Yeah but Chomsky was in the club. The reiki practitioner likely isn’t unless they’ve gained a following of extremely wealthy “donors.”
And I’m not adverse to whatever metaphysical thing people want to believe as long as others are free to disbelieve of their own accord, unlike some weird scientology type stuff or proselytizing by ambush/cornering I guess…Otherwise wear temple garments or practice TM, taiji, asatruism, merkavah, or thelema or karate. WASP religions or offering Orishas, or Judaism or Baha’i. Jesus Christ supposedly lived off women of means and street preaching, so there’s that. But more than that, WASP heavily colors (no clever pun intended) every other Christian denomination as the Torah colors Judaism and Christianity. But it should never be the justification for abusing neighbors, individuals or entire states/continents. So I can understand wanting to dispense of metaphysics completely, as well. When healthcare is inaccessible, allow the opiate.
And I’m also for bodily autonomy. So to say I have complex ambivalent feelings about it is a bit understated.
Yeah but Chomsky was in the club. The reiki practitioner likely isn’t unless they’ve gained a following of extremely wealthy “donors.”
it doesn’t matter - the patient still dies from cancer (and just to add, even if you take away the allegory I was using for capital, this isn’t hypothetical but very much real. To see someone die from metastasised cancer because they decided to go for alternative medicine very much influences how one understands how “benign” these practices are against society)
we have to get away from the elite vs the rest of us thinking. Everything Chomsky did as a whole was still awful irrespective of wealthy/state patronage just as what the reiki/chiropractor/homeopath does as part of a system - they engage in quackery, they are not benign, and they are harmful.
we also have to get away from elite vs the rest of us thinking because that is not what the science of capital teaches us. The CIA, the western military industry complex, their news media etc all exist as an outgrowth of the imperial cores’ bourgoise proleteriat + their petite-bourgoisie + bourgoisie; these things exist as a function of protecting and expanding private property against the global south proleteriat for their benefit. These industries could all be state owned (take the prison industry complex for example which the is not really all that profitable and largely state owned) but they still function as a defense for capital. The “elite” comprises of the western masses.
MLs should “tolerate” the metaphysicists as a concession because transition to communism is not instant; Plekhanov is right to a degree about stagism, Lenin supercede him because he was significantly more dialectical and less mechanistic in his materialism in practice - human beings are not passive agents to productive forces and relations of production.
The PRC understood this as it learned from the Soviet’s and pre-Deng/Mao era’s more heavy handed approach (and it should be added if it weren’t for the latter two - Soviet and Mao- more strict approach we would not have the lessons we have today. One only needs to travel to India (or the West with their anti-vaccination / illuminati / capital mythology etc nonsense) to see what a timeline without the cultural revolution entails).
it doesn’t matter - the patient still dies from cancer (and just to add, even if you take away the allegory I was using for capital, this isn’t hypothetical but very much real. To see someone die from metastasised cancer because they decided to go for alternative medicine very much influences how one understands how “benign” these practices are against society)
As long as it’s informed and well-understood, bodily autonomy should take precedence, as long as it’s not contagious. For example, Steve Jobs had the financial means to access any treatment, the intellectual capacity to understand them, I’m not sure. A family member hadn’t the financial means, Intellectual capacity but chose treatment for an aggressive form of cancer where survival rate is very low; they died. Identical twins developed lung cancer from cigarettes. One was diagnosed as their sibling who chose treatment died; the other decided to forego treatment, seeing their sibling rapidly robbed of any ability to enjoy any of their remaining time due to treatment. The sibling survived five years on and crossed several experiences off their bucket list, leaving friends and family with photos of them really enjoying hot air ballooning, hiking, camping, surfing. The last year was pretty wretched, but they had left behind a suitable insurance policy for burial and their children’s modest (not poverty level, middle middle class) upbringing, and with insurance and remaining bank account, was able to afford the best palliative care at home, including string opiates and marijuana. I just think the patient should have the right to choose, and counseling should be available to loved ones helping them to accept the patient’s wishes.
However we can have a systemic understanding rather than an idealist one of how a person comes to the their decisons and how they can act on them. We can have a scientific understanding of freedom rather than the liberal metaphysical conception.
We are dialectical matetialists; consciousness does not make the social being, it is the social being that makes the consciousness.
Yeah but Chomsky was in the club. The reiki practitioner likely isn’t unless they’ve gained a following of extremely wealthy “donors.”
And I’m not adverse to whatever metaphysical thing people want to believe as long as others are free to disbelieve of their own accord, unlike some weird scientology type stuff or proselytizing by ambush/cornering I guess…Otherwise wear temple garments or practice TM, taiji, asatruism, merkavah, or thelema or karate. WASP religions or offering Orishas, or Judaism or Baha’i. Jesus Christ supposedly lived off women of means and street preaching, so there’s that. But more than that, WASP heavily colors (no clever pun intended) every other Christian denomination as the Torah colors Judaism and Christianity. But it should never be the justification for abusing neighbors, individuals or entire states/continents. So I can understand wanting to dispense of metaphysics completely, as well. When healthcare is inaccessible, allow the opiate.
And I’m also for bodily autonomy. So to say I have complex ambivalent feelings about it is a bit understated.
it doesn’t matter - the patient still dies from cancer (and just to add, even if you take away the allegory I was using for capital, this isn’t hypothetical but very much real. To see someone die from metastasised cancer because they decided to go for alternative medicine very much influences how one understands how “benign” these practices are against society)
we have to get away from the elite vs the rest of us thinking. Everything Chomsky did as a whole was still awful irrespective of wealthy/state patronage just as what the reiki/chiropractor/homeopath does as part of a system - they engage in quackery, they are not benign, and they are harmful.
we also have to get away from elite vs the rest of us thinking because that is not what the science of capital teaches us. The CIA, the western military industry complex, their news media etc all exist as an outgrowth of the imperial cores’ bourgoise proleteriat + their petite-bourgoisie + bourgoisie; these things exist as a function of protecting and expanding private property against the global south proleteriat for their benefit. These industries could all be state owned (take the prison industry complex for example which the is not really all that profitable and largely state owned) but they still function as a defense for capital. The “elite” comprises of the western masses.
MLs should “tolerate” the metaphysicists as a concession because transition to communism is not instant; Plekhanov is right to a degree about stagism, Lenin supercede him because he was significantly more dialectical and less mechanistic in his materialism in practice - human beings are not passive agents to productive forces and relations of production.
The PRC understood this as it learned from the Soviet’s and pre-Deng/Mao era’s more heavy handed approach (and it should be added if it weren’t for the latter two - Soviet and Mao- more strict approach we would not have the lessons we have today. One only needs to travel to India (or the West with their anti-vaccination / illuminati / capital mythology etc nonsense) to see what a timeline without the cultural revolution entails).
As long as it’s informed and well-understood, bodily autonomy should take precedence, as long as it’s not contagious. For example, Steve Jobs had the financial means to access any treatment, the intellectual capacity to understand them, I’m not sure. A family member hadn’t the financial means, Intellectual capacity but chose treatment for an aggressive form of cancer where survival rate is very low; they died. Identical twins developed lung cancer from cigarettes. One was diagnosed as their sibling who chose treatment died; the other decided to forego treatment, seeing their sibling rapidly robbed of any ability to enjoy any of their remaining time due to treatment. The sibling survived five years on and crossed several experiences off their bucket list, leaving friends and family with photos of them really enjoying hot air ballooning, hiking, camping, surfing. The last year was pretty wretched, but they had left behind a suitable insurance policy for burial and their children’s modest (not poverty level, middle middle class) upbringing, and with insurance and remaining bank account, was able to afford the best palliative care at home, including string opiates and marijuana. I just think the patient should have the right to choose, and counseling should be available to loved ones helping them to accept the patient’s wishes.
As for the rest of it, I largely agree.
This is a given.
However we can have a systemic understanding rather than an idealist one of how a person comes to the their decisons and how they can act on them. We can have a scientific understanding of freedom rather than the liberal metaphysical conception.
We are dialectical matetialists; consciousness does not make the social being, it is the social being that makes the consciousness.
I’m not seeing any disagreement.
Fair enough