INTELLECTUALS, reason & al.

[Jonathan Broad (NC)]

Greetings, citizens.  First time caller, long time listener, etc. Ralph
and Jim seem hell-bent on filling the dataline with a lot of good
old-fashioned (self) righteousness.  For my own part, the only reason I
tune in to this list is in the hope that I might find some illuminating
perspectives and honest witnesses to the odd and painful spectacle of our
so-called civilization.  Why?  BECAUSE I HAVE NOTHING ELSE TO THINK ABOUT
WHILE I WORK THE PUNCH-PRESS FOR FIFTY HOURS A WEEK.

Hmm, does this qualify me as "working-class"?  God, no.  I have a four
year degree (philosophy/religion, if you care to know), come from a
nouveau-upper-middle-class background, and I got my present job via a
"temporary employment agency".  My current assignment (sounds exciting,
no?) is one of those "indefinitely temporary" or "temp-to-perm" rackets so
absolutely coveted by temps.  I wrote my thesis on Hegel and Nietzsche.

I came to philosophy/religion from a political theory (__not "science"__),
history, and economics.  Mostly because, after I had answered to my
satisfaction some basic questions about the social world I grew up in, I
found myself extraordinarily suspicious of the questions I had been
asking.  Why did I consider myself a Marxist?  Why was I so reluctant to
__call__ myself one?  By what right, by what motivations did I feel
compelled to take such a critical view of a culture that had never
persecuted me specifically?  But then, what did I owe a culture that had
never given me anything but excuses for itself, empty visions of progress
and destruction, and its shi@-eating permission to fail?

In the end (ha), it has become a question of ethics and desire.  I can't
submit to the oh-so-obvious discipline of an "academic career", I refuse
to prostitute my mental apparatus as an "intellectual worker" 
(read:ideological apologist/advertising executive), so for the time being
I am using my body to "reproduce its means of existence" while my mind
testifies to the time by thinking and dreaming of a world beyond the
"dream-world of commodity capitalism", for which I produce the little
metal rods that advance your Hewlett-Packard printer's paper. Who am I? 
What am I?  Who cares?! because I can articulate my place in the scene,
from a number of angles (with the occasional run-on).  To what
end? Who knows-- (but I have some idea).

Ralph and Jim advocate affiliation with "working-class" organizations.  By
which they seem to mean a Marxist organization, or perhaps a union.
Although I have no particular interest in commenting on the "hip-hop"
schizm entwined with this thread, I must note that as far as I can tell
hip-hop (or goth, or reggae, or industrial) "clubs" are as populated by
the honest-to-god "working-class" as anybody else.  If the music did not
articulate some aspect of that experience, only the booze would remain.
To which I expect a standard Marxist pat answer, something along the lines
of the "false consciousness" of the "working class".  It doesn't wash.

Some middle-class kids go to college, and suddenly realize that the whole
game is rigged, that the pate sucks, and that the joke was on them all
along.  Some then drop out, go to Detroit, and join a union to "organize".
Some don't quite understand that what they observe really and truly
includes them, and so they are content to note that there are lots of
interesting things going on in that "rap" music they like to listen to
while smoking up.  (don't get me wrong--there is.  My fave is "Tricky",
but that's more dub-reggae.)  Both of these routes seem pretty naive to
me.  There are no hard and fast lines I can draw between the two
positions, no "dialectical" (please, please don't use the word unless you
really mean it--and then prepare to defend yourself) solution to this
conflict regarding the "Intellectual".  But this doesn't mean that
dialogue and articulation is doomed to class- or gender-dominated and
capital-coopted nattering about who's who and what's "really" going on.
Nothing worth mentioning is going to change about this hellacious
"society" we've gotten ourselves mixed up in until humans in all sorts of
places hit the right note and the glass shatters.  That's what I'm looking
for--the bits and pieces of the sonata which must arise if Benjamin's
Angel of History is to find peace and close its wings.  It's our
%$#^%##%$@ responsibility.  So--testify!  Articulate!  Confess! Lament!
Chastize!  Rejoice!  The alternative, as we must know by now, is silence
and ashes.

To Ralph, who I suspect is either a Marxist-Humanist or something close:
What did you mean by the "Universal", which is the "development of human
beings" or somesuch?  I sympathize with your stance that there are many
things which cannot be learned except by engagement with those you call
"working class", but I find your language suspect.  "Development" can only
be managed within a totality, and one articulation of the Marxist position
has determined that said "development" can only be had via a statist
revolution.  Do you believe that the "universal" is an ahistorical
perspective accessible to human consciousness via a "party" organization?
Is this party sole propriator of the universal "theory" or perspective?
Are its articulations and actions in some sense guided by this totality?
You and your friend have spoken volumes about the problems facing academic
language--but what of your own?  What gives you the right to shout down
the voices of fellow travelers who have chosen a different path through
life, however confused?  Academic language may retreat into its
solipsistic channels from time to time, but we must admit that it is this
type of language which has given rise to the piercing insights which we
must find a way to broadcast in more timely fashion.  Instead of "human
development" being the guiding light, I would suggest that "articulation"
(a word I will leave in pupae state at the moment, for lack of
time--except to say that by articulation I refer to more than simply
language, as it must include social organization and production as well
to be more than idealistic or simplistically pluralistic) is a better
guideline for left-minded people.

Please make an effort to disclose what you are bringing to share with us,
the insights of a different way of life, rather than simply venting your
spleen.  I for one think that most Marxisms are bankrupt for ideas or
useful action, although not hopelessly so.  If we continue to be inspired
by the visions of our Marxist predecessors, we must find new ways of
bringing their perceptions to bear on our world, and to understand why
they have all failed (although not entirely) to transform this world for
the better.  


 Ralph Dumain wrote:

> The universal is not complaining; the universal 
> is the development of human beings.  You turn my stomach.  Obtuse, 
> idiotic, intellectual puppies who can't understand the most 
> elementary principles of human existence expressed in plain
> English.  Makes me sick.  

 Neither is the universal rage. Development must include ethical
development, and ethics must confront those destroyed by its own
justifications.  Which means "development" must cease long enough for a
conversation to occur, and for obligation to take hold.  And who can speak
for the universal?  To confront its tyranny is the strangest obligation of
all.

	Jonathan Broad

	"My God," he murmurs.  "The hands of the years show always the
	same hour."--Edmond Jabes

	"Hypothetical--that is the word which clarifies that strange
	appearance of the pieces of the universe for us.  Not one of these pieces
	has a secure, an unalterable place; a secret If is inscribed over
	each."--Franz Rosenzweig