>>> Carrol Cox <cbcox at ilstu.edu> 03/03/99 12:33PM >>>
Charles Brown wrote:
> I'm with you, sister. We have got to figure out some criminal punishments for the big bourgeoisie.
Come on Charles -- you can't be this naive. ________ Charles: Think in terms of process. You have to think of the present in unity with the future. ______
The big bourgeoisie inflicting criminal punishments on the big bourgeoisie? ________
Charles: The working class is the only force that can inflicti criminal punishments on the big bourgeoisie. Did you see anywhere in my post where I said the "big bourgeoisie inflicting punishment on the big bourgeoisie" ? I know you read very well. ___________
If "we" (and just who is your "we" here ________
Charles: It ain't Ezra Pound, comrade.
_____________
had half enough power to inflict such punishments we wouldn't need to because we would already have socialism and there would be no big bourgeoisie to punish. _________
Charles: Dialectics is creeping into your thought. Now you are starting to get it.
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Now on the other hand, if you keep fantasies of actually punishing corporations and their owners out of it, )))))))))))))))))))))))))))))
Charles: I'm a scientific ,not utopian , socialist. (See _Socialism: Utopian and Scientific_ by Fred Engels)
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Carrol: I can imagine (under the right circumstances) mass campaigns to punish corporate murder with corporate death (not of individuals, of the corporation itself) being an effective organizing tool. E.g., imagine thousands of persons going door to door with a petition demanding the execution of General Motors, all armed with a reasonable amount of detail as to GM crimes. Ditto Walmart. The important thing would be the person-to-person contact between the circulator of the petition and the people visited, and perhaps even more important, the process the circulators go through among themselves to work out the goals and methods of the campaign. )))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))
Charles: Now that's not a depressing thought. What would Milton say ? By the way, Aristotle stole a lot of what he knew from the African libraries in "Alexandria".
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But as to actually daydreaming about punishing the CEO of GM or ATT. Forget it. )))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))
Charles: As to daydreaming about Buffy, wellllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllll
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Carrol Also, please note that while many of us as marxists wear two hats, marxists and class militants, there are and always will be far too few marxists to go around for such activities, so they will be for the most part initiated, organized, and carried out by non-marxists. )))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))
Charles: A scientist, as opposed to a utopian or daydreamer or fantasizer, looks at what actually occurs - like Maggie Coleman, an intellectual, worker and unionmember putting forth the idea of punishing corporations for murder - and builds action related to it. This is where you miscategorize my post as daydreaming, utopian, etc.
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This is the Leninist theory of the priority of spontaneous action, creating the context in which the struggle against the theory of revolutionary spontaneity can be carried out. No Father Gopans, no Lenins, Trotskys, or Maos.
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Charles: That sounds alright, but a bit out of date. Today we say, No Maggie Coleman's , no revolution. ( unless Maggie is offended at being analogized to Father Gapon :>) )