This stuff is Onion-worthy. Jason Mueller --- In quizbowl_at_yahoogroups.com, "qb_hmm <qb_hmm_at_y...>" <qb_hmm_at_y...> wrote: > Part Four: "I Designate Caliban" > > Ultimately, the question must be where will morally progressive people who = > > care about quizbowl turn? Paradoxically it is the format most often held up= > as > the voice of conservatism that allows us to reshape quizbowl with the maste= > r's > own discourse. Precisely because of the Enlightenment ideals of self- > fashioning it espouses, its past history as the format of Seth Kendall and = > > Strom Thurmond can be overturned. The recent calls to scrutinize the so- > called "knowledge arms race," a very worthy cause if the true motivation > behind the ire were not to simply reify quiz bowl's exclusionary and simpli= > stic > past, actually hides the ways in which ACF's growing question subject > expansion may hold the most promise for the quizbowl utopia we have > always dreamed about. In other words, the format's elitism and search for n= > ew > frontiers of knowledge actually helps to diversify the game, and promulgate= > s a > more inclusive vision of the world. Ask yourself why you hate the format—is= > it > really the difficulty or is it all the non-western, non-male questions that= > seem > unanswerable? In their never-ending quest to one up one another many ACF > players actually extol (often not deliberately) global contributions to the= > > tapestry of human culture. Inadvertently or not, ACF has become an > alternative space for minority voices. Curiously, their own core members > includes the most diverse ethnic cross-section of any format (though they > must address their gendered politics to truly show a commitment to growth) = > > and not surprisingly they are often the subject of slander. Note how the > consistent sniping about the over-representation of hip-hop would be > interpreted in another context—can you say Trent Lott? What we can take, > therefore, from ACF, is not the elitist aloof stance towards the rest of th= > e > community, but their implicit willingness to explore and expose players to = > the > myriad ways of knowing that are otherwise silenced. > > Conclusions: > > In conclusion, this letter was not written out of hate, but out of love, lo= > ve for the > game, love for the people who play it, love for knowledge. We must be aware= > > of the power structures that effect our daily lives. It is only through a g= > rowing > consciousness of our sordid past that we can have a future as one people, > united, buzzing, together.
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