anaxarchos
01-17-2007, 01:41 AM
Not sure how far this goes... If you are talking about a political outlet like PI, certainly this is true. If you are talking about a demonstration, there are too many "issues". Coalitions are about one issue... such as Iraq. Conflating the two seems to be one of the symptoms of "primitiveness" in the current "movement".
Two things I see. First, the upper class bias in the activist community, secondly the faction that seeks to convert people to a new awareness or enlighten people. There is only a tiny percentage of the population that is interested in becoming enlightened. For most of the people, it is meaningless at best. Gatherings of like-minded people, and efforts at converting people to be like us is the main theme that I hear from the activist community. That can only serve the ruling class.
Activists want the stupid TV watching WalMart shopping rednecks to wise up and become like them – beautiful and gentle and peaceful and enlightened – altogether superior beings, don't you know – and fill the ranks of mass demonstrations so that the activists can “get what they want.” Never mind what the stupid rednecks want. These sentiments are expressed everyday in activist meetings and on the liberal boards - “how can we get what we want?” and “what will it take to wake the people up?”
In other words, the activists want the people to serve the, and the activists want to be an elite aristocracy that decides what happens – for people's own good, which they presumably are too stupid to recognize.
The proper relationship for the intellectuals and activists from the working class is to place themselves into the service of the blue collar people, not try to get the blue collar people to serve them. That is what we need to get enlightened about, and enlightenment about political and social problems is only of real value to the extent that it is useful in raising the conditions – not the spirituality – of the broad mass of people. If, on the other hand, enlightenment continues to be a matter of self-actualization and self-fulfillment - “what we want”and “my personal values” and “my choices” - enlightenment remains at best irrelevant politically.
That's pretty much on the mark. It manifests itself it so many ways.
At all the anti-war demos and vigils around here one of the often asked questions is "How do we get more black people involved?" Well of course the presumption behind that is a bit of a "Why won't they come join us?" type o' thing. Rarely, and only from the radical fringe, is the question put back, "Hey where were you at the protests for lead abatement last Wednesday?" with the answer always being, "We didn't know about that!?" With the follow up being "Yea, I know don't ya' see!?"
Well anyway that's all I have to say on that.
Just to let ya' know my computer is on the fritz and I'm rather ambivalent about getting repaired or getting another. So it's hard for me to post very often. Damn beast is freezing up big time.
It's all got to happen in the streets.
Sorry to give you trouble on yet another board and when your computer is on the fritz to boot, but... what you just said is a complete crock (with all due respect). Perhaps I am misunderstanding so let me lay it out.
1. Since the time that British textile workers went on strike to prevent the British government from siding with the Confederacy during the American Civil War, despite the fact that this meant that they would be in opposition to their own narrow interests as well, resistence to the external imperial adventures of ones "own" country has been the most important and legitimate "litmus test" of the "maturity" of the left in all imperialist countries. This is the special responsibility that comes from living in the "belly of the beast". Having an understanding of the nature of imperialism only deepens that responsibility. The convenience of organizing around that issue is entirely secondary.
This does not mean that one has to meet this responsibility soley on the basis of emotion or morality or reckless abandon of long term goals or anything else. It also does not mean that this is all that one does or, even, that it is the most important thing that one does. It does mean that this responsibility fundamentally cuts across "issues" as they are understood in American politics today.
2. The Iraq War is the decision point for this phase of American imperialism. It will have significant impact on the nature of direct U.S. military "intervention", and domestic support for it, for the next 20 or 30 years. Whatever may happen inside the United States, the outcome will heavily influence what happens in the rest of the world. That is why the partisans of this war are willing to take such extreme risks to prolong or deepen it. That is what makes the ever increasing opposition of the American populace, despite the absence of a "mass" anti-war movement, so important. That is why the open treason of the Democrats is so obvious and in itself creates the opportunity for a very different politics. In these ways, the Iraq War has similarities to the First World War and Vietnam and Algeria and other epic contests that define the answer to the question, "Which side are you on?"
3. The Anti-War Movement, as it presently defines itself, does not "own" the Iraq War. How they act, "subjectively", changes nothing. They can ignore all demonstrations on lead abatement and drive SUVs and welcome global warming and you may still decide to work with them. Alternatively, they may all embrace a simpler life with a very small personal footprint, and you may still decide to have nothing to do with them. The decision is based on two criteria: the relative importance of the issue based on your world view and your assessment of whether that movement as it is presently constituted helps or hurts the advancement of that issue. In truth, all of this only answers the practical question of who you decide to work with.
In fact, the absence of black people in anti-war activities (if true), may well be a reason to try something a little bit differently. Anti-imperialism, in one form or another, has been a foundation of the modern Civil Rights movement since well before King's famous speech and the importance of it is very explicitly underlined in virtually the entire spectrum of the movement from Julian Bond to King to Malcom to Huey to even CORE in their social chauvinist phase (when they were backing UNITA), and this continues to the present. I would also be very surprised if the significance of the Iraq War was lost on a large part of the Immigrant Rights movement.
On the other hand, opposition to the Iraq War may well, and does in fact, include suburbanites, liberals, "activists", and even a section of the actual capitalist class. That in itself is both a reason for "coalition" and a very good argument for not getting completely subsumed in such a coalition... i.e. to act with two seperate objectives in mind.
Like I say, I may have misunderstood. I've been doin' that a lot lately. If so, please ignore this attempt at "intervention" to keep you from twisting your logic into a pretzel (I can't fucking believe how "sensitive" I have become since I started posting on PI).
Either way though, fix your computer. I have a feeling this chat is only starting.