What would happen if one day my thoughts are considered so influential, or at least so intact? I would be surprised. For me, no matter it is considered only as a rumor. This is not for the humble-heart: I never look at myself as a thinker who has the system, or in the system, especially a system that can be named. I am a person who is more familiar with the world of literature and art. The world makes me occasionally 'deeper dive' into the arena of theory and philosophy, to answer questions that arise in the experience there.
To build a complete thought, to construct a system of philosophy, are not included in the desires and my abilities. Maybe that's why if I accept Marxism, even without a certificate from Ralph Miliband, Zhou Enlai and others that seems to have the authority to give it. I'm not going to make it as the faith that can boost my self-esteem and makes me 'quiet'. For me the best attitude is to follow what I describe it as the spirit to walk to explore and treat the ideological beliefs (or 'faith') as torches, not as a fortress.
People treat ideological beliefs as the castle is usually when they feel their beliefs are being attacked and they are afraid to be shaken. In the 'position of the fortress' for example, the idea of "who are not us" regarded as a dangerous gun bullets because it can kill or paralyze 'faith'. Although as seen in the history of the arena opinion, a confrontation with an idea - as well as the idea that we do not agree though can make us more mature.
Treat the belief as a fortress means shut down, feel the need to maintain the purity of doctrine. Heterodoxy is the enemy. Those who do not have 'credentials' as allies are shunned, and interpretations that come from outside was suspected. Of course what and who is 'outside' is determined by the time to retreat into the fortress.
Such a position is far from the 'materialism' and 'dialectic'. Outside the fort, the world is changing, its elements collides. Moves. 'Purity' is a creature outside of history. "No one today is purely one thing", I remember what was said by Edward Said. Life never let the ideas go untouched. History -- forever -- is eclectic, especially when beyond our walls appear various kinds of conditions to the idea which has never existed previously. Faster and faster.
One of the characteristics of a 'position of the fortress' is what I refer to as "Textual Involution".
'Textual Involution' is (1) using a set of text as the only source of truth,(2) describes the 'truth' of the text with take other texts that actually gets its power from the initial text, and (3) determine the first texts which should be read and not to understand the source text. In other words, whirled in a circle of interpretation. In terms of interpretation of Marxism -- for example -- a number of people competing. The most knowledgeable in reading is the most 'authentic'. Each one of them shows the ingenuity of Marxism.
I guess that's the result of a desire to die and live with a system of thought. It shortlisted again with anathema to the attitude that stands outside any system - a view that is not going to understand Kierkegaard's position, for example, when he freed himself from Hegel.
Often, Textual Involution is a way of working the apologists - that choosing the right text to liberate the doctrine of inconsistency (or 'error') that occurs in practice. In religious circles, the apologist is not few in number. But apparently they can also be found among Marxists, who regard religion as an error.
Indirectly, the Textual Involutionl say that a proposition is true if, and only if, one part (or 'members') of a set of propositions that maximally coherent and consistent. It's not far away from the German Idealist thought and England in the 18th century. Idealism arise unexpectedly from behind the wall, when the truth can only be considered firm with ideas and theories, and ideas and theories treated as powerful things.
Slipping into Idealism also occurs when a person who declares himself confident of Marxism but ignores the Praxis.
We can not judge a 'progressive revolutionary' because of his complete reading of Marxism, by displaying a list of names of Marxist thinkers and his books.
Or say that to understand (or just quoting) Marxism one must understand the methods, logic, epistemology, ontology, and so on and so on. As far as I know, Ho Chi-minh and Ché Guevara never showed their depth in reviewing the Das Kapital, also probably never read the work of Lukács or Marxist Studies (let alone to study midwifery in the magazine, if it does exist).
But perhaps this is a symptom of today: Marxism has been made complicated and difficult. This is common among intellectuals who read so much and so little foray into political struggle. As in the American academy, Marxism only be in the arena of insight and ideas, either brilliant or cliche. 'Marxism study room' is indeed an ongoing trend when the Left's political struggle is deteriorating.
What will be funny is when -- with emphasis on the theory of complete obedience and impose ideological -- Marxism will be as prayer in a fairy tale as told by Leo Tolstoi. Three old man on an island trying to learn to read a prayer just as the teachings given by a priest, but the old age had made them easy to forget. They're so fear of sin just because they could not repeat the text completely. Finally, although weak and frail, they were swimming the bay to meet the priest again whose boat had lifted its anchor. They asked to be taught once again.
As I recall, at that time the priest advice was very precise, "Need not be perfect. Pray according to the circumstances of your life and your heart needs. The text is only a tool, does not have privilege over your subjectivity.
But there is an attitude that treats the text as a liberating power and generous : the attitude of those who treat ideology or belief as torches. With the torches they cover areas that may be completely different. See the unexpected. They are exploring and treating the text as a liberating power and generous : those who treat ideology as a torch in exploration. Indeed , this makes them as inconsistent. Want to be a 'revisionist'? Or 'liberal'? Or 'apostate'? Or follow the 'cult'?
For the keepers of doctrine order, it all have to be removed away. In Shakespeare's play, Polonius, the throne waiter and supporting procedures, saw Hamlet 's behavior as 'crazy ': is not orderly , and perhaps also because he was like always in doubt. Polonius -- whothought with the teachings only-- would assume any attitude that began with doubt thinking was muddled, mushy, hazardous (eg by wearing De omnibus dubitandum motto , "Doubt everything!", As Marx). To them, the chaotic or disruptive must be avoided or discontinued.
Excessive? Of course. Penetrating the torch is different with to discard the ideology or beliefs into the trash. Torches are retained and needed, but how much of its flame is determined by space and time travel. The torch will not be separated if the ideology or belief is something that has seeped like the salt without appearing to life, if ideology or belief presents as the awareness that comes from the journey of life and shaping us to face the life.
A good example which I know is the study in journal Rethinking Marxism, or a blog called Open Marxism, or books like Regaining Marxism of Ken Post. There, people recognized the shortcomings of Marxism in the present, but with a Marxist analysis they also met and confronted with some other theories (Post called it, with humor, 'our Uncanny guest'). The 'outside' is not rejected. With a Marxist analysis, criticism of the 'guest' was received or replied with criticism, and in turned the analytical skills grew increasingly sharp to deal with the problems not faced by Marx and Engels in the 19th century.
One of the problems that are not faced by Marx and Engels in the 19th century is the agencies change or subjects in the emancipation struggle. If the theory gets the privilege, when the ideological doctrine so sublime, one basic question appears asking to be answered: Should only the subject who holds a particular theory, the specific 'consciousness', who can perform the task of liberation in history?
Marxism -- from Marx, especially Lenin -- was put 'Proletariat' who conscious of their class (proletariat pour-soi) in position as liberators. There is no revolution without a revolutionary theory. The workers who hold an action without Class Consciousness will easily fall into the 'Economism'. The idea of 'Vanguard party' (which was later echoed in Sayyid Qutb's thought in his idea of Islamic struggle) sourced from here.
The problem is - and by mentioning the name of Qutb - I want to remind that since the late 20th century there are so many struggle of emancipation. There's emancipation of labor against the Communist Party
in the name of proletarian consciousness, as in Poland. There's emancipation of Black people to the oppression of apartheid regimes in the United States and South Africa. There's emancipation of women to the social structure formed by patriarchy. There's emancipation 'Islamists' against secular authority, 'West', especially America. There's national emancipation (also in a certain degree of racial) among the Palestinian people under the Israeli occupation. There's a gay liberation movement, and of course, the emancipation effort against the capitalist exploitation in many countries has not stopped, including in China now.
In this case, came the Laclau criticism against the Marxist thesis of the proletariat as a universal "Class". According to Laclau, emancipation is not only one, but many kinds of emancipation. Laclau, of course, a 'post-Marxist' and once said, 'I always mix with other Marx'. But that does not mean his views are wrong.
According to him, the emancipation was supported by a number of concrete experience in the late 20th century. So in my opinion, we need to enter briefly into this 'Post-Marxist' thought. Several aspects of Laclau view is more open to the struggle for the emancipation rather than views which commonly labeled as "Post-Structuralist".
Actually, the view of 'Post-Structuralist' itself -- which celebrates the differences -- not always reactionary. It can help liberate the human thought from totalitarianism to be uniform live (with Orwell's novel 1984 as a model, and Nazism, Fascism, Stalinism and now Islamic law regimes as an example). View of "Post-structuralist", for example, helps resistance to what the followers of Foucault called 'Biopower' behind capitalism: the political forces that designing an investment in the human body, with the discipline of health, reproduction, sexuality and life in general.
There's a time the 'Post-Structuralism' is able to evoke 'Identity Politics', starting with the feminist movement for women's liberation from patriarchy. Also the struggle against apartheid. I remember that Derrida once denounced as 'apolitical'. With writing, among others, le Dernier Mot du Racisme (1983), he showed he was not, as concluded by simplistic interpretation: he was not a carrier of skeptical versatile view, all-round relative, let alone nihilism. "Deconstruction is justice", his famous phrase. In the discussion of deconstruction and pragmatism in 1996 he was even more obvious: simply by saying 'yes' to emancipation, a decision could be called as 'Political Ethical'. "I must say," he said, "That I do not have a tolerance to them - both the deconstructionist or not - who behave ironic towards large discourse of emancipation".
But the spirit to 'Celebrate the Difference' in general does contain serious flaws. Identity politics - and also 'multiculturalism' - often urges us to appreciate the wisdom local, different identities, or the uniqueness of a people. What is not realized is, this attitude can end up with a political which does not require transformation.
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(CZ-lacalifusa121713)
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