[lbo-talk] the fantasy of being outside ideology

Carrol Cox cbcox at ilstu.edu
Sun Nov 22 07:22:14 PST 2009


We could get into metaphysics here I suppose in playing with "are" and "being." Keeping merely to superficial usage, statements such as "you're being silly" now are quite commonplace, and refer only to activity then going on without no implications as to the "nature" or "essence" or "usual practice" of the person.

But the important political question involves Angela's assertion that no one can escape ideology. I agree with her, only pointing an arrow towars the transformational effects of practice. I'm not sure how deep and broad the disagreement between Ted an me is here in reference to Marx's phrase "revolutionizing" or "revolutionary" practice. (I've seen both translations.j) One of his posts on it ended with the assertion that Marx was wrong (I forget the qualifying adverbs/adjectives in that assertion.) I never got around to responding to that post and asking Ted what what part of Marx's position as he describes it was wrong, but assumed that it was the assumption that capitalist labor would transform the laborers. That obviously has not been the case, but I don't think that fact alone undermines the assertion that change (in consciousness, etc) comes through collective practice.

Returning to the topic of racism. What happened in the '60s (or one of the things that happ3ened) is that individuals would become involved in attacking some flagrant instance of racist practice and in organizing their protestss they wuld also become involved in extensive discussion of what was the racist aspects of the practice opposed, which would lead to their deepening their understanding of racist structures AND lead to further (collective) examination of their own prior attitudes and thought, leading to a change in their personal thinking and acting leading to ....

Carrol



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