[two or more responses I sent yesterday, on the Roy matter, have not
appeared on the list, perhaps because I sent them from the wrong email
address. I am awaiting MP's help since a SNAFU at my end caused local
copies of the messages not to be saved]
On 16 Apr, 2007, at 8:50 AM, Doug Henwood wrote:
I don't approve of attacks on leftists because they're "privileged."
It generally requires some privilege to get the time, perspective,
and education to be a critic. "Organic" intellectuals are pretty
rare, and once they achieve any recognition, are likely to become
less organic with time. Who can blame them, either? My pal Sean
Jacobs used to use a lyric from a Brazilian samba as a sig quote -
only intellectuals love poverty, poor people love luxury. But
intellectuals most love the poverty of others - it makes them
authentic.
But what intellectuals are we talking about here? Generalising from Roy
about intellectuals (or any group, such as the middle class) in India
seems a worse form of nearsightedness. If the Western liberals commit
the error of thrusting their romantic ideals on the Indian population
(lower and middle classes), then the hard-nosed leftist criticism of it
involves (thus far) an equal error of thrusting the critic's "common
sense" "realism" on the Indian population as well.
As I noted in one of my posts (perhaps one of the one's that never
appeared on list), neither of these approaches does justice to the
population, sub-groups, internal politics, culture, etc in themselves.
Are Toor, Henwood, Jacobs, et al ;-) sure that there aren't Indian
intellectuals who are not enamoured with luxury (the opposite of which
is not "poverty")? That if they exist they have nothing substantial to
offer in a socio-political sense? Now that Gandhi has been effectively
dismissed by leftist fashionistas?
My missing post also brought up realism/pragmatism from a different
perspective. It is possible that the middle-class and the poor desire
three cars and continuous electricity. Does this act of desiring change
either the state of things or the range of possibilities?
Do the residents of Manhattan love the luxury of a BMW and a Jaguar and
a house with a garage to park them in, preferably with a view of the
park? Or perhaps they realise that such a Manhattan is unfeasible? And
perhaps they resent the small but powerful group of upstarts who
believe otherwise and attempt to fashion such a Manhattan to their
desires?
--ravi
