti e agenzie.

Migranti straccione e turisti modaioli, due viaggiatori completamente diversi.

Eppure qualcosa li unisce, perlomeno quando pensano alla bellezza. Ascoltiamoli.

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“Com’era bella la mia valle” (altro che questo squallore dove sono capitato), sospira quasi subito il migrante nostalgico.

“Che posti meravigliosi ho visto” (altro che questa mediocrità che mi tocca), pensa e dice a tutti trasognato il turista di ritorno.

Eppure il migrante scarta risoluto l’ipotesi di tornare tra le “bellezze” in cui si culla, così come il turista non prende nemmeno in considerazione un trasloco nel “paese delle meraviglie” che occupa i suoi sogni.

Perché? Scoprirlo ci dice qualcosa sulla “trappola della bellezza”.

Propongo allora tre ragioni:

1. Perché il “visibile” batte l’ “invisibile” e noi di primo acchito tendiamo a privilegiarlo. La bellezza appartiene al regno delle apparenze, non sorprende quindi l’incoerenza di chi “vanta ma non compra”. In questo ambito parole e fatti divergono. 
2. Perché esiste il cosiddetto “‘adattamento edonico”: alcune felicità sono fugaci, e quelle che regala la bellezza – dicono gli psicologi – lo sono in modo sorprendente. Chi ha un bel quadro in casa – tanto per dire – cessa di vederlo dopo pochi giorni, ma anche chi vive in una bella casa è presto indifferente a questo privilegio. I bambini che giocano in discarica sono felici quasi quanto quelli che pernottano una settimana a Disneyland.
3. Perché vantare un contatto con la bellezza innalza il nostro prestigio sociale per cui l’ostentazione in questo campo ci porta vantaggi a prescindere dalla sua fondatezza.