BK on Identity

[Yoshie Furuhashi]

>Yoshie Furuhashi wrote:
>
>>I think white workers benefit from racism _neither in the short nor 
>>in the long run_, for they don't become less exploited by capital 
>>by practicing racism.
>
>How many workers *feel* this systemic exploitation? They may have a 
>gripe about the boss, or wish they could pay the kid's orthodontist 
>bills more easily, but you're assuming a sophisticated political 
>economy analysis that right now only left-wing intellectuals can 
>articulate. But even among those who might feel it, without a 
>possible utopia to imagine as an alternative, most probably view it 
>as a fact of nature.
>
>Doug

I think more workers than otherwise will come to understand this 
systemic exploitation clearly if leftists *quit* telling them 
*untruths* that (a) white workers benefit from racism & racism is in 
the interest of white workers and (b) the U.S. working class benefit 
from imperialism.  It is Marxist intellectuals' job to explain 
clearly what exploitation is.  Throwing untruths (a) & (b) out, of 
course, doesn't solve all the ideological problems, but it's a good 
start.  The next step is to emphasize that (a') white workers 
actually *lose* in real wages and social programs by *gaining* more 
relative advantages over black & other discriminated-against workers 
& (b') the U.S. working class bear the abominable costs of U.S. 
imperialism.

Truth = the Good News.  :-)

Intellectuals are useless unless they tell the truth to workers who 
need all-sided political education as Lenin emphasized.  Truth is in 
the interest of the working class, even when the working class are 
not in a position to immediately make use of it.

Yoshie