Comments on: Borat: Exploiting the tolerance towards the ‘other’? http://cac.ophony.org/2009/12/21/borat-exploiting-the-tolerance-towards-the-other/ Wed, 08 Feb 2012 11:00:19 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 By: Szidonia http://cac.ophony.org/2009/12/21/borat-exploiting-the-tolerance-towards-the-other/comment-page-1/#comment-40411 Szidonia Tue, 19 Jan 2010 22:40:37 +0000 http://cac.ophony.org/?p=2987#comment-40411 Well, this is my first time watching Borat in action, thanks to the YouTube insert, and I think he is "exploiting the tolerance towards the 'other'" well enough. I would never had the patience of his interlocutors, for sure. And, after all, I do not think he wants to communicate at all; what he does is comedy, indeed farce, and there is no genuine need or desire on his part to make himself understood, on the contrary, he exploits all the possible opportunities for misunderstanding. I do like the idea of the "willingness to suspend judgment," though; it reminds me of Coleridge's "willing suspension of disbelief" as the primary requisite for any act of the imagination and for reading literature. I hope that many of us remain willing enough to suspend our judgment and honor our interlocutors with the gift of our patience. (I've just finished reading Eric Hobsbawm' Globalisation, Democracy and Terrorism, and I am obviously "under the influence" of his rather bleak diagnosis of our contemporary world where what we eminently lack is precisely tolerance and respect for others and the wish to, indeed, communicate with them.) Well, this is my first time watching Borat in action, thanks to the YouTube insert, and I think he is “exploiting the tolerance towards the ‘other’” well enough. I would never had the patience of his interlocutors, for sure. And, after all, I do not think he wants to communicate at all; what he does is comedy, indeed farce, and there is no genuine need or desire on his part to make himself understood, on the contrary, he exploits all the possible opportunities for misunderstanding.

I do like the idea of the “willingness to suspend judgment,” though; it reminds me of Coleridge’s “willing suspension of disbelief” as the primary requisite for any act of the imagination and for reading literature. I hope that many of us remain willing enough to suspend our judgment and honor our interlocutors with the gift of our patience. (I’ve just finished reading Eric Hobsbawm’ Globalisation, Democracy and Terrorism, and I am obviously “under the influence” of his rather bleak diagnosis of our contemporary world where what we eminently lack is precisely tolerance and respect for others and the wish to, indeed, communicate with them.)

]]>