[lbo-talk] Hamas "a project of Shin Bet" (was: Hezbollah vs IDF)

Yoshie Furuhashi critical.montages at gmail.com
Tue Oct 17 21:58:39 PDT 2006


On 10/17/06, Angelus Novus <fuerdenkommunismus at yahoo.com> wrote:
> --- Yoshie Furuhashi <critical.montages at gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
> >It seems to me that it is important
> > for us to
> > acknowledge that quite often leftists in the West
> > and peoples outside
> > the West don't think politically alike. Many
> > Russians, to this day,
> > think Stalin is a greater leader than Lenin or
> > Gorbachev and they
> > apparently prefer Peter I and Alexander II to Stalin
> > (cf.
> >
> <http://mailman.lbo-talk.org/2005/2005-January/000801.html>),
> > to take
> > just one example.
>
>
> I think the point you are making is correct when
> applied to western leftists projecting their hopes and
> ambitions onto other people in the world.
>
> But I get the impression sometimes, from you and Chris
> Doss especially (political Islam in your case, Putin
> in his), that there is also something of the opposite
> approach, that whatever the people of the world
> instinctively support should be supported
> automatically by western leftists, particularly if
> what they support potentially stands in the way of the
> U.S. state or American capital.

I try to understand other peoples in other countries on their own terms, and I don't expect them to agree with me 100% on everything, from major to minor issues. If they agree with me halfway on major issues, I'm already happy. By looking at what many other leftists in the West say about the rest of the world, though, I get an impression that they expect other peoples to agree with them on _anything and everything_, _now_, regardless of their historical trajectory, level of economic development, and so forth, which I think is unreasonable.

That said, I only pay special attention to peoples who I think are promising -- for the purpose of checking, or better yet removing, American hegemony over the world -- because of what they are capable of rather than just what they believe.


> Critique of ideology is very important to the Marxian
> critique in general. I don't think people in
> Palestine or Russia are in a privileged position where
> social relationships are transparent, whereas it is
> only the American and West European masses who are
> ideologically blinded. If many Russians have a
> positive attitude towards Stalin's legacy, or if many
> Palestinians harbor anti-semitic sentiments, then of
> course that is worth understanding, but not supporting
> or justifying.

I'm all for criticizing any ideological problem anywhere, but I think we should also keep this question in mind, for the sake of curbing our own arrogance: if we are so damn smart, why aren't we getting anywhere in our own countries? If we get somewhere politically where we are at, I'm sure the Russians, the Palestinians, any other people for that matter will heed what we say. :-> -- Yoshie <http://montages.blogspot.com/> <http://mrzine.org> <http://monthlyreview.org/>



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