> > Oh, pulllease... You're very good at informing people that there are
> > things you do not understand, and you are very good at insisting that
> > because you do not understand something it must be dangerous.
Ken:
> Of course I have written no such thing. But I have been expecting this
> line of argument for some time -- in essence, that today's Marxism is
beyond
> the comprehesion of mere workers or other mortals, and therefore requires a
> new priest class of celebrity intellectuals to explain it.
Expectations are powerful things. Fateful, one might say. The statement above suggests only that _you_ have admitted that you do not understand Zizek, and that this makes you very uncomfortable. You talk about it quite a lot; much more so than anything else going by what you post on. It does not say that Zizek cannot be understood, nor that Zizek cannot be understood by 'the masses'.
But, ok, let me say this about obscurity:
Clear and unambiguous slogan -- there is no such thing. This discussion is already evidence of that. Psychoanalysis is one way in which ambiguities are explored. You don't like that, fine. But, politics, well, politics would not even exist were it not for ambiguity, contradictions, and so on. The same has already been said about the the preconditions of science by earlier marxists, or maybe it was the fat guy himself.
Now, either you really beleive that there is such a thing as an uncomplicated and unambiguous slogan, in which case I have no idea how to even begin to find a basis on which to have this discussion; or you do not believe this, in which case, I'm inclined to think that you wish for a moment when statements will no longer have any ambiguity, that this will somehow constitute a revolutionary moment. If the latter, then I think you are dreaming about the end of politics, not its possibilities.
As for 'mere mortals' and 'priests' & obscurantism:
Obscurantism, if we are to make at least some attempt to recall this word's etymology before it ossified into a breezy epithet, implies a politics which _resorts_ to a certain distinction between mere mortals (the masses) and priests (revolutionary intellectuals), and beleives that because the masses do not understand (will be disoriented by ambiguity), intellectuals have to deliver the message in little saying, slogans, preferably without any possibility that the masses will or can interpret, make the word slide off the path laid out by their leaders who lead because they know... Is it beginning to sound familiar?
> I answered those posts directly, by observing that the choice facing
> Marxists is to take the side of the militants in the struggle
If you read the posts rather than simply answered them, you might have noticed not only that there are far more militant actions taking place against Fortress Europe than has ever been the case during the antihaider protests, and you also may have noticed thereby that "the struggle" is not what Albright and Blair tells you it is.
> , whatever their
> alleged failures might be (and I do not concede such allegations of failure
> are true); an argument for abstention is capitulation to the ruling class.
Again, you are completely wrong. It is not an argument for abstention, but for doing something else (which Mack has already made numerous suggestions on), and for supporting those militants -- from the cobas, autonomia, ya basta!, and so on -- who have been doing quite a lot of pretty outstanding things for some time now. I cannot but wonder why you choose to insist that the antihaider protests are the only game in town. If you want more info -- if it is indeed your ignorance which explains your fixation on this lie -- you will have to go looking in the lbo archives. However, below is a recent report from Ya Basta, on the southern front of Fortress Europe.
Angela _________
> Hello,
>
> 3 more deads here around (in Italy, I mean) in a normal day of ordinary
> craziness.
>
> This morning, 2 died in the Straits of Otranto as a result of the usual
> crazy race between Italian Coast Guard ships and Albanian "skafos" loaded
> with migrants. Another migrant has been taken to the hospital in desperate
> conditions. The story is pretty simple: the Albanian skafo, with 29
> migrants on board, approached before dawn the Italian shore. It was 4
> kilometers East of the city of Otranto when it was spotted by Italian
> ships. Usual race with 350 HP motors, till the boats collided and 2 died --
> migrants, of course: a girl apparently just 18 and an albanian man about
> 35. Most likely, also the wounded man won't make it.
>
> But this evening news were all for the single cop which was taken to the
> hospital with a light cut in his head. The word "clandestine" was repeated
> at least 15 times in one and a half minute.
>
> The third dead is a young Maroccan boy, age 17, killed outside a Social
> Center in Rome. The dynamic, here, is totally unclear. Apparently, the
> police was called from a mobile phone because a baby-gang was robbing the
> people getting out of the SC. But when they arrived, there was this group
> of migrants out of the SC. They saw the police and run away. The cops run
> after them. Few minutes later, the murder. The police claims they were
> forced to shoot because the boy had "something suspiciuos" in his hand.
> They said they shot only once -- bad luck, that was it. And the group of
> migrants was (of course) hold responsible for the robberies. But the people
> of the SC has a different version, according to which the group of migrants
> had nothing to do with the robberies, and they run away because they were
> "illegals". Also, according to the comrades, the police shot many times, at
> least 4 or 5 times, and one cop came back and said to the others: "This
> time, one is dead." At which the others answered: "Shut up, these bastards
> are listening to you". This was said by the comrades at the 8 PM news, and
> they sounded completely convincing. No comment from the police.
>
> So, another day of ordinary folly has gone. What's next?
>
> Giuliano