A Leninist Proverb on Race

Charles Brown CharlesB at CNCL.ci.detroit.mi.us
Thu Mar 8 12:57:21 PST 2001



>>> sokol at jhu.edu 03/08/01 01:38PM >>>
At 09:38 AM 3/8/01 -0500, Charles wrote:
>Leninist proverb on race: Workers and oppressed peoples of the world, unite !

Charles, I'm nonplussed by this injection of subjectivism. "Workers" is an objectively defined category, i.e. "those who sell their labour power to the owners of the means of production." But "oppressed?" - everyone can feel "oppressed" ferchrissake. In fact, fighting "oppression" is a call to arms by the lunatic right who feel "oppressed" by the IRS, the "gummint," "liberal cultural elite," "reverse discrimination" and the kindred pandemonium of bogeymen - not to mention that the Nazis felt "oppressed" by the Jews, Serbs felt "oppressed" by the Bosniaks, and so on.

(((((((((

CB: Wojtek, your criticism should be directed at Lenin, not me. He actually did modify the slogan. So, you think Lenin was being too subjective ?

Naw, "oppressed" is an objective category too ( See Lenin's polemics on self-determination of oppressed , colonialized nations and peoples ). Or perhaps we can say those laborers systematically placed below average wage-laborers in the wage-labor system , such as slaves, sharecroppers, poor peasants, racially oppresssed, peons, housewives, etc.

Maybe you are thinking of "depressed".



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