Subject: M-I: Re:"mostly accidental" sexist vocabulary From: acaruso-AT-juno.com (Anthony J Caruso) Date: Sat, 09 Nov 1996 16:48:47 EST I would like to refer now to one posting I did make: I predicted that m-i was off to a bad start because of the failure of list members to respond to caruso's (mostly accidental) sexist vocabulary-- that only a woman had responded, and she had received no support >from other list members. (I don't know whether she is still on the list or not, but we have heard no more from her.) Two things: *One* "that only a woman responded"? This is more sexist than the remarks that I (not mostly--totally, my friend accidentally) made earlier. Is not the phrase "only a woman" (yes, exclude the "only a" because it is in reference to the fact that the reply came in a *singular* form. If you care to take notice, good *person*, you will no doubt note that I have evolved to signing most of my posts "Comradely in *Marxism*" This is indicative that I realize your point (a valid one) and have taken steps to change that behaviour, even though I think that 99.99999% of anyone on *earth* wouldn't be offended by the term "Fraternally." This is the scathing bulls*it that I would expect >from some kind of imperialistic list, as well as the inference that I *alone* have caused the downfall of this list. Listen, my friend, I am a member of the YCL, and hopefully very soon a member of the CP-USA. I strictly adhere to the Communist Manifesto and anything that Karl Marx ever penned. I am currently fighting pleurisy and pneumonia, (which doesn't excuse anything I do) and thought that this list could be a comfort to me in my days of ill health. However, I see that because of ignorance like this, even this place is not a safehouse anymore. *Please* people, *PLEASE* don't try to pin the inactivity of this list on me, or on any one person. If you do that, you are defeating Marxist purpose by singling out certain bodies to serve as your scapegoat. *Don't* try that with *me.* *I* know that it's not true, and I am sure that since most of this list is comprised of intellectuals, they would agree with me. Next, you state that you haven't had time to do much posting...*Did it *EVER* cross your mind* that *other* people have lives, too. In effect, you are part of the cancer that alledgedly plagues this list. It was I, in fact, who originally posed the topics of the American Elections and the Russian Revolution, *did you know that ?!* I expected the topics to fizzle away and die, but it started a flame. Secondly....*If you insist on *me* watching what I type* (which is, I think, only fair) then please take care to *capitalise* my last name...It *is*, after all, a *Proper* Noun... But the socialist movement has, empirically, had a very bad record on issues of women and race, and the nearly all-male compo- sition of this list is probably one minor manifestation of that 200 year old record. Oh, I see...it is *MEN* who are destroying this list, is that it? I seem to resent this remark (a deliberate remark, I might add) on the same censorship premise that you shoved down *my* throat. Pseudo-progressive foes of marxism can and repeatedly do make effective use of that "unfortunate" record--and when marxists get careless in their language or (in meetings and conversations, even tone of voice or volume of foot shuffling), those tiny (?) failings are vicious because they evoke a long history of real racism and sexism inside the socialist and workers movements. Such slips are nearly the equivalent of putting limburger cheese in the ventilation system at a conference: they drown everything else out. If they drown everything else out, it is because the constituency of the said conference was never really focused on the subject in the first place. Think about it, if something is important to you, do you let something which is really all a bunch of distraction from the purpose take away your concentration? It wouldn't *mine* ;-) think of that huge list of addresses that Paul Amar sent his stupid posting to; most of the names on that list were probably hardened academic pomos--but some of them might be people (grad students? others) whose direction is up for grabs--and we may have given them the excuse they needed to forget about Marxism and socialism and the workers' struggle. Yeah...don't know of any *useless* posting around here...Not any *nitpicky* ones anyway. >;-) Also, personally, if a person is not psychologically "hardened" enough to where he/she/it can be swayed from a topic by mere digression, then *I* don't think they are fit to be a Marxist!! Karl would agree, I think. Righty-o; we need to educate people, yes, but if someone isn't able to *stick* to a system, then do they really belong there? I think that an unsure person can do more damage than help to *our* fight. (*Take notice to the emphasis placed on the word "our." It denotes the fact that I realize that this is the fight of *everyone* on this list, and *not* on this list, but to every working man, *woman* and child on this earth, even though I tend not to agree with people from time to time. This, to me, indicates that I grasp the concept of the importance of the said fight and the purpose of the said fight, or class struggle. Thank You.) And finally, Aronwitz is not the only fat person in the United States (or UK, Australia, etc)--my younger daughter is extremely overweight, and after she lost her first longtime job as a computer analyst because the effects of undiagnosed depression had snuck up on her, she was unemployed for nearly four years, mostly I suspect because of employer's more or less conscious prejudice against fat people. So in the future let's try to lay off the merely physical (or personal, as in depression or anxiety disorder) "defects" of our enemies. This, I fully and %100 agree with you on...and, I agree, this is definitely a boil on the butt of humanity. The people who discriminate against someone merely because of their physical appearances are no less humans than those they pick on (it's quite a sticky paradox, yes) but I think that in our society, the re-emphasis on the "content of one's character" needs some reviving. :-) Comradely in *Marxism* Anthony J. Caruso acaruso-AT-juno.com --- from list marxism-international-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu ---
Display software: ArchTracker © Malgosia Askanas, 2000-2005