Re: Replying to Yoshie and a word for Carroll was Re: On Academeand the list was Re: NACLA and Colombia

[Yoshie Furuhashi <furuhashi.1@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

Gary:

>I merely point out that this is *not* an academic list.

The division between manual & mental labor is _not_ an academic
point, though.  It's a political & practical problem under
capitalism.  And it's a political & practical problem under socialism
as well.  Actually existing socialism -- be it planned or market --
has never been able to do away with the division between manual &
mental labor.  Hence the Prague Spring.  The collapse of the USSR.
"Democratic oppositions" in Serbia.  And so on.  And so forth.  So
this is a question that should interest all here.  Moreover, I
continue to argue that we must understand this division as one
primarily _within_ the working class, following Karl Marx & Harry
Braverman, instead of tailing Max Weber & Emil Durkheim in a
workerist fashion.

Of course, I could have easily made exactly the same point without
mentioning a non-Marxist leftist's remark on LBO-talk, but I wished
to call attention to the fact that workerism & a misconception of
"intellectuals as a separate class from labor & capital" are widely
shared, both among Marxists & non-Marxists, academics & non-academics.

BTW, I consider workerism to be a pastime of paid intellectuals.
Manual laborers tend not to go for it.

Yoshie