Chuck Grimes wrote:
>
> > And yes, usually they all roll their eyes whenever they hear me go off
> on the capitalist pig hegemony.
>
I guess there are a few "anti-capitalists" (to use the most general formula possible), marxists, or "marxists" on this list who got that way by reading. But that is really aberrant. Almost all radicals _first_ get involved in some sort of activity, some sort of struggle for (what will seem to them) a perfectly simple and achievable goal. Then the struggle gets nasty. Then, one of two things.
(A) In periods like the '30s or '60s, when mass upsurges are developing, a few (not many but a few) people in such a situation will begin to look around on their own for an explanation, and thereby arrive at some sort of abstract explanation which makes sense of their own struggle by linking it to more or less 'global' struggles extending over time.
(B) More frequently, there will be others involved in the struggle who had already been reached by radical theory, and the embryonic radical will turn to them for an explanation.
Chuck's co-workers are not actively involved in struggle yet, so while he can influence them on the war, his more abstract explanations (any proposition which _links_ various phenomena is to that extent abstract) doesn't "take" -- they just roll their eyes. If they get involved in the anti-war effort, or if the general excitement of the anti-war effort generates various concrete struggles (even for a cleaner washroom -- as in the old "is your restroom breeding bolsheviks?" ads), _then_ they might suddenly become very interested in what Chuck has to say about the systematic oppressions and stupidities & atrocities of capitalism.
Now let's bring this back to left writers. In so far as influencing Chuck's coworkers -- or the archetypal "Joe six-pack" or what-have-you) -- it doesn't make a damn bit of difference whether they write well or badly, they won't have any influence. But if they _provide_ information and analysis that Chuck can use (and I'm sure Chuck can wade through pretty bad prose if he has to: _any_ agitator or organizer worth a fuck can wade through as much bad and/or obscurantist prose as is necessary to provide the weapons/tools he/she needs) -- if the writers provide the tools for the organizers, agitators, they will have done their part.
Carrol
> Chuck Grimes