[lbo-talk] Progress and Cariucature (Was Re: Catholicism. . . )

Michael Smith mjs at smithbowen.net
Mon Dec 15 03:35:29 PST 2008


On Sun, 14 Dec 2008 23:35:29 -0500 Doug Henwood <dhenwood at panix.com> wrote:


> But really, why go to all that trouble if you
> didn't have an ethical beef with capitalism?

I note that the ground has shifted from "moral" to "ethical"; is there a difference?

Marx would certainly have argued against the claims of bourgeois morality. That's a moral argument in a sense. Did he erect in its place a theory proletarian morality? Not that I'm aware of. Does this make him an antinomian? Would he have considered all talk of right and wrong, duty and obligation, nonsensical? It's not clear that he would.

He certainly hated capitalism. But his justification for expropriating the expropriators isn't founded on the immorality of the latter, is it? That would presuppose some moral framework (founded on what?) existing over and above or outside of the historical dialectic.

--

Michael Smith mjs at smithbowen.net http://stopmebeforeivoteagain.org



More information about the lbo-talk mailing list