comment number two (if i may)
Revolution can be fun too! (Doing a dress up WTO
protet/info session tomorrow... simply lovely...)
monika
--- russell p <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> Mick Hume gets it right!
>
>
> >This article was originally published in The Times
> (London) on 6 December
> >1999
> >
> >'The disparate demonstrations against capitalism
> represented more of a
> >general moan about life than a movement to change
> the world'
> >
> >by Mick Hume, LM editor
> >
> >When Karl Marx suggested that capitalism would
> create its own gravediggers
> >it
> >seems unlikely that he had in mind a motley
> collection of individuals
> >dressed
> >as turtles and butterflies, jigging around with
> giant inflatable dolphins
> >to
> >the beat of native drums, whose slogans ranged from
> 'Barbie Kills' and
> >'Trust
> >Jesus' to 'Free Tibet' and 'Go Vegan' and whose
> aims were apparently
> >endorsed
> >by the president of the United States. The
> 'demonstration against
> >capitalism'
> >in Seattle (and its runt offspring in London),
> staged during the World
> >Trade
> >Organisation conference, captured well the degraded
> state of radical
> >politics
> >at the century's end.
> >
> >As the face of faceless multinational capital, with
> a director-general who
> >looks as if he personally put the fat in 'fat cat',
> the WTO makes the
> >perfect
> >Bond villain against whom a global diaspora of the
> disaffected can vent its
> >frustrations. Protest organisers claim that the
> wide range of issues raised
> >shows their movement's strength. In fact, those who
> protest against
> >everything end up challenging nothing in
> particular. The disparate
> >demonstrations against capitalism represented more
> of a general moan about
> >life than a movement to change the world.
> >
> >For many of the protesters this kind of gesture
> politics is primarily an
> >exercise in self-flattery. Those who claim to speak
> for the masses often
> >end
> >up expressing a kind of exclusive moral elitism.
> Their message is that 'I
> >am
> >a better person than you', because they don't eat
> at McDonald's, or buy
> >clothes from stores with politically incorrect
> names such as Banana
> >Republic,
> >and they were once pushed by a policeman.
> >
> >A century is a long time in politics. At the start
> of the twentieth century
> >anti-capitalists wanted to go beyond the best that
> the market economy could
> >offer to build on the achievements of capitalism
> and raise productivity
> >further. By contrast, the Seattle protesters' basic
> complaint was that
> >capitalism has gone too far, too fast, and that
> economic growth should be
> >reined in. One does not need to be a fan of the WTO
> to see that developing
> >nations need to develop, and that the alternative
> on offer from these
> >backward-looking anti-capitalists is even worse
> than that which they
> >attack.
> >
> >For all of their talk about protecting the world's
> poor, many of the fin de
> >siècle anti-capitalists' proposed measures of
> environmental protectionism
> >would hit third world economies hardest. Whatever
> the intention, their
> >approach ends up endorsing a new neo-colonial
> division between the moral
> >West
> >and the immoral rest - or, as the boss of the
> American Teamsters union put
> >it, between 'good citizens of the world' such as
> the US, and 'these
> >renegades' with their 'low standards'. Many who
> complain about the global
> >domination of the WTO applauded NATO's air war
> against the 'renegade' Serbs
> >
> >If this is what anti-capitalism has become it poses
> less of a threat to the
> >powers that be than at any time over the past two
> centuries. So, while
> >President Clinton proclaimed that the critics
> should be inside the WTO
> >conference, the media treated the protesters in
> fancy dress like teenage
> >hero
> >turtles, and even the Seattle riot cops put on the
> nearest thing they have
> >to
> >kid gloves. Those who tried to compare the Seattle
> state of emergency to
> >the
> >repression of past civil rights and anti-war
> protests might recall that the
> >National Guardsmen sent to pacify American campuses
> in 1970 used, not
> >rubber
> >pellets, but live ammunition. Those protests were
> sparked by the decision
> >to
> >send US forces into Cambodia. If Washington invaded
> South-East Asia again,
> >it
> >would probably have the support of today's
> anti-capitalists - so long as
> >the
> >president pledged to use the napalm and Agent
> Orange to end unsustainable
> >logging.
> >
> >
>
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Monika Penner
homepage: http://members.home.net/glen-penn
ICQ: 28921068
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