[lbo-talk] Bush and Foucault

[wrobert at uci.edu]

I really can't say how much I agree with Bitch on this.  To put it
rhetorically (and therefore in a somewhat unfair manner), is the goal to
produce a radically new society or is it to punish wrong doers?  Too
often, I have seen this kind of wounded attachment become turned inwards
on the social movements that I have been a part off.  Both Foucault and
Deleuze note the ways that solidarity and care get dropped off the agenda
for radical groups (they are neither the first nor the last to make this
remark).  I think that there are ways we can express difference without
trying to kill the other (both Foucault and Lorde write about this in
radically different contexts, but I think come to similar points....)

         The other thing that seems to be missing in the analysis of
resentiment is the fact that N. is describing a cultural dominant
of capitalist society.  N may part ways with me on this, but I
tend to see the primary condemnation on the bourgeoisie who
become 'slaves without masters' rather than the subaltern
classes....

                         robert wood


> At any rate, i think part of what N does is remind us -- how shall I put
> this? -- how there is this desire for punishment and retribution that is,
> indeed, a really bad thing to base a marxist social movement on
>
> from a detached distance, i've been observing various blog shitstorms of
> late. it becomes obvious that some of the venom is, indeed, a desire for
> retribution -- precisely because people lack any way of thinking or
> talking
> about structural oppression.
>
> what i mean be that is this way -- and I've participated in this -- people
> who step over the line in progressive spaces (racism, sexism, whatever)
> are
> piled on endlessly, the whole thing escalates beyond belief, with charges
> of "you're a sexist" "me? a man with a history of fighting sexism? how
> dare
> you!?"
>
> and it just escalates from there. this happens pretty regularly, where
> lefties/pwogs reveal their inability to grasp that their enemy really
> isn't
> specific person or type of person (yuppie or academic, f'rinstance), but a
> set of social relations and processes that cannot be undone by giving
> individuals severe educations.
>
> All the progressive/lefty/whatever talk about supposedly understanding how
> oppression works reveals itself as a sham.
>
> Because that resentiment is present, I think, is good reason for us to be
> wary of not addressing it and seeking ways to create political practices
> that mitigate it here and now -- tothe best of our ability.
>