Religion and the left

Carrol Cox cbcox at rs6000.cmp.ilstu.edu
Tue Jun 2 12:51:34 PDT 1998


Katha writes: <<But WHO exactly is doing all this chastising of everyone who believes in god? WHO is refusing to work with Sister Helen Prejean on death penalty stuff, or the methodist church on social justice issues? Who says Cornel West is a jackass because he's a minister?>

These questions, or ones like them, bother me intensely whenever leftists start bad mouthing the left for this or the other alleged shortcoming in its "relation to the people." Actually, in any demographically *or organizationally* significant way, the answer to all these questions is "No one!" (In invoking demographic significance, the the total population I have in mind is fairly small: Self-consciously self-labelled leftists" (who are not, like Alterman, obviously lying when they give themselves that label).

This is the reason Moore's article in the *Nation* on the left's need for humor ticked me off so, and ticked me off at a number of close friends and comrades who went along with Moore's posturing in that article. Perhaps Yoshie would re-post the message she sent at that time expanding on my briefly expressed irritation with pointless left self-hating.

Carrol



More information about the lbo-talk mailing list