[lbo-talk] doom

Jerry Monaco monacojerry at gmail.com
Fri Mar 24 12:33:10 PST 2006


On 3/24/06, John Adams <jadams01 at sprynet.com> wrote:
>
> On Mar 24, 2006, at 1:54 PM, Scissors MacGillicutty wrote:
>
> > I don't think that's a vote for giving up; just a reminder that
> > putting the building blocks in place are a lot easier with a lot of
> > $$$.
>
> The claim was that the bucks themselves are a building block. Accepting
> that is tantamount to giving up unless George Soros shows up to fund
> the revolution. Lawrence Ferlinghetti wrote a novel about an anarchist
> banker, so I guess that holds out some hope.

I thnk there is a bit of mixing up of conditions here. It is obvious that "money" (even big money) is a building block of social and political organization in U.S. society. I don't think anybody can dispute this. But is it either a necessary or sufficient condition for political organization? I think "no" on both counts. One of the conditions that makes a "ruling class" a ruling class is that those in the class have ready made social and political networks. Such networks get a huge boost by a certain amount of monopolization of wealth in a society. The ruling elites in any society can maintain extra-governmental institutions to reproduce their world view, and they can do so with the wealth they extract from the exploited classes.

It is not giving up to recognize this. In fact, in certain circumstances it may lead to a bit of optimism of will. Many of the political organizations of the rulers are mercenary institutions, people maintain them because they are paid to maintain them. In the midst of a social movement some people will break away from institutions that maintain social oppression and find themselves in other institutions doing work for less pay.

I think Chip's list is a good list for social organizers to keep in mind......

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-- Jerry Monaco's Philosophy, Politics, Culture Weblog is Shandean Postscripts to Politics, Philosophy, and Culture http://monacojerry.livejournal.com/

His fiction, poetry, weblog is Hopeful Monsters: Fiction, Poetry, Memories http://www.livejournal.com/users/jerrymonaco/

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