Marable weighs in

Gordon Fitch gcf at panix.com
Sat Nov 10 06:01:01 PST 2001


Gordon Fitch wrote:
> > On the other hand, by the _argumentum_ad_odorem_, Art and I
> > should be more concerned with the NYPD, because they're much
> > closer at hand and we're more likely to be killed by them,
> > if they're popping off certain classes of citizens, than by
> > a Salvadorean death squad. (My approach is to analyze the
> > situation materialistically, rather than moralize.) The
> > _spirit_ of the killings is probably the same, no?

Luke Weiger:
> You're more likely to be killed by any one of your significant others, as
> well. Do they constitute a "death squad" worthy of great concern? As for
> your question (apparently rhetorical) about the "spirit" of the killings,
> the answer is absolutely not. The one is a mass concerted effort to
> eradicate dissent, and the other a small collection of abuses of power and
> the occasional instance of self-defense.

On the contrary, both the death squads and the more random killings of the NYPD stem from the same source, the ideology of slavery as modified by liberalism-capitalism, whereas the motivations for significant-other killings are much more variegated (although some of them must fall in the same category). If you don't see this right away, you're probably forgetting for a moment that configuations of property, public order and so forth are ideologically defined, constructed and imposed. What is to be brought forth is the domination of Capital; the differences between El Salvador and Bedford- Stuyvesant lie in the accidents of circumstance, not the _telos_, which is total, universal and unquestioned.

-- Gordon



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