>Specifically, I don't think that the problem lies only with the rich
countries.
If I have a cold, the problem, as I see it, is that my head hurts, my
throat is sore, I lack energy, and I have a nasty cough. But the source of
the problem is a virus. No one said the problem is only with the rich
countries. The US is a rich country. Our problem is not us, but the rich.
Period. My point is that arguing simply from a population standpoint is
often deployed on behalf of right-wing ideologies, and we have to carefully
and constantly distinguish ourselves from that current.
>I also know about something which is a step in the wrong direction. You're
not
>gonna like this folks, but liberal immigration policies and food relief
for those
>countries where the life-giving infrastructures are deteriorating the most
are not an
>incentive for the people there to take charge.
So what are you proposing? That I join with our resident fascists and
xenophobes to round up undocumented workers and ship them back to their
misery? Sorry. Can't do that, and I'll start a fight with anyone who
does. These are the very people who are my most sought after
allies--sorry, folks, but they come WAY WAY before alliances with academics
and comfortable liberals--and when their struggles raise their
consciousness to the point of boiling and of unity, they will remember who
was with them and who coldly suggested benign neglect as a strategy to
incite them. You're right. I don't like it. We marxists are accused of
being immoral and amoral, and here someone suggests we should refuse food
to the hungry, or treat people who are seeking their own survival as
criminals.
>
>I guess it depends what you call force. I'm not a native English speaker.
Let's say
>those things can happen without coercive violence.
Violence is always the capitalist response.
>Power also concedes things it doesn't value much. Sometimes it even
chooses to
>concede things because it figures out it might benefit by doing so.
>Not everything is a military matter.
>
True. Not everything. Politics is economics by other means, and war is
politics by other means.
You talk about profit, but you don't talk about where profit is created, or
how. Until you have a grasp of THAT, then your notions about sustainable
practices, et al, being profitable will fall on deaf ears. Profit is
created by material exploitation of people and resources. It is ALWAYS
WITHOUT ANY EXCEPTION created that way. Taling as if profit can be gained
wihtout exploitation of people and resources is like talking about building
a fire without oxygen.
>>The alternative practice that will be used--so long as the same class
>>structure prevails--will be what they've always used as an alternative.
War.
>
>Frankly, I don't understand what you mean. This looks like the worst kind of
>marxism determinism.
It means that in our capitalist epoch,every time there has been a crisis,
war has been the method for expanding ones resource base and markets, and
of destroying excess capital. If pointing to the facts is deterministic,
then I plead guilty.
Do you argue that agricultural practices have never adapted
>to changing conditions and/or perceptions since the beginning of
capitalism and
>that war has been used to kill "excess populations" instead?
No. Never said either thing. War is the alternative not to agricultural
practices, but to "business."
>Sorry, but history tells
>another story.
On the contrary.
Plus, not all capitalist countries are as much prone to wage wars as
>yours nowadays. Stuff like bombing Sudan or Yugoslavia is OK but real wars
that
>kill are another matter.
I can not even believe what I am reading here! Don't take this personally,
but have you been living in a bubble? Between 1970 and 1996, as a soldier,
I went to eight conflict areas. They were real, and people were being
killed. Do you know what the body count is in Iraq now?
"I am not a Marxist."
-Karl Marx
"Mask no difficulties."
-Amilcar Cabral
"Am I to be cursed forever with becoming
somebody else on the way to myself?
-Audre Lorde
_______________________________________________
Crashlist resources: http://website.lineone.net/~resource_base
To change your options or unsubscribe go to:
http://lists.wwpublish.com/mailman/listinfo/crashlist
