Seeking to be genuine

Had a dinner yesterday with a French association's members in Japan. Despite the relaxed and enjoyable atmosphere of friendliness, I was reminded - thanks to my not participating often to such social gatherings - how we, grown-ups, deep into our fabricated personae work so hard for most of them to control the conversation in order to have it hoover in the safe realm of light humor. Any utterance that starts to dwell into the personal, the uneasiness of ones life at times, the fear of this of that, is invariably met by someone throwing in a cold water bucket like wordplay, joke or guffaw to break the spell of humans trying and share common humans concerns. The usual stance against my point is: we are here to have fun so don't start talking seriously about serious thing. I have never quite understood this argument, and as time goes by, I tend to value those discussions, laced with humor alright, that are not interrupted by someone cracking a joke, whose effect is to forcefully make the course of the discussion change direction toward a lighter side of daily banalities.

One French university professor talking about yet a new strategic verbal blunder delivered this time about French language by far-rightist Tokyo governor Ishihara was met by a no-comment no-wave strategy from the French official attending the speech. I tried and have that professor tell me whether there was some risk at him taking some action - that is, expressing in some way his discontent with that official trash from a Japanese politician with a fascistic local agenda. I referred on purpose to using a anonymous personae if his current status and job would be put at stake. I did not refer on purpose to weblog. All this came to no avail. The usual scornful "why the French authorities do not react?" did not recede an inch toward something like "what can I do about it?". That the French authorities and the Japanese ravenous politician have both specific agendas is one point. But what about "my own agenda"?. The discussion was safely diverted toward using video conference over PC to keep in touch with one's family back in the land of freedom of speech and Human rights. Seeking and being genuine is a risky business.