Date: Sun, 5 Jan 1997 19:50:16 +0100 (MET) From: malecki-AT-algonet.se (Robert Malecki) Subject: M-G: Re: ebonics Neil wries; > > Bob Malecki and a couple others say that criticizing the (strikebreaking) >Oakland , Ca. schoolboard and others for pandering to the >patois of "ebonics" as some panacea to cover up these bourgeois >politicians caving in to the gutting out of funding for english language, > ESL, Head start and other moderately successful programs >is racism or the politics of the 'white middle class'. I love Neil! I love Neil because he is always consistent! On EVERY question whether it be the former Soviet Union--the Trade Unions--and now Ebonics he always takes the historical ULTRA-LEFT position of throwing out the baby with the bath water. And Ultimately winds up on the side of the class enemy. Too bad because I think Neil *really* hates the bougeoisie! The last time around with Neil was on the LP list and the trades unions and now that even the LP is getting interested in this question i shall send this + some other material to it. Neil was trying to tell us that the Trade Unions are at best counter-revolutionary and that Malecki, who thinks that Communist will be in trade unions and fight for the leadership of the working class was at best a asskisser to the trade union bureaucracy. Because Neil as usual can not see the difference, nor the historical role that trade unions play for the proletariat. His line is to go out in the desert and build something rrrrrr-volutionary with his little state cap ultra-left group. Now Neil has turned his attention to the question of Ebonics with basically the same methodology that he has on the trade unions. The only difference is that now Malecki is kissing ass for the "strikebreaking" Oakland scoollboard who at best are just trying to wrip off the state for money. In fact he says i am caving in to the board who does not want to fund english classes. Well he is wrong on all three counts as usual. In fact Communists nor have i said one word in support of the Oakland schoolboard. And in fact Communists are for free education for children and in this case Ebonics as a tool in helping these children to find a way they can communicate in a language that they feel comfortable in. It does not mean that i am for not teaching english or anything else but it does mean that i support the demands for teaching Ebonics to these children. And in fact i have a question to Neil. Don't you think that this debate that is going on has very racist overtones? Not in the least the so called reverse racism shit that is becoming very popular. I recently said in another letter the following; Oh really! Well, I disagree with you! Despite your sour looks- white rascism has been the OPPRESSOR-Black rascism has been the OPPRESSED! Now to me that is a BIG difference.. And if Justin agrees with you he is full of shit also. Communists are not democrats on this stuff. We look at it the WHYS,the WHERES and the WHO,S to determine a position on a question like Ebonics. But for you this question is posed as all liberals pose the question. You hit me and i hit you back thus you are both wrong. and I did not nor ever will say that Ebonics has a tendency to split along racist lines.Because it certainly does! Well this also goes for the National Question but it does not mean that Communists do not fight for the right of peoples to self determination - including the right to succeed and build their own state. This naturally does not mean that Communists raise this to a PRINCIPLE everywhere but we do try to have a Marxist approach to this stuff. among other things. > >Bullshit Bob! Try Preaching your liberal platitudes and panderings >to black students in LA or Oakland Schools who are sick and tired >of being dissed( whoops !!) by the upper middle class forces who >sit on these school boards and who go along with 90% of >of Pete Wilson's and the Calif. Legislatures cutting hundreds >of millions of dollars out of school budgets over the last 6 years. You should have been and algebra teacher. Because your arguement is OB+BOB. Oakland Board + black oppression = Betrayal! But it has nothing to to with dialectics nor contradictions, nor combined and uneven development, nor having any kind of tactics to intervene in poor and working class struggle other then screaming. Bullshit Bob as you once again wonder off into the desert! > >Along with the bourgeois programme of making the workers >paying for more 'public' monies tranferred to the rich. >Many black , white, latin and other working class students >are facing a dummying-down of public education into previously >latent but now more blatant 3 or 4 tiered public education based >directly not just on race, but class as well. OK! I can buy this stuff. At least from a distamce. I mean the same thing is going on in Scandinavia including a form of the Ebonics debate. I recently said that we have here in Sweden a garantee for first and seconf generation foreign nationals to send their children to state funded home language courses. Because these children feeling secure in their home language first can learn to communicate in a secure and comfortable envionment. Going on later to be able to learn other languages instead of winding up in a dead end of having NO language at all! > >In LA as well as Oakland here in Calif, many black public school students >and parents themselves have denounced the use of "ebonics" as part >of this dummying- down process for working class students . >With all the budget cuts and class over crowding. >(Typical HS English classes pushing 40 students in LA and Oakland > public schools!) >Use of Ebonics will more likely just use up more precious class time >and in this education for the capitalist market system , leave many >working class black youth falling even further behind the higher tiers >of the "separate and unequal" "schools" in the phony >"bourgeois " equality of the present public education system. >Educators like Jonathon Kozol (Savage Inequalities) have shown have >tiered the education funding and training structure to serve the needs >of the bourgeois corporations, who as they need LESS skilled ghetto labor, >and LESS educated black workers who are a key potential volcano >of workers rebellion of past and future, are truly ghettoizing the level >of "education' for workers to correspond to THEIR profit needs and >the needs of social control as well. Well, everything that is done in society the bougeoisie certainly fight for their interests. But this does not mean that you take out a stick and beat Ebonics and black kids on the head. It means that Communists defend free school and education in any language which their appears to be a need for amongst poor and working class people. So in fact you are just supporting the parents who trash ebonics I defend both these parents and the parents of those children who want to use Ebonics! > >If "ebonics' use by teachers can combat elitism and bring the >teachers , TAs, classified employees, students and working class > parents together to fight for quality education in the inner cities, then > that would would be a big step forward for the black and other working > class forces, who have taken defeat after defeat from the rich and their state >here in Cali f .and other states over th past 5 years.. Good. Sounds like a fairly decent partial goal for teachers. I think that we have to go much futher and build a poor and working class republic in the United States as elsewhere being the only *real* garantee that our children have a future at all! > >But to promote the use of "ebonics" (patois) as a second language and make >pseudo scientific defenses of it, e.g "Ebonics is genetically based >language in African Americans with origins in Africa" ( Arguments so absurd that >even the board members are retracting them now!!) is to fall into >a real trap of reactionary "eugenics" thinking . This is however , >where so many nationalist supporters of separatism/segregation, usually >mainly white racist exploiters but now with a coterie of black nationalists >sucking up for a bigger piece of capitalist pie, are taking us. Ah Neil are you a board member? I mean you always appear to know what those in power are trying to do. The problem is that you always throw out the baby with the bathwater! Once again! As you have done on the question of the Soviet Union--the trade unions--and now Ebonics! Never any contradictions, no tactics, and in the final analisis desertion into the desert in the face of the ruling classes attacks on poor and working class people! In Defense of Ebonics! In Defense of all children to free education! For a workers government which is the only garantee of justice and equality! For a Multi-racial Workers Party in the United States! Bob Malecki ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- -------------------------------------------- http://www.kmf.org/malecki/ Read the book! Ha Ha Ha McNamara, Vietnam-My Bellybutton is my Crystalball! COCKROACH, a zine for poor and workingclass people NOW ON LINE -------------------------------------------------------- --- from list marxism-general-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu ---
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