Date: Sun, 10 Jun 2001 07:57:06 -0700 (PDT)
From: commie zero zero <commie00-AT-yahoo.com>
Subject: Re: wheee... nationalism  ... Re: AUT: back Vance crisis theory


i guess why i'm balking at this notion of nationalism
being an expression of class struggle is because
nationalism is, to me, class collaborationism. it
takes something that is real (class relations
expressed in terms of race), and obscures the class
part of this to create nationalism with the local
bourgeoisie saying "we're bosnian / black /
palestinian / etc. too". 

> National oppression can be quit real when one is
> denied the use of one's
> language (Kosova, etc.), is denied access to certain
> jobs and rights (take
> your pick of small nation), is legalized as 'not
> citizen' (Palestinians,
> etc.) or is subject to a government which rules
> mainly by military force to
> enforce all of the above, or are the objects of mass
> rape based on national
> origin (Rape of Nanking, Bosnia) and so on.

i would see this as class expressed in racist terms.
when it becomes nationalist, class collaboration has
taken root and the struggle against capital is
truncated.

> People know that when they get set shot
> at the border for being
> illegals, it is not simply their status as workers
> that is responsible, but
> their status as Mexican workers illegally
> transgressing US borders.  They do
> not get picked up the La Migra because they are
> workers, but because they
> are Mexican (or Chicano and picked up without ID, as
> happens in the
> Southwest.)

i would disagree. the reason people are shot and
turned back at the border is because they are workers
trying to overstep their bounds. the excuse used to
get people to shoot them, to excuse the shooting, etc.
is race. thus, there is racism on the part of the
people doing the shooting and what not, and so the
racism is "real", in that sense... but as far as the
system is concerned its all about their class.

and i still don't see how this is national oppression.

so, have you been reading the incomplete marx? a
coupla things ya said there (viz. marx and the
importance of marx's divide between labour and
labour-power) made a bell go off in my head... 

> (Hey, you coming to Chicago or what??  ;)

my first trip up will be sometime in early july
hopefully...






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