Then again I'm one of the genuine angst-ridden, self-absorbed, doubt-plagued. individual types who can't just find a comfortable position in which to squirm. I'm put off by those who blithely piddle on concern for justice because their own brand of danger is the mystery that is their criteria for objection and opposition. There seems to be a whole lot of absolutism in evidence in many of these threads, moral or otherwise.
In the realm formerly known as the left there's too much hair splitting argumentation, boundary-maintenance about who can be counted as friend or foe, too much of and too close to the vein of 'the enemy of my enemy is my friend.' And its happening in every direction.
I've spent the past month reminding my students to get a grip on perspective and context, the complicity and duplicity of the US in the attack on its own homeland, the hollowness of nationalism and patriotism, the moving target of our concern (lets get the bad guys...or its our oil), terrorism's birth and upbringing in colonialism and imperialism, and the slippery slope of escalating warfare, death, destruction, etc. I wonder sometimes how my students are receiving this transmission. I also have some who have been personally affected by the WTC attacks and I'm not so sure that they're in a position to think about things soberly.
But I'm also dogged by the fact that an act of mass murder occurred, the magnitude of which is staggering. And it matters if nothing else because of proximity and some tentative tribal connection. There's something mutant about the attacks - in their scale, in their unarticulated purpose, and in the delusional response by the US with clinical strikes, and in how fundamentalism of every sort has captured the flag of principle.
Dennis Breslin
----- Original Message ----- From: "Doug Henwood" <dhenwood at panix.com> To: <lbo-talk at lists.panix.com> Sent: Friday, October 19, 2001 11:39 AM Subject: Re: Desire for Justice in the Unjust World
> Dennis Breslin wrote:
>
> >Lets dispense with moral arguments and concerns over justice
> >and injustice as Yoshie wants. And lets follow a pragmatic
> >path. If the tactic of suicide attacks on the WTC and the
> >Pentagon makes a dent in the Empire's armor so that its pride
> >is hurt, it arrogance is now an embarrassment, its actions
> >provoke increased global resistance or instability among the
> >regimes the Empire supports, and a reluctance by the Empire
> >to shed its own blood and therefore its effectiveness,
> >then the 6,000 deaths on American soil are were not victims,
> >their death not regretable, and sorrow for the dead and
> >their families run counter to the aims to undo the Empire.
>
> Are you endorsing this position, or just proposing it for consideration?
>
> Doug