Tom Walker wrote:
[snip]
> I have this notion -- I've mentioned it before -- that we strive hardest to
> differentiate our views from people whose views are actually much closer to
> our own then we would ever admit.
I think there is a name for this which, if not psychoanalytic,
borrows from psychoanalytic theory adn jargon:
The hypercathexis of small differences.
(Perhaps an example of this is the bitter feuding between the
Isrealis and the Palestineans? Or, closer to home and less
deadly: "Go Yankees! The Mets are bums!" (or vice versa).)
> When I said that many of the
> neo-conservatives were (ex) Stalinists, I was wrong. A few of them were. But
> the most conspicuous were (ex) Trotskyists and thus considered themselves
> from their student days to be adamantly anti-Stalinist. Well, don't bother
> telling a Trotskyist or an ex one that you don't really care about the
> distinction. Don't bother, that is, unless you want to learn all there is to
> know about the Comintern, the third period and Popular Frontism, etc.
[snip]
I have not studied Trotsky deeply enough to tell whether he
was "bad" or "good" -- i.e., whether he would have led the Soviet Union
to a Gulag even without Stalin, or whether his idea of
[I forget the exact phrase...] "perpetual revolution" would have
led to genuine self-renewing worker rule (anarcho-syndicalism, etc.).
I would once again invite everyone to reflect on what I
consider one of the defining images of the 20th century, Robert
Capa's photograph of Trotsky lecturing in Copenhagen, 1932:
http://www.users.cloud9.net/~bradmcc/trotsky.html
I also am deeply impressed by the writings of Cornelius
Castoriadis, whom I believe was or was an "ex-" Trotskyist,
but about whom I seem to read that there may have been some
questionable details (was he in any way coopted/compromised by the
United States?). I deo not know anything except the name
of his organization which I think was active
in the French 1968(?) student revolt: "Socialism or barbarism".
--
I recently read in the Internet yearbook page of a student in a
Dutch school, something remarkable:
"The lights are going out all over Europe.
We at least shall try to relight them."
\brad mccormick
--
Let your light so shine before men,
that they may see your good works.... (Matt 5:16)
Prove all things; hold fast that which is good. (1 Thes 5:21)
<![%THINK;[SGML+APL]]> Brad McCormick, Ed.D. / [EMAIL PROTECTED]
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Visit my website ==> http://www.users.cloud9.net/~bradmcc/
