>I too have found that quote endlessly annoying, since it implies a
>kind of political purism which will be hard to achieve in a
>contradictory world. Further (and I guess this is just another way
>of saying the same thing) it gives the master WAY too much credit by
>presuming (a) that "his" tools really are his (and not implicitly
>social, collective); (b) that the master's tools are so perfectly
>suited to the master's system of rule that they are incapable of
>anything that does not reproduce the master's power. There's a kind
>of implicit functionalism at work here.
The topic of Audre Lorde's remark on "the master's tool" came up on this listserv four years ago. Her statement is a sensible one within the context of her essay (see the context at <http://squawk.ca/lbo-talk/9909/0953.html>). It is only when her remark is taken out of her context and used as a free-floating quotation that it can be made to imply the assumptions that you suggest.
>How about "democracy"? Is that just the master's tool, or is that a
>contradictory terrain of struggle?
Democracy, as it was originally conceived, was the master's enemy:
***** And then democracy comes into being after the poor have conquered their opponents, slaughtering some and banishing some, while to the remainder they give an equal share of freedom and power; and this is the form of government in which the magistrates are commonly elected by lot.
Yes, he said, that is the nature of democracy, whether the revolution has been effected by arms, or whether fear has caused the opposite party to withdraw.
(Plato, _The Republic_, Book 8, <http://etext.library.adelaide.edu.au/p/p71r/book08.html>) *****
It still is. -- Yoshie
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