M-L-M Mayhem!

My recent participation in an event about how anarchists and maoists can work together ––in Hamilton, in the really neat anarchist Tower collective space––has caused me to think of Nietzsche in a non-Nietzschean manner.  As many of my normal readers will be aware, I have particular problems with Nietzsche and a very low tolerance for those (usually philosophy undergraduates or self-proclaimed "intellectuals") who think that Nietzsche is the colloquial "cat's pyjamas."  Because I supposedly have a degree in a discipline that gives me some sort of "authorative" right to speak of Nietzsche––because I, you know, teach him from time to time in a post-secondary setting with the requisite degrees––I do like telling his fans to screw off with dismissive posts about what I generally argue is his reactionary politics.  Even still, due to recent events and hours of reading time, I found myself thinking through some of Nietzsche's categories in a somewhat prod

Today, after reading Kersplebedeb's repost of Emmanuel Ortiz's seminal poem A Moment of Silence  and Zak Brown's reflections on his childhood experience of September 11th 2001, I also found myself reflecting on this event. (More accurately a date that became an event because it was forced into significance by US imperialism––in some ways the only event , as Ortiz pointed out, that is allowed to count as a contemporary event according to imperialist discourse.)  Due to this date's significance in initiating the so-called "War in Terror" I cannot help but reflect on it from time to time, particularly whenever I am faced with the fact that the majority of my students were children when it happened and that t his is often their cultural reference point .  Brown's article was salient in this regard; he reflects on a childhood dominated by this event and the ideology to which he was subjected in the following years. The fact that the event of "9-11"

Around two years ago, I wrote a post called Our Petty-Bourgeois Selfishness which was meant to serve as an introduction to a small series based around Mao's Combat Liberalism .  Unfortunately, perhaps due to my own liberalism, I failed to produce such a series.  Recently, however, I was reminded of that post and its promise when I wrote about the general failure, amongst the left, to be self-critical .  So now I'm going to try and deliver on the promised series, though maybe not in the way I originally intended, and we'll see how far I get. It seems to me that the instances of individual liberal behaviour described in  Combat Liberalism  tends to fall into two general categories.  The first is the liberal behaviour produced by general arrogance, the petty-bourgeois selfishness that, according to the dominant ideology of liberal capitalism, is natural and part of what it means to be human.  The second is the liberal behaviour produced by an unwillingness to confront th

When it comes to the proposition of the revolutionary vanguard party, the anti-capitalist left falls into two general camps: those who reject the entire notion, and those who believe it is still a worthwhile concept.  Within these two camps there are significant variations, but it important to note that the concept itself is divisive. The first camp is further divided between those who think that the entire notion of a party vanguard was worthless to begin with, and those who possess a slightly more nuanced view and who might argue, to a greater or lesser degree, for the historically embedded worth of the concept.  So we have a group that might be broadly defined as anarchist  who, in my opinion, promote an improper definition of "vanguard": rather than trying to wrap their minds around the idea of an "advanced guard", they simply and inaccurately define it as "authoritarianism" (once I made a bad joke about this) and sometimes, due to this conflatio

Regular readers of this blog will be aware that I've often harped on the problem of dogmatism in the left.  Sometimes I've tried to categorize the various forms of dogmatism that afflict the mainstream left, specifically at the centres of world capitalism, even discussing those dogmatisms that like to imagine they are anti-dogmatic.  Other times I have complained specifically about the most obvious forms of dogmatism, annoyed by what can only be understood as marxist missionary cults .  An interest that has been a common thread throughout all of these discussions on dogmatism, and that I probably need to address very specifically in the near future (though I've mentioned it more places than I can recall), is about maintaining the distinction between adopting a principled politics and adhering to some form of dogmatism: that is, I think it is very important to understand that accepting a principled and specific political perspective is not synonymous with dogmatism and I fe

Having been part of the mainstream left for years––roaming between organizations, marching with various contingents in demonstrations, participating in social unionism in different ways, joining affinity groups, losing sleep over meetings––I have had enough time to grow increasingly frustrated with activist culture.  It is unsurprising that so many activists either burn-out or turn into banal social democrats.  Once I used to feel as if those who dropped out were guilty of political betrayal, but now it is difficult to see their decision as much more than a product of the culture cultivated by leftwing activism at the centres of capitalism. There is a rather particular attitude cultivated by activist culture.  Infantile, self-righteous, judgmental, and above all a lack of self-criticism.  By focusing on the problems with society (sometimes correctly, sometimes incoherently) it is easy to imagine that we are pure––smarter and better than the ignorant masses who often lack the same opp

Due to a number of conversations, debates, and arguments I've had over the years with comrades and not-so-much-comrades, and due to the fact that I often use the term dogmatism  in reference to other leftists with  barely any explanation, I felt that it was necessary to post something about how dogmatism functions within the left as it should be understood by critical leftists.  All of us, whatever our shade of red or black, have probably been guilty of acting dogmatically at some point of our lives.  And sometimes, even if our entire approach is not in itself dogmatic, we can occasionally come across as dogmatic, uncritically fail to realize that some of our practices are dogmatic, and then fail to self-criticize and assess our behaviour.  Sometimes I catch myself, when pressed into unexpected arguments and confrontations, making statements that seem more religious than critical––I'm sure that all of us have had the experience of being forced into denouncing conservative famil

Back from a brief vacation with a long post that will probably annoy some people, but is the result of a long-standing annoyance... By now I am getting extremely annoyed with a certain discourse around sex work that has become popular amongst some sectors of the North American (and occasionally European) left.  Originally a discourse that was limited to lifestyle [and predominantly male] anarchists, as well as a few hippy sex fetishists, the political assertion that sex work is liberating, and that the liberating potential of sex work should be treated as part of a radically progressive politics, is now being embraced by the broader left-wing population and gaining the support of so-called feminists, socialists and communists who should know better.  Indeed, the unqualified pro-prostitution position is being treated by some as a litmus test for numerous radical commitments as it is now attached to, and turned into a falsely essential component of, feminism, queer and trans libera