From: zatavu-AT-excite.com
Date: Mon, 10 Jul 2000 16:19:41 -0700 (PDT)
Subject: Re: VS: PLC: Marxist Propaganda



On Mon, 10 Jul 2000 10:11:39 +0300, phillitcrit-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu
wrote:

>  I have been following this discussion with a smile on my lips. Since I
>  lived for 30 years in a country whose government called itself
>  communist, Marxist and (when in a good mood and wanting to score some
>  global PR points) socialist, I might have more experience with the
>  subject than the rest of the people on the list.
>  
>  So, as a straight male film theorist coming from a middle class
>  background and having a degree in philosophy and comparative literature,
>  and a person who always considered himself to be a leftist and Marxist,
>  it's really nice to see the difference between 'my' Marxism and the
>  variety one can find in the countries that never smelled the sweet smell
>  of Marxism in action. And mind you, the country I lived in was often
>  cited as an example of a successful implementation of Marxist ideas, a
>  country where civil liberties were recognised and respected. At least in
>  theory.
>  
>  As a Marxist, I could never agree with the government of my country. One
>  of the reasons is probably the fact that no one in my (or any other)
>  'Marxist' government ever read what Marx had actually written. Marxism
>  is for me (as other Marxist philosophers have taught me) first of all a
>  method of analysing social and political issues. The global picture
>  offered by Marxism is valid, but the details are often out of date, out
>  of touch with the reality or simply wrong. 
>  
>  Another problem is the question of making a single philosophy a basis
>  for practical political action. So when Troy writes:
>  
>  my only point is that every time Marx's philosophy is put into practice,
>  it ends up brutal. 
>  
>  I would add: every time any philosophy is put into practice, it ends up
>  brutal. Try to put Plato's philosophy into practice and you'll get a
>  perfect fascist state. Does that mean that Plato should have known
>  better or that his works shouldn't be read at all? Of course not.
>  Philosophy is ment to be read sum grano salis, not as an instruction for
>  use. Of course, in such an 'application' of a philosophy it is always
>  matter of using it for one's own ends. But just as it would be absurd to
>  accuse Nietzsche for Nazism, it is just as absurd accusing Marx for
>  Stalinism - although some Nietzsche's and Marx's statements could be
>  understood as supporting Hitler's and Stalin's ends.

I greatly appreciate your insights, and do not disagree with them. I do not
deny that putting quite a few philosophers' ideas into practice do indeed
end up as brutal governments. I would not say all, but certainly quite a
few. Certainly Plato's philosophy is a good example. The Nazi's were known
to have used his Republic as an outline for their own Nazi state, as well as
some of the ideas of both Marx and Nietzsche, though I would argue that
these were mostly tkaen out of context. Rousseau is another example. His
ideas were used as the foundation for the Terror in France, and his ideas
can undoubtedly be shown to give rise to both Marx's ideas and to various
"Marxist" countries. However, most philosophers (Plato being one of the
exceptions) were not interested in setting up a new kind of state. Marx was.
He said one of the problems with philosophy was that it told us how men
were, and not how men ought to be. His philosophy was meant to do that. Marx
told us that in reaching his goal of a communist state, it would have to go
through a brutal dictatorship of the proletariat. What else was Stalinism
than that? Who was more proletarian than Stalin? At the same time, I do find
Marxism useful for certain kinds of analysis. I think Marxist literary
criticism's making us pay attention to the methods of literary production
(publishing, etc.) is very helpful in helping us see how we value literature
and for what reasons. Thus, I do find certain aspects of Marxism useful as
an analytical tool.

Troy Camplin
>  
>  
>  Boris Vidovic
>  
>  
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