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Hi comrades I come at this issue as a complete outsider, being British and not American, so please let me know if I'm missing any cultural nuances. However, the idea that the freedom to purchase fire arms somehow breaks the state's monopoly on force rings false to me. The state may allow an individual the immediate power of using lethal force, but it still reserves the right to adjudicate afterwards. Therefore, a black person who uses their "right" to use said force ends up in prison/executed, George Zimmerman goes free, etc. Am I correct in saying that the root of the "right to bear arms" is essentially rooted in a petty bourgeois concern in preserving property rights? It strikes me that even if this wasn't the original intention of the Second Amendment, it certainly seems to be how that "right" is used. I'm entirely in favour of the working class having recourse to force, but that doesn't mean I am in favour of an individual, even a working class individual, having the right to use force whenever it suits them. For "the class" to have recourse to force requires them to have said recourse COLLECTIVELY. Any decision to use force should be subject to democratic procedures decided on by the class, which means it should be the prerogative of working class organisations. Any other approach, which centres the rights of the "individual" strikes me as a little Proudhonist. Tim N On 28 Feb 2018 15:12, "Mark Lause via Marxism" <marxism@lists.csbs.utah.edu> wrote: > ******************** POSTING RULES & NOTES ******************** > #1 YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. > #2 This mail-list, like most, is publicly & permanently archived. > #3 Subscribe and post under an alias if #2 is a concern. > ***************************************************************** > > You can't parcel realities like this inside your head and not realize that > they have a very material meaning. > > Does anyone seriously suggest that we need to defend the profitability of > the gun manufacturers in the sale of military-grade 21st century weapons to > anyone with the $$$ in order to protect the rights of the workers to take > their muzzle loaders to the defense of the barricades? > > And this does not really exaggerate the issue at all, because the working > class will never win (or match) an arms race with the capitalist state. > Not this side of Fantasyland. > > We are going to have to win with numbers and politics. > > In the interim, students (and faculty and staff) have the right to have a > safe place in which to learn and work. Any attempt to let the capitalist > class off the hook over its responsibility to meet certain minimal > standards of safety in any workplace is incomprehensible. > > ML > > PS: If they force teachers to have arms--and I work where such silliness is > not out of the question--I already have put in my request in for a > bazooka. > _________________________________________________________ > Full posting guidelines at: http://www.marxmail.org/sub.htm > Set your options at: http://lists.csbs.utah.edu/ > options/marxism/nelsontim86%40gmail.com > _________________________________________________________ Full posting guidelines at: http://www.marxmail.org/sub.htm Set your options at: http://lists.csbs.utah.edu/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
