]mmanuel writes: In any event, everybody whose followed Marx has ended up there. It's not by accident that today's Neo-Marxists are burning down neighbourhoods, bludgeoning shopkeepers, attacking the police, murdering and maiming children, and advocating Malthusianism in the name of the sacred climate. These ideologues find different reasons, but always end up doing the same awful kinds of things.
Alexiev writes: You clearly have no idea what a Neo-Marxist is. This is no surprise. Most of them are not Communists. Instead, they study culture using Marxist concepts like alienation, class conflict, and the notion that the economic infrastructure is the most important factor in determining the direction of culture.
It is always
a moral task to try to 1) locate IC within his activist's position and to see and understand this for what it is, and 2) to examine some of the statements he makes and to make fair assessments as to their validity.
Does the present conversation and any resolution now hinge on what is, and who is, a Neo-Marxist? We know that an old-school Marxist-Lenninist is -- one can easily find their own descriptions of what they sought, and what they opposed, through a careful search on Google. Their ideology really is a *praxis* -- a means and a method of undermining the institutions that upheld Occidental civilization. In their own documents, in their speeches, they say
exactly this. So it is not that hard nor demanding to define an *anti-Marxist-Lenninist* position and to be certain about it.
But what
then happened with those who were *committed Marxists* and modified their commitment and the ideology supporting it? That is the question that, when answered, leads into interesting and also contentious territories. But to reduce it to something relatively simple we must (I think) recognize that we have all be tremendously influenced by Neo-Marxist theorists and their theories.
Unquestionably. The question is actually: Do we admire this and do we agree with their theoretical propositions? Or do we find something, say, *subtly insidious* in their new doctrines which seem to express Marxist praxis through other and different means?
Who makes the analysis? And what is the basis of their critical position?
Here, obviously, we will have no choice but to refer to the Frankfurt School and the relocation of nearly all of its protagonists to the United States in the PostWar (ll) period.
Who will analyze their ideology and their influence? Based in what established philosophical or ideological ground?
I have the sense that it is in this specific area that Alexiev seems to be uninformed, or not sufficiently informed, to say much. Immanuel has a great deal to say, and more preparation, and yet
similarly to his Christian apologetics, which repels everyone, so too his political ideology, though
linking to truthful perspectives (in my opinion of course), also evokes a peculiar opposition. Again, you have to carefully sort through his statements and, often, re-express them in better terms.
Immanuel is
absolutely impervious to the statement "Your Christian apologetics drives everyone away from a sound and reasonable understanding of historical Christianity, and destroys the possibility of *appreciating it*".
Similarly, he seems unaware how his political opinions operate similarly and achieve a similar result. Thus, again, the defects
in the man are evident.
Immanuel wrote: Karl Marx was a narcissistic, nihilistic parasite who made all of his stuff up, at least, what he didn't steal from Hegel. He hated humanity, he stole from and abused his friends, he had a wicked temper, a totally selfish disposition, and abused the only Prole he ever knew personally. He was actually the opposite of an "activist," because "activists" DO things. He did DO anything for the poor: he just employed them as pawns in his theorizing.
There are 13 or 14 direct and obvious -- thoroughly unambiguous -- and classic ad hominem statements here! Textbook variety! What we see in this is that, to all appearances, Immanuel Can is a
hypocrite. This view cannot be escaped. This is not a complaint, since I have no issue with (proper use) of ad hominem, but rather just one more attempt to *locate* IC within his ideological, and also personally established, milieu.
I cannot absolutely disagree with some of his assessments of Marx -- they *reflect truth*. Yet they are simultaneously highly prejudicial and as such, taken as such, they will not help us to understand either Classical Marxist-Lenninism nor the mutation into Neo-Marxian forms.