tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4486641877026778105.post8751389083282505473..comments2024-03-27T09:14:27.496+00:00Comments on All That Is Solid ...: Decolonising Social TheoryPhilhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06298147857234479278noreply@blogger.comBlogger29125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4486641877026778105.post-20410700126519356352021-08-13T15:54:09.990+01:002021-08-13T15:54:09.990+01:00"There is a movement from below, of scholars ..."There is a movement from below, of scholars entering British universities committed to understanding and undoing the legacies of past and present imperialist endeavours"<br /><br />Sorry, but these academics arent "from below" as if part of the working class, but are petty-bourgeois, not that that alone invalidates their points. <br />According to Blake Stimson, "in the heyday of the anticolonial movement it was the colonies and the colonized that needed decolonizing, not the colonizers". He goes on to say "of course we understand that the “decolonize” in the slogan “decolonize your syllabus” is metaphorical, that it means diversify or “decenter” (as we also like to say), but that does little to allay the fact that, formally, rhetorically, it collapses the distinction between colonizer and colonized".<br /><br />Social history and the history of slavery and empire are important, but often these debates seem out of touch with the actually existing working class, and sometimes the people leading them are more concerned in a diversity as justice agenda, where academia is deemed equal, as long as some of the professors are 'insert identity', rather than fighting for universal higher education. Theres also sometimes a tendency of said people to fetishize the 'thirld world' (sometimes referred to as First World Third Worldism). <br /><br />Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4486641877026778105.post-71309082032011331522021-07-30T20:42:50.240+01:002021-07-30T20:42:50.240+01:00Kamos,
Again, apologies for the delayed reply.
N...Kamos,<br /><br />Again, apologies for the delayed reply.<br /><br />Not the Ottoman empire nor imperial Japan nor imperial China ever had anything like the reach that the European colonialisms between them had within the lifetimes of many people alive today. Moreover, both imperial Japan and imperial China ceased to benefit directly and tangibly from their colonial legacies (i.e. from the wealth extracted from the populations whom they colonised), or at least ceased to so benefit to anything like the same extent as hitherto, when their empires were destroyed as a result of defeat in total war (in the case of China, at the hands of the Eight-Nation alliance in 1912, and in the case of Japan, at the hands of predominantly the US in WWII).<br />The Ottoman empire, for its part, had already ceased to have much reach by the time of its demise in the aftermath of WWI.<br /><br />The most that can be said about modern China, Japan and Turkey regarding whether they're benefitting from their colonial legacies is that they're so benefitting in a very indirect and roundabout way (from the technological know-how and whatnot developed in part through the exploitation of resources (including human labour power) from the parts of the world that they colonised). That said, there is an argument to be made that these countries have been benefitting from <b>other people's</b> imperialism.David Parryhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16543341419630019419noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4486641877026778105.post-32606343542413946852021-07-30T18:56:25.116+01:002021-07-30T18:56:25.116+01:00Dipper,
Apologies for the delayed response.
Fasc...Dipper,<br /><br />Apologies for the delayed response.<br /><br />Fascism has at least something of an ideological foundation to it, even if that foundation is notoriously incoherent and slippery. The BLM movement does not have an ideological foundation to it. Those who align with BLM range from anarchists to liberals to Marxist-Leninists, with about the only thing uniting them in terms of a shared intellectual foundation is an understanding of racism as an institutional problem.<br /><br />The tweet you linked to was from the Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation, which I already mentioned as one of the organisations aligned with BLM. Also, there's nothing in the tweet that indicates that the organisation is endorsing the Marxist-Leninist ideology of the Castro regime.David Parryhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16543341419630019419noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4486641877026778105.post-36381425692018543642021-07-18T12:58:29.673+01:002021-07-18T12:58:29.673+01:00@ David Parry
'I made a mistake in assuming t...@ David Parry<br /><br /><i>'I made a mistake in assuming that there is a single organisation called 'Black Lives Matter'. There is no such organisation'</i><br /><br />well, here's a tweet claiming to be from an organisation calling itself Black Lives Matter<br />https://twitter.com/sabrod123/status/1415496641658896391 and it has a political programme involving supporting Cuba, and it has a political symbol of taking one knee.<br /><br /><i>"What there is is a broader social movement, and a loose network of organisations across the world associated therewith."</i><br /><br />1930's version:<br /><br />'there is co single organisation called Fascism. It is a broader social movement, and a loose network of organisations ...'<br /><br />'England Footballers giving the straight right arm flat hand salute in Germany weren't identifying with a political party. They were showing solidarity with other Europeans. It shouldn't be taken to mean they were supporting anti-jewish policies' etc etc. <br /><br />Dippernoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4486641877026778105.post-40946071839499967392021-07-16T13:42:23.943+01:002021-07-16T13:42:23.943+01:00@Dipper - "I don't believe anyone on the ...@Dipper - "I don't believe anyone on the left should be supporting an organisation that looks to embed race as a critical part of determining people's place in society."<br /><br />There are plenty on the left who are critical about #blm/crt - check out Adolph Reed, Pascal Robert, Karen and Barbara Fields, and Cedric Johnson. <br /><br />@David - thanks for clarification. I remember hearing things online from activists from Ferguson that were critical of some of the #BlackLivesMatter people, such as Deray McKesson. Cant remember exactly what was said, but I got the impression that some of the #blm people were just opportunists. Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4486641877026778105.post-32142559038159518802021-07-16T10:32:17.516+01:002021-07-16T10:32:17.516+01:00@ David Parry.
Still no books for me to read. No ...@ David Parry.<br /><br />Still no books for me to read. No list of thinkers inspiring BLM. Your failure to give some intellectual backbone to your position is noted.<br /><br />I think BLM is an organisation, it has a supporting basis of Critical Race Theory, and regards me first and foremost as someone whose rights and position in society is determined but the colour of my skin. Taking the knee is the symbol chosen by this organisation to indicate support. <br /><br />I don't believe anyone on the left should be supporting an organisation that looks to embed race as a critical part of determining people's place in society. Dippernoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4486641877026778105.post-39199098991356871672021-07-16T10:21:11.227+01:002021-07-16T10:21:11.227+01:00@ David Parry
It is incredibly ignorant to suggest...@ David Parry<br />It is incredibly ignorant to suggest these other empires didn't have the same impact on contemporay economics and geopolitics. These empires have profound modern legacies; such as the Ottomans in Asia Minor, the Middle East, North Africa and the Balkans. Whilst China and Japan are hugely important in the modern positioning of Asia as a global engine of growth. I appreciate that there is sensitivity around analysing the extent to which modern African power relations are influenced by the balance of coercion and cooperation between empires (European and non-European) and native tribes and kingdoms, the pre-colonial mechanisms of slavery being perhaps the most taboo subject, but that doesn't mean it should be out of scope. <br /> <br />The only reason to dismiss 'non-white' histories is to avoid having to judge them by the exceptionalist standards being applied to European empires. This approach doesn't come from any serious attempt to decolonise academia, it's a pseudoscientitic/pseudohistorical postmodern 'grievance studies' approach.<br /><br />Empire is a competitive business. What European empires did only makes sense in the context of who and what they were in competition and coopearation with. It's easier for grievance narratives if they dismiss the context and treat European empires as exceptional; far more comfortable than having to apply those standards consistently. I'm all for expanding enquiry beyond the narrative of the victors, but it should be a warts and all process that avoids double standards. Protecting some actors from critique infantalises them. Kamonoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4486641877026778105.post-5413551550295246362021-07-16T00:28:35.461+01:002021-07-16T00:28:35.461+01:00Anonymous,
I should probably hold my hands up and...Anonymous,<br /><br />I should probably hold my hands up and say that, earlier, I made a mistake in assuming that there is a single organisation called 'Black Lives Matter'. There is no such organisation. What there is is a broader social movement, and a loose network of organisations across the world associated therewith.David Parryhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16543341419630019419noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4486641877026778105.post-70620913010998829582021-07-16T00:21:58.085+01:002021-07-16T00:21:58.085+01:00Kamos,
Another thing: imperialism hasn't been...Kamos,<br /><br />Another thing: imperialism hasn't been a constant of human history. It's been a constant of class-based modes of production, sure, but not every human society has been divided by class.David Parryhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16543341419630019419noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4486641877026778105.post-90716847649950527642021-07-16T00:20:06.325+01:002021-07-16T00:20:06.325+01:00Dipper,
Pointing out the impact of the legacy of ...Dipper,<br /><br />Pointing out the impact of the legacy of imperialism on the continent of Africa has nothing to do with blaming the nearest white person for all the travails that blight much of the continent, and everything to do with recognising that you cannot have some parts of the globe used as a means of wealth extraction by other parts of the globe through colonialism, and ruthlessly exploited and subjugated for century upon century, without that leaving a huge, baleful legacy for the colonised parts of the world - a legacy which cannot be overcome in a few short decades, especially when even after European colonialism ended, you had imperial powers exploiting the tremendous economic disparities stemming from European colonialism, and the resulting disparities in technological, and thus military, capability, to the hilt by exercising imperial dominion over erstwhile European colonies through the proxies of client regimes serviceable to the imperial powers' geopolitical and commercial interests.<br /><br />Also, it isn't just 'Englishmen' whom I blame. It might have escaped your notice, but I quite deliberately use the phrase 'European colonialism' rather than 'British colonialism', European colonialism including not just British colonialism but also, for example, Belgian and French colonialism.<br /><br />It isn't just 'the West' either. You might not recall this but earlier, I quite clearly noted that the USSR also had a hand in creating the present mess in which so much of Africa finds itself, having had a few client regimes of its own on the continent.<br /><br />Regarding Black Lives Matter, I think it's unreasonable to expect either the broader social movement or any of the organisations associated therewith to have much of a coherent intellectual foundation (beyond, perhaps, an understanding of racism as an institutional problem) when neither those who align themselves with the movement in some way nor members of any of said adjacent organisations have a single shared political ideology.<br /><br />I'm genuinely at a loss as to why you bring up Nation of Islam. I doubt that that organisation has much purchase among those who align themselves in some way with BLM in the US, much less elsewhere. In fact, I don't think it'd be too unsafe a bet to venture that a huge proportion of Americans, BLM-aligned or otherwise, still less people outside of the US, don't know who the fuck NoI are or what they stand for.David Parryhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16543341419630019419noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4486641877026778105.post-9284078032121367652021-07-15T22:00:51.834+01:002021-07-15T22:00:51.834+01:00Kamos
None of the empires you mention had suffici...Kamos<br /><br />None of the empires you mention had sufficient geographic scope recently enough to have had an impact on contemporary global economics and geopolitics in the way that European colonialism has had. Any surviving legacy they have today is largely cultural. That's the long and short of it.<br /><br />What I'm dismissing as whataboutery is talk of conflicts, looting and whatnot between African peoples prior to European colonialism in response to critiques of European colonialism and its legacy. I don't see how one can reasonably describe such retorts as anything other than whataboutery, as their purpose is quite plainly and transparently to deflect criticisms of European colonialism by pointing to the completely irrelevant behaviour of other peoples.David Parryhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16543341419630019419noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4486641877026778105.post-85688780806140821322021-07-15T18:16:53.031+01:002021-07-15T18:16:53.031+01:00One criticism of the 'decolonial left' is ...One criticism of the 'decolonial left' is that they valorize the geopolitical power balance between bourgeois regimes in lieu of the class conflict between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie, and have displaced the class struggle with crude geopolitics and shifted allegiances from the proletariat to bourgeois states.<br /><br />Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4486641877026778105.post-73831265843100241012021-07-15T16:05:20.197+01:002021-07-15T16:05:20.197+01:00@David - can you explain how #BLM are a political ...@David - can you explain how #BLM are a political organization ? Adolph Reed describes them as a hashtag only. It would be interesting to hear your thoughts on his comments regarding them. <br /><br />@Dipper - "Finding the nearest white person to blame for African political and civil unrest may fit in with some people's inclinations, but it isn't necessarily an objective or helpful view". Maybe some have that agenda, but its elite Europeans, not regular individuals being criticized. Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4486641877026778105.post-39528411795807715162021-07-15T12:33:49.487+01:002021-07-15T12:33:49.487+01:00@ David Parry
I could be wrong, but you appear to ...@ David Parry<br />I could be wrong, but you appear to be pushing an exceptionalist and ahistorical approach to colonialism/imperialism centred on British or European empires that requires these complex, globally interlinked concepts to be boxed off into a convenient bubble. Vast swathes of global historical context is written off as 'whataboutery', because its 'legacy' is 'problematic' when trying to reach the kind of pre-determined conclusion 'decolonisers' will be comfortable with. This isn't really decolonisation, it's just filtering the evidence for a different gloss. Empires, and all the unpleasant behaviour that has always come with them, have been a significant political unit across the whole world for the entirety of human existance, and even during the lifespan of the British Empire non-white empires (and related client polities) existed that left huge legacies that continue to shape the modern world; the Ottomans, the Mughals, the Japanese, and the Chinese to name some obvious ones. Much of the 'imperialist' history now apparently being rethought only truly makes sense in the context of what has to be excluded to protect the sensitivities of charlatans. However, it is deliciously ironic that such 'rethinking' requires 'non-white' history to be cancelled because it falls short of standards retrospectively applied to 'white' history. Kamonoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4486641877026778105.post-31994676526871217962021-07-14T22:52:45.165+01:002021-07-14T22:52:45.165+01:00@ David Parry
thanks for the reply
Again I disag...@ David Parry<br /><br />thanks for the reply<br /><br />Again I disagree. Finding the nearest white person to blame for African political and civil unrest may fit in with some people's inclinations, but it isn't necessarily an objective or helpful view. Not every bad thing in the world can be traced back to a white Englishman, and It infantilises Africans to assume they are incapable of organising themselves without some western country disrupting things. There is lots of history of tribal conflict before White folk ever appeared.<br /><br /><i>"Even if they did, people who hold to the same political ideology can subscribe to wildly different meta-ethical systems, and thus will arrive at very different answers to questions such as 'why is slavery wrong?'."</i><br /><br />Fine. Folks like me are often told to educate ourselves, to read a book. So can you point me to a writer who has given an intellectual foundation for organisations such as Nation of Islam or BLM who you think worthy of consideration? Because the last time I educated myself and read a book (Pre-Colonial Black Africa, by Cheikh Anta Diop,) It didn't go quite as I expected, and certainly didn't support the narrative of Empire the left like to relate.Dippernoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4486641877026778105.post-34114943265902534602021-07-14T16:55:29.669+01:002021-07-14T16:55:29.669+01:00Dipper,
The point regarding European colonialism,...Dipper,<br /><br />The point regarding European colonialism, which you obdurately refuse to understand, is that, unlike tribal conflicts in very specific parts of the world in the dim and distant past, it is both recent enough and reached far enough around the world to have an impact on contemporary global geopolitics and economics, and to constitute a major part of the root of ongoing and systemic economic injustices in the world today. It isn't about Europeans stealing from Africans somehow being worse than Africans stealing from Africans when judged from an abstract moral standpoint. It's about legacy.<br /><br />Pointing out the reality of imperial powers involving themselves intimately in Africa even after European colonialism ended, and that a huge proportion of the travails that have blighted so much of the continent during this time period are attributable to that, is not to suggest that African peoples are, in principle, <b>incapable</b> of acting independently of external influence. It's to point out that their ability to do so has, in practice, been severely curtailed. To pretend otherwise - to pretend that the economic disparities stemming from the legacy of European colonialism, and the disparities in technological, and thus military, capability, which go with them, don't matter, and that imperial powers haven't exploited those disparities ruthlessly and to maximum effect since the end of European colonialism - is simply ahistorical. Ask Patrice Lumumba. Oh sorry, I forgot, the CIA did him in - the same CIA who went on to install Joseph Mobutu as the head of the US' client regime in Congo-Leopoldville (now known as Congo-Kinshasa or, alternatively, the Democratic Republic of the Congo). Those who know a thing or two about post-colonial African history will know how <b>that</b> story panned out!<br /><br />It is not in the least infantilising to Africans to recognise the foregoing. It's simply pointing out reality.<br /><br />It's ridiculous to expect either those who associate with the Black Live Matter movement or members of any of the organisations associated therewith, such as the Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation, to have a shared position on the abstract philosophical whys and wherefores regarding the undesirability of slavery. Neither those associated with the broader political and social movement nor members of any of the organisations associated with it, as far as I'm aware, even have a single shared political ideology. Even if they did, people who hold to the same political ideology can subscribe to wildly different meta-ethical systems, and thus will arrive at very different answers to questions such as 'why is slavery wrong?'.David Parryhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16543341419630019419noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4486641877026778105.post-78413885206536818772021-07-09T12:48:24.085+01:002021-07-09T12:48:24.085+01:00Apologies for my rudness in not replying earlier.
...Apologies for my rudness in not replying earlier.<br /><br />@ David Parry.<br /><br />I flatly disagree.<br /><br />It is not ‘Whataboutery’ to look at pre-colonial societies. Criticism of the British Empire requires comparison to a standard, and I’m just pointing out that pretty much most of human history performs poorly against that standard, so why pick out the British Empire in particular? Your observation on the Benin Bronzes is strange. It is okay from Black Africans to steal from each other, but not for a white man to steal it? Again, double standards.<br /><br /><i>“What has happened on the continent since European colonialism ended is a testament not to what Africans do when left to themselves (because they haven't been left to themselves) but to how imperialism by proxy can be just as ruinous as old-fashioned settler colonialism.“</i> Seriously? There was no time ever in human history when people were just ‘left to themselves’ It is all one tribe against another. And it is infantilising to African people and African nations to suggest that they are incapable of acting independently without external influence. <br /><br /><i>“BLM are a political organisation, not a philosophical think tank, so I rather doubt that they're too pre-occupied with the abstract, philosophical whys and wherefores regarding the moral undesirability of slavery.“</i> This is ridiculous. Political organisations, by their definition, are concerned with abstract political thoughts. Otherwise they’d just be quasi-criminal organisations shaking people down.<br /><br />@ Anonymous <br /><br /><i>“I'd guess that most people today probably don't feel the need to rigorously work out WHY slavery is morally wrong, because the vast majority of us assume that it self-evidently is.”</i><br /><br />This statement seems self-evidently true, but I don’t think stands up to scrutiny. For centuries many societies had a caste-type system eg in Africa there were kings, artisans and craftsmen, and slaves. The general rationale for this was that an interventionist god had put people in these categories. If you were a slave, that was because God had ordained it.<br /><br />The notion that people are born equal, that birth should not determine your status in society, that people should not own other people, was a revolutionary idea. I believe it came from Western Europe, based on Christianity and developments in politics and philosophy. If you have another source for the origin of this view I’d be keen to hear it.<br />Dippernoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4486641877026778105.post-78147586664214877812021-07-06T13:14:54.755+01:002021-07-06T13:14:54.755+01:00Dipper,
Firstly, everything David Parry said.
Bu...Dipper,<br /><br />Firstly, everything David Parry said.<br /><br />But also, I'd guess that most people today probably don't feel the need to rigorously work out WHY slavery is morally wrong, because the vast majority of us assume that it self-evidently is. Do you require most people to philosophically justify their opposition to rape and murder? Granted that the past is very much a foreign country, but that's not entirely relevant.<br /><br />Don't try to invoke MLK in defence of your own conservative views. The man was clearly quite radical and left-wing (albeit explicitly not a Marxist, and I'd disagree with his expressed opinion of Marx and Marxism). MLK identified (at least towards the end of his life) as a "democratic socialist", and evidently meant that. He was critical of inequality, not only in terms of race, but also class. He called the US state "the greatest purveyor of violence in the world" and asked how he could possibly preach non-violence to black Americans without condemning the violence of the US state in Vietnam. Can you imagine any 'centrist' saying something like that today? Obviosuly not; it would be the 'far-left' that would be saying that.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4486641877026778105.post-31718692129749594832021-07-05T20:12:16.783+01:002021-07-05T20:12:16.783+01:00Agree with all the above, but where did you get &q...Agree with all the above, but where did you get "BLM are a political organisation" from ? <br /><br />From reading people like Adolph Reed, my understanding was that its primarily a hashtag. Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4486641877026778105.post-48309407389171564462021-07-05T18:15:19.722+01:002021-07-05T18:15:19.722+01:00"Responding to points, John said the book cou..."Responding to points, John said the book could be read as breathing life into dead white men and making them interesting and significant again"<br /><br />Can John provide a more solid criticism of Marx than the above ? In what way does Marx's racial identity invalidate his philosophy ? <br /><br />Will the book be affordable ? Some of these lofty academic decolonial books are lots of money, so not something us working class people can easily obtain, not to mention that these debates seem to take place in elite settings.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4486641877026778105.post-18127016945702210972021-07-05T12:11:20.587+01:002021-07-05T12:11:20.587+01:00Dipper,
To pretend that it doesn't matter tha...Dipper,<br /><br />To pretend that it doesn't matter that European colonialism encompassed most of the globe and is within the living memory of many people alive today, and thus impacts world affairs today in a way that other colonialisms simply don't, whether because they never reached very far or because they happened too deep in the past, and that this is an illegitimate basis for singling out European colonialism for criticism, is absurd on its face. <br /><br />Also, your claim about what critics of European colonialism believe regarding the behaviour prior to British rule of the native populations whom the British colonialists brought under their dominion is nothing more than a strawman, and your bloviating about inter-tribal conflicts and looting among African peoples pre colonialism is pathetically transparent whataboutery designed to deflect criticism of British colonialism. It simply will not wash. <br /><br />Your attempt to draw an equivalence between demanding the return of the Benin bronze statues to Benin and demanding the return of the statues to whatever tribe from whom they were stolen prior to the British turning up also falls flat. The theft of the Benin statues from Benin by the British symbolises an enormous colonial enterprise whose baleful legacy constitutes a major part of the reason for ongoing economic injustices in the present, while the theft of said statues by people A from people B prior to colonialism symbolises nothing beyond a petty squabble between tribes in a very specific part of the world in the dim and distant past.<br /><br />This is why critics of European colonialism don't waffle on at length about tribal conflicts in Africa (or, for that matter, the Americas) prior to European colonialism. It isn't because we imagine the territories in question to have been a peaceful nirvana prior to the European colonial settlers coming along and ruining everything. It is because, from the standpoint of recent world affairs, such conflicts are utterly inconsequential, except for where they were amplified by the divide-and-rule policies of the European colonial settlers (e.g. Rwanda and Burundi, Kashmir). European colonialism, on the other hand, is far from inconsequential from the standpoint of the modern world, for reasons I've already explained.<br /><br />Post European colonialism, the continent of Africa was not left alone, but rather was subjected to imperial dominion of a different sort - imperial rule by proxy. The dictators you allude to have, for the most part, been propped up (and indeed, installed in some cases) either by the US, the UK and so on or by the USSR, in the furtherance of the geopolitical and commercial interests of the imperial powers in question. What has happened on the continent since European colonialism ended is a testament not to what Africans do when left to themselves (because they haven't been left to themselves) but to how imperialism by proxy can be just as ruinous as old-fashioned settler colonialism.<br /><br />I very much doubt that BLM have repudiated Martin Luther King. On the contrary, I'm pretty certain that most BLM members continue to hold him up in high esteem as a source of inspiration. I imagine a lot of them do take issue with how MLK's legacy has been co-opted by certain people who whitewash his radicalism and portray him as this milquetoast reformist who saw racism as an individual (rather than systemic) problem, and who viewed colour-blindness as its antidote (as opposed to being a natural outgrowth of the long-term aims of the civil rights movement being achieved), but that's not quite the same thing.<br /><br />BLM are a political organisation, not a philosophical think tank, so I rather doubt that they're too pre-occupied with the abstract, philosophical whys and wherefores regarding the moral undesirability of slavery. I daresay that BLM members would give quite wildly differing opinions if you asked them about such abstract ethical subjects.David Parryhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16543341419630019419noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4486641877026778105.post-47016968051319122092021-07-05T09:20:43.310+01:002021-07-05T09:20:43.310+01:00That Christianity existed for more than a millenni...That Christianity existed for more than a millennia prior to the Enlightenment demonstrates that the latter owed its existence to historical contingency rather than anything that was particularly native to Christianity itself.<br /><br />The universalising ideas of both exist in other philosophical system and have in any case been observed more in the breach than the observance.<br /><br />They continue to exist in law more as statements of fundamental rights than anything anchored in the notion of a supreme being and/or some idea of an imago dei.<br /><br />And I don't think you've read much MLK.chris stileshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16220270505988683271noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4486641877026778105.post-67322990329394983352021-07-04T17:26:07.390+01:002021-07-04T17:26:07.390+01:00@ David Parry. - so? Much of the criticism of Brit...@ David Parry. - so? Much of the criticism of British Colonialism seems to rest on the notion that before the UK turned up there were just indigenous groups occupying 'their land' and getting on happily with their neighbours. Obviously this is nonsense. To take one issue - the Benin bronzes. These were looted, so we should return them to their original owners. Well, good luck with that. The people we looted them from had themselves looted them. Prior to Europeans turning up Africa experienced lots of inter-tribal conflict, wars, looting, enslavement. And now Europe has departed ...<br /><br />Once we have dispensed with Black American thinkers like Thomas Sewell (too right wing), or Martin Luther King, who are we left with? Who do BLM take their philosophy from? Malcolm X?<br /><br />I know why I think Slavery is wrong, its because I've been brought up in a Christian/Enlightenment world where individuals are born equal and have innate rights. But BLM have rejected this particular strand, so why do they think slavery is wrong? On what philosophical or moral basis?Dippernoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4486641877026778105.post-69815231727521516932021-07-04T16:50:07.524+01:002021-07-04T16:50:07.524+01:00I can just imagine sociologists reframing the disc...I can just imagine sociologists reframing the discussion in a way best likely to progress their careers, as they always have.<br /><br />Colonisation is history. Britons were slaves of the Romans, then Briton colonised in its turn. The Aztec and Inca empires (the clue is in empire) were massive colonisers, and African empires (clue) also played their part. This bullshit about native Americans not owning things - maybe the plains Indians, but as for the rest... and never mind the Indian and the Chinese... empires.<br /><br />These dead white men created the discipline of sociology in their times - and it is useful to think about the context of these times - but to delegitimise historic sociology simply on the basis that it was born, partly, out of the wealth generated by colonisation is like rejecting the classic canon because it was written by wealthy Romans and Greeks who owned slaves. <br /><br />Has someone put something in the water - why on the left, and right, does cretinism appear to be so dominant? Now that, I think, is a subject worthy of sociological enquiry. Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4486641877026778105.post-82117514192029294032021-07-04T15:53:18.628+01:002021-07-04T15:53:18.628+01:00Sociological theory is inevitably going to be infl...Sociological theory is inevitably going to be influenced by the decolonial turn, much like the way, thirty years or so ago, it was heavily influenced by the 'language turn'. Then, it fell headlong into postmodernism/post structuralism and started the process of 'foregrounding' (a nice PoMo term) culture over economy or the particular or the general or even, epistemology over ontology. This language turn took sociology down a cul-de-sac, which led to it rejecting rationalism and even sociological theory itself. Sociology has for the past decade tried to reverse out of this cul-de-sac of infinite scepticism and belatedly accepted that maybe there is such a thing as capitalism after all. Our general obsession today with 'identity' rather than with evaluating the ontological consequences of social class, for example, is a by-product of that era. <br /><br />Then, like now, there is a tendency to deconstruct Marx. Most postmodernists didn't read any Marx but they felt qualified to describe him as a determinist, historicist or as a crude positivist. He was the bad guy who didn't have anything to say about power & sexuality. He was a misogynist who devalued the role of women and worst of all, 'grand narratives' like his led us not to emancipation but to totalitarianism. Let's hope Decolonial Studies doesn't enter the same cul-de-sac and affords Marx his fair dues? Dialectician1noreply@blogger.com