Darren Smith wrote:
> Thanks for your insightful comments. But, my hatred for NATO is not greater
> than my compassion for the oppression of Kosovar refugees. However, my
> compassion for all those peoples who are and have been subjected to
> oppression around the world (particularly in Africa and South America) is
> greater than my compassion for one particular humanitarian crisis. What is
> disturbing is that you have spent more time considering the plight the
> Kosovars than you have any other group.
Mr. Smith, I don't see that to be a valid criticism of his remarks. The fact
that there
exists such oppression around the world is well known fact on this list that no
one
is denying, at least that I've seen. While we can argue about the episteme that
leads
us to focus on this one issue to the near exclusion of other current ones, that
doesn't change
several incontrovertible facts.
1) Just because NATO is focusing on this one issue and not others does not
matter
logically as to the validity of this particular mission. Your logic appears to
lead
to one simple conclusion: that since NATO can't be everywhere at once, it can't
be anywhere. This is simply a non-starter. No entity is capable of ommipresent
action and attempting to judge NATO or any other entity by this criterion is
absurd
by Foucaudian (or anyone's else's) standards.
2) Just because someone lives in a country where ethnic cleansing has occurred
in
the past, especially before they were born, does not emasculate their ability to
criticize actual human rights violation incidents. While I don't know what
country
you are writing from, I suspect that your government has also committed such
violations.
(Almost every country has been cited by Ammesty International for violations at
one
time or another) Thus, by your own logic, you have no right to criticize Mr.
Ralph!
This means that no one can criticize or offer corrections to another, since
everyone
has done wrong or lived in a country where wrong has been done. Absurd.
3) All the countries you mention certainly have human rights issues that must be
addressed, but you are attempting to argue that one person must express and
become
active in every particular instance of a given occurence, in order to have any
validity.
This is absurd. No activist is morally obligated to help every worthy cause that
comes
along in order to validate any one resistance they offer. No one has that kind
of time
and effort. Your fantasy realm of "All or Nothing" criticism is perfect for any
totalitarian
regime, capitalist or not, that wishes to argue that "Nobody's Perfect,
therefore I can do what
I want." In fact, from a Foucauldian perspective, this notion you have is in
dire need of analysis.
The strategy of placing any remedial perspective as out of reach---a type of
political skepticism--
is itself a claim for power/truth/legitimation of the most base, nihilistic
order. It is
completely transparent as an argument---it wouldn't even work on Herman/Chomsky
terms as
a replicative/reinforcing hegemonic discourse--it is transparent as a
legitimation
for oppression.
4) Instead of grandstanding by pummeling everyone at once who doesn't mention
every single country where action is needed in a single breath or sentence, you
could
encourage eveyone to use Mr. Ralph's support for the mission of NATO as
a springboard for discussing how other human rights violations could be remedied
in the current political climate. Instead of "more leftist than thou" trumpeting
this could actually turn into a good discussion. I agree with Mr. Ralph that
this
is perfect illustration for Foucault--- given that there are no clear answers
and
all alternatives are ambiguous and dirty.
In any case, I find it difficult to feel sorry that the Serbian people's general
support for a bloody, murderous. proto-fascist government seems to have
"inconvenienced" them. It would have been thought-provoking to know what
the American government's response would have been had someone starting
bombing us during our westward expansion. I wonder if we would have seen
the same pitying and wailing of the leftists for the "poor" U.S. government.
---
Christopher W. Chase
-----------------------------------------------
ECA 377 Department of Religious Studies
Arizona State University Tempe, AZ
(480) 965-7145
christopher.chase@xxxxxxx
http://www.public.asu.edu/~heresy
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