Joanna
Miles Jackson wrote:
>Brian Charles Dauth wrote:
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>>>Race, sex, sexual preference are all tied up with the distribution of
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>>property and the division of labor.
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>>But Doug, you have to actually live life and not just theorize it to
>>understand this. But some people are content to be keyboard
>>jockeys and opine from the safety of a home office.
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>>
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>This argument is precisely analogous to the claim that a medical doctor
>could not understand the etiology of a disease unless the doctor
>personally experienced the disease. Being able to thoroughly analyze a
>phenomenon and test causal linkages is not dependent on having an
>immediate "personal" experience. This assumption that a person cannot
>"know" something unless they personally experience it is one of the most
>pernicious misconceptions about knowledge that I come across as a
>college prof.
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>Miles
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>>>And it's a phenomenal fact that people experience their lives
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>>through these "identity" categories. You can tell them all you
>>like that it's a delusion, and it's really all about class, but
>>you've got to do a lot of analytical and rhetorical work to make
>>that clear.
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>>Or maybe build on their actual exprience of these identities so
>>that they then expand to an inclusion/creation of a class identity.
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>>>And there are a lot of important things that class doesn't really
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>>touch - like the privilege of visiting your sick partner in the ICU.
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>>And because you have been refused entrance, the man whom your
>>mother came to call her third son is put on machines he never
>>wanted to be on because you were denied access.
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>>>I think identity politics marked the end of class struggle -- that
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>>it coopted the legitimate grievances of women and minorities
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>>I always thought being murdered was a legitimate grievance. The
>>things you learn on lbo-talk.
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>>>I am not sure what there is to get here.
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>>The fact that in anti-queer culture, the likelihood of violence against
>>queers increases. In fact, if you want to help the elite do its work,
>>you oppose efforts to end sexism, racism and anti-queer hatred.
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>>>A [genuine] question: what is the basis of solidarity? Surely it is
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>>more than back-scratching?
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>>Why does it have to be more than that? By working to alleviate the
>>real life oppression I suffer and my doing the same in return, a great
>>of solidarity can be brought about (you have to unattach yourself from
>>your keyboard to do so, of course).
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>>>They are under the delusion that there is some magic formula which
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>>will instantly revive The Left
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>>It is the desire for some Party Line they can prostrate themselves before
>>which I do not see coming back any time soon (maybe never). Pluralism
>>looks like a permanent fixture of the future.
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>>>more or less deliberately avoiding the fact that criticisms of or policies
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>>for The Left are empty until there is something (probably a loose coalition,
>>but an identifiable one) that can be called The Left.
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>>However, The Left re-emerges, I doubt it will be similar to Lefts of the
>>past.
>>Time to throw the wayback machines on the scrap heap.
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>>>Capitalism is possible w/o the oppression of gays, blacks, women and
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>>national minorities
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>>Is it?
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>>>but you can't have capitalists or capitalist society w/o workers.
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>>Agreed, but you also need scapegoats in capitalism.
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>>>I tried to explain this to Rorty, but he remained, as
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>>I told him to his considerable resentment, a vulgar
>>"Marxist" to the core, unshakable in his belief that
>>all of us are really fairly directly linked in our
>>behavior to our economic interests understood in
>>pretty narrow terms as wages and benefits.
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>>Throwing reality in Rorty's face? No wonder you were
>>offered no roses.
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>>>so what do we do with racist homophobic white union activists?
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>>who then is engaging in identity politics at the expense of class
>>struggle?
>>
>>Sing out Louise!
>>
>>Brian
>>
>>
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>>
>>
>>
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