Greetings Economists,
It is fundamental to our movement across the spectrum that we feel that
with understanding things change. What I wrote in my post to which E
Nilsson replies this way,
E Nilsson, 17 February 2002 05:48 UTC
...However, I never articulated--and don't share--such beliefs.
and
...His behavior was,
indeed, explained by his illness. Nash agrees. Others agree. In fact, no one
disagrees.
How is it anti-disabled to say his behavior and delusions were sometimes
caused by his illness?
Eric Nilsson
Doyle
We must begin by accepting that you don't share such beliefs against
disabled people, and my reaction must have been misguided despite how clear
it appeared to me. This isn't a court to pursue the "truth", but a place to
build our movement. But you are also bound by your words above to clearly
state what you are against. You ask me to articulate what is anti-disabled
about the behavior that Nash freely describes about his "illness"? I would
refer first to his disability rather than medicalize John Nash as "illness".
Nash is privileged by working at Princeton. Another example of Princeton's
relationship to mental disability is Kurt Goedel the mathematician famous
for his incompleteness theorem. Goedel symptomatically was obsessive and
compulsive. According to accounts Albert Einstein personally stood by
Goedel through the years in a variety of supportive ways. Princeton then
shows us they will accommodate to disability. That one is not fired at that
level for their disability but rather their being a part of the community
and a right to work in their context is apparently policy of the Princeton
University system. We can understand Nash's symptoms in the context of
building a socialist movement wherein disabled people have work rights to
protect them from abuse.
You say my reaction is knee jerk. Perhaps that is so because I reacted
quickly and with my own intensity, but do you react when someone on the left
says about our right wing enemies "the nutcases"? Such comments obviously
without merit or proof of symptoms those righties admit to themselves. I
see these comments often, and I choose carefully where I think it necessary
to bring up the whole subject matter.
You are bound by your words above though to challenge like me such comments,
and to consider do we fight every last instance? Or are we focused upon
building the movement and winning against this system and to some strategy
that advances understanding? Where are the means to fight this attitude
against disabled people so widely shared? What is the common strategy we
follow to stop what is certainly true about this class system in acting
toward disabled people. That understanding on my part is not knee jerk if I
show that I select my time to bring this up, and to use a deeply informed
political understanding you have stated above you share with me. I accept
that you want more clarity about anti-disabled thinking as I see it appear,
putting aside that my first remarks did not accurately describe you.
What this list is about is the economic analysis of the economy at a high
level from various academics and other participants (such as
homosexuals/bisexuals like myself who have no academic credentials). We are
concerned with the structure of how class divides our society in economic
terms. Why at Princeton, Nash gets to stay on and work there where
elsewhere being schiz is a serious problem for keeping a job. We pursue
this understanding at the level of the U.S. economy and the global economy.
For example Information Technology is not just about a company, much less an
individual, but how standards are arrived at, and money is made in the
global system. So that disability is not an individual, not about the
blind, mere segments of disability, but the greater systemic structure of
how the capitalist system encompasses the masses who include the disabled.
On that level when you speak of a disabled person, and their symptoms you
must exhibit understanding of economic meaning of what that entails. For
example, Microsoft is supposed to by law provide access in their software to
the disabled. This is not a trivial issue, but represents first of all the
range of people who are affected through their disability at accessing the
software to do their work, and more importantly because the WWW (World Wide
Web) is the center of the shifting Information Technology economy what does
that mean for the world economy that at least 15% of the worlds population
will be affected by these corporate actions.
You cannot talk about the individual John Nash and how his disability
affects his access to the web and expect us to understand what the spectacle
of symptoms mean in terms of class structure. You may ask John Nash from
his experience of his symptoms, or you may ask in a scientific manner what
is schizophrenia and how the web relates to that. And if you do ask in a
scientific manner, for example the book length review of what is known about
schizophrenia, "In Search of Madness, Schizophrenia and Neuroscience", R.
Walter Heinrichs, Oxford University Press, 2001 page three, states,
"Empty your mind, for a moment, of stereotypes about schizophrenia. Never
mind the staring lunatic; forget the ruined panhandler. Let the
misunderstood visionary and the creative eccentric stand aside. Resist the
amusement, but accept the discomfort, of a witness of madness. And ignore
temporarily the pull of science that transforms, too smoothly, human
suffering into chemistry. Focus instead on the experience of a woman with
mental illness. Ruth is a real person, but her name has been changed. This
is her madness, drawn from interview notes and from her own words:
Around my neck, and hanging down from each shoulder there is something like
a creature. It comes at night. I know it's there because I can feel
weight. It coils around me yet remains invisible. An invisible burden. it
feels like an enormous leech on my body and it touches me in familiar ways
and in intimate places. It reeks of animals smells. It has a strong
vagina smell that rises from its sliding body. It is incredibly powerful
and irresistible. I can't resist it."
Doyle
You must be prepared to as a member of the left to understand where our
views and understanding lie, and sociobiologists thinking, the drug company
thinking, etc. lie. To in other words on the level of this list, to go into
depths.
Is John Nash really relevant? Perhaps so, but not clearly from how you
raise the man's life to us.
This isn't trivial by any means nor is it served well by intense disputes
brought to the surface to do brainwork to which this list is dedicated.
Your words can be taken in the context in which they are written to mean you
allude to some member of the left being disabled and that is a problem for
which their removal for their symptoms is required. Though you don't mean
that others may think that. They may not mentally as Princeton does
accommodate a disabled professor, but react in concert to throw out a person
not so privileged. I call then to understand in depth how to counter that
pernicious attitude which does come up and is intended about disabled
people, because like me you share our understanding to counter such
attitudes. In not a knee jerk way either as you rightly raise. To
understand also when people do come out with an attitude that the left can
no longer accept, that their human capacity to learn from mistakes is what
comes first for us. Not condemnation and removal but building a strong base
that really addresses what we stand for and succeeds.
thanks,
Doyle Saylor
