[lbo-talk] Lou Proyect responds...

[Eric Beck]

On Fri, Feb 10, 2012 at 5:29 AM, shag carpet bomb <shag at cleandraws.com> wrote:
> The author goes on to critique the term, anti-capitalist, but doesn't
> question the idea that a nascent social movement, in a country like the
> u.s., is only worth active participation only if its members are somehow
> fully formed freedom fighters against capitalism, ready to dispose of a
> capitalist economy, here and now, end of fucking history.

I think this is exactly why every post of Marv's grates on my nerves.
(I don't mean this personally or to pick on Marv; I don't know him.
But as Deleuze said, everyone needs an enemy.) His political analysis
and strategy are all about identifying where people are on the
political spectrum, assigning them an identity based on their subject
position, and delimiting possibilities based on those things. Unlike
the Platypussers, Marv doesn't use that sad taxonomy to advocate doing
nothing; just the opposite I think. But the drawing of and obedience
to these very conventional, ideological lines can only reproduce
things as they are. What's lost is discovering the possibilities of
transformation.