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On 2/11/15 5:10 PM, James Creegan via Marxism wrote:
Provocation can sometimes be in the eye of the reader. Some might say that
hurling epithets--sectarian, Spartacist, ignoramus-- as a first reply
to what began as a series of angular but fairly polite comments from me,
might have had something to do with the escalating acerbity of this
exchange. A sectarian is apparently anyone who disagrees with Louis from
the left, an ignoramus anyone who ventures to express an opinion
without offering a 10,000-word disquisition .
I don't think you are an ignoramus. You probably went to Harvard, based
on your air of superiority. It is just that nobody can learn anything
from your messages here. Frankly, if you are too lazy to research
Greece, you could simply crosspost what other more committed people
write with your own 2 or 3 sentence intro.
Eduard Bernstein, after all, ultimately discarded
the label.
Well, this is really the bottom line, isn't it. I am Eduard Bernstein?
Well, that's a relief from being Christopher Hitchens. And what does
that make Creegan? Rosa Luxemburg?
He keeps whining about being pilloried here when the poor soul only
seeks to draw razor-sharp class lines between himself and me. Maybe I
was mistaken to define the parameters of Marxmail 15 years or so ago:
MODERATION PRINCIPLES: The Marxism mailing list is extremely permissive.
There are a couple of things that are frowned upon strongly. If you come
to the list with the attitude that you are a true Bolshevik, who needs
to convert 'Mensheviks' to your beliefs, you will be unsubbed.
http://www.marxmail.org/sub.htm
It is possible that Creegan never read this. But nevertheless that's the
guidelines I established. Every so often someone gets the trapdoor
opened up beneath them when they decide that they are issuing
communiques from Coyoacan. I suspect that most of the 1500 subscribers
to Marxmail feel that it meets their needs so I only show people to the
door once or twice a year.
If there's one thing I've learned over the years, it is that some
subscribers have to be kept on a short leash since they are habitually
prone to thinking of Marxmail as a costume party where they can come
dressed as Leon Trotsky or VI Lenin. We are in dangerous and critical
times and need to keep the focus on serious discussion that does not
state implicitly or explicitly that the list must be divided into
reformist and revolutionary wings--that is if you want to remain a
subscriber.
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