Date: Thu, 12 Feb 1998 15:52:32 +0100 From: Hugh Rodwell <m-14970-AT-mailbox.swipnet.se> Subject: M-TH: Intersubjectivity Rob writes: >For better or worse, today is the seed of tomorrow. And anyway, collective >action based on any premise other than intersubjectivity is not socialist >by my lights (hence, for example, my problem with Leninist vanguardism). This is crazy. It should read "sectarian and Stalinist caricatures of 'Leninist' vanguardism" for starters. And *all* human action is based on intersubjectivity, willy-nilly. It's just that some kinds of action are oppressive in various ways and others are qualitatively less so. The crunch is you've got to act in collectively powerful ways if you want to get rid of the capitalist oppressive version of skewered intersubjectivity. As I've been repeating here till I'm blue in the face, only a thorough knowledge of the necessities of modern society can pinpoint the areas where it's possible for human action to change this society from capitalism towards socialism. No Stalinist or sectarian brainwashing operation will ever manage this -- as for instance is shown by Mark Jones's incredible posts on M-I illustrating (against his will) the run of Stalinist fiascos regarding knowledge and preparation for action in the second world war. The Bolshevik party that led and consummated the October revolution was not the same party that the Stalinist bureaucracy gutted and twisted out of all recognition after the attrition of the civil wars (successfully) fought to defend the revolution. You need the correct balance between thorough discussion of conditions and options before a decision (intersubjectivity if you like), and discipline in carrying out the decisions once taken, followed by a more intersubjectivity in discussing the results of the decisions/actions in a balance-sheet. There's nothing specifically revolutionary or Marxist or socialist or Bolshevik about any of this -- the same goes for any sensible action by any collective at all. It's just that bourgeois ideology pretends that democratic centralism is an alien bogey that's going to rape your wives and daughters, steal your house and car and force you to do unspeakable things. Now the reason all this ideology hits home is that the everyday experience of living under capitalism at work and at play reinforces oppressive patterns of human interaction. We recognize the charges being made and believe they are real because we know how real blackmail, violence, violation of integrity, foreclosures, lies, stunting and terror are all around us. The imperialist imagination is overflowing with repressive brutality and exploitation, just like its reality. Every time Rob slouches in front of the telly he'll get sprayed with the shit, just like the rest of us. And the orders coming from above are always inhuman and repressive and given tyrannically -- what Rob and all the other gut-reaction anti-vanguardists are reacting against are these American-as-apple-pie insanities, only the ideology says one brave maverick can always change things and win through and make America a better place again without the bullies and boneheads who are abusing their power right now. The hero always defies orders, but instead of losing his job and friends and maybe getting killed or exiled for his pains the rules of the happy end kick in, and we can forget about our anxiety till the next programme in five minutes after the equally oppressive commercials. All this home-bred fear and loathing is too much to take for most people when it comes to seeing where it comes from, so all the inhumanity and viciousness of their own oppressed experience is projected on to alien enemies, who may be treated with any degree of brutality because they are projected as being so incredibly vicious. And the scapegoats are many -- any victims of oppression will do, and the worse the oppression they suffer, the worse the atrocities attributed to them (Native Americans, women, blacks, Japanese, Germans, Communists, immigrants, workers...). It's time for Rob to get real and think about the extent of the oppression he's suffering in his own real life that make him invent this kind of empty projection to ward off Leninism and democratic centralism. Because the difference between Bolshevik-Leninist democratic centralism and the rest of the political spectrum is that it isn't trying to hide anything, and that it shies from neither the need for open discussion when making policy nor for strict discipline when putting policy into action. Cheers, Hugh --- from list marxism-thaxis-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu ---
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