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A few random comments: Shaun May wrote: What are the historic roots of anti-semitism in Europe? In the feudal order in Europe, the Jews could not hold land in fief and were also excluded from the feudally-mediated Guild system of petty handicraft. This meant that they were forced to living by trade (such as hawking and tinkering) or by money lending (usury, money capital), buying and selling, etc. Trade and usury, as they developed, began to serve to undermine the feudal order itself, acting as a dissolving influence on it. ********************* I'm certainly not well versed in Jewish history, but would only point out that Avram Leon, author of The Jewish Question, the only Marxist work on Jewish history I know of (and the only book on Jewish history I've read with the exception of Isaac Deutscher's essay ,The Non-Jewish Jew) offers a somewhat different account. Leon argues that Jews engaged in trade not because they were excluded from land ownership and guild handicraft, but because they came to Europe as a trading people to begin with, emigrating from Palestine due to overpopulation, and stepping into the place of the Phoenecians in the Mediterranean. I believe he would also dispute the idea that anti-Semitism was the result of the threat posed by Jewish commercial activity to feudal relations. He argues instead that, with the expansion of commerce during the second feudal age, non-Jews began to covet the commercial monopolies held by Jews, and therefore sought to drive them out. I'm not arguing Leon's position, just pointing it out. ************************************* Are the apololgists for Ukranian nationalists on this listserve diecting their fire at RT because they are unable to answer the actual arguments of those of us who are critical of the Maidan and the government in Kiev? No one here is echoing Putin's demagogy to the effect that the interim government, or the crowds of the Maidan, are fascist. We are simply pointing out that all nationalist forces are pro-US/EU, that fascists play a definite role among them, and that they are not being opposed by any organized force. Stop aiming at straw men! Second, I think it's complete scholastic idiocy to argue that fascists aren't fascists because, unlike the fascists of the 30s, there is no workers' movement for them to attack. Would you like to propose another monicker for people who hate Jews, gays, immigrants and unions, and who make conscious use of Nazi symbols? Would you argue that Anders Breivic isn't a fascist because he laid waste to an interracial social democratic summer retreat instead of a union hall? Please! You are carrying on in the best traditions of the late Gerry Foley, who never met an Eastern European reactionary he didn't like, and was never at a loss to distort Marxist concepts beyond recognition to justify his predilictions. Jim ________________________________________________ Send list submissions to: Marxism@greenhouse.economics.utah.edu Set your options at: http://greenhouse.economics.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
