RD: > But what conclusions to draw without knowing what people do and how > they behave off-list? This doesn't just pertain to Marxists, but to > any political movement, and to many ostensibly non-political subjects.
I am not even sure what conclusions to draw from the ON-LIST behaviour. For example, Marxmail claims over 1000 subscribers, and yet looking at its archive, you can quickly see that only a very small percentage actually post any content whatsoever to the list, and then only a small percentage of that discuss anything or are regular contributors. RD: > > There is often a political correlation to debates over how many > Hegels and surplus values can dance on a pin, if nothing other than > the intellectual life of a movement tells you something about the > human development that goes on or is stunted within it. In the case of these political discussion lists of the 'left', they are far more interesting for what they suppress and censor. Basically, on nearly all the ones in the US that I have seen, read, tried to participate on, the biggest no-no is the combination of zionism and militant Islam. Take a strong anti-zionist stance combined with an informed acceptance of militant Islam, and you will soon be persona non grata in any of the dominating clique's discussions. RD > > Practical political interventions are rather severely circumscribed > by circumstance; thought usually jumps ahead, or lags behind, or > both. And then, when politics is treated as do-gooderism in which > your goal is to wreck your life and sacrifice yourself to a cause, > the farther removed from your next-door neighbors the better, without > any expectation of anyone else sticking up for you when you're in a > jam--well, that's radicalism as an avocation of the middle class for you. Which is why I am mostly against do-gooderism. Why should people do productive work (often at the risk of destroying themselves) to try and improve or ameliorate capitalist societies? This doesn't mean I ignore real need when it is at my doorstep (or my university office door), but after 10 years of trying, I have quite given up on NGOs and NPOs and volunteer organizations (just like lists they are dominated by a small number of self-serving egoists, they don't do near as much good as is claimed, and the philosophy that we should try to improve capitalist societies outside of politics, these are all things I reject). > > Besides academic radicalism, there is also pure "activism", which > means have a handful of issues you are critical about but be a > simpleton otherwise--like out local Pacifica radio station. Don't > worry about being intellectually sophisticated--just know that the > Establishment is your enemy but be totally uncritical of crackpot > ideas and ethically questionable people among your ranks. We don't have too many of that type in Japan. If they exist it probably is most likely that they have a post at a university--most likely also with a law degree. > > In any event, people need to decide what they want discussion lists > for, what their intellectual and political goals are. These things > were a novelty in the '90s, and it was easy to get addicted and lose > control--Lisa, who moderated several, was even more of an addict than > I. But eventually people should get sick of the same old shit and > try something different. Well they seem to exist largely outside the potential collective wishes of their readership (I suspect most uninterested subscribers are too lazy to figure out how to unsubscribe), if what is posted to such lists (a limited number of people actually posting, limited content, small but expressive bully gangs suppressing others) is any indication. Unless the world of political discussion lists is really just a mass of vicious voyeurs (I won't deny the possibility). Lists, homepages, blogs, blogcasts, etc. etc. They don't add up to very much for an intellectually engaged life in the global political economy , I'm afraid. And if they add up to potential profits or at least shore up the bottom line, then the mainstream media giants will take them over (which seems to be the case in the world of blogdom). CJ _______________________________________________ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
