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1096 [lbo-talk] barbarism -- rank: 1000

"Thus capitalist levels of economic productivity are unnecessary in a socialist society." Indeed, capitalist levels of productivity are way too low to meet the needs of the majority, they will have to be increased - and happily that should imply the natural corollary, resource efficiency, too. On Zizek's point, yes, discipline as in alienated discipline over a workforce whose contribution is brute strength will be lost, and a good thing too. Mechanisation should mean there is less nee ...

Document Size:	5292
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Sat Mar 3 15:39:39 PST 2007

1097 [lbo-talk] barbaric (was Marxism and religion) -- rank: 1000

John Thornton says capitalism is barbaric to its core. I think that is silly. If it is just a semantic distinction then ok. But I think barbaric does mean something. (It means civilised, in the sense of talking Greek, not "Bar-bar", originally). For socialists with a sense of progress, it meant slipping backwards, as in Luxemburg's slogan, socialism or barbarism (she meant that in the conditions just before WWI there could be no stabilisation of the market, only movement forwards or ba ...

Document Size:	6491
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Sat Mar 3 01:37:09 PST 2007

1098 [lbo-talk] Marxism and religion -- rank: 1000

Thornton, hoping that rhetorical posturing will substitute for argument: "Occasionally barbaric? It [capitalism] is barbaric at it's core and it's barbarism manifests itself hourly, not occasionally." That is just silly. Words have meanings. Barbaric would mean getting worse, say, rather than getting better. If life expectancy were falling, say, you could say, barbaric. But across most of the globe, life expectancy is continuing to climb. Fastest in the developing world. Infant morta ...

Document Size:	6663
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Fri Mar 2 15:59:09 PST 2007

1099 [lbo-talk] Marxism and religion -- rank: 1000

Carrol, wrong on both counts. A. Marx clearly thought capitalism much superior to feudalism, 'Asiatic Despotism' (whether that was a good characterisation or not) and primitive communism. The difficulty in understanding Marx is only that he always had his eye on the possibility of improving further, and so expressed his endless impatience with things as they are - on which score of course he was right, too. And B. he was right that capitalism was much better than its predecessors. Your vision of ...

Document Size:	6502
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Fri Mar 2 04:33:19 PST 2007

1100 [lbo-talk] Marxism and Religion -- rank: 1000

Marx "thinks that ...market society is a higher, better, superior social form than prior forms, but it doesn't follow that he thinks that that the ideology for a higher form is therefore better. " Yes, it does. "He's not very flattering about the ideology of liberty, property, equality, and Bentham either. " Not very flattering, when comparing them to socialism, but very flattering indeed when comparing them to enslavement, bondage, patriarchy etc. As for Islam, how could you ...

Document Size:	5351
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Thu Mar 1 16:23:45 PST 2007

1101 [lbo-talk] Marxism and Religion -- rank: 1000

Oh come on Andie. First you say "On the relative ranking of religions according to some criteria of progressivity, the later corpus is silent." Then I show you that on the contrary, here, in what is arguably the most important section of the most important chapter of his most important book, the argument suddenly veers into precisely that, the relative ranking of religions. J ust think about that - at just the moment that he is doing the revolutionary thing that he does in <i>Cap ...

Document Size:	8286
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Thu Mar 1 14:30:55 PST 2007

1102 [lbo-talk] Americans & evolution -- rank: 1000

Wojtek: "Again, my point is not that people are neglectful or frivolous while serving on jury duty, but that they have problems separating fact from fiction when their religious beliefs enter the picture - and that happens all the time, given this country inundation with religious symbolism, invocations of god, or swearing on the bible." Well, that's the thing about the people, they are just as good as they are, not as good as we want them to be. The case for juries is not that they ar ...

Document Size:	5486
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Tue Jun 12 15:45:49 PDT 2007

1103 [lbo-talk] Olympic displacement -- rank: 1000

1. Most things that George Monbiot says are daft 2. Londoners are very glad to have the Olympics 3. Of course it raises some issues of priorities that people will argue about 4. Gentrification is not a problem in itself (except in the very broadest sense that social inequality is a problem, which I do not see anyone seriously suggesting can be overthrown by the siting or not of the Olympics) 5. The real problem is that Britain builds too few houses (a problem that I was among the first to raise, ...

Document Size:	5490
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Fri Jun 8 00:45:34 PDT 2007

1104 [lbo-talk] [Foucault and] Nietzche: Left or Right? -- rank: 1000

I tend to agree with Charles that Nietzsche's politics were pretty straight-forwardly reactionary, in the strict meaning of the term. The labour question, he wrote, should never have been asked; Democracy was the victory of the little people etcetera etcetera (nowadays people alight on his sexist comments because his anti-working class and anti-democratic prejudices are shared by so many on the left that they seem unremarkable). Even the things that seem appealing, like his anti-religious outbur ...

Document Size:	8929
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Thu Jun 7 23:12:41 PDT 2007

1105 [lbo-talk] Do LBOers face book? -- rank: 1000

Do LBOers face book? I've been trying it out, it's quite pretentious. But I found that the only people on Myspace were vituperative ex-students (http://www.myspace.com/heather953). Maybe its a mid-life crisis.

Document Size:	4816
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Mon Jul 30 13:10:06 PDT 2007

1106 [lbo-talk] Ra?l on the 26th + Fidel on Cuba's Self Criticism -- rank: 1000

Yoshie wrote: "Doug's response is rooted in a mental block...Such mental blocks, imho, really dumb down discussion. A fair moderator might try to elevate the level of discussion rather than lower it himself." These are quite harsh exchanges (on both sides). But it seems to me that Doug's comment was contribution not moderation. As contributor to the list, Doug has just the same responsibilities as everyone else. You might not like his comment, but that's debate. I find your contributi ...

Document Size:	5845
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Sun Jul 29 11:17:24 PDT 2007

1107 [lbo-talk] WSJ: "Why I Fired Ward Churchill" -- rank: 1000

Yale's loss is London's gain: Welcome! "Just got an email from Graeber the other day announcing that he got a job at Goldsmith in London. He's not very bummed about leaving Yale, he says." (I do oppose Ward Churchill's persecution, but I cannot help but think that we were lucky to get Graeber.)

Document Size:	4977
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Sat Jul 28 11:54:33 PDT 2007

1108 [lbo-talk] Ra?l on the 26th + Fidel on Cuba's Self Criticism -- rank: 1000

Yoshie: "But this mailing list is your private property, so it's up to you how you make up and selectively enforce your arbitrary rules." Doug does share his private property with the rest of us, and his rules are not arbitrary, but enjoy our assent because they are generally fair. I enjoy Yoshie's posts, but Doug has a point about lengthy quotation.

Document Size:	5138
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Sat Jul 28 11:33:07 PDT 2007

1109 [lbo-talk] The Long March From Yenan to Barclays -- rank: 1000

"The Eurozone has 300 million people. The acquis communautaire gets bigger and more comprehensive every day." Yes, indeed, this comprehensive body of law gets bigger everyday - but the peoples of Europe have only the very vaguest of influence upon its formation. There is no European-wide political process that could possibly reflect upon the acquis communitaire, which emerges instead as a huckstering between national elites. It is socially illiberal, patrician, security-driven and for ...

Document Size:	5794
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Fri Jul 27 13:05:48 PDT 2007

1110 [lbo-talk] Marx and Justice -- rank: 1000

Carrol "5th-c equivalent of Pinochet" The principle of historical specificity says that the 5th century has no equivalent of Pinochet. On the other hand, consider the exchange between Plato and Diogenes: Plato: 'If only you would learn to praise [the dictator] Dionysius, you would not have to wash lettuce for a living, Diogenes. Diogenes: 'If only you would learn to wash lettuce, you would not have to praise Dionysius, Plato.'

Document Size:	4969
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Tue Jul 24 09:01:45 PDT 2007