File spoon-archives/marxism-general.archive/marxism-general_1997/97-04-02.183, message 27


From: m-14970-AT-mailbox.swipnet.se
Date: Mon, 31 Mar 1997 10:17:29 +0200
Subject: M-G: A *real* development on the list -- Rahul M


Anyone following the lists for the past year or so will have noticed that

* real developments do happen

and

* the lists are not irrelevant to this.


I want to take up a personal example. It's about individual commitment to
revolutionary ideas and action.

Last summer, Rahul M was seething with frustration in Austin, Texas. The
bile was flowing freely, as witness these words (2 June -- the Queen's
official birthday -- against Boddhisatva):

>... you must be
>a loathesome, fucked-up, nasty, subhuman, disgusting piece of shit crawling
>with lice and maggots.

I was trading punches with him as much as anyone.

However, I had the following to say in a posting to Rahul on 22 July
entitled "Siege of Leningrad & Rahul's bored cynicism":


>>No one will undergo more hardship for the
>>cause than a religious fanatic.
>
>Do you mean to imply that the root, the core of all endurance and sacrifice
>for a cause is religious delusion??
>
>If not, talk straight about what happens when willingness to sacrifice
>teams up with a cause that is neither delusive nor a historical dead-end.
>
>The cynical wanking of your past few posts makes me think it really is time
>for you to get organized, for the sake of your own health. Take a
>sabbatical (or just a year off if you're still in the foothills of Olympus)
>and go and join a rumbustious young party like the PSTU in Brazil (if
>they'll have you). You could do some good once you know the ropes. Or if
>your tastes are more centrist than Trotskyist, go and join Zeynep and her
>comrades: they need willing hands.
>
>A bit of experience like this and you might be ready to do something
>serious about India.


If you strip away the antagonistic tone, you can see a real dialogue at work.

Rahul had been pushing at me to give examples of what I saw as real
revolutionary party work. Here I made a couple of concrete suggestions. One
of them (as is obvious with hindsight) is related very closely to the way
Rahul's own mind was working.

Rahul's decisions are very much his own. The important thing here, is that
his decision to leave Texas and go to Turkey would have been unthinkable
without the list or Zeynep's presence on it.

Given what I wrote, I obviously applaud his decision. First, willing hands
got to the right place! Second, the rarefied, indirect and contradictory
nature of any contributions made by academic thought were driving him
crackers in Austin. By going to Turkey, Rahul's intellectual qualities were
put to a use promoting the liberation of the working class and thereby
humanity in direct struggle.


And there's not much more to say, except that every step of real
development is worth a thousand postings.

Cheers,

Hugh












     --- from list marxism-general-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu ---


   

Driftline Main Page

 

Display software: ArchTracker © Malgosia Askanas, 2000-2005