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Posted to FB by John Game:
For me one of the great historical failures of our generation's left has
been the inability to shift internationalist solidarity work to take
into account the rise of democratic revolutionary movements in the MENA
countries, probably the first harbringer of which was the Green movement
in Iran. The whole logic has been one where the struggle for democratic
rights has been put at loggerheads with the struggle against imperialism
in dominant left discourse, whether this took the shape of a quiet
uneasiness or wild conspiracy theory.
Attempts to address these tensions were met with attempts to paint those
arguing this into the same corner as older liberal internationalist
opponents of the anti-war movement-with greater or lessor dishonesty.
Its always hard to say something new but harder still with those kinds
of accusations flying around. it was a combination
ideological/organisational police operation that was empowered by
co-inciding with older kinds of campist ideology, whose proponents had
allied with by now equally creaky post-68 leftists during this period,
both locally and globally.
Its produced a situation where the anti-war position has become
associated with people who decry the revolutionary movements in the
region as little more then CIA conspiracies etc and where, perfectly
reasonably, a new generation of activists thrown up by these mass
struggles see little but lies and hypocrisy when they look at what
officially counts as the 'left'-and given this see no reason to listen
to any left wing arguments at all. Its reduced what was once a global
movement with enormous potential to the status of a bunch of truthers.
Instead of fashioning a politics where the struggle for democratic
rights went hand in hand with the struggle against imperialism-the
established left has created a discourse which mirrors that of our
rulers-where these things are treated as opposites. I think that's a
terrible crime particularly given the very favourable climate that
existed in the noughties to create something better. Instead of using
the globally transformed consciousness of the period to create something
better--resurrection and nostalgia ruled the roost.
Laziness, confusion and opportunism mean that we have the worst of all
possible worlds. Most of the damage has been done. I think a good start
is to refuse to go along with lies and also understand that an
internationalism which is concerned only with domestic issues is not
really internationalism at all. For the immediate future I think the
best place to forge a new politics of Internationalism is in the refugee
solidarity movement.
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