If the left would learn to speak not only
with a beginning, middle and end but also with a sense of humor and a sense of
humanity instead of simply enjoying the sound of its own ineffective and
irrelevant voice, maybe we'd all get somewhere...
I want to see the name-calling cease -- it ain't getting us
anywhere. Stop insulting people like me with statistics on how many retail
workers there are -- "they're working class, too!" -- we already know this! If
you don't own the business, you're part of the working class as far as I'm
concerned. Unfortunately, because certain people either forget where they came
from or believe that because they have a degree or two they're not like the
"rest of us," we waste a lot of time bickering over all this bullshit when all
of our energy should be directed at those in power who run the whole freakin'
mess we're in....
And It is not I who believes the working class is like the Bundy family.
Sadly, it's many of you and others on the "left" who don't think we read
poetry or can speak a foreign language or understand that Roger Smith is only
a symbol. We don't want to turn the opera house into a bowling alley; we want
you to take down your invisible "Do Not Enter" sign and let us in.
>>I think these excerpts are pretty revealing. Not only is the left
"ineffective," apparently, but it is downright "irrelevant." If so, what is
MM trying to accomplish with his movies -- advance a non-leftist critique of
capitalism? He insists he wants the name-calling to cease, but in the next
breath accused Doug of "insulting people like me" with statistics about the
make-up of the working class. One moment he is pleading for gentility, the
next he is exuding hostility. "...[W]e waste a lot of time bickering ... when
all our energy should be directed at those in power" -- but to what end? What
is our goal? What should we replace the current "freakin' mess" with? "We
don't want the opera house turned into a bowling alley..." -- again the use of
the of the royal we. What makes MM think he speaks in behalf of the working
class? Has he been elected to some position of leadership that I don't know
of? Or has he simply used his showbiz talents to grab center-stage.
Socialism = working-class democracy = the creation of institutions by
which workers can debate politics, adopt programs, and fight for political
change. It does not mean some narcissist announcing to the world that he
knows what the working class wants because, hey, he once worked for 12G's a
year, so the rest of the world better listen up. The danger of this sort of
demagogy should be all too apparent by now.
Dan Lazare.