> Nonsense. There is no _Left_, period, in the U.S., there are only
> scattered individuals who (more or less) see themselves as interested in
> bringing a left into existence. I would assume that "The Lifestyle Left"
> is mostly due to the creative imaginations of Time and Newsweek
> reporters. In any case its existence or non-existence is of no interest.
Wow, Carrol, you *do* know everything! I hadn't heard that Murray Bookchin was a reporter at Time/Newsweek. That's very surprising.
What Bookchin, in a book the title of which I'm sure Chuck0 can remind us of, calls "lifestyle anarchism" is what I take Kelley and others to mean by the "lifetstyle left". Bookchin is, among the strains of contemporary anarchism I know about, notably sane, clear-headed, and a fairly decent prose expositor of his views. I vastly prefer his stuff to the (what I see as) silly primitivist camp around John Zerzan.
> When, in any definite context (as, for example, LBO discussions) someone
> seriously puts forth a proposition treating individual style choices as
> having political weight (as some months ago some jerk whose name I
> forget was making a big fuss about using Microsoft products) it is
> appropriate to pile up on him or her. But such generic attacks as Kelley
> is launching are as obnoxious as any of the targets of that attack.
Ah, the ol' "what's good for the goose will get the gander shot." Neat trick, that. Surely someone who enjoys heaping abuse on unknown correspondents as much as you enjoy it is prepared to take a dose of what he dishes out?
Your priggish squealing about Kelley's "generic attacks" is actually very entertaining. Keep it up, I need the laughs.
What's odious and contemptible is your lack of interpretive charity, your disregard for accurately representing the views of those with whom you disagree, and the petty, vicious manner with which you dismissively respond to claims you either cannot understand, perversely refuse to understand, or simply don't like.
I was, for a few moments, actually interested in your position vis-a-vis the boundaries of personal morality and political action and organizing, since it strikes me as totally bizarre and incoherent, but every exchange with you is so unfruitful that I'd rather poke hot needles into my eyes than try, yet again, to have a civil discussion with you about it. Or anything else, for that matter.
Kendall "The Jerk" Clark