Thanks, very much, Stan, for your latest two posts
I was not long ago at a meeting between the HSUS (Humane Society of the US)
and a group of hunters, both sides there to see if common ground could be
found. While both seemed vehemently committed to their own viewpoints, at
the end of a surprisingly gentle meeting it was concluded that both groups
should seek to work on "overpopulation." A small victory, but progress,
nonetheless.
In a perfect world, we eco-doomers and you marxies could construct some
over-riding leadership that would arbitrate our differences and keep both
movements headed in the same direction, mutually supporting each other.
Unfortunately it ain't a perfect world and we don't have much time. That
means we have to do those things for ourselves. It means we have to develop
knowledge of and respect for each other's positions. It means we have to
VOLUNTARILY support each others goals and actions, as you suggested Stan.
It means that we must educate ourselves to the knowledge each of us brings
to the table, . to the issue of survival. I must read and understand Marx's
criticism of mechanistic science. The Philosophy of Right, [and] Lenin's
critique of the metaphysics of positivism"; and you must read Naess and
Sessions, Quinn and Hardin. YOU, Stan need to know what a "neo-malthusian"
is, and I gotta decipher what an SWP type is. I have a long reading list of
what you should know, and I have received more than one longggggggg reading
list about Marxism since I have been on crashlist. Offlist Julien and Tony
and others have patiently chipped away at my ignorance. (Do you find that
admission obsequious, Hal?) This is what Mark Jones envisioned, I think,
when he set up this list. Mostly he has been the only consistent
practitioner of that attitude.
It means that when one of your own rolls his eyes at some deep ecology
concept and mutters "malthusian" as if he was muttering "Jesuit", you need
to set him straight; just as much as when one of my clan mutters "marxist" I
must explain that indeed "solidarity takes dialogue and work and more
dialogue and more work... These are the realities of organizing."
We must each spend some time away from the choir, learning the wisdom of the
other, so that I am sure of what I am talking about when presenting Marxian
truth, and you when presenting ecological concepts.
(BTW, the Sierra Club sell-out and treachery is ours to deal with, and is
being confronted across the country even as we write. You could perhaps
persuade the Marxist camp that to admit some priority to habitat issues is
crucial.)
It means you call Carrol down when he calls us "religionists", etc., and I
call Hallyx down when he likens the lot of you to fundamentalists. -- I
will kick it off right now in a show of good faith:.
Hallyx, I hereby invoke the Thumper Rule. SHUT THE FUCK UP. The marxies have
a point when they say there is a fundamental component to survival in their
theories of political struggle.
One thing I think we can begin to agree upon, Stan, comes straight out of
Einstein. In addition to "necessity", one basic concept that is required in
confronting the crash is summed up in a single word as well.
Reciprocity.
Thanks for listening.
Tom
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