File spoon-archives/marxism-general.archive/marxism-general_1998/marxism-general.9805, message 89


Date: Tue, 05 May 1998 08:49:49 -0500
From: Vladimir Bilenkin <"achekhov-AT-unity.ncsu.edu"-AT-NCSU.EDU>
Subject: M-G: Let's have another M1 and slug it out


Let's resurrect M1 dialectically, on a higher level and slug it
out in the name of the proletariat!  This thing about the "silent
majority"
really bothers me.  Today I woke up in the middle of the night (how else
you
can put it in English?) because of that guy from Fiji.  I collected
stamps
when I was a kid, we all did it in the SU instead of learning how to
think
dialectically and this is one of the reasons why the SU never proceded
to 
a higher level dialectically and even to the contrary.  Anyway, I know
that
Fiji is something diffrent but I still cannot picture it but as a bunch
of
coconut trees on the ocean shore, happy aborigens in hammocks, tropical
breeze,
etc.  What is he up to, this subscriber from Fiji?  What does his
silence mean?
What does he think of Malecki or me "fighting it out in the name of the
proletariat"?
And what does he think about the "proletariat"?  I know that people,
like Hugh,
never doubt the existence of the "proletariat" or the subscriber from
Fiji.  
I imagine they have special notebooks and in the end of the day they
enter
in them the number of droppings they made and multiply them by the
number of 
lists and their subscribers they have "reached" and then they go to bed
feeling
good about themselves: the "masses" have not been left untended, the
garden has
been watered, sooner or later the harvest will come.   

I doubt the material existence of the Fiji guy and even that of the
proletariat.
But I am open to all sort of suggestions in this regard. I am more
certain about
the material existence of those who have been writing for Spoons marxist
lists 
last couple of years. Every given time period they number 30-35 people
at the most.  That's all. Most of them are menopausal men who know that
they will never lead
revolutions or even witness them.  They were born just too late or too
early.
So let us have another M1 with virtual revolutions and flame wars.  We
can
have three posts limit and up to 100 during emergency situations when
announced
by BM and seconded by LP.  All the rest is free for all.  We can form an
editorial
committee (revolutionary, of course) and publish the "best of m1." 
Let's have
fun.  We don't want a really bad flame war in the very beginning.  So,
for start
I propose to discuss whether we live in the "revolutionary epoch" or
not.  I will
argue that by the end of his life Lenin rejected this idea and no longer
believed
that in the forseeable future class struggle would be the primary motor
of historical change. But please, no mail bombings.  There are just not
too many of us left to
continue a meaningful discussion.  Unless the Fiji guy rises from the
dead.

Vladimir


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