[texhax] question about \if

Philip Taylor (Webmaster, Ret'd) P.Taylor at Rhul.Ac.Uk
Fri Nov 12 15:14:24 CET 2010



Susan Dittmar wrote:

> I think you read that too darkly, Philip. I had the impression Uwe just had
> a bit of fun with the results of Vafa's trying to explain his problem in a
> foreign language, when explaining it in itself already is quite a
> challenge. Uwe shared this fun with us -- and then even tried to stress
> that it's just meant as a harmless bit of fun. I write 'tried to', as I am
> not sure whether a non-German-native person would have read his brief
> apology like that. Though Uwe's language might sound harsh at times, I am
> very positive that is mainly due to the fact that he's writing in a foreign
> language too, and far from his intention.

Well, perhaps so : but for one non-native speaker to make fun
of another non-native speaker's English seems to indicate a
rather strange sense of humour, and when the sentence in
question appears to be directly related to the second speaker's
sense of national identity ("I prefer the most bloodcurdling death
to living with humility. The only country I am faithful to, is IRAN.
Do not denigrate my last moments..."), then I for one find
Uwe's attempts at "humour" to be in singularly bad taste.

** Phil.


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