Re: [Marxism] glorious Spring
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == No apology necessary, Manuel. I didn't intend my response to sound more techy than bemused at the two of us bantering about "power," when we both know we mean the same thing. Tell you what, though. If we were in the streets, you could say tomato and I'll say tomato...but we'll rest assured that we'll both be throwing at the same target. Yrs, Mark 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
Re: [Marxism] glorious Spring
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == Sorry, Markreally wasn't trying "catch" anyone out. I really didn't think you were commenting like the post-modernists (I do know your roots and respect them). I was simply taken aback by the use of "power" politics because of the way I hear so many in my field (of education) use it. Apologize if you took umbrage. don' be so sensative, ese! it's jus' a discushun!(sorry, couldn't help it, "dude") 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
Re: [Marxism] glorious Spring
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == Gee. Manuel. It's a good thing you're not trying to catch anybody out and denounce them for deviant politics. I stand by what I actually wrote. If anybody can read that and come away seriously saying that it wasn't about who was wielding power, they should pass the bong ML 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
Re: [Marxism] glorious Spring
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == Mark Said: "The underlying similarity in all these upheavals revolve around the issue of power in its various forms and the specific way we hope to see it challenged in the most fundamental ways...not through a mere change of regime, dynasty, or party but by establishing the rule of those who labor and have no fundamental vested interests in sustaining the injustices and insanities of the present order." I am fairly sure, Mark, that you do not mean to convey some sort of post-modernist claptrap bordering on "good and evil" religiosity, but what you just wrote almost smacks of the kind of nonsense I often hear from the Henry Girouxs and Donaldo Macedos of the world who love to appear transcendent about the sweep of history and how "power" is the problem and not who wields it. However, I wonder (not actually sure yet) if we part ways on the analysis of what is taking place and the Class connection of the quite disparate struggles from Egypt to Greece to Madison to Latin America. If we are in an age of imperialism (and we are) and the designs of the finance capitalists--the imperialists--and their political and military henchman throughout the world are decidedly united in their common solutions to economic crisis (no, they don't have to sit in a room to be so united--though they often do--they just have to act like the "birds of a feather" that they are), then it should follow that even though the response of the working masses is fragmented and less than directly united there remains a clear commonality of response. In Europe, austerity has resulted in the channeled response through the main working class, but bureaucratic parties (and, even so, popular anger is being demonstrated). In the Middle East, it is the righteous anger of the entire population with workers and youth playing a pivotal role, in the U.S., unions are bearing the brunt of the attack and workers are beginning to see the viability of the popular struggles taking shape globally. It really seems like something new is taking shape, but I recognize that upsurges have occurred in the past and, as many of us have seen those previous upsurges, it is tempting to put what we are seeing from those lenses. In a nutshell, I think that what has been experienced before has informed what is happening now both positively and negatively. Negatively, the near total bankruptcy of lesser-evil politics (USA) and the bureaucratic workers' organizations to lead popular struggles has made it difficult, especially in Europe and the U.S. Positively, the rise of revolutionary youth from Ireland and the U.K through Europe and in the Middle East, the ongoing leadership in battle and on the street of women, and the striking independence of the masses from their traditional leaders is creating a valuable example and I believe is having its impact on workers in the imperialist world. 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
Re: [Marxism] glorious Spring
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == The underlying similarity in all these upheavals revolve around the issue of power in its various forms and the specific way we hope to see it challenged in the most fundamental ways...not through a mere change of regime, dynasty, or party but by establishing the rule of those who labor and have no fundamental vested interests in sustaining the injustices and insanities of the present order. In what we face, how we face it, and how we want to resolve the crisis, we are following in the footsteps of 1968, 1919, 1848 By definition, though, materialists recognize that this power varies from place to place and certainly from one generation to another, and what is needed best to challenge that power will vary accordingly in terms of immediate issues, slogans, demands, etc. Still, no successful challenge of any sort can be made without mass mobilizations and the political process by which the people themselves learn their power and begin to practice its exercise. That is why the large street demonstrations call to mind so readily other large street demonstrations in other places and times...quite naturally so. ML 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
Re: [Marxism] glorious Spring
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == Hi Dave There is also the commonalities of people moving into struggle after decades of quiescence. The spectacle of successful resistance is so unlike all the other spectacles designed for the people, that they are almost delirious with the discovery of their historical agency. comradely regards Gary 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
Re: [Marxism] glorious Spring
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == Also agreed. Reality is deeply uneven and we have to find some way of taking that into account. Ignoring it can be fatal. But we also have to understand commonalities where they exist. Is their a deep story that connects Egypt to Wisconsin or are they fundamentally different events and the seeming connections are a surface coincidence and illusion? I would argue the former and I think understanding it means coming to an understanding of how capitalism has evolved, how imperialism has mutated, etc. Things bound up with terms like neoliberalism and globalization. -dave On Fri, Feb 25, 2011 at 3:18 PM, Charlie wrote: > > Mark Lause wrote: "...waves of social upheaval took the form of a series of > very different events in very different circumstances. 1968 wasn't the same > in Paris as Mexico or Prague or elsewhere. And 1848 was certainly different > and came to different ends, depending on where you look..." > > Agreed. Nonetheless, a common theme in the current movements is that the > rich are waging a war on the rest of us, and one way or another we must > fight back. That theme was barely visible in 1968. No Rich, No Poor > > Charles Andrews 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
Re: [Marxism] glorious Spring
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == Mark Lause wrote: "...waves of social upheaval took the form of a series of very different events in very different circumstances. 1968 wasn't the same in Paris as Mexico or Prague or elsewhere. And 1848 was certainly different and came to different ends, depending on where you look..." Agreed. Nonetheless, a common theme in the current movements is that the rich are waging a war on the rest of us, and one way or another we must fight back. That theme was barely visible in 1968. No Rich, No Poor Charles Andrews 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
Re: [Marxism] glorious Spring
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == John said "If I've misrepresented Manuel on this, then I apologise, but that's what I think and it's where I think he and I are in agreement." No, indeed, that is exactly what I am saying, John. We may learn from the past, but we can't simply apply the past and, equally important, I would encourage us to stop trying to equate the present with the past. It doesn't seem to have helped us much and we just seem "old" (yeah, I know many of us are, but, damn, do we have to make a fetish of it?) 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
Re: [Marxism] glorious Spring
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == I'm probably missing something here, but iI don't know what Marxism means if we propose to understand the present without reference to our reflective experience of the past ML 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
Re: [Marxism] glorious Spring
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == "I think that what's going on now is already bigger than 1968. I think it would me more appropriate to ask if this was what 1848 was like." I would really encourage all of you to stop trying to understand what is unfolding in terms of the past. The rules are changing, this is veritably a new day and we do a disservice to our class and the people of the world if Marxists stopped trying to interpret Marx, Engels, Lenin, Trotsky, or Even Castro (witness how he is teetering on Libya). We Need To Start Emulating Our Heroes Not Copying Them. They tore asunder the borders of "possibilities", it's time we did the same. 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
Re: [Marxism] glorious Spring
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == On Fri, 25 Feb 2011 12:12:22 +0100 Anthony Hartin writes: > > Just watching Aljazeera at work > > Mass protest in Tahrir with Tunisian, Libyan and Egyptian flags. > Mass > protest in Yemen. Revolution still deepening in Tunisia. Protests in > > Baghdad. Benghazi has become Petrograd on the Mediterranean. > > General strike and *huge* march in Greece, Class struggle stirring > once > more in the US. The spirit of Bouazizi seems to be manifesting in > the > whole world. Is this what 1968 was like? I think that what's going on now is already bigger than 1968. I think it would me more appropriate to ask if this was what 1848 was like. Jim Farmelant http://independent.academia.edu/JimFarmelant www.foxymath.com Learn or Review Basic Math > > What a glorious Spring this is going to be > > Kill Your Wrinkles Mom Reveals Shocking $5 method for erasing wrinkles...Doctors hate her http://thirdpartyoffers.juno.com/TGL3141/4d67b57b5c6d1567741st02vuc 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
[Marxism] glorious Spring
== Rule #1: YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. == Just watching Aljazeera at work Mass protest in Tahrir with Tunisian, Libyan and Egyptian flags. Mass protest in Yemen. Revolution still deepening in Tunisia. Protests in Baghdad. Benghazi has become Petrograd on the Mediterranean. General strike and *huge* march in Greece, Class struggle stirring once more in the US. The spirit of Bouazizi seems to be manifesting in the whole world. Is this what 1968 was like? What a glorious Spring this is going to be 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
