Stephen E Philion wrote:
> On Sun, 16 Apr 2000, Carrol Cox wrote:
>
> [snip]A huge photo of Anti-China signs labelled UAW! Readers
> > of the Tribune will see the whole week as dividing into some
> > anti-China workers and some kids who made trouble and were
> > perhaps treated badly on the weekend. No issues.
> >
> > Carrol
> >
>
> And this problem will continue as long as this movements' leaders don't
This is premature. It is not at present a matter of what the "movement's leaders" think or don't think but a matter of deciding (torturously) *who* the movement's leaders *are*. (Or, more fundamentally, determining *whether* there is a movement.) The debate over the last weeks on this list (though a sideline debate rather than internal to the activity) over the "China Question" is not a debate over deciding policy -- it is a debate over who is to decide policy. That is (for the most part) the neither "side" will persuade the other; rather, one position will win out in the activities of all those who make up the embryonic movement. Max and I are rude to one another because both of us know this. If the AFL-CIO unions maintain control, that will abortl the embryo. (And I'm assuming, as in my earrlier post, "Anarchists, Front and Center," that the current effective opposition to Democratic Party Cadre is made up of those who can be seen roughly as anarchists.)
>
> sit down and think seriously about the wisdom of slogans that most
> American people can't relate to, i.e. Cold War imagery, protectionism,
> anti-China stereotypes
No. Those who think such slogans are wise will still be thinking that, for the most part, 20 years from now. It depends not on their doing any thinking but on their losing control of the core of the activists in the movement.
> (there was a photo on the front page of Boston
> Globe or another big 5 East Coast paper of young women in some skit
> wearing Red Guard Cultural Revolution garb...way to show how in touch the
> mv't is with *today*'s China?)...The media will have a field day with such
> gifts from Mana.
This is wrong too -- because there will *always* be such a fringe. There was such a fringe in Nicaragua during the Sandanista Rule -- even victory doesn't get rid of them. Nor will it work to attack them. My original post was not advice to try to keep the media from having a field day. The media will make up whatever they need for a field day. A movement that depends on the media (or that even looks over its shouder at the media) will eventually peter out.
Carol Moore (in a post fwd by Chris Doss) is correct but irrelevant because she ignores this set of facts. Even if everyone takes her advice (and they won't), the readers/viewers of the media will never know it. It will have to be conveyed to more people by word of mouth in the localities by people who were in D.C.
Carrol
> ...
>
> Steve