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On 5/26/16 4:35 PM, Douglas Medina via Marxism wrote:
Introduction to Against Ultraleftism: http://nonsite.org/editorial/introduction-to-against-the-ultraleftists
I don't think this article is so great. It was co-written by Adolph Reed, Walter Benn Michaels and Todd Cronan. It states:
"Our little group of papers, however, is more directed toward what it still makes sense to call the ultraleft: from those who think that Sanders should never have run as a Democrat to those who, disdaining electoral politics, don’t care who runs as what, from those who think that socialism is insufficiently attentive to the particularities of a universe of paramecially fissioning identities to those who sign up for TIDAL under the impression that corporate mass culture is revolutionary popular culture. Maybe the most impressive of all are the ones who spend their time analyzing Breaking Bad or Beyoncé videos while waiting for the rate of profit to finally bottom out; when it gets low enough, they hope, horizontal organizing—it’s the Mass Strike, Elizabeth!—will happen."
Well, I don't think that Sanders should have run as a Democrat. That position is not particularly ultraleft. It is consistent with what Green Party leaders argue, hardly capable of being mistaken for the Spartacist League.
In terms of "paramecially fissioning identities", that's obviously something that either Michaels or Reed cooked up or maybe they coined the term collectively. It is basically their way of saying that the left should be based on class and not those "divisive" identity issues like affirmative action or reparations. You could have heard the same thing from Gus Hull on how feminism and Black Nationalism are diversions from the class struggle but at least he wouldn't have phrased it as if it were a plenary talk at the ALA.
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