Andrew Wayne Austin <aaustin@utkux.utcc.utk.edu> writes:
>
> I joined this list (and IPE) for academic
> discussion only to find myself constantly attacked by a rightwing
> anticommunist, and then blamed for the tactics of my attacker.
>From Andy's busy cutting and pasting I assume this latest bit of
name-calling is directed at me.
Correction: I am left wing and anti-Communist; i.e.I oppose the Commuist
parties and International(s) politically and think the intellectual
pretensions of Marxism silly. "Marxist analysis" is bunk -- or else
refreshingly free of Marxism. As far as communisms are concerned, I am
neutral and unjudgemental about those I have seen in action. Since a
Communist communism has never been seen, it is of course a different case.
Anti-anti-Commuists have said, I think with justice, that social democratic
anti-Communists are the worst kind. The explanation for this, I think, is
that we have often worked along side Communists on issues of social
justice, labour organization, anti-imperialism, and so forth, and this has
given us the opportunity to know them well.
The "constantly attacking" thing is a bit of a puzzle. I have asked Andy
in private mail to give me an example of my having attacked him, and after
studying everything I have written he came up with the fact that I once
addressed him as "silly bunny." Confronted with this dire evidence I
promptly both apologised and recanted.
With this exception, the public name calling and the private sending of
filthy and violent letters has all been one way: from Austin and in several
directions, not to him.
-dlj.