File spoon-archives/marxism-general.archive/marxism-general_1997/97-03-08.233, message 33


Date: Fri, 7 Mar 1997 16:10:32 -0500 (EST)
From: louisgodena-AT-ids.net (Louis R Godena)
Subject: M-G: Re: The moderator's position


        .
Adolfo writes of his suspension:            
        
>Who wanted this action?  Apparently only Zeynep Tufekcioglu, and since
>Godena in shining armour has come out to vouch for the lady and share her
>guilt, him too, while Jonathan, simply remains in the backgroud mumbling
>obscurities.   

Adolfo,  I have already taken full responsibility for what happened on
marxism-international.    Zeynep was genuinely upset by the type of language
that was being bandied about on that list.    As she has had to live with
the immediate consequences of a fractious and internecine "Left" (as have
you,  I'm sure),  I can well understand her visceral reaction.    But that
is neither here nor there as far as the real issue is concerned,  that of
the action taken by the moderators on March 2nd.    As I have already
stated,  the decision to suspend was agreed to,  in effect,  by all three.
If there is culpability here (and there is), it lies with me and not,  by
any stretch of rhetoric,  with Zeynep or Jon Flanders.    If there is
someone who remained in the background "mumbling obscurities",  that someone
is me.   I acknowledge it,  I regret it,  and (for the third time) I
apologize for it.

Adolfo continues:

>But what kind of "death talk" is that upsets this "revolutionary Marxist
>lady"?. Certainly only one kind of death talk - anti-imperialist
>anti-reactionary death talk.  
>As to pro-imperialist, reactionary death talk - millions of murders by
>Stalin, Chairman Mao, the PCP, and whosoever ever dares to touch a hair of
>the reactionaries and the imperialists, such "death talk" really never
>upsets her!  On the contrary, it "gladdens her" - she sees it as "necessary
>criticism", and she occassionally indulges in this "death talk" herself
>without upsetting her tummy even a little tiny bit.
>She winces in pain at the mention of the word icepick - but her lips curl
>turgidly while the imperialist catchword "gulag" rolls easily and matter of
>factly from her own tongue.     

Adolfo,  I can only regard every word of this as fantastically untrue.
How on earth can you say such a thing?   There is private suffering and
there is public suffering (such as we see in many guises on this list).
Last summer,   Zeynep was quite "upset" by what was happening to her
comrades inside the dungeons during the hunger strikes.    Far more so than
any hypothetical threats emanating from a mailing list in cyberspace.   It
was a wrenching time for her and many others.    She is not in any way
"gladdened" by the accusations leveled against Comrade Stalin or the PCP
(and I know you can not really believe that she is): on the contrary,  she
is deeply troubled by what she sees as the cavalier attitude of many on the
Left toward the seminal issues of human suffering,  issues that must engage
all of us if our revolution is to ever mean anything.    You have
misrepresented her,   my friend (and I hope we are still friends).    Your
quarrel is with me,  and should be addressed as such.

Louis Godena



 



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