>
> On Dec 7, 2006, at 2:53 PM, bitch wrote:
>
>> Which is to say, Chomsky characterizes Foucault as suggesting that
>> what he's about is criticizing the content of of the concept of
>> human nature C offered. But foucault is not. He is denying that
>> there is a human nature at all.
>
>
> According to that piece on Chomsky's political philosophy by I can
> remember who in NLR about 10 years ago, Noam believes that we're all
> hardwired for freedom, and it's only external distortions (e.g., a
> bad state) that inhibit us from realizing this inner essence.
>
And this is exactly my problem with Chomsky: by referring to this "inner
essence of autonomy and freedom", he's contributing to the ideology
about human nature that helps capitalism to thrive. In fact, I'll go so
far as to claim that capitalism couldn't function without the ideology
of the essentially free individual! This insight--that people who
purportedly challenge and undermine power relations can in fact
reinforce them--is nicely analyzed by the Foucaults, Butlers, and
Zizeks. If you pooh-pooh it all as intellectual elitism, you're tacitly
approving and valorizing ideological claims like Chomsky's that sustain
capitalism and all of its brutal forms of exploitation.
One more try: Orwell's point about impoverishing language as a means of social control still stands. If we wish to contain thought and behavior in narrow, socially approved parameters, we should eliminate all "jargon" and make language as "simple" as possible. (I can't resist: the will to "simple" language is an instantiation of--the will to power!)
Miles