[Marxism] Edward Said on our Loss of Precision

[Labal Piny <x03002f@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

The article "Loss of Precision," by Said appeared in Al-Ahram Weekly,
March 20 1997, and is republished in "The End of the Peace Process"
Random House, 2000.

<<The phrase "our country" or the pronoun "we" has acquired an
unassailable positive force, so that even the word "America" in common
discourse is an ideological term, not just a simple national designation,
and is used as such on television. Most individal vocablularies today
therefore tend to be assaulted constantly by pre-packaged terms like "we
are going forward," "the great opportunities that God has given us," and
so forth, most of them safeguarding unrestrained capitalism even though
the majority's interest are being harmed.>>

It also bears noting that Edward Said in the last chapter of "Culture and
Imperialism" made repeated allusions to the point he addressed directly in
the above quote. He was of course was neither "thick-headed" nor "mixed
up" about "points of rhetoric and the dynamics of socialism". He simply
knew better than most that language is not independent of the ideological
and political ends it serves, a point which got the correspondent below so
riled up.

And, for a number of reasons, I nowhere in my correspondence mentioned the
"most reactionary sectors of the white working-class," as claimed below.
For one, I know of no reliable way to distinguish between the "most
reactionary sectors of the white working-class," to whom my correspondent
refers, and the "less reactionary sectors of the white working-class".
Second, even assuming that the two are readily distinguishable, I would
hesitate to argue either is more reactionary or dangerous than the "least
reactionary members of the ruling class" -- whom we might identify as, for
instance, the upper strata of the readership of The Nation magazine, the
Katrina vanden Heuvel cult and the friendly face of imperialism presented
by house negroes like Powell and Anan. Thirdly, insecure and foul mouthed
as she may be, it did not occur to me that the correspondent below might
yet fall into any of the aforementioned categories. This being the case, I
had no reason to hint that she does.

On Mon, 19 Apr 2004, wrote:

> Listen carefully you fucking fool,
>
> There is no "comradeliness" is hinting that I share the same love for
> the state machine as the most reactionary sectors of the white
> working-class. So let's not play games.
>
> You can't change realities by constructing dogmas or lecturing me about
> class. Go fucking lecture the Indians or Inca about class - see how far
> that shit got them.
>
> You think you are a genius because you made the most obvious and banal
> observation that blacks in the US are more aware and therefore skeptical
> of government claims to be liberating people. Well, no shit, Sherlock -
> do you want someone to hand you out a medal?
>
> "We" Americans have to stop imperialism. Are you so thick-headed that
> you mix up the points of rhetoric with the dynamics of socialism?
>
> Apparently so.
>




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