[lbo-talk] Support Bloomberg and Rafsanjani? (was Re: Rafsanjani to lead key Iran body)

[Yoshie Furuhashi]

On 9/17/07, wrobert at uci.edu <wrobert at uci.edu> wrote:
> > Tariq Ali is wrong. For socialists Islam, Christianity, Judaism, etc.
> > should rightly be considered modalities of repression to be opposed.
> > They are superstitions which have nothing to offer in guiding modern
> > society. The only question is how opposition to such superstitions is to
> > be incorporated into strategy. In many cases it should play a very minor
> > role but in other instances a much more prominent role could be favored.
>
> No doubt, Yoshie will respond to this, but I thought I would toss in
> my slightly less articulate two cents.  To me, this kinda reads like
> Chris Hitchens lite.  Fundamentally, Ali's point is that attacks on
> Muslims (and Islam) within Europe and the United States are
> fundamentally racist and xenophobic and these need to be responded to
> as such.  I think that it is a fairly serious mistake embattled
> subaltern religious groups (for example a Muslim Student Union on a
> university campus) with a highly funded and powerful Christian
> religious right.

John's comments remind me of not Hitchens Lite but a joke from the 50s
that Carrol sometimes mentions: "What's the height of arrogance?
Answer: a flea approaching an elephant with intentions of rape."  Even
embattled Muslim communities are far larger than "communities" (or
rather mostly a collection of minuscule sects and loose cannons) of
socialists in the USA, let alone the balance of forces on the
international level.


> As a Spinozist, I tend to agree with Doug that I wish that we lived
> in a world without these modes of mystification, but as an organizer
> I don't see the point of alienating potential allies who have
> similar beliefs as me, despite their need for transcendental
> mystification....

I rather think that liberalism and secularism, particular forms which
commodity fetishism has assumed in the West, are the most powerful
mystification, more insidious than any transcendental mystification,
and it's that mundane mystification that needs to be criticized first
and foremost, as far as those of us who live in the West are
concerned.

On 9/17/07, Doug Henwood <dhenwood at panix.com> wrote:
> Once again, I don't see why I can't say I don't like religion, and at
> the same time work with religious people.

What you don't like may be objectively equal in moral and political
worth to what you like.  In some cases, the former may be even
superior to the latter.  If we are to engage in the ruthless criticism
of all that exists, surely that's a possibility that we must
entertain.
--
Yoshie