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<!--StartFragment--><p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none; text-autospace:none"><font class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial">Ryan, Danny, Luis, et. al.:</font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none; text-autospace:none"><font class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial"><br class="webkit-block-placeholder"></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none; text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family:Arial;color:black">I would sum the problems of both Ryan and Danny by linking them to one of the difficult stances in critical theory (the deconstructivist pov of Spivak and Gilroy in particular)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>and other identity politics discourses: the danger on the one hand of identitarianism, which in effect,<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>is synonymous with libertarian individualism – the false ideology of every person for themselves as long as no harm is done to others – the legacy of the Enlightenment. Everything is OK as long as all are equal according to the rules of the system – which in effect shields the far more important problem – that the system is a system of injustice, oppression, environmental suicide, etc, etc. [There has been a massive “scale shift” in the politics of crisis production. Hello?!] Identitarianism is the sacred “ethical” heart of capitalist liberalism Much identity politics of this sort leads to a stalemate “ethics” akin to “don’t ask, don’t tell.” It is an ethics of<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>“ difference tolerance,” which is a far cry from an ethics of engagement, even if it’s agonistic, which on the whole it can only be. The entire politics of the “other” on the other hand, is based on a socialist ethics that is in fact, communitarian of one type or another, and in place of “identity” substitutes the complete antithesis of “identity,” – its impossibility. It finds fault with the 70’s rallying slogan: the personal is political, because of its inevitable [political] slide into identitarianism. This is not arcane philosophizing, but constitutes the very secular political heart that aims to build a socialist democracy “against” liberal democracy and the dark side of capitalism it shelters at all costs.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Paul Gilroy in Against Race, 2000, posed a challenge to Spivak’s strategic essentialism and suggested instead, strategic universalism. He takes this line because he among many others see that the identity politics of “multiculturalism” has crashed and burned, leading only to continued atomization of the political by ceding identity to separatist forces and further marginalization. [A political, real world analog at the level of the state can be seen in the debate of 2-state and 1-state solutions to the Palestine-Israel horrific situation.] <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none; text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family:Arial;color:black"> <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none; text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family:Arial;color:black">My response to Luis is based in that context. And I think it is long overdue to bring such criticism “home,” to this “social formation” of online collective, though non-collaborative, discourse that takes as its primary agenda, the potential of technology for radical social change. When does the “warm and fuzzy” iDC “inside” join up with the “cold and geno-eco-cidal” outside?<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none; text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family:Arial;color:black"> <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none; text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family:Arial;color:black">I bracketed the term “bourgeois” precisely because of is its flatulence, if you will. Yet, it still holds a discourse aura of it owns that continues to be provocative, and to that degree, a cue to complicity – which is where the ethical and the political cleave. IDC is a thoroughly “bourgeois” “in here” and “out there.” Where are the discussions of race here? [As Paul Miller occasionally has lamented.] What is the racial makeup of the participants of this list? A great deal of excellent dialog takes place here. But, the rhetoric of “new media,” which is so often “social,” doesn’t in the end, take seriously, here, the implications of its own conclusions. Social media leads to radical social change. Yet, does it? I took Luis’s post as a challenge to exactly this internal contradiction.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none; text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family:Arial;color:black"> <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none; text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family:Arial;color:black">I am in no way calling for some kind of detestable “ideological purity.” I’m suggesting that an “ideological” purity does exist in latent fashion on this list unless there is, as Luis has brought forward, self-critique imbedded in the discussion here, in a theoretical way relative to the “entity” that iDC in fact, IS. Where is the discussion of the metadata of ethics and politics of iDC?<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none; text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family:Arial;color:black"> <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none; text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family:Arial;color:black">Jeffrey put it succinctly: “But why just substitute politics for ethics? rather than seeing politics as ethics...Which I think you are suggesting.”<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none; text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family:Arial;color:black"> <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none; text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family:Arial;color:black">Which is precisely why I’m “trashing” Amy Goodman…. – don’t get me wrong – I agree that she is an amazing journalist. But she shuttles “progressives” back into the Democratic machine when she advocated for the “safe state” voting strategy, as she did in 2000 and 2004. [US politics for those not of the US]<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none; text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family:Arial;color:black"> <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none; text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family:Arial;color:black">In this same way, I am, as Danny has put it, saying that this group is in fact, “not good or political enough.” I do believe that. And I point that finger at myself as well. [Though, I have suggested here in the past ways to turn the collective intelligence here into a “problem solving” resource. If open source can solve technical problems, why can’t “we,” solve social ones?] But that is certainly not news, is it? Danny goes on to say of ethics:<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none; text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family:Arial;color:black"> <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;tab-stops:28.0pt 56.0pt 84.0pt 112.0pt 140.0pt 168.0pt 196.0pt 224.0pt 3.5in 280.0pt 308.0pt 336.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family:Arial; color:black">“[Ethics] is precisely concerned with reality - the reality between us - and<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;tab-stops:28.0pt 56.0pt 84.0pt 112.0pt 140.0pt 168.0pt 196.0pt 224.0pt 3.5in 280.0pt 308.0pt 336.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family:Arial; color:black">not with the idea of politicised social change which occurs at some<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none; text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family:Arial;color:black">point in the future if we all sign up to the programme.”<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none; text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family:Arial;color:black"> <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none; text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family:Arial;color:black">This is exactly what is not good or political enough. What is more crucially necessary than ever, is, a program of collective action for SOME future. If a social imaginary that looks to a viable future is denied, as Danny denies it, in favor of a false sense of some kind of individualist “reality between us,” but which is based on the false consciousness of identity politics formed in a non-corporeal virtual discourse zone, then there will be no future. Period. And this is the deep problem of the complicity between identity politics and liberalism that is the predominant ideology of iDC contributors, in my assessment, after following the discussions here for quite a while now.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none; text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family:Arial;color:black"> <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none; text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family:Arial;color:black">As Jeffrey implies, but doesn’t state explicitly, the identity of politics and ethics is another way to raise Reich’s formulation of the problem reformulated by Deleuze and Guatarri: why do people desire their own oppression? The “proper” name of this desire is “liberalism” and “identitarianism.”<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none; text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family:Arial;color:black"> <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none; text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family:Arial;color:black">Why do “progressive” US voters continue hopelessly to vote for “lesser evil” candidates instead of electing Ralph Nader or Cynthia McKinney, who have enormous experience and hold, and have worked relentlessly for, and even succeeded in creating, the values that they say they believe in? <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none; text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family:Arial;color:black"> <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none; text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family:Arial;color:black">[The main argument is: because it will be so much worse than….. this a completely spurious argument when the actual details are examined.]<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none; text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family:Arial;color:black"> <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none; text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family:Arial;color:black">so, many thanks to Luis. I’ll respond to your message next.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none; text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family:Arial;color:black"> <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none; text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family:Arial;color:black">mark</span></p> <div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial;color:black"> <o:p></o:p></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial;color:black"> </span></div> <!--EndFragment--> <div><div>On Dec 18, 2007, at 3:03 PM, Danny Butt wrote:</div><br class="Apple-interchange-newline"><blockquote type="cite"><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">What I find most problematic about Mark's post is the suggestion that, <span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">on the one hand, iDC has a techno-apologist quality, promotes <span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">"academic profiteering", and has many members who "risk hypocrisy".... <span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">I don't necessarily disagree with the diagnosis of my own behaviour, <span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">but.... while the post intimates that, on the other hand iDC should, <span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">somehow, be activated in the service of "the political", through <span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">collective action. Yet Mark has essentially told the group it is not <span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">good enough, or political enough.</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><br></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">So what happens, does a light bulb suddenly come on and we all wake up <span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">and go "gee, I've been risking hypocrisy all this time and I've never <span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">realised it! Thanks Mark!" and begin the global political <span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">interventions that have been sitting there waiting for us to <span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">collectively work on, while we've been distracted by bourgeois ideology?</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><br></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">Or would we say that the task of activating the political is a bit <span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">more complicated, because at each moment it is the ethical <span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">relationship with one's collaborators which can either increase or <span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">decrease the feeling of collectivity, and thus the action performed? <span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">In that sense, there is nothing "pure" about the ethical tradition <span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">(especially when reading it through the feminist ethical tradition). <span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">It is precisely concerned with reality - the reality between us - and <span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">not with the idea of politicised social change which occurs at some <span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">point in the future if we all sign up to the programme.</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><br></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">Enough people on this list have been involved with enough activist <span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">politics to know the futility of vanguardism. The suspension of the <span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">ethical in the name of the political is precisely this: ignore how I <span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">am relating to you right now because in the future it will be <span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">different if we change what is "out there." But we are all already (in <span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">our own ways, as Ryan suggests, and possibly quite incompatibly) <span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">involved in our own "out theres". So let's not forget what happens in <span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">here.</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><br></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">Cheers,</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><br></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">Danny</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><br></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">--</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><a href="http://www.dannybutt.net">http://www.dannybutt.net</a></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><br></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">On 19/12/2007, at 7:13 AM, Ryan Griffis wrote:</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><br></div> <blockquote type="cite"><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">On Dec 18, 2007, at 6:00 AM, <a href="mailto:idc-request@mailman.thing.net">idc-request@mailman.thing.net</a> wrote:</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><br></div> <blockquote type="cite"><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>"Is our primary mission as artists [people] to produce commerce</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">fitting monuments to ourselves, or is it to use art to help bring</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">ethics into the picture?" --</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><br></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">would have to substitute "ethics" with, "politics."</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><br></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">Politics requires something much more demanding that mere "good</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">values." It means strategic and tactical "actions" that might not</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">conform to the purities of "ethics."</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><br></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">Thus, Q.E.D., ethics can aid and abet conservative politics. MoveOn,</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">Amy Goodman, Michael Moore, etc. all continue to support "lesser of</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">evil" voting, which only maintains the status quo. They steal</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">"progressive" "values" and mainstream them in support of the</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">Democratic party..... A hopelessly naive form of reactionary</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">politics, and a form of passivity that maintains the status quo.</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><br></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">This is counter-intuitive for those who are wrapped up in</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">"bourgeoise" ideology, which has been the target of most of the</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">theorists that many on this list ascribe to: Foucault, Delueze, etc.</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">etc. Which is to say, many on this list risk hypocrisy.</div> </blockquote><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><br></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">i'm totally on board with Mark's response to Luis' provocation...</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">replacing "ethics" with "politics" is no mere semantic feat indeed</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">(ethics is an entirely conservative discourse in my estimation).</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">However, at the risk of sounding an apologist myself... i'm weary of</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">the drive to eliminate the "hypocrisy" of being "wrapped up in the</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">'bourgeoisie' ideology". Those contradictions run so deep and are so</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">complicated that to call for some kind of ideological purity for</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">those existing in a ecology that is so contaminated is little more</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">than ideological grand standing. Don't get me wrong - i think</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">pointing to contradictions is useful and a necessary tool in critical</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">change. There are so many tactics and efforts needed, some of which</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">are going to be carried out under less than ideal circumstances and</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">with less than "pure" intentions.</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">Again, i don't mean to suggest that we shouldn't be critical of this,</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">but that trying to eliminate "bourgeois" motivations as such might be</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">a mistake in that it creates an atmosphere of false purity and</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">asceticism, which can be less than productive for action across</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">constituencies, which i think many would agree is necessary. A real</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">critique of compromise and democracy (ala R. Deutsche's</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">"agoraphobia") might be necessary.</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">Personally, i don't look to lists for direct action or even really</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">engaged political discussion, although the thoughts and ideas that</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">come through them make their way into my contributions in arenas</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">where i think those more direct discussions occur (generally in more</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">localized, face-to-face forums).</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">i certainly don't have any answers, just some doubtful questions. i</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">also don't think action begins with answers, so there you go.</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">Just some quick thoughts in response.</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">best,</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">ryan</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">_______________________________________________</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">iDC -- mailing list of the Institute for Distributed Creativity <span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">(distributedcreativity.org)</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; 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margin-left: 0px; ">Share relevant URLs on Del.icio.us by adding the tag iDCref</div> </blockquote><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><br></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><br></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><br></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">--</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><a href="http://www.dannybutt.net">http://www.dannybutt.net</a></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><br></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><br></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; 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