-----Messaggio originale-----
Da: anand-bhatt <anand.bhatt@xxxxxxxx>
A: 'foucault@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx'
<foucault@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Data: Wednesday, March 03, 1999 8:59 PM
Oggetto: RE: postmodernism and liberalism
Clare O'Farell talks of the 'millions dead of Marxist derived ideologies',
forgetting the fact that many of the millions wanted to die for these
ideologies. I am in India right now, and could claim to know some who have
done so, I know some more who would gladly do so. The Naxelites for one. The
Marxists and other socialists I know have seen their own and their fathers'
bodies broken in sweat shops; love draining from their hearts under back
breaking Labour. They have seen their mothers go beg on the streets for a $
0.04 meal when out of job. They make things I see on my postmodernist
friend's bodies.
[What are you doing around postmodern friends and their bodies when you
should be breaking your own body in a sweat shop?]
These postmodernists would not die for postmodernism. They spend $ 5.0
watching postmodernist movies and discuss Women's Movement. They spend $
20,000/- and study in America. The fat of the land.
[But remember Aristotle's point that a certain level of luxury is needed for
the pursuit of virtue. See _Politics_, Book II, Chapter IX; see also Book
VII, Chapter IX.]
She also forgets the millions killed by the liberals: I wonder what an
Baathist socialist mother's position on liberalism is, especially after her
child was denied medicine by a so-called liberal American administration. I
wonder why the Vietnamese fought the greatest military machine ever and died
by the millions until they won.
On a personal note, I fail to see the 'difference' between Marx and
Foucault, of course they said different things and suggested we go abut
things in a different way. But fundamentally, both revealed the world as is,
it's oppression and cynicism; its tragedy how it came about and so on.. in
a systematic and dispassionate manner.
What would Foucault have done had he been born in the Enlightenment?
[He would've been Diderot. But Diderot is not like Marx, thus Foucault is
not like Marx.]
Anand-Bhatt, ARCHITECT.
J-36, saket, new delhi.
"I am no doubt not the only one who writes in order to have no face. Do not
ask me who I am and do not ask me to remain the same: leave it to our
bureaucrats and our police to see that our papers are in order."
Michel Foucault
-----Original Message-----
From: Clare O'Farrell [SMTP:c_ofarrell@xxxxxxxxxxx]
Sent: Wednesday, March 03, 1999 5:54 AM
To: foucault@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: re: postmodernism and liberalism
Darren writes
>>Below is an article that appeared in a student newspaper. I think it
raises a number of pertinent issues.
>>Postmodernism: Liberalism's Partner in Crime
Well, let's compare it with Marxism and socialism (not from any
ideological bias I may have). Let's face it, Marxism and socialism, from
the moment of its inception, posed a major threat to existing (liberal)
institutions and this threat breached the closed world of university
education and similar institutions.>>
N.B no flames intended but I can't see anything in this article beyond a
boringly familiar Marxist style trashing of postmodernism - my religion
versus your religion. The writer is clearly unaware of the enormous
impact Foucault's work (for example) is having at a very practical level
on the analysis of day to day policies and practices in professional and
institutional areas. And what about the millions dead in the name of
marxist derived ideologies?
I do not wish to minimise the positive effects socialism (and I include
non marxist socialisms here) has had on 20th century social thinking -
but that style of thought has been well and truly recuperated - we need
to think things through from a different angle - not that so called
'postmodernism' isn't without its own very large problems!!!
Clare
Clare O'Farrell
email:c_ofarrell@xxxxxxxxxxx
web page: http://www.qut.edu.au/edu/cpol/foucault/
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