[lbo-talk] Re: Instinct

[Michael Hoover]

>>> cbcox at ilstu.edu 11/28/05 3:12 PM >>>
But identity politics (in the original and narrow sense) has little to
do with personal sense of identity -- it is a _political_ theory
REPLACING class politics (as well as women's liberation and black
liberation) with politics as the sum of various competing identities. It
was a way of reconciling oneself to the ebbing of political activity and
the beginning of the counter-offensive of capitalism in the mid-'70s.

BUT since then many people have applied the phrase "identity politics"
to the struggles against racism and male-supremacy in the '60s and early
'70s. For example, some idiots and/or racists have claimed that
all-black political caucuses or organizations (e.g., the BRC) are
instances of "identity politics." I have even seen references to SNCC
and the Black Panthers as being instances of identity politics. And that
is pure nonsense.
Carrol
<<<<<>>>>>

all politics is identity politics, consider 'class in itself' and 'class for
itself'...

re. 'identity' politics as described above, origins are in liberation 
ideologies asserting that democratic self-rule is impossible unless 
folks have have well-developed sense of self-worth/self-respect, 
such ideologies attempt to implant/reinforce sense of dignity, as 
such, move from liberation politics to identity politics is kind-of 
slippery slope, 'multicultural' politics grow from same roots with 
advocates of identity politics or 'politics of difference' viewing 
emphasis on cultural differences as positive development...
michael hoover

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