At 09:07 AM 12/14/00 -0500, you wrote:
>When it comes to formulating solutions, the neo-Malthusians,
*like their titular genie,*
(I pull this out to show how we can be unnecessarily clever--and acid--and
engender defensiveness; not, it seems to me, a particualry productive
strategy for dialogue, even if it makes nice competitive-amtagonistic points.)
*don't want to look at class formation, class exploitation/conflict and
class rule.*
(Again, why impute the motive "don't want to", when "aren't taking into
account" would serve just as well to make the point, without raising so
many defensive hackles? We Marxists may sense a dialectical process
here--a thing turning into its opposite--when our own defensiveness, grown
out of our experience with anti-communism, turns into a predisposition to
attack.)(Is our motive here to win an argument or to persuade? To show
who's most erudite, or make alliances?)
*Their approach is to accept their own class position*
(Do we even know what the author's class position is? Or are we drifting
into gratuitous ad hominenism? Please, comrades, let's take the time to
phrase our arguments carefully and be a bit less self-righteous. I've
committed all these errors myself, and it's never gained me an ally. If we
really are serious about making these alliances work, we have to check our
weapons at the door.)
in the inherited structure and then to posit either of two approaches: a
rightist ("let them eat cake, because we can't/won't provide them with more
bread"), or
>a leftist-seeming ("it is undeveloped individual consciousness or thinking
or spirit that is the problem; people must become more humane,. or less
anthropocentric, or more spiritually in tune with nature/god/goddess," etc.).
>In the dialogue below, we see how it plays out between
philosophica//historical idealism and philosophica/historical materialism.
The spiritualists' rebuttal to CB will be, "Well, we will look 1,000,000
years back. So there! And if you look 2,000,000 years back, we will look
back and back to the Big Bang."
>
>Tom: 2)looking for the root causes of the environmental AND the economic
disaster
>that DOES concern you must begin 10,000 years before the beginnings of
>capitalism. Starting *only* with the industrial revolution or even feudalism
>is misguided and counterproductive if you wish to survive on the planet
>beyond 2100.
>
>((((((((((
>
>CB: Once again, here is a point at which materialism, historical
materialism ,impinges. Actually, in this case, we agree with you. Our
perspective on capitalism is based on a theory , historical materialism,
which understands it in relation to the whole history of humanity, 52, 000
years, or even earlier. We also give special attention to the rise of class
exploitative society.
>
>((((((((
>
>Charles Brown wrote:
>
>> >>> [EMAIL PROTECTED] 12/13/00 12:12AM >>
>>
>> 1) there has been a basic problem in how marxists use "relative scarcity"
>> and "resources" as you do the above. It has implications of an
>> anthropocentric negativity marxists seem not to understand. Resources for
>> whom? Scarcity because .... what?
>>
>> ((((((((((
>>
>> CB: Here's a point on which you might get some attention at the Sierra
Club as to the significance of materialism. We materialists don't agree
with you that we are anthropocentric, in any pejorative sense. We think we
are correct and you are wrong on this issue
>>
>> ((((((((
>>
>> 2)looking for the root causes of the environmental AND the economic
disaster
>> that DOES concern you must begin 10,000 years before the beginnings of
>> capitalism. Starting *only* with the industrial revolution or even
feudalism
>> is misguided and counterproductive if you wish to survive on the planet
>> beyond 2100.
>>
>> ((((((((((
>>
>> CB: Once again, here is a point at which materialism, historical
materialism ,impinges. Actually, in this case, we agree with you. Our
perspective on capitalism is based on a theory , historical materialism,
which understands it in relation to the whole history of humanity, 52, 000
years, or even earlier. We also give special attention to the rise of class
exploitative society.
>>
>> ((((((((
>>
>> Common ground
>>
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>
>
>
>
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"If insurrection is an art, its main content is to know how to give the
struggle the form appropriate to the political situation."
-Vo Nguyen Giap
"Rather than seeking comparabilities in statistical terms among what are
all too often superficial features of different situations, comparabilities
must be sought at the level of determinate mechanisms, at the level of
processes that are generally hidden from easy view."
-Eleanor Burke Leacock
"Every day one has to struggle that this love to a living humanity
transform itself into concrete acts, in acts that serve as examples, as
motivation."
-Ernesto "Che" Guevara
"Mask no difficulties."
-Amilcar Cabral
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