On the Unpopularity of Leftish TV shows....

[Wojtek Sokolowski]

At 04:59 PM 9/10/2002 -0400, you wrote:
>It's definitely not an individualistic approach in the usual sense of the
>term.  (Is it possible to say "Hey, let's try to think dialectically about
>this"  without sounding like I'm resorting to mumbo-jumbo?)  A person's
>ability to tolerate dislocations in their internal adjustment to coercive
>social conditions depends to some degree on social conditions.  But it's
>useful to recognize -- this *happens*, it's not just a figment of a
>theoretical model -- that a person being exposed to criticism of coercive
>social conditions to experience an internal dynamic of an increasingly vivid
>experience of anger and frustration that can set off a countermovement.

Yes, but how that counter-movement is channelled makes all the difference 
in the world. German and Italian fascism or Islamic fundamentalists feeds 
on popular discontents with the status quo, but channels that "social 
energy" into a reactionary direction.  Farrakhan and its outfit "Nation of 
Islam," the lesser Black churches, and the hip-hop industry do pretty much 
the same thing with the Black discontent in this country, the Repug party 
and its satellites (churches, NRA, veteran groups, etc.) channel the 
discontent of "angry white men,"  and the Democrat party channel the 
frustration of wussy liberals.  There is no political institution in the US 
that is able to effectively channel these discontents to the left causes 
and policies.  I once thought that Labor Party may become such an 
institution, but apparently it was dud.

The left will be politically meaningless in this country as long as it does 
not have a mainstream institutional representation.

wojtek