Split from AFed and "Privilege Theory as a new starting point..." thread

Jonestown gave it a go.

And you cite me for...

..?

I've created a monster.

edit: in response to

Abolish identity, abolish algebra!

These are exactly the kind of problems that I think result from an identification with the categories we've ended up in. I could get together with other people facing homophobia, for example, to find ways of fighting against the way it affects us. But if I assumed we all had something essential to us in common that's somehow more fundamentally "who we are" than any other aspect of our personalities, if I think that, for example, "the homosexual" is a certain "type" of person, then I might see myself as having some fundamental part of myself in common with some ruling class people. Basically I'm in agreement with the fact that identity politics can easily lead to cross-class collaboration, if that's what you're saying, I just have no idea what that has to do with fighting racism, sexism, homophobia etc. which is what I thought we were going to discuss here.

As with the example above, if I think that a homosexual is a certain type of person rather than a person who likes and/or does certain things then I'm more likely to think that one can extrapolate other qualities from knowing that about a person (and maybe conform to those qualities myself if that were a category I identified with). If you strip away essentialism, oppression, stereotypes etc then there is nothing left of identity. I don't know what this means "the creative potential of these categories and arrangements for those involved and their ability to create new and beautiful ways for humans to interact and love each other" as it's not particularly concrete but I'd be interested in trying to understand how identity is anything but a hindrance to this. I see a lot more creative potential in having ones own unique combination of qualities seen as legitimate than in being expected to conform to expectations associated with one's (chosen or assigned) category. Also what does silence have to do with it?

Agreed. That would be a terrible slogan. It would be confusing to have slogans that bear no relation to our immediate circumstances but equally I would also stay away from portraying my politics as celebrating the fact that we are working class as if some shared personality traits should be the source of our unity.

Edit: Though I think this discussion might have important implications I wanted to mention that I don't want to distract from the helpful practical suggestions that are on here.

It means that the category of the 'homosexual' where it is I guess for you is a purely repressive category, has contained within it the ability to transform peoples lives, to see themselves as 'gay', 'lesbian', 'bisexual', 'transgender' etc. to produce identities which people find very transformative, both socially and in relationship to themselves.

To reiterate, these categories are both repressive and liberatory.

Because thats what you pulled me up on

What about being straight? Is that a category which has within it the ability to transform people's lives? Is being straight liberatory? And transformative from what? I've not met many straight people who found their identity as straight to be transformative. You're assuming a default heterosexual starting point to feel that any sort of transformation is happening. Of course coming out as some flavour of queer when you've been socialised in a society which assumes you to be straight, and makes you feel weird about not being so, can be "transformative" in the sense that you've overcome internalised homophobia enough to come out at all. Overcoming your fears and your shame is liberatory. That's not insignificant in our current society and I occaisonally am quite chuffed with myself for being out for that reason. It's exciting stuff like stopping hitting your head against a brick wall is exciting stuff. But in a society where certain preferences aren't marginalised it won't be.

I pulled you up on the fact that your first few contributions to a thread about how to incorporate an understanding of racism, sexism etc into our praxis, and develop class struggle politics which are anti-racist, anti-sexist etc (following on from a class-struggle demolition of privilege theory), was to point out the divisiveness of identity politics which you backed up with examples like the Respect party. You might as well come onto a thread which someone's started about doing a march on their boss and warn them against organising in their workplace because the mainstream unions have done nothing for us and that the Labour party is a crock of shit (this was meant to be be a hilariously absurd example but it fell a bit flat, let's hope the discussion on what the word "identity" means is as exciting as the one about what a "union" is).

how do we address the problem of reactionary attitudes and behaviors manifesting themselves within the movement? effectively, and without the pitfalls of privilege theory?

I think if we all took reactionary behaviour seriously, and some people stopped dismissing things as identity politics and liberalism and all the other shit silencing stuff, then people wouldn't necessarily turn to privilege theory. Most of the time people aren't offered any alternatives, so why should we expect them to give up on something that gives them a way to look at their experiences and challenge cunts?

For instance, I would use libcom more if people would just stop dismissing some oppressions out of hand. I've noticed this has stopped things being discussed properly because some people are unable to realise how their behaviour might silence discussions or cause people to fuck off elsewhere.

Any group (membership organisation or not) is responsible for working out how they'll approach this. For instance, someone recently said that all membership organisations should have a basic set of ideas of how they will approach these behaviours. This is where I think community accountability processes are helpful - it's a way for an individual to address their own behaviour whilst the community around them thinks about their own attitudes and how people have been allowed to be sexist/racist/homophobic/transphobic/abusive/etc and use those reflections as a way of changing themselves and the culture of their community.

This is more difficult to do in some situations than others (for instance, I don't know how we'd do an accountability process for anyone on libcom) so another way to approach it is for a group of people to discuss what is unacceptable, make decisions (ie moderating libcom) based on this and actually enact their own agreements rather than taking the easy route. For instance, if you're facilitating a meeting, make clear what is unacceptable and when someone does it, explain to them why it's unacceptable rather than just telling them it is. We all bring socialised ideas with us and might not see why what we're doing is a problem.

It's not a quick solution. I think one of the useful things privilege theory has done is to empower people experiencing oppression to ask someone else to 'check their privilege', and that there is an expectation that the 'privileged' person should then reflect on how they're behaving and why that might be a problem. Obviously 'check your privilege' indicates some level of connection with privilege theory, which apparently just makes loads of posters here throw their toys out of the pram, so maybe we need to think about how else to put it.

how should we address things like patriarchy and racism as structural problems? when it comes to the class war, many suggest that the workplace is a great place to attack the enemy; is there such a strategic way to attack patriarchy or white supremacy? (note: this may vary based on country)

I think that organising at work does actually give people a chance to challenge oppressions as well as exploitation, but often the workers are already divided by oppressions and so won't necessarily trust people from the 'other' group to even talk about it. (and the 'other' group might not notice it, which doesn't make them Bad People, but demonstrates that these socialised divides go a lot deeper than a lot of people think).

'Strategic' always makes me think of big huge things, but I think challenging oppression when you see it, or supporting people raising it as an issue can easily be a strategy (although for it to be a strategy I suppose your group need to agree what actually constitutes oppression). Again, the more we do this, the more people are likely to challenge it themselves.

Even just challenging your own behaviour and trying not to act in an oppressive way (for instance, not talking over women; not making assumptions about people because of their apparent race or culture; not thinking it's HILARIOUS to dress up as a muslim/person of colour/trans*person; chairing your meetings so everyone gets a look in, not just the loudest person) is a good way to start.

You could also commit to fighting for class issues that are linked to other oppressions, like abortion rights or anti-fascism or anything else that oppressed groups are talking about...

I don't know if this is helpful. I was waiting until the thread was less distracted by the accusations of identity theory really.

Good post lzbl

I think that you have to have respect for people's experiences as a fundamental basis for this kind of discussion. Someone can have a valid issue with the ideas expressed in privilege/identity theory (I'm unsure about it myself), but even then people should be able to feel comfortable expressing their personal experiences and taking part in the discussion. If people are not comfortable contributing then you have a massive problem. You're not really having a debate at all, certainly not one that is open and free.

I do hope that something positive can come out of these threads. There is an incredibly vital debate to be had on these issues.

To give an example of this, I know of one case where a woman in an abusive relationship spoke to her (female) workmates about it, which gave her the confidence and support to leave him. The problem was he was ultra-controlling (checking her web use, reading her texts etc), so work was about the only place she could talk or use the internet freely (relatively - forcing employers to adopt supportive domestic violence policies could also be a demand of workplace organising). Now obviously not everyone in an abusive relationship works, but I'd like to see workplace organisation that's capable of supporting people in situations like this (which could range from signposting to the local women's centre to collectively confronting someone). Sexual harassment is also something that comes up in a workplace setting, and which can be organised against collectively. I know some women in SolFed are putting together a 'Stuff Your Sexist Boss' on that kind of thing.

Getting away from the workplace, I have less clear ideas...

Historically, the women's movement set up women's centres for self-education and mutual support. Some still exist, but as I understand it a lot have lost their independence and/or radical politics as they've been forced to accommodate themselves to funders. I think that 'confronting a stalker' video I posted earlier might be an option in some cases, i.e. using SolNet style tactics against particularly abusive individuals. In terms of stuff like the domestic division of labour, I'm not sure what can be done beyond propaganda at this stage, though maybe there could be something like an organiser training in this area, e.g. role-playing confrontations over unequal division of domestic chores (I need to read that new Federici anthology, which might have some ideas). Could e.g. SolFed produce a 'stuff your boss' style guide to establishing an egalitarian division of labour at home?

A lot of adult education centres have 'assertiveness training' for women, which might be useful resources to develop. It certainly seems to support women to challenge things like that (my mum proper stamped on the sexist norms my dad was reproducing after doing one) but would be good to support women after the course finishes.