me: >> A large number of people marching in the street (and chanting slogans >> from roof-top) in opposition to and in defiance of an authoritarian >> clerical regime -- including its thugs -- isn't a "revolt"?
Doyle: > It does not sound like a revolt to me. A protest movement, but not ready > for revolt. That rests in my view on sustaining momentum, and scale of the > protests to become a real revolt. Of course, it's the clerical elite and their thugs who are preventing large-scale protests (at the same time encouraging large-scale bitterness and loss of legitimacy by the regime). Are you blaming the movements themselves for the demonstrations' smaller size in recent days? In any event, what I wrote before is still appropriate: > Maybe I don't know what a "revolt" is. Is there some Leftist > Dictionary I've never heard of that defines such terms? Is a "revolt" > something that _we_ approve of without any qualification? is it the > precursor to socialism? what in heck is a "revolt"? Doyle: > Having seen the sixties and lots of mass actions I'm quite content to want > more than street protests to characterize a revolt. As you might recognize > from your comment you have a hard time saying what is a revolt. To me a > revolt is a crossing of lines from normal civil mechanism to mass actions in > a sustained way that leads to significant national conflict. A qualitative > level beyond election protests. If mass protesting of an unfair election in an authoritarian society isn't "crossing of lines from normal civil mechanism," I don't know what it is. It's not like the ritual demonstrations that used to happen regularly in Sproul Plaza when I lived in Berkeley. Protests against the election in Iran are treated as a sin against the Faith and the State -- and people are punished for it. "election protests" means different things in different contexts. In the context of a clerical authoritarian regime, it's much more than people being upset about Dubya's theft of the 2000 election. In this case, it involves such matters as protesting the role of women in Iranian society. That's much more than an "election protest." me: > What else do you expect? do you want them to yell "All Hail to the New > Iranian Socialist Revolution"? or "All Hail to Doyle Saylor"? Mass > movements in actually-existing societies -- as opposed to those that > happen in abstract pictures of society -- reflect the societies they > develop from. They hardly ever reflect leftist preconceptions exactly. Doyle: > This says to me that religious opposition is the main force here. So I > expect things to settle down because if in a religious context there is no > place to go with the protests. No alternate religious regime vision so to > speak. so Iran has to go agnostic or atheist?? or are you saying that the protest has to call for disestablishment of the Iranian Shi'ite religion? or does the protest have to accept some other faith besides Shi'ite Islam? Are you saying that the demonstrations have to embrace your program to be a true "revolt"? Is it a matter of either/or? In any event, even if Doyle sneers at them as being mere "election protests," the _mass struggles_ we've seen in Iran (or we haven't seen -- since the regime there has censored the news heavily) can turn to something much larger. It can become a "revolt" (and thus hopefully worthy of Doyle's support). me: > By the way, were the sit-down strikes during the 'thirties an example > of a "revolt"? did they live up to your standards, Doyle? or were they > mere protests that should be rejected? Doyle: > I would have been participating in events in the 30s as a worker. I'd try > to not go ultra leftist in those events and say now is the time for > revolution comrades. Just as now I would evaluate the godless prospects in > Iran and not counsel leftists to go too far assuming anything about the > election protests. Of course we shouldn't expect too much. But dismissing mass demonstrations in an authoritarian society as mere "electoral protest" is going too far the other way. Expecting too little is an error, too. me: > So are you equating "revolt" with a "left revolt"? as mentioned above, > there are lots of other kinds. Doyle: > Like you say some revolts I can't support. Honduras is a good example. If > the left is clearly making headway with say a liberation religious element > I'm fine with supporting a peoples revolt. I mean a real live social force > capable of making some reforms happen if not revolution. Democracy and > rights though as demands can take an awful lot of social turmoil to become > real demands. I don't see why you emphasize the religious stuff so much. I'm an agnostic in theory and an atheist in practice, but I don't see any reason why I should proselytize others to take up my (lack of) faith.[*] In addition, I've known a lot of very religious people who have been very militant and dedicated in leftist politics. Disestablishment of the Mosque seems to be a good idea. It -- and other reforms -- might result _even though_ the protesting people in Iran aren't calling for it. (It's quite common that the objective effects of group actions differ from their subjective goals.) This is because (1) the imams have been excessively authoritarian toward their own people (from the point of view of most Iranian people -- even men -- themselves, not just mine). The Iranian regime has gone far beyond opposing the Shah and the meddling by the Great Satan; and (2) the upper clerical stratum has itself split over these issues. I can imagine that the Mosque may be demoted a bit in its political power. (Of course, no-one can predict such things.) If so, it would open Iranian society to increased democracy and even a _de facto_ disestablishment of religion. In Latin America, one reason why the military has generally stopped overthrowing governments the way they used to is the military didn't like getting the blame for what happened after the coup. The same kind of thing might drive the imams to voluntarily demote the Mosque's role in society. -- Jim Devine / "Segui il tuo corso, e lascia dir le genti." (Go your own way and let people talk.) -- Karl, paraphrasing Dante. [*] if people _want_ to talk about these issues, I'll do it. But I don't push my opinions on this issue the way some atheists do. (One guy thought that if everyone just abandoned religion everything would be hunky-dory. What was his name again? Richard Dawkins? Sam Harris? Christopher Hitchens? Nah.) _______________________________________________ pen-l mailing list [email protected] https://lists.csuchico.edu/mailman/listinfo/pen-l
