>I an sorry you disagree with me about the meaning of the passages I referred
>you to. How about this: Marx attacks the political economist for "reducing
>the worker's need to the barest and most miserable level of physical
>subsistance and by reducing his activity to the most abstract mechanical
>movement. He says: Man has no other need either of activity or enjoyment!"
>(Paris Manuscripts, Tucker p. 95). I take it that Marx isendorsing the
>opposite view. Note that a "need" here si not a bad thing, not a mere tickle
>that generates a want. It is a requirement the absence of which will harm
>you, but the presence of which will benefit you.
>
>--jks
Marx was talking about eliminating hunger, economic insecurity, war, racial
injustice, poverty-induced disease, etc. He was not equating socialism with
the life style of privileged workers in imperialist nations. In fact, this
life style is unattainable without exploiting the rest of the world. It is
something I used to hear from Heartfield ad nauseum, until he found greener
pastures. It is a con job based on the notion that people in Africa, Asia
and Latin America can aspire to the current life style of people in G7
nations. If anything, many of the privileges these folks enjoy must be
curtailed for the health of the planet, starting with automobiles, easy
access to tropical fruits, suburban housing of the kind found in greater
New York, etc. Basically, all this is not only environmentally
unsustainable, it is not what people are looking for. It amazes me to see
ex-Marxists in their late 40s and 50s returning to the stifling
middle-class values of their parents. It is split-level New Jersey filtered
through the Grundrisse. Ugh.
Louis Proyect
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