blinkandwheeze posted:

when they need it, and i fundamentally believe that the communist hypothesis will be needed by any emancipatory movement, lest they fall short of liberation, the proletariat will find it themselves

not to necessarily quibble with your overall point but there are confounding factors. perhaps the focus of any aspiring vanguard should be to remove them? fucked up and liberal, but maybe true

http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2012/10/solitary-confinement-shane-bauer

To validate an inmate as a gang member , the state requires at least three pieces of evidence, which must be "indicative of actual membership" or association with a prison gang in the last six years. At least one item must show a "direct link," like a note or other communication, to a validated gang member or associate. Once the prison's gang investigator has gathered this evidence, it is reviewed in an administrative hearing and then sent to CDCR headquarters in Sacramento.

There is no evidence that Pennington has ever communicated with a member of a gang in his life. His validation as a gang "associate" relies on items such as a newspaper article and a coffee mug.
In Pennington's file, the "direct link" is his possession of an article published in the San Francisco Bay View, an African American newspaper with a circulation of around 15,000. The paper is approved for distribution in California prisons, and Pennington's right to receive it is protected under state law. In the op-ed style article he had in his cell, titled "Guards confiscate 'revolutionary' materials at Pelican Bay," a validated member of the Black Guerilla Family prison gang complains about the seizure of literature and pictures from his cell and accuses the prison of pursuing "racist policy." In Pennington's validation documents, the gang investigator contends that, by naming the confiscated materials, the author "communicates to associates of the BGF…as to which material needs to be studied." No one alleges that Pennington ever attempted to contact the author. It is enough that he possessed the article.

The second piece of evidence was a cup Pennington had in his cell bearing a picture of a dragon, an image CDCR considers an "identifying symbol" of the Black Guerilla Family. The third was a notebook he kept, which the gang investigator alleges "shows his beliefs in the ideals of the BGF." Its pages are filled with references to black history—Nat Turner, the Scottsboro 9, the number of blacks executed between 1930 and 1969, and quotes from figures like W.E.B. Du Bois and Malcolm X. There are also passages in which Pennington ruminates at length on what he calls "the oppression and violence inflicted upon us here in maximum security," referencing a Time exposé.

Pennington never mentions gangs or unlawful activity in his writing. But in his validation documents, the gang investigator points out that the notebook contains quotes by Fleeta Drumgo and George Jackson, two former Black Panthers who are revered by members of the BGF and politicized African American prisoners generally. The single Jackson quote Pennington wrote down reads, "The text books on criminology like to advance the idea that the prisoners are mentally defective. There is only the merest suggestion that the system itself is at fault."

California officials frequently cite possession of black literature, left-wing materials, and writing about prisoner rights as evidence of gang affiliation. In the dozens of cases I reviewed, gang investigators have used the term " training material" to refer to publications by California Prison Focus, a group that advocates the abolition of the SHUs; Jackson's once best-selling Soledad Brother; a pamphlet said to reference "Revolutionary Black Nationalism, The Black Internationalist Party, Marx, and Lenin"; and a pamphlet titled "The Black People's Prison Survival Guide." This last one advises inmates to read books, keep a dictionary handy, practice yoga, avoid watching too much television, and stay away from "leaders of gangs."

The list goes on. Other materials considered evidence of gang involvement have included writings by Mumia Abu-Jamal; The Black Panther Party: Reconsidered, a collection of academic essays by University of Cincinnati professor Charles Jones; pictures of Assata Shakur, Malcolm X, George Jackson, and Nat Turner; and virtually anything using the term "New Afrikan." At least one validation besides Pennington's referenced handwritten pages of "Afro centric ideology."

As warden of San Quentin Prison in the 1980s, Daniel Vasquez oversaw what was then the country's largest SHU. He's now a corrections consultant and has testified on behalf of inmates seeking to reverse their validations. As we sat in his suburban Bay Area home, he told me it is "very common" for African American prisoners who display leadership qualities or radical political views to end up in the SHU. Similarly, he recalls, "we were told that when an African American inmate identified as being Muslim, we were supposed to watch them carefully and get their names."

thirdplace posted:

blinkandwheeze posted:

when they need it, and i fundamentally believe that the communist hypothesis will be needed by any emancipatory movement, lest they fall short of liberation, the proletariat will find it themselves

not to necessarily quibble with your overall point but there are confounding factors. perhaps the focus of any aspiring vanguard should be to remove them? fucked up and liberal, but maybe true

yeah, this is a totally valid point - what i'm saying isn't intended, at least, to be a call to just sit back and let things unfold themselves, or to take any stress away from the importance of a vanguard formation. the sentiment that the proletariat can grasp and incorporate these materials is pretty meaningless if, you know, these materials aren't actually publicly accessible or otherwise in circulation (altho this brings up another problem, this continuous melting and decontextualization of radical thought into the field of capital flows - no matter how attractive they might be, verso publishing a new set in the radical thinkers series isn't exactly a transgressive practice. at worst, it's just an excuse for the petit-bourgeois intelligentsia to pat themselves on the back for having the audacity to consider these ideas, all the while contributing to the machinations of capital flow)

i think you're absolutely right that the role of a vanguard should be removing these obstacles, burrowing holes and inconsistencies ... the mechanisms that keep the bourgeois in power are increasingly complex fields of striation, the deepening of apartheid, building walls to maintain exclusion, to refuse the movement and thought of the part-of-no-part ... for the proletariat to realize consciousness and engage with militancy they need the freedom and space to be able to. we absolutely need to defend the sites, like the prison as school for revolutionary thought or public housing as proletarian citadels, that have allowed that autonomy in the past

swampman posted:

your post is fine but kind of off the mark. bonclay's post didnt seem to me to be about, okay forgive me, because i always thought this was the dumbest shorthand, ever since i first encountered it doing undergraduate discussion of the Republic back when i was in the third grade having just been born, but anyway, it didnt seem to be about capital N Nihilism, but rather lower case n nihilism. Nihilism, the philosophy of the scab picker. we know existence doesnt spring from meaning or truth - meaning and truth are pathetic defense mechanisms like a rudimentary amoeba tooth or something. and that can hurt and feel weird, and Nihilists obsess over that weird feel. i get that Nihilism can change from a cold lonely void to a warm comforting void, that philosophy can make gold from lead for all us cerebral internet drug users, but is that what bonclay was squealing about? No, and more specifically, i thought the point was about nihilism, where the Futility of Life, Hopelessness of Actions, Insignificance of Jazz, Ludicrous Dearth of Meaning, are all set aside, and we just are restricting ourselves to worries about agency and truth on the human scale. (i think how much longer and more abstract the words are in your post versus bonclays.) This is a difficult but human scaled problem, the problem of social organization / achieving social impact. We dont need to use special relativity when newtonian mechanics will do okay, and most people wont ever fully understand special relativity anyway. Thanks for reading

i think what i'm trying to suggest is that there is this distinction between nihilism and capital N Nihilism, the latter embodying an embrace and acceptance of truth as a determining factor of existence while the former rejects truth in the same breath as meaning, as if these are both the products of human artifice. that kindof nihilism is totally groundless and is really just oscillating between existential malaise (brought on by a useless grappling around this absence of meaning) and i suppose a more nietzschean positively charged void (which is admirable in some ways but problematic, revolutionary but without a subject, i guess as likely to drift towards bourgeois individualism as it is collective action)

so bonclay does something which i think is very cynical and troubled which is basically accepting this nihilism as a starting point (maybe in the same way that post suggests we take the exiled rapesquad as a starting point for economic concerns?) but asserts that there is a place for the artifice of narrative in this void because ... it's better than nothing? it gives us something to cling to, easy to believe in? in bonclay's post, marxism is only really present as a suggestion of a teleology, it's reduced to a narrative rather than a collection and investigation of truth claims. that reduction to a simple narrative, i claim, is one of the biggest flaws of 20th century actually existing socialism, this messianic supremacy of the state, dedicated to bringing about the end of history by purging our story of villains. it just seems totally arbitrary to me, picking one fiction over another, just because it's useful for the realization of a narrative that is basically a fiction itself, and i don't see it leading to much more than an easily digestible story of the white suprematist knights driving the jewish snakes out of the world and showing the ignorant masses the light of our dead prophets. and believing in something like that just because it's better than nihilism is just as selfindulgent and useless as individual malaise about our insignificance is in the first play. i mean, that and i think it's basically the complete foundation of the fascist impulse

and then what i think is being missed here is the alternative, what is the radical kernel of nihilism, taking the form of this Nihilism, this assertion that there is a truth beyond human artifice, in the face of which narrative is only broken idealism. the idea that the proletariat are not a force to imbue our lives with meaning and goodness and the promise of a better world but a force that are Right, that the value of marxism lies not in a teleology, not a set of positive propositions for a new ontology of being, but as a hyperawareness and total rejection of present conditions facilitated by the dedication to truth

blinkandwheeze posted:

thirdplace posted:

blinkandwheeze posted:

when they need it, and i fundamentally believe that the communist hypothesis will be needed by any emancipatory movement, lest they fall short of liberation, the proletariat will find it themselves

not to necessarily quibble with your overall point but there are confounding factors. perhaps the focus of any aspiring vanguard should be to remove them? fucked up and liberal, but maybe true

yeah, this is a totally valid point - what i'm saying isn't intended, at least, to be a call to just sit back and let things unfold themselves, or to take any stress away from the importance of a vanguard formation. the sentiment that the proletariat can grasp and incorporate these materials is pretty meaningless if, you know, these materials aren't actually publicly accessible or otherwise in circulation (altho this brings up another problem, this continuous melting and decontextualization of radical thought into the field of capital flows - no matter how attractive they might be, verso publishing a new set in the radical thinkers series isn't exactly a transgressive practice. at worst, it's just an excuse for the petit-bourgeois intelligentsia to pat themselves on the back for having the audacity to consider these ideas, all the while contributing to the machinations of capital flow)

i think you're absolutely right that the role of a vanguard should be removing these obstacles, burrowing holes and inconsistencies ... the mechanisms that keep the bourgeois in power are increasingly complex fields of striation, the deepening of apartheid, building walls to maintain exclusion, to refuse the movement and thought of the part-of-no-part ... for the proletariat to realize consciousness and engage with militancy they need the freedom and space to be able to. we absolutely need to defend the sites, like the prison as school for revolutionary thought or public housing as proletarian citadels, that have allowed that autonomy in the past

swampman posted:

your post is fine but kind of off the mark. bonclay's post didnt seem to me to be about, okay forgive me, because i always thought this was the dumbest shorthand, ever since i first encountered it doing undergraduate discussion of the Republic back when i was in the third grade having just been born, but anyway, it didnt seem to be about capital N Nihilism, but rather lower case n nihilism. Nihilism, the philosophy of the scab picker. we know existence doesnt spring from meaning or truth - meaning and truth are pathetic defense mechanisms like a rudimentary amoeba tooth or something. and that can hurt and feel weird, and Nihilists obsess over that weird feel. i get that Nihilism can change from a cold lonely void to a warm comforting void, that philosophy can make gold from lead for all us cerebral internet drug users, but is that what bonclay was squealing about? No, and more specifically, i thought the point was about nihilism, where the Futility of Life, Hopelessness of Actions, Insignificance of Jazz, Ludicrous Dearth of Meaning, are all set aside, and we just are restricting ourselves to worries about agency and truth on the human scale. (i think how much longer and more abstract the words are in your post versus bonclays.) This is a difficult but human scaled problem, the problem of social organization / achieving social impact. We dont need to use special relativity when newtonian mechanics will do okay, and most people wont ever fully understand special relativity anyway. Thanks for reading

i think what i'm trying to suggest is that there is this distinction between nihilism and capital N Nihilism, the latter embodying an embrace and acceptance of truth as a determining factor of existence while the former rejects truth in the same breath as meaning, as if these are both the products of human artifice. that kindof nihilism is totally groundless and is really just oscillating between existential malaise (brought on by a useless grappling around this absence of meaning) and i suppose a more nietzschean positively charged void (which is admirable in some ways but problematic, revolutionary but without a subject, i guess as likely to drift towards bourgeois individualism as it is collective action)

so bonclay does something which i think is very cynical and troubled which is basically accepting this nihilism as a starting point (maybe in the same way that post suggests we take the exiled rapesquad as a starting point for economic concerns?) but asserts that there is a place for the artifice of narrative in this void because ... it's better than nothing? it gives us something to cling to, easy to believe in? in bonclay's post, marxism is only really present as a suggestion of a teleology, it's reduced to a narrative rather than a collection and investigation of truth claims. that reduction to a simple narrative, i claim, is one of the biggest flaws of 20th century actually existing socialism, this messianic supremacy of the state, dedicated to bringing about the end of history by purging our story of villains. it just seems totally arbitrary to me, picking one fiction over another, just because it's useful for the realization of a narrative that is basically a fiction itself, and i don't see it leading to much more than an easily digestible story of the white suprematist knights driving the jewish snakes out of the world and showing the ignorant masses the light of our dead prophets. and believing in something like that just because it's better than nihilism is just as selfindulgent and useless as individual malaise about our insignificance is in the first play. i mean, that and i think it's basically the complete foundation of the fascist impulse

and then what i think is being missed here is the alternative, what is the radical kernel of nihilism, taking the form of this Nihilism, this assertion that there is a truth beyond human artifice, in the face of which narrative is only broken idealism. the idea that the proletariat are not a force to imbue our lives with meaning and goodness and the promise of a better world but a force that are Right, that the value of marxism lies not in a teleology, not a set of positive propositions for a new ontology of being, but as a hyperawareness and total rejection of present conditions facilitated by the dedication to truth

I don't really know what you mean by the truth. What is the truth of reality that I have mistaken for a void? Tell me more about it. I don't want to write the long, thoughtful responses that your posts deserve and suddenly have them be irrelevant because I have argued with a different conception of truth than the one you're using.

I would also note that I believe in truth, and my entire argument is a vindication of Marxism against small-n nihilism, petty skepticism, and the various forms of surrender to futility they entail.

Crow posted:

babyhueypnewton posted:

jewish menace.

blinkandwheeze posted:

jewish

gyrofry posted:

Jewish

jools posted:

jewish

blinkandwheeze posted:

jewish snakes

yep, matt taibbi really hates jews

getfiscal posted:

my mom said she wanted to see slave cabin remnants.

i saw one of these places in louisiana, and apparently the slave quarters were still occupied by black families up until the 1970's, except they had to pay rent for the privilege. in the 70's, they were forced into a trailer park across the highway so the plantation grounds could be designated a state historic place.