File spoon-archives/marxism-international.archive/marxism-international_1997/marxism-international.9712, message 36


Date: Wed, 03 Dec 1997 17:23:51 -0500
From: Louis Proyect <lnp3-AT-columbia.edu>
Subject: Re: M-I: Re Andrew Walton's post. Query?


1) Philip Ferguson is a member of a small group in New Zealand that is
affiliated with James Heartfield's group. About a week or so ago he posted
a news release on the Trotskyite newsgroup promoting a British TV show
produced by Heartfield's wife called "Against Nature." The blurb included
an attack on those protesting the Narmada Dam project in India, funded by
the World Bank. Living Marxism claimed the Indians were for the dam but a
cabal of greens living in Europe put pressure on the World Bank to stop the
 project. They presumably wanted the Indians to suffer for philosophical
reasons. Perhaps the greens had been reading Heidegger or something.

2) A frequent contributor to the Trotskyite newsgroup named Sayan is from
India and she was appalled by the news release. Her reply stated that it
was poor Indians who protested the dam because it would destroy their
livelihood and spoil the environment, not Europeans acting on some
philosophical motive. In responding to the publicity blurb, she identified
it as being written by Philip Ferguson instead of the Living Marxism
publicity machinery. He simply crossposted something that his comrades had
put together to promote the tv show.

3) In the course of discussing the first installment of the show which was
an attempt to cast doubt on the global warming phenomenon, Heartfield
mentioned how horrible it was that the Narmada dam construction had been
stalled. I posted Sayan's APST reply to Philip Ferguson, not knowing that
the source of his attack on the dam was the press release rather than his
own words. When you are dealing with a "Marxist" version of Invasion of the
Body Snatchers or the Startrek Borgs, it is a little hard to distinguish
one "unit" from another. It is a little bit like dealing with the Syracuse
Orange gang, except that this crowd loves fox-hunting, nuclear power and
fast cars instead of faculty pissing contests.

4) Philip Ferguson was outraged when I identified him as the source of the
original attack on Narmada, which is a little disingenous. All of his cult
members are pro-Narmada. I have no idea why he should make such a big stink
over this since he implicitly supports worthless projects like these.

Louis P.



At 03:08 PM 12/3/97 -0600, you wrote:
>The >s in the margin, when too thick, always make my head spin. I'm
>not really clear who is being attacked for what here.
>
>Carrol
>
>> 
>> At 01:05 PM 3/12/97 -0500, you wrote:
>> >Philip Ferguson, a member of Heartfield's cult in New Zealand, posted a
><snip> et cetera.
>
>
>     --- from list marxism-international-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu ---
>
>



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