Thanks Doyle, I do try to entertain. I took liberties 'cause I know you're familiar w/ my posting styles.
>My contention was that strong feelings applied to
a rule, represented
moralizing.
But what on earth are you talking about. When have I said that ethical-political thought is founding on feelings? Please fill me in as I worry that there's another SnitgrrRl posing as me, or I'm posing as her or something. Must clear this up.
>I contend that a rule must be founded upon
something other than strong
feelings to be >useful to us as lefties. Feelings
are fine by me, but not as a
criteria for judging the >efficacy of socialist
policies.
But you see, this is positivism. Oh there are plenty of marxist positivists, and you may be one and that’s just fine by me. But that shan't stop me from complaining. One underlying point of my exchange w/ Paul is that there's a fundamental problem w/ this insistence on dismissing feelings thereby creating a politicized hierarchy in which thought is privileged as superior to feelings/emotions, which are merely 'fine by you' but ultimately unimportant to what ‘really counts’. Well, not really, but more on that later. Firstly, its a political claim, since historically Western thought has derided emotions/ feelings as a grrRl thang (also a white trash thang, a queer thang, & a black thang. Well actually now that I think about it emotions have been consigned to and identified w/ just about any thang that’s not white, western, elite, and male. But lets just look at the grrRlz for a moment because grrRlz gotta come <snicker> first. And let just look at one historical era, oh about 1800-present. Before I do so I want to make a disclaimer: I’m using this hueristically once again. It works as a teaching tool (I hope) and it doesn’t mean that I buy wholesale into all that I shall say, but enough to make me think it useful for a moment. That is, i’m reallly not a follower of Mary Daly, Carol Gilligan, radical or liberal feminism. I draw from a marxist-feminist analysis of gender/capitalism. But it might sound like these other folks, especially because to day my rhetorical mood is cloudily feeling like playing around w/ words just for the fun of it. So:
Emotions=grrRl thang and so they are inferior just as grrRls are inferior to buoys in every respect (naturally, biologically, physically). It’s obvious cause those silly grrRlz cry and feel and the like Then they don’t want their buoys to go off to war or bash fags (who are altogether too much like buoys and that’s why we ought to bash ‘em) or exploit and oppress their employees. So sensitive, so emotional these grrRlz. They *feel* bad, sad, horrified, disgusted and they identify w/ the plight of the soon-to-die buoys on both sides, and the queers, and the workers. They just can’t see the rational argument for war, fag bashing, and capitalism. But we like grrRlz cause lawd knows we wouldn’t want anyone to think we’re fags (and fags=grrRlz), so they’re just fine by us. We’ll let them play, but on our terms: GrrRlz are necessary cause they’re the keepers of the hearth and home, where they tend the flame of feeling/emotion which keeps us warm and fuzzy so we can be good daddys, considerate lovers (keeping the greeting card and florist industries alive and well and doing their patriotic duty for capitalism) and protect their families in this altogether ‘nasty, brutish, and short’ war of each against all created by boyz who are basically animals at root. The has been called the Victorian separation of spheres that emerged alongside and in tandem w/ capitlism, making it quite efficient let me tell you.
And the best part Doyle: It ain’t dead by a long shot. Why Reagan’s fave social theorist, George Gilder, (whose book he plied to everyone he knew) thought that men were naturally competitive, though thoroughly rational and logically brutes bound to self destruct as they raped and pillaged each other and everything in sight. A kind of Reaganite logic that men dig their own graves if unchecked by the Grrrlz who are off running about calculating investment strategies on Wall St. and working in flower shops, card shops and restaurants on Main St. Every social problem we face today, sez Gilder, is the result of the grrRls trying to be like the buoys. They’ve LEAKED out of the kitchen by God so, Henceforth and Hastily, the grrRlz must get back in the kitchen and the bedroom, with occassional forays into the public world outside to attend a PTA meeting or volunteer at a homeless shelter. For it is in the private domain that grrRlz must do the work of keeping the flame of emotion/feeling burning so that their buoys will be capitalists with heart and bureaucrats with feeling. The rest of the working stiffs will thereby be appeased by warm fuzzy capitalism and it takes a village liberalism and so they won’t raise a ruckus when they get screwed over in their cubicles and on the factory floor (oh, and something Gilder didn’t consider, but I’d add, just for the sake of a good chuckle, and the buoyz will be especially peeved at having to be behind the service counter -- cause when women go back home the buoys will have to wait table when the buoys occassionally take the grrRlz out to dinner in order to get laid that night in good vanilla het fashion.)
And, not only that, if the buoys do manage to see through the veil of ideology, they can always go home to the grrRlz who’ll soothe their furrowed brows, rub their aching muscles and calm the sparking of revolution. How? Well, since the grrRls now absolutely depend on the buoys for money, they’ll encourage their buoys to rest up and buck up and be REAL buoys and go out there and be good worker bees cause lawd knows we wouldn’t want out buoys to lose their jobs.
And what's more, the grrRlz will keep the animal buoys in line w/ their by reminding them of emtions and feelings (kindness, love, caring, etc) which are important, but not too much so. (just fine by me) Hence, the buoyz won’t rape, pillage, loot or worse, slack off on the job.
Okay. Do you see the ‘connectionism’ there? On the separation of spheres logic, there is connection to be sure. Why connectionism is absolutely imperative, because though separate and different they work in tandem with one another and its imperative to keep both operating properly but in their proper place. And that place is in binary opposition to one another, as the pomos like to say. Obviously, so it goes according to what’s implied by your post, emotions and rationality are inseparable, but one is more important (privileged) than the other. Emotions are just fine by me, but they can’t or don’t or shouldn’t do the important work in life is what you’re saying. Ditto ethical-political thought or, as you prefer to say, moralizing which I shall get to in another post. See how what you’ve posted so far sounds like this to me?
It is an important point I raise and it has ethical-political implications which is to say you are making a moral claim about the relationship between reason/emotion that has political consequences insofar as, historically, reason=buoys and emotion=grrRlz/working class/gay men/poor/third world. Now you can dialectically maneuver yourself out of this charge, though I haven’t seen you manage this so far. What you have so far is Hegel’s master/slave binary, not dialectic.
SnitgrrRl