Miles Jackson <cqmv at pdx.edu>
writes
'I'll interject the crude Marxist insight here: individual energy consumption in the U.S. is not some personal preference; it is the inevitable outcome of a society based on capitalist production. ... Of course Americans use lots of energy; it's an integral aspect of our way of life! But we shouldn't treat this "SUV culture" as the product of uninformed or deluded individual choices. The energy consumption choices people in our society make are constrained by powerful economic interests.'
Oh come on, this is not Marxism, crude or otherwise, it's just bad faith. Marx understood that people make their own history, however much they inherit the circumstances.
My point is not so difficult to understand: if there was any real popular feeling behind the hand-wringing over energy use, then people would at least attempt to cut back. But they don't. On the contrary. They increase their energy use at every opportunity - and why shouldn't they?
You cannot dismiss the actions of 280 million Americans, and 350 million Europeans (nor for that matter millions of Koreans, Chinese, and Latin Americans) as capitalistic brain-washing. People want to improve their lives, and make use of whatever resources are available to do so.
There was a time when those on the left were supportive of working class aspirations for greater resources. I see from Miles' post that he, by contrast wants to see mass consumption curtailed. Why doesn't he just come out with it and demand a cut in wages.
-- James Heartfield Sustaining Architecture in the Anti-Machine Age is available at GBP19.99, plus GBP5.01 p&p from Publications, audacity.org, 8 College Close, Hackney, London, E9 6ER. Make cheques payable to 'Audacity Ltd'. www.audacity.org