From: brumback-AT-ncgate.newcollege.edu
Date: Sat, 21 Mar 1998 21:40:25 -0800
Subject: Re: M-TH: Brain damage


I agree with Hugh (and anyone else) that I should not have referred to Bob
as brain-dead. My apologies to Bob and to the list for writing in a
disrespectful manner. In my defense, I will say that the insults,
vulgarities, and racist language Bob used to express himself against were
and are personnally offensive. I felt I had to give some of it back.
However, a reason is not an excuse, I know.

But I apologize on the basis that nobody should be called "brain-dead," and
not because of Bob's supposed working-class authenticity. If he is so
authentic, then he should be willing to listen to another's point of view
without spewing forth venom, whether he agrees or not. I suppose that he
sees the Dictatorship of the Proletariat as the vehicle that will save all
of the oppressed, but if he can't listen, how will he know who's who or
what's what? Somebody else will have to tell him, or he will have to rely
upon stereotypes, as he does today. He has absolutely no idea who I am; yet
he categorizes me freely. If all of the members of the DOP are like him,
then I will never recommend the DOP to my young sisters and brothers of the
working class.

I stand by my position that the large-scale swallowing of fundamentalist
teachings prevents one from learning how to think and assess things for
one's self.

Have I despaired of the working class? Well, I am sitting here trying to
communicate with others who identify with working class politics: trying to
see on which points we agree and which we disagree. I have a mission in
participating on this list. I think that socialism is failed theory exactly
because Marxists have not taken women's issues seriously. A case in point is
what Bob wrote in his 3/20 post and I quote: 

"Well guess what in 1917 the Bolsheviks had the workers working in the
party. The Bolsheviks understood poor and oppressed people in 1917 and it
worked. The point being that historically there have been poor and working
class kids in very specials skills (sometimes skills which the bourgeoisie
consider criminal) have had an enormous effect on the outcome of historical
struggles. The hookers in the Bolshevik party are one example."

Against the mentality rationalized here, Bob thinks that "Communist Women
and Youth" are going to be the ones to lead the revolution. 

Nancy



>A brief note to Nancy, a sort of point of order before getting on to the
>content of her dispute with Bob in another post.
>
>It's a mistake to underestimate or patronize Bob. Nancy's not the first to
>to claim that his arguments are based on biological/mental damage. This is
>the same kind of argument racists and aristocrats love to use against
>socialist opponents.
>
>She lets form of argument get in the way of substance. Bob doesn't present
>his arguments the way Nancy expects because he's not trained in or
>interested in the rhetoric in which the imperialist intelligentsia has been
>schooled. He expresses class interests in political terms within the
>framework of an organizational commitment (more or less). Grasp that and we
>won't have to suffer through diversionary accusations of brain-dead or
>Alzheimer's or whatever.
>
>Lay off the biology and focus on the politics.
>
>Bob is probably the closest thing we've got to an authentic working class
>voice on this list, if we're talking politics of identity or origin. I
>should have thought those who plead for special consideration for certain
>oppressed identity groups would be able to take this into account in
>relation to the biggest and most important oppressed group of all.
>
>But then perhaps Nancy really has despaired of the working class? Does this
>condemn those who haven't to figuring as brain-dead totalitarians?
>
>Cheers,
>
>Hugh
>
>
>
>
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