[lbo-talk] Lincoln Gordon, he dead

James Heartfield Heartfield at blueyonder.co.uk
Fri Jan 15 13:49:55 PST 2010



> Do any of us really believe that it's possible to be non-racist
> within a certain social relationship, or racist outside of it?

This seems like a counsel of despair to me. Social relationships are just the sum of human actions in the end, and endorsement or challenge to racism are some of the choices available. I am not saying that it is a question of personal behaviour. Lots of people who had no interest in Jewish culture, or even had any Jewish friends fought against the British Union of Fascists in the 1930s, because they knew it was in their interests to do so. Similarly, many trade unionists mobilised when a handful of East London dockworkers rallied in support of the racist Enoch Powell - because they understood that his was a political challenge to their movement. Many of us marched against racist immigration laws in the 1980s, and mobilised against racist attacks because it was part and parcel of everyone's struggle. And people marched against the wars that Britain and America made on the Middle East because they understood that the case against the arab people was a casse for reaction at home.

That, rather than the self-serving introspection of white guilt (which ultimately concludes that racial difference is unchallengable) is what it means to be anti-racist.



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