Date: Mon, 4 Mar 1996 22:46:53 GMT
From: hariette spierings <hariette-AT-easynet.co.uk>
Subject: Re: THE NANAS


>It seems to me there is a striking convergence in method on the list
between the Shining
>Path adherents and the 'democratic socialists' on the militias. Both
willfully distort, the
>difference being that the Stalin lovers are confronted while a deafening
silence clouds
>the 'democratic socialists' when they engage in the same dishonest
misrepresentations of
>their opponent's arguments to make their particular polemical points.
>


I really fail to see what Mr. Price is aiming at.  First it would be
DISHONEST to say that those Marxists - or radical democrats (the only true
consistent radical democrat is a Marxist) who have been loyal to Marxism and
the revolution in supporting the Peruvian process, have been in any way
"confronted" in Marxists terms.  Insults and regurgitating the slanders of
the imperialist media and opinion forming apparatus cannot by the the most
inventive strechting of imagination be called "confronting". 

For example: Have any of our "confronters" been able to refute our thesis on
Lenin and Stalin vs. Trotskysm? Have they been able to refute us on the
question of state capitalism and workers control? 

No. They have only alleged - after their groundless assertions were
challenged - that it is a useless debate, while at the same time running for
cover under what they now call the "tactics" of silence.  Is that
confrontation?  

Where is the HONESTY of this gentleman's gratuitous comment?  Where in the
world can running for cover be called confrontation?  Maybe we are in an
Alice in Wonderland world where - being a looking glass world - a retreat
can be deemed an advance, rearguard with vanguard, and reactionary
bourgeoisie with proletariat.  If that was the case, then I would really
understand when Mr. Price says "Shining Path adherents ...... wilfully
distort."   

Meanwhile, not being familiar with all the ins and outs and details of that
movement, there is only little we can say about the militias. However, it is
clear to us that the people who conform this movements - even the most
reactionary and fascistic - are closest to the spirit of Marxism (and
Consistent Radical Democracy) than those "marxists" (and phoney democrats
who advocate the disarming of people for the benefit of the bourgeois state.

Marxism  (and any consistent radical democracy) is, and must always be,
about the "armament of the masses", as Lenin put it. If the militias - with
all the retrograde ideas that most of those outfits express today - are
succeeding in a task which should be a Marxist (and a democratic) task, the
real and honest Marxists (and democrats) - no matter from what school of
thought - would be right to question what are they doing wrong than others
are actually advancing on a task that should be theirs.  

Father Gapon was indeed a reactionary and a demagogue.  However Lenin was
very careful to study and pay attention to his movement "because he had the
ability to get close to the masses".  Is that the attitude of a good chunk
of the "marxists" in this list?

No. They only regurgitate old "horror stories", and scare each other no end
under their beds, clutching their Teddy Bears!

That, for me, is really dishonest.

A.O.



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