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[Carl Remick]

>From: Chris Burford <cburford at gn.apc.org>
>
>At 31/10/01 07:39 +0000, you wrote:
>>>From: Chris Burford <cburford at gn.apc.org>
>>>
>>>The price the left has had to pay for these remarkable victories by 
>>>global
>>>civil society since Sept 11, is to be careful not to act in a sectarian
>>>way. To bite its tongue when ordinary people mourn 5, 000 killed in the
>>>WTC, and not hurl insults on the grounds that 20,000 children die a day
>>>unecessarily in this cruel capitalist world.
>>
>>"Ordinary people"?  Not exactly the mot juste, Chris.  I think a less
>>lofty tone is called for.
>
>We are obviously not on the same wavelength and I am not sure whether it is
>important.
>
>Anyone subscribing to a list like this presumably thinks it is important to
>think consciously about politics and economics. At least 80% of the
>population do not. They live their lives existentially, and where they have
>political or economic views these are simple reflections in the ideological
>realm of their class position and their limited experience.
>
>They are no less dignified than subscribers to this list. Perhaps more so,
>because they have the dignity of universality.

Yes, there are more pressing issues than whether we're on the same 
wavelength, Chris, and I don't want to harp on this point or seem pedantic.  
However, I think that casual use of a phrase like "ordinary people" when 
referring to the general public serves to objectify others and put them at a 
distance.  I believe this aura of clinical detachment taints leftist public 
pronouncements too often and is one reason why at least 80% of the public, 
as you note, pay no attention to politics and economics, seeing them as 
remote from their lives and concerns.  IMO, the left has to do a better job 
heeding public sensibilities and -- preferably without waving flags -- 
affirming solidarity with the community at large.  In short, it has to 
convincingly get down with the folks it putatively represents.

I would stress one key distinction:  heeding public sensibilities and being 
responsive to them does not mean the same thing as pandering to the public's 
worst, most shortsighted instincts.  The latter, I fear, is exactly what is 
done by leftists who counsel political "realism" and think the left should 
do nothing to try to cool the U.S. public's war fever.

Carl

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