andie nachgeborenen wrote:
>
> > Well, the only posters in the "Marxist Camp" who have earned a lot of
> frequent poster mileage are yours truly, Carrol Cox, & Justin
> Schwartz (a Midwestern Marxist Camp?).
>
> "Je suis ne pas Marxiste." As I've said here, I don't think the label hasa point anymore. jks
>
Justin will have to accept nomination as an honorary Marxist then on the grounds I explained in a post last June:
*****
Subject: Re: Determinism
Date: Sun, 30 Jun 2002 10:10:24 -0500
From: Carrol Cox <cbcox at ilstu.edu>
Todd Archer wrote:
>
> Joe said:
>
>
> What characterises a "secular religion", anyway, aside from having an "-ism"
> in its name?
>
Someplace Engels jokes about the acquaintances who, told that one is an atheist, exclaim "Oh, then atheism is your religion."
But notice, this whole discussion has not touched on either marxism or religion. Rather, it has consisted of a series of free-floating assertions about _people_. The argument is not that marxism is a religion. To make that claim would require an analysis of actual marxist positions. Rather Joe & others are claiming to be mindreaders -- they know better than I do what is going on in my head when I affirm a position about the world.
Todd is probably correct about my first response to R -- I made the mistake of responding in the mode he introduced: that is, the mode of talking about the people who hold a give conviction rather than the conviction itself.
Justin argues that the theory of surplus value is not a necessary (or even desirable) basis for explaining exploitation. He _doesn't_ (at least ordinarily -- we all slip) say that anyone who believes that theory is a robot, etc. So I can argue with Justin. It's called being principled. One can argue about principles but there is nothing to say in response to someone who engages in reading my mind to describe my secret or unconscious or whatever motivation in holding that conviction.
Rhetoricians have described R's mode of argument as "polluting the waters of discourse." That is, he has attempted to establish a context in which anything I or Yoshie or other "marxist" says is irrelevant and merely proves his position. He does not make statements about marxism. And he pulled both me and to some extent Yoshie into that shithole with him -- of unprincipled statements about people rather than principled statements about theoretical or practical positions.
Carrol ****
To which Justin responded:
****
Subject: Re: Determinism
Date: Sun, 30 Jun 2002 22:18:26 +0000
From: Justin Schwartz <jkschw at hotmail.com>
>But notice, this whole discussion has not touched on either marxism or
>religion. Rather, it has consisted of a series of free-floating
>assertions about _people_. The argument is not that marxism is a
>religion. To make that claim would require an analysis of actual marxist
>positions. Rather Joe & others are claiming to be mindreaders -- they
>know better than I do what is going on in my head when I affirm a
>position about the world.
No, what makes Marxism a secular religion isn't any particular position
or even a set of them. It's the way people have held it--as sometime
believed a priori, immune from criticism, with a kind of worshipful
devotion to (often unread) texts; with the language of orthodoxt,
betrayal, etc.; and it's something that people have used to inspire the
meaning in their lives. Not all of this is bad, especially the last.
None of it has any connection to the truth value of any theoretical
propositions in Marxism.
>
>Justin argues that the theory of surplus value is not a necessary (or
>even desirable) basis for explaining exploitation. He _doesn't_ (at
>least ordinarily -- we all slip) say that anyone who believes that
>theory is a robot, etc.
Of course not. Though the way that some people adhere to the claim--e.g. Andrew Kliman, strikes me as religious. Jim Devine, on the contrary, has a scientifically founded, though I think erroneous, conviction that value theory is useful.
>So I can argue with Justin. It's called being
>principled.
Same, Carrol.
jks ****
Remarks on "some [unspecified] leftists" or "some [unspecified] marxists," for me, exclude a person from classification as a marxist, regardless of his/her opinions otherwise. One can screw up in this regard many times, but the bulk of a person's output must be, in the senses defined above, principled.
I of course violated my principles here when I called s a liar. As Lou Paulsen pointed out, his story could be true and we had no evidence to the contrary. The hypothesized rumor was ridiculous, but I had no basis for judging the motive behind repeating it.
Mental telepathy is outside the marxist circle.
Carrol