[Peace] [Peace-discuss] Join us to leaflet the Art Theatre tonight 6-7pm

Thu May 11 18:05:30 UTC 2017

Now, are we all happy? I think we’ve beaten up on Carl enough for one day. I hope the bfsuiuc appreciate our worthy contribution of support and feel a sense of obligation to support us, in our efforts to prevent the killing and devastation of people of color around the world. War does have an impact on “people of color” here in the US. They are the ones who suffer the most from our wars, either through conscription or loss of social services, and the militarization of the US police forces across the nation.

On May 11, 2017, at 10:53, Karen Aram via Peace <peace at lists.chambana.net<mailto:peace at lists.chambana.net>> wrote:

We set a precedent last year, when a person approached us to be on the program, someone on this list who has made his views known, that of anti-semitism, holocaust denier, blames the Jews for everything. I openly was opposed to having a known racist on the program.

Ron, Stuart, Karen M. in their support for “freedom of speech” disagreed with me, Carl wasn’t sure given he supports freedom of speech, but the program has limited time.

I, given I was alone on this issue, insisted on bringing David Johnson, and David Green into the picture, and they agreed with me. Karen M. then took the position that we weren’t preventing this person from his freedom of speech, he could get his own program.

So, from my perspective the vote, majority rules, set a precedent. We need not always be in agreement on every issue.

On May 11, 2017, at 10:23, Harry Mickalide via Peace <peace at lists.chambana.net<mailto:peace at lists.chambana.net>> wrote:

So that's Harry Mickalide, David Johnson, Karen Aram, Stuart Levy, and Karen Medina all for having AWARE sign on as officially supporting the demands. What is AWARE's policy on organization-wide decisions? Do we need consensus or a majority vote?

On Thu, May 11, 2017 at 11:32 AM, Carl G. Estabrook <galliher at illinois.edu<mailto:galliher at illinois.edu>> wrote:
Harry—

I and I’m sure other members and friends of AWARE support those three points (and perhaps stronger versions, including free tuition and a universal basic income.)

But the bulk of the 13 demands - containing some legitimate complaints - constitute identity politics as Reed describes them.

That’s separate from and at worst a distraction from the politics that have animated the "Anti-War Anti-Racism Effort” of C-U.

AWARE members may support the demands, but I think it’s outside the purpose of AWARE as an organization to do so.

I hope members of both groups will cooperate in combatting war and racism.

Regards, Carl

On May 11, 2017, at 10:13 AM, Harry Mickalide <mickalideh at gmail.com<mailto:mickalideh at gmail.com>> wrote:

Carl, here is my frustration. You continue to assert that BSFR (Black Students for Revolution) is engaging in identity politics at the expense of being anti-capitalist and anti-war when multiple people have told you that BSFR is very much anti-capitalist and anti-war.

Here are some quotes from their list of demands to prove it.
https://www.bsfruiuc.com/our-demands

From demand 1
"While students are being handcuffed with loans, private lenders are making a profit and the federal government is spending public funds on wars, drones, wall street bailouts, and corporate subsidies. Situated at the intersection of white supremacy, capitalism, and patriarchy, today’s education model marginalizes and excludes both the working class and students of color. As a first step towards a tuition-free and debt-free reality within higher education, we demand that tuition hikes come to an immediate and permanent end, and that MAP Grants, regardless of state funding, should continue to be issued to recipients."

From demand 8
"We believe adequate shelter, food, water, and health care are human rights owed to all workers, and that a living wage is a first step in ensuring that for all people."

From demand 13
They call for divestment from "corporations which actively support or enable states currently carrying out human right’s abuses (e.g., Israel, Saudi Arabia, Myanmar), all private prison corporations, and all private military contractors and weapons manufacturers."

Despite this clear overlap between the goals of AWARE and BSFR, you refuse to support them because they are also choosing to rally around their shared blackness? That seems hella racist to me.

On Thu, May 11, 2017 at 9:20 AM, Carl G. Estabrook via Peace <peace at lists.chambana.net<mailto:peace at lists.chambana.net>> wrote:
More useful than Google (not, perhaps, the most revolutionary organization...) is the ‘Search’ function on the Peace-discuss archives, Karen.

This is from six months ago, re <https://www.bsfruiuc.com/our-demands>:

...The list certainly raises (once again) questions of the nature and provenance of identity politics (the mainstay of the Clinton campaign).
See Adolph Reed's mordant description … :

"[Identity] politics is not an alternative to class politics; it is a class politics, the politics of the left-wing of neoliberalism. It is the expression and active agency of a political order and moral economy in which capitalist market forces are treated as unassailable nature.
"An integral element of that moral economy is displacement of the critique of the invidious outcomes produced by capitalist class power onto equally naturalized categories of ascriptive identity that sort us into groups supposedly defined by what we essentially are rather than what we do. As I have argued, following Walter Michaels and others, within that moral economy a society in which 1% of the population controlled 90% of the resources could be just, provided that roughly 12% of the 1% were black, 12% were Latino, 50% were women, and whatever the appropriate proportions were LGBT people.
"It would be tough to imagine a normative ideal that expresses more unambiguously the social position of people who consider themselves candidates for inclusion in, or at least significant staff positions in service to, the ruling class” <http://bennorton.com/adolph-reed-identity-politics-is-neoliberalism/>.

It’s difficult to see how a serious critique of US war-making can arise from identity politics. (Not enough blacks and women among Special Forces killers?)
It would seem that US war-making arises from domestic and foreign class conflicts; given that we’ve killed more than 20 million in 37 nations since WWII, we should be clear about causes.
<https://www.popularresistance.org/us-has-killed-more-than-20-million-in-37-nations-since-wwii/>.

AWARE has seen as its task for 15 years to encourage awareness of how and why the US government is the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today.
And to do that we must tell the truth and shame the devil, as Hotspur says.

I’m not convinced that endorsing these demands contributes to that effort. —CGE

Six months on, and as worthwhile as some of the goals of the demands seem, that still seems right to me.

Regards, Carl

On May 11, 2017, at 9:06 AM, kmedina67 via Peace <peace at lists.chambana.net<mailto:peace at lists.chambana.net>> wrote:

Carl, Google it.

Sent from my T-Mobile 4G LTE Device

-------- Original message --------
From: "Carl G. Estabrook"

Send me their list of demands (and read Reed…)

> wrote:

Point to items on their list that are identity politics

-------- Original message --------
 e.g. Adolph Reed’s critique:

<http://bennorton.com/adolph-reed-identity-politics-is-neoliberalism/>.

AWARE was founded to foster local opposition to US war-making and racism - and, by implication, capitalism, the source of both.

We should be willing to cooperate with others who have effective ways to do that as well.

But as Reed explains, identity politics is a defense of capitalism - and therefore at best only accidentally useful in an anti-war anti-racism effort.

—CGE

Carl,

It is online. I can't copy and paste the url from my cell phone. But you can Google their demands.
-karen medina

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