Yeah, I know that I'm supposed to make fun of these people. But, in fact, the counter-culture movement was a bit scary for the capitalists.
Why?
Cbc] (a) I'm not sure "the capitalists" as an agent that fears or doesn't feat is wholly intelligible (b) Some capitalists are scared of their own shadows; some capitalists aren't, and state agents (police, etc) are apt to belong to the first category.
(b) No one knew where "counter-culture" ended and the complex & intertwined left of the period began. So the fear, so far as it existed, was not focused on the counter-culture as such. (On another list I observed that any article that mentions either hippies or weatherman in its first paragraph is probably a tissue of lies.)
J] Making something by hand implies and embodies a completely different relationship between producer/consumer/object
Cbc] When done for purely personal, non-political reasons, fine: It's the person's business and he/she enjoys it. Put forward as a political principle and it is totally reactionary, one of the sources of sympathy for fascism among the intelligentsia. You can find versions of it in the Cantos.
J] Everything I have made by hand has lasted at least twenty years; this is dangerous too, it's a different model of "fashion" and of "newness" as the ultimate good.
Cbc] Fine for you or for some consumer journal. As someone said in this thread, I value my time more than that.
J] In this model, you have less, but what you have is much better than the mass produced stuff.
Cbc] So? This is still totally a-political. And my time is worth much more than any such difference in quality. And notice: you are forcing people to say "I," apolitical at best, reactionary at worst.
As merely social chatter among friends (phatic conversation) saying "I" is of course harmless. But I assume we are talking politics here.
Carrol
Joanna
----- Original Message ----- From: "Fernando Cassia" <fcassia at gmail.com> To: lbo-talk at lbo-talk.org Sent: Sunday, January 23, 2011 10:23:38 AM Subject: Re: [lbo-talk] Politics of DIY
On Sun, Jan 23, 2011 at 1:21 PM, James Leveque <jamespl79 at gmail.com> wrote:
> Ms. Levine, who receives hundreds of submissions from makers who want to
be
> shown in her gallery, does see a lot of owls. "But even when I turn people
> down," she said, "I want to send a message: Don't stop. What matters is
that
> people keep making things."
Yes people need a pastime or hobbies...
But was the last time you saw a true revolution made by artists and hippies?.
FC
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