The nature of anarchism (Lefty Despair etc.)

Catherine Driscoll catherine.driscoll at adelaide.edu.au
Tue Oct 1 08:28:42 PDT 2002


Doug replies:


> >Well this depends on what you actually mean by "differences". If
> you
> >mean social differences -- in the conflicts of interest sense --
> I
> >think there's a valid argument that differences between men and
> >women are class differences. That is, in the sense that we
> actually
> >use the term "class" today, which is in a more general sense
> >descriptive of "economic" inequalities rather than class in
> Marx's
> >more specific sense.
>
> Sex also has a lot to do with one's access to property and role in
> the social division of labor - more traditional Marxian markers of
> class.

Sure. Yes.

But I guess I was trying to respond to the idea that sexual difference might be outside of class in a social sense. Not sure it is. I mean, I'm not sure that the ways it is aren't more urgently framed as "class".

Yes I have a uterus. Well, last time I looked; or, rather, someone else did. But how that "means" anything socially in terms of "conflict of interest"...? 'Class' is a diffuse enough concept now -- I mean in public culture and in social criticism -- that it can probably encompass most of that.

For the moment I'm out on whether either the more diffuse use of "class" as a concept or the ease of explaining the social functions of sexual difference as an interest via "class" are good things, or not.

Catherine



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