Peasant revolts and ideological backwardness (was Re: An earlier "crime against humanity" by the oppressed)

["Gorojovsky" <Gorojovsky@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

En relación a An earlier "crime against humanity" by the oppres, 
el 6 Oct 01, a las 1:03, Lou Paulsen dijo:
[...]
> 
> Marx was the earliest commentator to recognize the 'national' character of
> the 1857 Revolt. 
[...]
> 
> Summary: apparently, for Marx, the religious, monarchic, traditionalist,
> etc. ideologies of the rebellion, and the killings of civilians, were
> secondary.  The primary aspect was the national rebellion.

War was the locomotive of history in Marx's own brain, in fact. It was only 
_after_ the 1857 rebellion that he began to modify his views on India and the 
effect of foreign capital in the colonial fringe of Europe.

In fact, neither Marx nor Engels were unaware of the important role played by 
peasantry (even "backward" peasantry) in the struggle for revolution. Although 
during their first, young years, they understandably focused on the new 
revolutionary class, the one which would bring the reign of necessity down to 
ashes, they never quite forgot all what they knew from the past of the agrarian 
revolts in Central Europe. In fact, Engels devoted a volume to the peasant wars 
in Germany where he unravelled the social and political meaning of the "absurd" 
-from the point of view of "rational" critics- ideas of the extremist Reform 
leaders in Germany.

Reading this pamphlet is, in my opinion, a good exercise to attempt a serious 
inroad into the apparently "mystical" world of "Islamic fundamentalism" or even 
"Third World church".

Those who believe that the universe of "rural backwardness" has passed away 
would do very well to remind the wise words of Sir James Frazer in _The Golden 
Bough_, which I can't quote exactly now but may be summed up as: "The universe 
of beliefs presiding over all this apparent nonsense is far from dead, it is 
still full alive beneath the soles of our shoes, so to say".

Or, in a more poetical way, as the ironic Argentinean philosopher Macedonio 
Fernández put it: "No toda es vigilia la de los ojos abiertos".

Néstor Miguel Gorojovsky
gorojovsky@xxxxxxxxxxxx
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