Steve Schwartz wrote:

>You know, I'm always a little suspicious of the righteous indignation that
>comes from a politically comfortable seat.  The Nazis had a terror state on
>a level most of us can't conceive.  Assuming I wasn't rounded up for the
>camps, I have no idea how I'd have reacted under such a regime - probably
>as cowardly as anyone else.

Leon's remarks in another thread had similar sentiments.  I agree entirely.

What a complex thing this is.  I suppose we tend to look to the great
people of any era to stand up against the tyrants and oppressors.  You
have to admire the ones who do and did take such risks.  But I think it
is unfair to condemn those who do not, especially if they stayed and
faced the harsh music.  It isn't necessarily cowardly to preserve oneself.
What effects would your resistance have on your family?  On your friends?
On your fellow musicians?  Would it do any good, even if you risked only
your own life and mind?  If you are a famous musician living under Stalin,
should you risk being disappeared?  Suppose so and suppose the worst
happens.  Did your sacrifice have a positive impact, or did it further
chill those who survive to see the result?  Your art, which might have
given comfort to your fellow citizens, is now lost, wasted.  Are those
who remain emboldened and given heart by your sacrifice or are they even
more suppressed and depressed?  Especially in the case of a famous person,
I think this is very hard to know.

If an artist is entirely devoted, perhaps selfishly so, to his or her
craft, then I can imagine doing anything to preserve whatever relatively
safe enclave one has, be it in Stalin's Russia or Nazi Germany.  On the
other hand, escaping to a safe country, which some would say is cowardly,
might be the most effective means of achieving change.  At least you can
make known what is happening (again with unpredictable consequences),
and even though some art disappears from your homeland, perhaps never
to be known to those who remain, it still survives in the world.

On the other other hand (you need lots of hands for such arguments),

    Vivent les dissidents!

Rick Mabry
Shreveport, LA