Monday 1 November 2010

More Glennbeckian Argumentation from the Coin Collectors' Guild

.
I've been looking at Wayne Sayles' blog post: The Whole Cultural Record. (UPDATE 29.09.2012: the original article has now been deleted by a repentant Sayles from his blog, but the text is available here).  The article by AIA President Brian Rose has a subheading (which may anyway have been inserted by the editorial team and not Rose) which Sayles has taken out of the context of the whole article on which he bases his comments. I think you'd have to be a real petty stirrer to create on such a basis the cheap-point-scoring construction Sayles attempts. One wonders whether the "collectors' rights" advocates live in the real world or not.

The contents of Article 1 of the 1970 UNESCO Convention (nor private property rights) have no relevance whatsoever to what Rose was discussing. I do not know if Sayles has problems following a simple argument as seems to be the case with most US and UK collectors, but it is entirely that mentality which the advocates of the no-questions-asked market in antiquities rely for their support.

Sayles expresses a hatred of "states" and their "ever-benevolent and omniscient bureaucracy". He then likens them all to "governmental models that permeated the mid 20th century and whose benevolence and wisdom wreaked havoc upon the world at large" [...] they were called "Nationalists" and the common thread among them was total state dominance over people and property". The old Glennbeckian ploy of referring everything to "Commies" and "Nazis" again.

Are there no coin (or artefact collectors) anywhere in the English speaking world with the intelligence to see and the guts to stand up to this sort of nonsense from the self-appointed advocates of "their" cause? They really are making a laughing stock of collectors and dealers as a whole.

Can anyone explain to Mr Sayles and his fellow ACCGers how Article 1 of the UNESCO convention is phrased and what it ACTUALLY means? (That is really a rhetorical question, I suspect the task may in fact be beyond even the best teacher.)

Sayles ends "Perhaps Dr. Rose will weigh in on this and enlighten the discussion". I doubt it, there is little point in discussing anything with the likes of Sayles who demonstrate time and time again with texts like the one discussed here that they cannot see the wood for the trees. Is there nobody else in the collecting community to talk with? Someone who can not only see sense, but talk it too?


Vignette: Who's responsible for opposition to the no-questions-asked market in portable antiquities, well according to the ACCG, Commy and Nazi Nationalists, of course !

No comments:

 
Creative Commons License
Ten utwór jest dostępny na licencji Creative Commons Uznanie autorstwa-Bez utworów zależnych 3.0 Unported.