[PEN-L:3459] Re: Doug's question

[Bill Burgess <burgess@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

At 04:19 PM 16/02/99 +1100, angela wrote:

>racism works because
>it echoes the structural logic of this 'fear of castration'...

It seems to me there are very shaky grounds for accepting that this
"structural logic" really exists. Of course there may be something to it,
but I can't understand building a whole political approach around it, which
seems to me is what has been done.

I thought Ken Hanley asked a series of very relevant questions about the
usefullness of the similar notion of the phallus, but they have not been
addressed. I have never tried to challenge and undermine racist attitudes
of fellow white workers by explaining it is because we fear castration.
Does this really work? Like, where?

Bill Burgess