[lbo-talk] Islamofascism Awareness Week

[ravi]

On 24 Oct, 2007, at 10:45 AM, Doug Henwood wrote:
> On Oct 24, 2007, at 10:26 AM, Jerry Monaco wrote:
>
>> We, yes you and me, are murderers and torturers of Iranians.  That
>> is not only our past but part of our present world.  You are a  
>> murderer.
>> I am a murderer.  Then we turn around and lecture the people we  
>> murder on
>> their morality.
>
> Well not exactly. I didn't murder anyone, and you probably didn't
> either, and I doubt Brian did. We are no friends of the American
> state. WHy this identification of state and people? Why this notion
> of collective responsibility? Is it related to Yoshie's preposterous
> idea that if we tried harder we could have stopped the ____ war (fill
> in the blank)?
>

Because, as Chomsky notes, in freer countries, the free (especially  
the chattering classes) have the responsibility to act. We *CAN* stop  
our government (that includes all of us who claim to care about USG  
attacks on other people i.e., not just marginal lefties like us  
LBOsters, but the "netroots", the hippies, the liberals, so on). To  
your credit, you do a decent bit by writing and talking on the radio  
about the issues. And so does Yoshie with all her activism. And  
though I (being the son of ahimsa!) fundamentally disagree with Chuck  
on both political anarchism and violence, I give him credit for  
trying something.

I am not a murderer in that I have not rolled a tank over a  
Palestinian child. But I knowingly participate in funding a  
government that carries that out, so that I may retain my liberal  
bourgeoisie life[style].

	--ravi