It means that without any brilliant tacticians (or even those with enough common sense and the courage to speak up), they’re going to get bogged down into an endless fight, trying only to defend their territory instead of claiming new ground.
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And returning to a starting point for this thread, part of my reaction was to what appears to be a classic bit of red-baiting, a practice with such a long history that the opening sentences of the Communist Manifesto refer to it: when you accuse people of being communists and that their apparent goals are only the surface expression of some hidden sinister scheme.
The reaction to red-baiting is quite often for those red-baited to make a point of demonstrating that they’re not radicals – which tends to mean shifting to the right, and also, tends to mean pushing away any actual radical leftists. Since, you know, we actually exist, and tend to gravitate towards big crowds.
If one is actually a red in a red-baiting scenario, then you’ve got the thorny problem of defending your allies who aren’t radical leftists, without hiding your own politics or allowing the accusation to stand that there’s something wrong with being a radical leftist.
In this case, most of the reaction to the “cultural Marxist” canard seems to be simple bemusement, as for most people, I suspect it kind of blurs into the way that the US right wing will label any faintly progressive idea as socialist. Which, I keep hoping, will eventually backfire on them, as people start to think, “If stopping climate change and providing universal health care are socialist, then socialism sounds like a pretty good idea.”
In other news, I’m wrestling with what “post” in “post-Marxist” actually means. I’ve been enjoying the discussion.
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Can you define that? Collectivist is often used a scare term, which is code for Stalinist-style communism of the mid-20th century. I think that they were more than anything else, anti-Authoritarian - given they were refugees from a state that made incredibly effective use of mass media and propaganda, and that they were seeing some of the same stuff in American culture. I doubt they were looking to set up a stalinist state, but were more interseted in a social democracy, which is entirely compatible with capitalism and democracy and with individualism.
There is nothing wrong with being critical of western culture. It is not above criticism, nor is it anti-western to be critical of western culture.
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Why does no one ever read their French history? Why?
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It doesn’t require that much reading, for that matter.
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Because I’m reading Dialectic of Enlightenment right now. The Marquise de Sade sounds like an interesting chap, though.
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Most statisticians consider that to be the best infographic of all time.
edit: link added. here’s video too.
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Actually, it’s not that people don’t know their French history, it’s that everyone is hanging out with bad decision dinosaur!
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This?
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Four out of five dentists surveyed prefer brushing against happy statisticians instead of brushing alone.
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88.2% of statistics are made up on the spot.
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Ah, I see.
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Hell no. The purpose of Critical Theory is deconstruct current society for the purpose of promoting a more liberatory society, free from alienating effects.
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I use the term to denote Communism, Socialism… Statism in general.
I understand, but where it goes sideways for me is where its seems that Western Culture seem to have a monopoly on being a target of criticism.
@funruly, @popobawa4u
Now, taking this quote from popobawa4u, can you guys see where the “culture warrior” rhetoric comes from ?
I cant( and wont try to ) speak for funrulys GamerGate people, but I feel as thought this is what they are talking about.
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Where is the critique of Asian cultures?
Lets try something. Would you care to critique the institution of marriage, in the West of course?
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No, it’s not.
Theory is not the same as how communism was practiced historically, nor does the left have some sort of lock on statism.
Bill O’Reilly?
All the fuck over the place? I think it’s far less valuable to critique other cultures when I don’t live there. I’d prefer to critique my own and possibly make it better.
That’s a broad topic, which is spread out over centuries. It is not a stable idea that has changed dramatically. The institution we have now, based on romantic love and, in theory, on an equal partnership, was not always the main purpose of marriage in “the west”. Marriage used to be much more of an economic partnership, meant to increase or at least maintain family wealth/lands. Women tended to have a lesser position within a marriage and were considered, maybe not property, but certainly dependants. They were entirely and legal subject to the will of their fathers and husbands, with a few exceptions to that rule. The point of marriage was also to produce children and to contain sexuality (at various points).
Plus, explain by what is the “west”. Which countries do you mean? Which cultures? Anglo-Saxon?
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Citations needed.
Yes.
I will respond to your marriage response. But I want to wait too see if any of the other want to opine first.
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Not a Japanese historian, but here seems like a likely list of books on Japanese culture - the first few are non-fiction:
or here:
Here is a class on Chinese cultural criticism, if you’d prefer to hammer away at the commies:
http://lrc.cornell.edu/asian/courses/litc/chlit610
Not everyone in the “west” is an anglo-saxon, btw. Or are you saying that those are the only people who count as “westerners”?
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Thanks for the links. I will check them out.
Well actually, I would have added Protestant as well.
To clarify - what I am talking about here are the targets of Critical Theory, not geographical location. For instance, Native American culture is not the focus of CT.
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