Re: Tribal Traditionalism: Part 1 Female Genital Mutilation

[MARIPOWER716@xxxxxxx]

>Jomo Kenyatta, the late President of Kenya, argued
>that FGM was inherent in the initiation which is in
>itself an essential part of being Kikuyu, to such an
>extent that "abolition... will destroy the tribal
>system".  A study in Sierra Leone reported a similar
>feeling about the social and political cohesion
>promoted by the Bundo and Sande secret societies, who
>carry out initiation mutilations
>and teaching. -Amnesty International

>Those who like to get all googly-eyed about tribal
>traditionalism might want to take a deeper look at
>some issues important to women - 51% of the world's
>population.
>Below are some excerpts from
www.religioustolerance.org
-JC

>FEMALE GENITAL MUTILATION In Africa, The Middle East
>& Far East

>FGM originated in Africa. It was, and remains, a
>cultural, not a religious practice.

>The operation is forced on approximately 6,000 girls
>per day, worldwide -- about one every 15 seconds.
>Since FGM is practiced when the girls are young, they
>are unable to give their informed consent.


Here is the rub and a "rub" is friction and ideological friction is a body of
politics moving in opposition.

Presenting a question - any social issue, from a standpoint in which it
cannot be resolved, much less understood as historical legacy of class
society by the leading advancing sections of the working class, places one on
a path of development in opposition to the movement of the class. Belittling
tribal tradition ("Those who like to get all googly-eyed about tribal
traditionalism") is historically the role of the bourgeois intellectual
seeking justification for the destruction of the non-sovereign peoples caught
in the bear trap of imperial exploitation and oppression.

What constitutes "belittling" - in this specific context, has in the final
instance to be decided by the class-conscious workers and communist of the
non-sovereign peoples, who are subjected to the immediate social impact of
"the people."  The historic imperial bribery of not simply the labor
aristocracy but the imperial peoples in relationship to the non-sovereign
peoples must be grasped historically and concretely in order to hammer out a
general line of advancement of the struggle against the bourgeoisie. To more
than less (the more than less means 51% and this is a slim margin from any
perspective) correctly decipher an issue and present it in an irresolvable
manner places one in opposition to the leading section of the working class
and splits the working class movement. The presentation of a social issue in
a manner that splits the working class is a method that merges one with the
chauvinist.

Why belabor the fact that women make up the majority of the worlds
population, when none of them could have be born without male sperm - that is
without men or fathers?  Have you considered the fact that part of the reason
the majority of homo-sapien-sapien is currently women, might - perhaps, have
something to do with "the state," or rather militarism and the fact that men
kill more men than women as a way of life? And this "way of life" is
currently driven on the basis of class antagonism. Most men love women and
their daughters and those who are class conscious continually daydream about
the benefits of a close personal relationship with nature, our familiy and
humanity. That, which is "traditional" in human culture signify this
daydream. In other words are you not demanding justice - a fuller and higher
meaning of justice, to be administered by the proletariat?

Why continue to belabor the fact that in this reality "big and powerful"
countries set the "parameters" - specifically shape, for history based on the
irreconcilability of class antagonism and historically evolved culture?  The
non-sovereign peoples - a term pressing a "certain" historical limitation due
to the current reconfiguration of capital, are dependent upon the peoples and
working class in these "big" countries? The problem is not dependency but
capitalist exploitation and the lingering impact of barbarism. Women as such
cannot end this state of affairs but the proletariat most certainly can
change society.

Your "identity" is showing and every question has to be formulated as the
question of the modern working class and the quest for the dissolution of the
status of labor as a commodity. Justice for all means exactly that comrade.
What part of "all" is not understood?

>Those who like to get all googly-eyed about tribal
>traditionalism might want to take a deeper look at
>some issues important to women - 51% of the world's
>population.

This is most certainly a radical petty bourgeois formulation.  "Some issues
important to women - 51% of the world's population," is quite frankly a
non-Marxist formulation in today's world. What women are you talking about?
Why the classless assertion and formulation? One cannot support "women" as
such without merging with reaction, because society is profoundly rent with
class contradictions. To heck with the women of the bourgeoisie. What
possible social issues affecting the proletariat - who you imply is 51%
female  (51% of the world's population) is not a social issue of the working
class - proletariat, by definition?

Any number of social issues might and will bring thousands to the corridors
of the class struggle and the standpoint of Marx. Once a person arrives "in
our hallways" the teacher must imbue them with class logic. Humanities
deepest sentiment is for the love of earth and the archetype of a "time that
never existed" - the fabled return to the Eden or what the class conscious
proletariat formulates as classless society. This is the vision that
inspires. The class-conscious proletariat defines the "time that never
existed" and attempts to recreate society in its image, where justice for all
means exactly that. Justice for all is self-explanatory.

Comrade, it is time to surrender classless formulations.

"FEMALE GENITAL MUTILATION" is apparently the reason for condemning tribal
traditionalism, in part 1 of your statement. You do not speak of specific
acts of cruelty but rather  "tribal traditionalism."  Well, only the
class-conscious proletariat can bring to end specific acts of cruelty and
outlaw them in society. There will still be a more or less lengthy period of
time to raise the cultural level of the propertyless masses. Is FEMALE
GENITAL MUTILATION as cruel as lynching, which of course was part of our
culture? The point is not to measure or compare "pain and suffering" but to
place all questions in historical context and their resolution from the
standpoint of the class struggle.  What of mutilation as part of historical
evolved culture? Why the separation of a specific mutilation? Comrades,
classless formulations are inherently wrong no matter how noble and pure. The
class-conscious proletariat does not subscribe to human mutilation, which is
not a question of "tribal traditionalism" simply because it arose in history.
Everything in history "arose historically."

Posing a social issue without revolutionary resolution reduces the issue to
petty bourgeois sentimentality. FEMALE GENITAL MUTILATION is a class question
not simply because it is only the proletariat in power that can overcome our
collective heritage of barbarism. Rather, we are dealing with a class
question because the entire world has been converted into propertyless
proletarians more than less, and according to you, the world is 51% female.
What of the proletarian stance against all mutilation in human society? What
part of "all" is not understood?

There is another issue at stake, which in the last period of history was
formulated as "bourgeois cosmopolitanism," or the imposition of the culture
of the imperial peoples on the world peoples.  Blanket condemnation of
"tribal traditionalism" is nothing more than Great nation chauvinism and
splits the forward moving sections of the world proletariat. Such is the
historical evolution and bankruptcy of "female ideology" as a current.


Melvin P.


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