Thread by @Lush_MLM

Very good Edward Said lecture by @NaomiAKlein on environment, capitalist crises and human dispensibility: lrb.co.uk/v38/n11/naomi-…

the essay relates to politics as such; which is always a question of defining the boundaries of the 'human'; limits of ethics; who 'matters'

all politics is a question of determining who has the right to exercise violence; who has the right to justice; the right to subjectivity.

for Spanish conquistadors First Nations were not entitled to this ethical position b/c they were not Christian.

likewise in slave societies slaves are 'property' - politics accompanies and 'justifies' division of labour through dehumanisation.

Liberalism insists that all are human; 'universal' humanity in shared values; opposition to slavery etc. this is, of course, good.

The trouble is, as Klein and Said point out, the category of the 'human' always excludes as much as it unites; in practice still delimits.

Liberal dialectic between universality of law and universality of justice; between conservative and radical liberalism; esp re: migrants.

Marx points out liberal ethical position (re; sovereign individual) necessary for capitalism; worker must be 'free' to sell labour-power.

scientific marxism takes leave of politics by focusing instead on labour-power and the proletarian as 'subjective position'.

TL;DR: radical liberalism insists we are ALL human; scientific marxism states that none of us are; this is better. #antihumanism #marxism

This is also why, though as militants we can't dispense with political argument, or cede political debate, marxism itself is not a politics.