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The Delusions of Academic Philosophy
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Tuesday, December 29, 2015
Ursula Le Guin’s The Dispossessed: Anarres as Description of the Communist Future (repost)
Ursula K. Le Guin’s is not only a criticism of present-day capitalism by way of science fiction but also a description of what an alternative system could look like. In the novel’s universe, there are the two worlds Urras and Anarres.
Read the rest of this post on the original site at Ursula Le Guin’s The Dispossessed: Anarres as Description of the Communist Future
on the main Kersplebedeb website: http://ift.tt/22vMHYe
Monday, December 28, 2015
Ursula Le Guin’s The Dispossessed: Anarres as Description of the Communist Future
Ursula K. Le Guin’s is not only a criticism of present-day capitalism by way of science fiction but also a description of what an alternative system could look like. In the novel’s universe, there are the two worlds Urras and Anarres.
Read the rest of this post on the original site at Ursula Le Guin’s The Dispossessed: Anarres as Description of the Communist Future
Tuesday, December 22, 2015
Trump's impact: a fascist upsurge is just one of the dangers
In some ways it doesn’t matter whether we call Donald Trump a fascist or “just” a right-wing populist. However we categorize him, his presidential campaign represents a serious danger.
Read the rest of this post on the original site at Trump's impact: a fascist upsurge is just one of the dangers
Trump’s impact: a fascist upsurge is just one of the dangers (repost)
In some ways it doesn’t matter whether we call Donald Trump a fascist or “just” a right-wing populist. However we categorize him, his presidential campaign represents a serious danger.
Read the rest of this post on the original site at Trump’s impact: a fascist upsurge is just one of the dangers
on the main Kersplebedeb website: http://ift.tt/1Sa5lAB
When We Leftists are Criticized by the Right
They see in the population’s hostility towards the left only the hostility towards the left, not the hatred against those who are socially privileged. (Red Army Faction)
Tell no lies. Expose lies whenever they are told. Mask no difficulties, mistakes, failures. Claim no easy victories . (Amilcar Cabral)
It happens, often. It may be a right-wing journalist, or it may be someone we know personally, a family member or someone at work … or a complete stranger on facebook. They make fun of or relativize/trivialize something our analysis has shown to be super important and that should be obvious to everyone. Or else they seize upon something they claim “leftists” — or in more irritating contemporary verbiage, “liberals” or “social justice warriors” — are up to, belittle or criticize it, exaggerate it to the point of ridicule, all to discredit or distract from the many good things our side is doing, all of our smart insights, the blessing that we are to this world.
This is met with a response from “our side” of denouncing the person in question as racist, sexist, etc. or right-wing, even fascist. Or simply as being stupid, or not cool, or a loser. And we then think we’ve won, or at least have “stood up for ourselves”.
Wrong.
Comrades need to distinguish between rhetorical attacks on the left, and attacks on the oppressed. The latter should be met with an aggressive defense, the former often call for nuance and even introspection. When coming from the oppressed themselves, or from third parties who we may wish to win over to our side, even what feel like unfair criticisms are sometimes best met with humility (though never obsequiousness).
Or to break it down in more detail — probably too much detail, but i know it’s useful to sometimes spell it all out (indeed, that is what this post is about):
Comrades need to distinguish between rhetorical attacks on the left, and attacks on the oppressed. This is an important distinction, even when the source of these attacks in the enemy, even when the motive behind both categories of attack are probably the same. It is true, when the enemy rhetorically attacks our ranks, it doesn’t do so primarily because it cares about us, it does so as a means of attacking the oppressed. Most of the time, we are a means to that end. Right-wing criticism of feminists is meant to reinforce the oppression of all women, feminist or not. Right-wing criticism of anti-racists is meant to reinforce white supremacy across the board. Right-wing criticism of trade unionists or those who work for labor rights is meant to reinforce the exploitation of all workers, especially the most oppressed, especially those who may not be in a union or benefit from the “rights” in question. Right-wing criticism of oppressor-nation anti-war movements in meant to prepare public opinion for attacks on oppressed nations abroad. Etc.
However, those comrades who assume our enemies are all stupid … well, let’s just say that wishful-thinking approach is neither helpful, nor borne out by the facts. And those right-wingers who are not stupid, are most likely to call attention to actual problems on the left, actual weaknesses. If they have the choice, intelligent opponents are less likely to invent something out of thin air, than they are to exploit real points of vulnerability. In other words, through our own fuckups and errors, we facilitate (on the level of that mythical “public opinion”, i.e. hegemony) the enemy’s attacks on the oppressed.
That is why our response to right-wing criticism should depend on whether it is the left or leftist arguments being singled out, or the oppressed directly. If the latter, we should respond aggressively, and generally should not dignify the charges being made with a detailed response. Oppressive discourse — understood in this case narrowly as discourse which explicitly attacks the dignity and advances the subjugation of oppressed categories of people — should be denounced for what it is, period. To do otherwise is to lend it credence, and to make ourselves partners with the right in a patronizing top-down “debate” about the merits or demerits of those who we then become complicit in oppressing.
On the other hand, when it is the left or leftists, or other putative anti-oppressive forces, being criticized, we should keep in mind that the criticism may be reminding us (or revealing to us) an actual problem with what we are doing. Even in those cases when the criticism seems “ridiculous” or a blatant example of “bad politics”, we should keep in mind that criticism and response is performative, with people watching (today, with social media, this is true as never before); people who we may hope to win over to our side, but who may actually be concerned or troubled by the charges being made against us. Indeed: they don’t know us, why should they trust us? The worst thing we can do in such cases is to decide to respond in an ad hominem manner, or to simply not dignify the charges with a serious rebuttal but just drop a flippant comment or dismissive joke. Doing so may make us feel more secure, more like we’re obviously right and have nothing to worry about, but the more perceptive observers (i.e. exactly the kind of people we need to win over) are going to see that we have not answered the charges or the criticism …and that rarely impresses anyone.
As such, when we — as leftists, as anarchists or communists or feminists or anti-racists, as “activists” or “revolutionaries” — are criticized or rhetorically attacked by those we deem “enemy”, we should approach this as an opportunity to explain our politics and to explain why the criticisms being made are incorrect. If we cannot do that, then we have to face the fact that there may be some truth in the criticism, and what’s worse we have allowed our enemies and not ourselves to call attention to this. That’s a double failure on our part. How we deal with it will depend on tactical circumstances, however if only behind the scenes, rectifying the error in question needs to be a priority.
Finally, we need to be exceptionally careful to differentiate between attacks from our enemies, and attacks which may use terms or arguments crafted by our enemies, but which are coming from the oppressed and/or from people we would otherwise hope to win over to our side. Too often, the more radical one feels one has become, the more arrogant one becomes not only in respect to the enemy, but also in respect to everyone else, including even the oppressed when these are not the immediate object of one’s political activity (and sometimes even then). This is not real radicalism, in fact it is more a real mirror image of the disdain the middle class mainstream (where many “activists” come from) feels for both oppressed people and the “less enlightened”. And while not necessarily the main reason, it certainly contributes to the hegemony the middle class has on the left.
Criticisms are made using problematic terms or arguments for all kinds of reasons. In contexts where debate on the left is either too quiet to be noticed, or where the right simply enjoys hegemony in public discourse, criticisms leveled by all kinds of people — including people whose interests objectively have far less in common with our enemies than the average “activist” does — will borrow the arguments, the idioms, the catchphrases crafted by the right. They may not even associate it with, or realize, where it originated. It drives me bonkers, and i am sure i am not the only one, to hear people leveling criticism using lousy terminology like “social justice warrior”, “political correctness”, etc. or words or turns of phrase that our movements have rejected or identified as oppressive or reactionary. But in cases where the people using this lousy language are oppressed people, or people who we feel objectively should be on our side, it’s worse than useless to focus on the words being used and not the criticism being made, on the form and not the content.1
People will use the terms and words that have currency in their culture, in their milieu; to use the way they speak as an excuse to discount their concerns is a sure way to signal that they have no place as equals in our movements. That they can join, but only on our terms, we gatekeepers of “liberation”. People with self-respect and enough wits to recognize this will either decide that all politics are useless, or else will check out other quarters for a place to intervene in social developments. And the latter possibility can be more than rhetorically dangerous to us.
This is not an argument to not confront and struggle against oppressive and reactionary ideas wherever they may be found, including amongst oppressed people. On the contrary, it is an argument to struggle against these ideas, to put in the work to refute them, but to also try to understand them, to take them seriously, and to not concede terrain to our opponents by pretending that we’re so cool or smart that we don’t have to address the concerns of others. And to keep in mind, that not every idea that challenges us is a bad idea — that other people, even in their badly formulated criticisms, may have a lot to teach us.2
- OK, so obviously this isn’t cut and dried. Reality provides many opportunities for people to be both oppressed and oppressors, and it’s not difficult to think of examples of oppressed people using racist, sexist, homophobic, etc. terms and arguments. Which should of course be rejected. But care should be taken not to assume that something we analyze as implicitly oppressive is intended as such, and in these cases intention is not nothing. We may have to challenge the terminology as well as respond to the argument; what i am saying is that doing the first does not absolve us from our responsibility to do the second, and should not be used to cover up our laziness.
- In this regard, a lazy attitude to refuting people’s arguments or addressing their concerns, instead just focussing on the words or tone or form of speech they use, or what “kind” of person they are, signals a lack of seriousness on our part. After all, if our ideas are not meant to be implemented then it doesn’t really matter if there are weaknesses or flat-out errors contained within. It’s all just for show, a game, in any case. But if we are planning on putting our ideas into practice, imposing them even, then every critic who identifies our problems and our fuckups is doing us a favor, regardless of their motivations, because we can’t afford to overlook anything.
on the main Kersplebedeb website: http://ift.tt/1O7F4B2
Thursday, December 17, 2015
Un drone aurait livré une arme à la prison Rivière-des-Prairies (repost)
Des mesures d’urgence ont été prises et des recherches sont en cours au Centre de détention Rivière-des-Prairies à Montréal pour tenter de retrouver une arme de poing qui aurait été déposée dans la cour de l’établissement par un drone, a appris La Presse.
Read the rest of this post on the original site at Un drone aurait livré une arme à la prison Rivière-des-Prairies
on the main Kersplebedeb website: http://ift.tt/22cdaKm
A Racist in the Streets: Trad Youth Ramps Up Public Actions (repost)
If the rhetoric of the racist right is tweaked at the edges, with the sharp language about minority groups shifted towards a broad discourse of “white dispossession,” then it can easily go under the radar as coded racial attacks are common to Tea Party groups and Donald Trump rallies.
Read the rest of this post on the original site at A Racist in the Streets: Trad Youth Ramps Up Public Actions
on the main Kersplebedeb website: http://ift.tt/22cdaKf
Un drone aurait livré une arme à la prison Rivière-des-Prairies
Des mesures d'urgence ont été prises et des recherches sont en cours au Centre de détention Rivière-des-Prairies à Montréal pour tenter de retrouver une arme de poing qui aurait été déposée dans la cour de l'établissement par un drone, a appris La Presse.
Read the rest of this post on the original site at Un drone aurait livré une arme à la prison Rivière-des-Prairies
A Racist in the Streets: Trad Youth Ramps Up Public Actions
If the rhetoric of the racist right is tweaked at the edges, with the sharp language about minority groups shifted towards a broad discourse of “white dispossession,” then it can easily go under the radar as coded racial attacks are common to Tea Party groups and Donald Trump rallies.
Read the rest of this post on the original site at A Racist in the Streets: Trad Youth Ramps Up Public Actions
Wednesday, December 16, 2015
Detroiters struggle to survive without city water (repost)
How do you survive without running water for more than two years? First, get a trash can. Put it under the roof to collect water to flush the toilet. Then, get a bucket and remember what your grandparents taught you in the early 1950s, before indoor plumbing reached all of rural America.
Read the rest of this post on the original site at Detroiters struggle to survive without city water
on the main Kersplebedeb website: http://ift.tt/1T0YRlF
In Flint, Mich., there’s so much lead in children’s blood that a state of emergency is declared (repost)
For months, worried parents in Flint, Mich., arrived at their pediatricians’ offices in droves. Holding a toddler by the hand or an infant in their arms, they all have the same question: Are their children being poisoned?
Read the rest of this post on the original site at In Flint, Mich., there’s so much lead in children’s blood that a state of emergency is declared
on the main Kersplebedeb website: http://ift.tt/1lOwdKc
Detroiters struggle to survive without city water
How do you survive without running water for more than two years? First, get a trash can. Put it under the roof to collect water to flush the toilet. Then, get a bucket and remember what your grandparents taught you in the early 1950s, before indoor plumbing reached all of rural America.
Read the rest of this post on the original site at Detroiters struggle to survive without city water
In Flint, Mich., there’s so much lead in children’s blood that a state of emergency is declared
For months, worried parents in Flint, Mich., arrived at their pediatricians’ offices in droves. Holding a toddler by the hand or an infant in their arms, they all have the same question: Are their children being poisoned?
Read the rest of this post on the original site at In Flint, Mich., there’s so much lead in children’s blood that a state of emergency is declared
Connecting the disconnected: when South Asians accuse East Africans of cultural appropriation (repost)
On August 9th, Yasmin Yonis, a Somali-American writer, caused a Twitter storm when she started a conversation about accusations of cultural appropriation made by South Asian Twitter against Black Twitter.
Read the rest of this post on the original site at Connecting the disconnected: when South Asians accuse East Africans of cultural appropriation
on the main Kersplebedeb website: http://ift.tt/1QLx8q3
Connecting the disconnected: when South Asians accuse East Africans of cultural appropriation
On August 9th, Yasmin Yonis, a Somali-American writer, caused a Twitter storm when she started a conversation about accusations of cultural appropriation made by South Asian Twitter against Black Twitter.
Read the rest of this post on the original site at Connecting the disconnected: when South Asians accuse East Africans of cultural appropriation
Saturday, December 05, 2015
Not Much Time Left for Regular Shipping to Arrive by Dec. 25th!
U.S. Deadline: December 8th
Canada Deadline: December 10th
Just a heads up for all of you that care and who are in the united states, there are just a few days left to place your orders with leftwingbooks.net in order for us to be able to mail them off to get to you by December 25th. Any orders places after this Tuesday, December 8th may not arrive until after the 25th.
If you are in canada, you have a little bit longer, but not much: orders we receive after this Thursday December 10th cannot be guaranteed to arrive by the 25th.
Of course, if you are up to paying for express post, that will buy you a few more days. But really the safest thing is to order now!
We look forward to hearing from you soon
on the main Kersplebedeb website: http://ift.tt/1RvOXtQ
Panther Vision: Essential Party Writings and Art of Kevin Rashid Johnson
Kevin “Rashid” Johnson entered the u.s. prison system over 20 years ago, one of countless young Black men consigned to lifelong incarceration by the post-civil right policies of anti-Black genocide. While behind bars, Rashid encountered the ideas of revolutionary Black nationalism and Marxism-Leninism, and of the people and organizations who have used and developed these ideas in previous generations, foremost amongst these being the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense. Along with other Black/New Afrikan prisoners, Rashid helped found the New Afrikan Black Panther Party-Prison Chapter, while using both his artwork and his political writings as avenues to advance the cause of liberation for all.
Here, collected in book form for the first time, are Rashid’s core writings as Minister of Defense of the NABPP-PC. Subjects addressed include the differences between anarchism and Marxism-Leninsm, the legacy of the Black Panther Party, the timeliness of Huey P. Newton’s concept of revolutionary intercommunalism, the science of dialictical and historical materialsm, the practice of democratic centralism, as well as current events ranging from u.s. imperialist designs in Africa to national oppression of New Afrikans within u.s. borders. And much more.
As Professor Jared Ball explains in his preface,
“Rashid represents the fear expressed by COINTELPRO’s fearful question: What happens if this radicalism reaches successive generations and then explicitly calls for the same and more in their time? He both articulates to his contemporaries and those coming behind him the context in which their art exists, the shifts in the landscape that take us from African medallion hip-hop to the bling era. He can also demonstrate with wondrous skill the power artists have in articulating those same ideas, critiques and concepts of revolution. Rashid in this sense becomes the problem he has himself warned is necessary.”
Foreword by Jalil Muntaqim, introduction by Jared Ball; afterwords By George Katsiaficas and Tom Big Warrior.
What People Are Saying
“The original Black Panther Party for Self-Defense challenged the prevailing socio-political and economic relationship between the government and Black people. The New Afrikan Black Panther Party is building on that foundation, and Rashid’s writings embrace the need for a national organization in place of that which had been destroyed by COINTELPRO and racist repression. We can only hope this book reaches many, and serves to herald and light a means for the next generation of revolutionaries to succeed in building a mass and popular movement.”
Jalil Muntaqim, Prisoner of War
“All Praise due to Brother Kevin Rashid Johnson, for his courage, determination and commitment from deep within the belly of the beast. For using his pen as a weapon to put forth his vision and perspectives, to inform and enlighten, to be discussed and evaluated.”
Emory Douglas, Revolutionary Artist & Former Minister of Culture, Black Panther Party 1967–1981
“The U.S. is a society that originally based itself on a form of prison labor called slavery. Then it based itself on a form of slavery called racial segregation. Now it sets at the core of its political culture a form of racial segregation called the prison industry, run by a judicial machine. Each of these phases of U.S. history has used its racialization of class relations to render its class exploitation extreme. As with all exploitation, there is resistance. Today, Rashid’s is one of the most powerful voices of that resistance.”
Steve Martinot, author of The Rule of Racialization
“Kevin “Rashid” Johnson’s Panther Vision is an extraordinary testimony to the human capacity to struggle against oppression. Johnson, a Virginia prisoner, who has been moved to Oregon and Texas, is a radical writer, artist, and organizer and co-founder and current Minister of Defense of the New Afrikan Black Panther Party Prison Chapter (NABPP-PC). The theme of struggle against capitalism and white supremacy as central to revolutionary change runs throughout this collection of thirty-eight articles (written between 2005 and 2015) and fifty-five, often extraordinary, drawings – most done with only a pen. Panther Vision breaks out of the walls of physical imprisonment to treat such topics as politics, history, theory, organization, Troy Davis, Trayvon Martin, and Michael Brown. It discusses well-known figures such as Marx, Lenin, Mao, Angela Davis, George Jackson, Ella Baker, Huey P. Newton, Assata Shakur, Kwame Nkrumah, Amilcar Cabral, Howard Zinn, George Jackson, and lesser known, but important writers such as Hubert Harrison and Theodore W. Allen. “Rashid” Johnson’s Panther Vision is a remarkable achievement — the power of his writings, art, and thought cannot be jailed and will continue to reach wider audiences and grow in importance.” — Jeffrey B. Perry, author, Hubert Harrison: The Voice of Harlem Radicalism, 1883-1918
on the main Kersplebedeb website: http://ift.tt/1N32zJV
Seven years after the riots, the suburbs of Paris still simmer with resentment (repost)
In the entrance hall of a run-down block of flats, a group of teenagers stood hanging out, smoking, track-suit hoods up, shoulders hunched, seemingly nonplussed that they were getting drenched. A storm was blowing rain into the building on the Chêne Pointu estate.
Read the rest of this post on the original site at Seven years after the riots, the suburbs of Paris still simmer with resentment
on the main Kersplebedeb website: http://ift.tt/1N2m0lW
Seven years after the riots, the suburbs of Paris still simmer with resentment
In the entrance hall of a run-down block of flats, a group of teenagers stood hanging out, smoking, track-suit hoods up, shoulders hunched, seemingly nonplussed that they were getting drenched. A storm was blowing rain into the building on the Chêne Pointu estate.
Read the rest of this post on the original site at Seven years after the riots, the suburbs of Paris still simmer with resentment
Friday, December 04, 2015
Inmates refuse meals to protest Innes Rd. jail conditions (repost)
Inedible food, no time in the outside yard, overcrowded cells and no access to religious or self-help programs. Muhamad Alhasi told the Sun on Wednesday that he and other inmates in the maximum-security wing — he says dozens — began to refuse meals Tuesday.
Read the rest of this post on the original site at Inmates refuse meals to protest Innes Rd. jail conditions
on the main Kersplebedeb website: http://ift.tt/1YMDoR0
Towards a Radical Critique of Eurocentrism: An Interview with Alexander Anievas and Kerem Nisancioglu (repost)
According to the dominant narrative, the origin of capitalism was a European process at its core: this was a system born in the mills and factories of England, or under the blades of the guillotines during the French Revolution.
Read the rest of this post on the original site at Towards a Radical Critique of Eurocentrism: An Interview with Alexander Anievas and Kerem Nisancioglu
on the main Kersplebedeb website: http://ift.tt/1XEqpUe
Inmates refuse meals to protest Innes Rd. jail conditions
Inedible food, no time in the outside yard, overcrowded cells and no access to religious or self-help programs. Muhamad Alhasi told the Sun on Wednesday that he and other inmates in the maximum-security wing -- he says dozens -- began to refuse meals Tuesday.
Read the rest of this post on the original site at Inmates refuse meals to protest Innes Rd. jail conditions
Towards a Radical Critique of Eurocentrism: An Interview with Alexander Anievas and Kerem Nisancioglu
According to the dominant narrative, the origin of capitalism was a European process at its core: this was a system born in the mills and factories of England, or under the blades of the guillotines during the French Revolution.
Read the rest of this post on the original site at Towards a Radical Critique of Eurocentrism: An Interview with Alexander Anievas and Kerem Nisancioglu
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