Communes (Re: "post-leftism")

billbartlett at dodo.com.au billbartlett at dodo.com.au
Mon Aug 26 18:55:20 PDT 2002


Alec Ramsdell wrote:


>Not a cop out at all - if anything a charitable
>presumption of reading skills. It maintains an
>inflexible and distorting perspective illusion to
>think of "class struggle" as a struggle between two
>classes - working class and ruling class. Or in
>simple terms of oppressor and oppressed, authoritarian
>vs. anti-authoritarian. These theoretical frames
>don't fit a messy reality. A former worker who is
>hired for management doesn't have her consciousness
>instantly and magically changed from "worker" to
>"ruler." Very simple points.

You're right, those theoretical frames are quite useless. But they are not any definition of class that a thinking person might advance, so that doesn't prove anything.

First of all, class isn't an occupational category. A worker hired to perform management work is still a worker, not a "former worker" as you blithely assert. Second, class isn't dependent on "consciousness". A worker who is not class conscious is still a worker and a capitalist who isn't class conscious is nevertheless a capitalist. I don't know where you picked up these silly ideas.

Bill Bartlett Bracknell Tas



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