Date: Fri, 31 Mar 1995 10:43:28 -0700
From: Lisa Rogers <EQDOMAIN.EQWQ.LROGERS-AT-email.state.ut.us>
Subject:  Re: Ireland -Reply


Louis,

Thank you for posting the article by Ralston.  I enjoyed it very
much.  The contradiction of the oppressed who become oppressors is
fascinating, and it does seem to happen very often.  I've noticed it
before.  Sometimes it seems that oppression actually increases
something like the "kicking the dog" response, or "bullshit runs
downhill."  Oppression is not guaranteed to create internationalist
human right activists, as we have all probably noticed before.

I'd also like to point out a possible non-contradiction between the
view of Ireland as part of an imperialist nation and the view of
Ireland as itself exploited.  Both could be true, depending on the
focus of the analysis or the power of the microscope.

For instance, in a world wide picture, the US can be seen as a
[unitary] capitalist power thing that makes specific economic
decisions, laws and policies with effects on other countries.  At the
same time, there are large segments of society and specific
geographic regions with the US that are presently devastated, such as
the Southeast.  People are so poor and desparate that "economic
development" consists of non-unionized sewing factories.  The land is
largely taken up by Weyerhauser's pulp wood farms, in between small,
poor rural towns inhabited mostly by the black descendants of slaves.

Similarly, Hawaii is now part of the US empire, making money for
capitalists,but that doesn't mean that it wasn't conquered or that
the effects of that conquest are not still in evidence today.

Both are true.

Lisa Rogers



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