Have you read it or just the excerpt above? What do you think that it's arguing?
Ye, read it all. Thought it was the only decent contribution to the other thread by an anarchist.
The article as a whole is critique of what I was trying to criticise in the other thread, activism or substitutionism?" The idea that you can substitute yourself for the working-class. "
Defining ourselves as activists means definingour actions as the ones which will bring about social change, thus disregarding the activity of thousands upon thousands of other non-activists. Activism is based on this misconception that it is only activists who do social change - whereas of course class struggle is happening all the time."
so I agree with the article as a whole, it is just some of the peculiar ideas upon which the general article is based upon, that I find interesting. For example "
The division of labour operates, for example, in medicine or education - instead of healing and bringing up kids being common knowledge and tasks that everyone has a hand in, this knowledge becomes the specialised property of doctors and teachers - experts that we must rely on to do these things for us. Experts jealously guard and mystify the skills they have. This keeps people separated and disempowered and reinforces hierarchical class society."
I'm very familiar with this argument from the disability movement. In the disability movement they contrast the social model of disability, with the medical model of disability, exposing that the medical model of disability certainly does what the anarchist described here, making disabled people
something that is managed by the medical experts, rather than
someone who manages their own disability with the assistance of others. the doctors to some extent do try to retain the specialised knowledge, making them someone we rely upon, keeping us separated and disempowered. This is why the disability movement activists prefer the term personal assistant, to carer, because we are not being cared for, we are caring for ourselves with the assistance of others. BUT this goes too far; "
The division of labour is the foundation of class society, the fundamental division being that between mental and manual labour. ETC"
Firstly, a division of Labour occurred in hunter gatherer societies, classless societies. For me, seeing the division of Labour as fundamental to class society and the working classes oppression, is wrong. The division of labour occurred in primitive classless societies, and COULD occur if there is any future more advanced classless societies. The fact that the division of Labour is distorted in class societies, by the people's alienation from the division of Labour, does not make the division of Labour itself a fundamental feature of class society. The division of labour is neither malignant nor benign. It is just as useful to the classless society, as much as the class society. It is just as useful to the progressive movements, as it is to the reactionary movements. It's just like the argument that the gun is evil, when in fact it is an inanimate object whose nature is defined by its use by human beings, not the other way around. And so it is how the division of Labour is applied, that is fundamental to its nature as progressive or reactionary.
what's more, "
A division of labour implies that one person takes on a role on behalf of many others who relinquish this responsibility. A separation of tasks means that other people will grow your food and make your clothes and supply your electricity while you get on with achieving social change. The activist, being an expert in social change, assumes that other people aren't doing anything to change their lives and so feels a duty or a responsibility to do it on their behalf. Activists think they are compensating for the lack of activity by others. Defining ourselves as activists means definingour actions as the ones which will bring about social change, thus disregarding the activity of thousands upon thousands of other non-activists. Activism is based on this misconception that it is only activists who do social change - whereas of course class struggle is happening all the time. "
now the activist, the person who substitutes themselves for the class, may make this mistake substitutionism, but this does not negate the possibility that Chomsky is "
more advanced than others in your appreciation of the need for social change, in the knowledge of how to achieve it and as leading or being in the forefront of the practical struggle to create this change." than the working-class member of the BNP. This also does not negate the possibility that a socialist is '
more advanced than others in your appreciation of the need for social change, in the knowledge of how to achieve it and as leading or being in the forefront of the practical struggle to create this change." than a member of the BNP,
BUT she is also aware that the emancipation of the working class, has to be the act of the working class. Vanguardism.
Anarchists SEEM to disagree with this. They SEEM to argue that we are all equally ""
in appreciation of the need for social change, in the knowledge of how to achieve it and as leading or being in the forefront of the practical struggle to create this change."if this is true, it seems illogical to me, and I would appreciate an explanation.
