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NEWS & LETTERS, August-September 2001 SCIENCE AND LIFE Orwell's book 1984 was not far off. The technology he described was almost prophetic. In August, the first chip using biological material bound to silicon is coming out. Later this year, two more companies are going to be producing such chips. The technology is currently available to satellite-track any human on earth, and it is being marketed in cute little bracelets. There is discussion going on as to whether or not to implant similar chips into prisoners. Bio- and nano-technology is not far from being commonplace, and the prison-industrial complex will be the proving ground. Prisoner, but no guinea pig The Ecuadoran government, despite its public denial that it is a participant in the notorious Plan Colombia, has shown otherwise through its actions, principally by its concession to the U.S. military of its airbase in Manta in the Province of Manabi. Now, just days before the Minister of the Environment issued categorical denials of the harmful effects on Ecuadorans who live near the Colombian border from the spraying of coca crops, a leaked government report has demonstrated to the contrary. According to the report, over 90% of residents of the border province of Sucumbios are suffering from "rare health afflictions." These include generalized dermatitis resistant to treatment, eye irritation, upper respiratory disease, muscular pains and general malaise. Just as there are no "smart bombs," there are no "smart chemicals" as we learned in Vietnam from Agent Orange. There are just dumb pseudo-scientists who, in the service of their imperious and militarist rulers, wreak irreparable harm on innocent victims. Supporter IN MEMORIAM FOR TSITSI TIRIPANO Poliyana Mangwiro-also known as Tsitsi Tiripano-died May 12. Tsitsi was a leader of GALZ (Gays and Lesbians of Zimbabwe). She was known to many in Zimbabwe for her fearless activism, and in the U.S. from a tour last spring sponsored by Amnesty International. GALZ is a fearless opponent of President Robert Mugabe's hate-filled actions against Zimbabwe's gays and lesbians. Despite severe police repression and a president who compared gays and lesbians to dogs, GALZ has confronted Mugabe at every opportunity, no matter where he has gone, including England. As Zimbabwe slips further into state-sponsored chaos while Mugabe's thugs have free reign, GALZ is more important than ever. Tsitsi will be terribly missed. Terry Moon THE FAKE ENERGY CRISIS The lead article on the fake energy crisis in the July issue delineates various forms of activism which stop at calling for public control of power production. The energy crisis has brought out self-appointed public activists preaching about getting rid of the fat cat capitalists. Governor Davis talks big, but doesn't want to do anything to alienate capital markets. Those that advocate public control of power must not have noticed that nothing stopped the public utilities from gouging on the spot market. The real crisis is in the ideology of capitalism, not between the "responsible" capitalists and the greedy ones. Health care worker Our age of absolutes is reflected in how the power of one idea-the commodity-is driving us to extinction. There are many manifestations of the infinite degradation capital foists on humanity. The so-called energy crisis in the U.S. shows how capital's restructuring for a new round of accumulation comes on the backs of the poor. The extremes of this anti-humanism are found in the politics of oil in places like Sudan and Colombia. Ron Brokmeyer WHAT IS GLOBALIZATION ALL ABOUT? What is globalization all about? They call Memphis the distribution capital of the world and then say that people in Memphis aren't trained to do technical labor so they can send the backbreaking jobs here and get it done for little above minimum wage with no benefits. It means we have families working two and three jobs for $7 or $8 an hour with no benefits. That's what globalization means for Black people here. Black activist When Mexican Industries closed its four plants here in May, Southwest Detroit, which is home to many Mexican and Central Americans, felt the blow psychologically as well as economically. The company, founded by former Detroit Tigers player Hank Aguirre, had provided hundreds of jobs to the community for two decades. In the last few years the UAW had won a campaign there and at least a portion of the workers belong to Local 600, once the largest UAW local in the country. We will send follow-up reports for coming issues. Subscriber While all the heads of state were expressing shock and dismay at the killing of a young protester in Genoa, they were simultaneously planning further militarization of their own cities during future meetings of world leaders and financial institutions. In the U.S., major cities are already "locked down" in anticipation of Black and Latino revolts. We saw the police come in swinging clubs at Latinos in the Bronx who were having their annual street party following the Puerto Rican Day parade. Revolutionary lawyer What the Italian police have done in Genoa on behalf of the G-8 and international capitalism is disgusting, despicable, and depraved. It must never be repeated. The fascist tactics of the police and "special" forces -including beatings, shootings, torture, trapping marchers, silencing free speech, making pacifists and others shout "viva il duce" and more-are terroristic. We can't let our silence be complicity. Resister When I think of globalization, I think about Vieques. We have over 1,000 military bases in the U.S. with people suffering the same consequences to their health as do the people in Vieques. But if we can win a victory there and draw attention to the militarism that damaged their health, maybe people can see through the smokescreen. Environmental justice activist Most of us know that cops will go to any length to discredit our movements. That's why it's easy to throw a few agents into a fringe of people who think the most radical thing to do at a demonstration is to smash windows. Isn't the radical part of the movement the fact that there are workers, environmentalists, feminists, and youth all marching together saying NO to capitalism and YES to a non-exploitative society? It isn't so simple as violence or non-violence. There's an inherent violence in capitalism and it doesn't need window-smashing to bring it out. What is needed is mass power, not the imagined power of a few elitist types who think they know best how to run a demonstration. Trying to figure it out STILL FIGHTING FOR JUSTICE I told you last month about the poem I wrote after I attended the Chicago Police Board public meeting in June. I attended the public meeting again on July 19 to continue giving support to the 11-year old African-American girl who was brutally beaten by three white male Chicago Police officers. When an adult is mistreated by some form of law enforcement entity, there is a legal remedy. I want to know whether there is any kind of remedy for a child abused by authorities. I've written a second poem for the little girl and I call it "When is Justice Coming?" Eleven year old girl attacked by three racist cops. When is justice coming? Her family has been asking for justice for months. When is justice coming? Police Board and the OPS haven't done a damn thing. When is justice coming? If you ask me I would answer: In a time called never. For, you see, she will never be white, which seems to mean she does not deserve any rights, let alone justice according to Police Board and OPS, it seems to me. George Wilfrid Smith Jr. ALABAMA'S DOUBLE STANDARD Your readers may want to know about a recent civil rights protest in Birmingham, Alabama. Outraged by a judge's ruling that ex-Ku Klux Klansman Bobby Frank Cherry is mentally unfit to stand trial in the 1963 church bombing that killed four Black girls, protesters pointed out that Alabama has executed six mentally retarded Black men since 1989. The racial double standard in the criminal injustice system is as gaping and obvious as ever. Observer AIDS AND CAPITALISM Maya Jhansi's column on AIDS as revealing capitalism's sickness is well
taken. I appreciate her anger that the pandemic is not seen as "dirty capitalist politics." But I don't think the fact that UN-AIDS singled out
men as their focus for World AIDS Day, when women are suffering more, can be characterized as "disregard" for women's self-determination, as Jhansi
says. Rather, this policy, which will mean many more women will die, is UN-AIDS' way of appeasing the anti-women Holy See as well as member states
like Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Iran, etc., who are hostile to any language or action that may even suggest that women have more control over their bodies
and lives. It is hostility to women's self-determination, in any form, that Women's Liberationist HEALTH CARE IN 2001 Htun Lin's article on HMO leeches in the July N&L showed how Marx's value theory is experienced on the shop floor. But in health care, value theory is felt not just by the health care workers, but by the patients as well. HMOs are pushing self care and home care. The medical system forces you to think about yourself as a machine that functions like a machine. Doctors are not taught to view you as a person, just a physical description of symptoms. What then, is a human being? Marxist Stem cell research is touted as helping to cure all kinds of diseases. It is an outgrowth of the fertility research being done for infertile couples. I am not convinced that the benefits of the new technology advances will trickle down. After all, fertility research did not make children a priority for the whole society. So many children still need adoption. Concerned nurse THE INDONESIAN SCENE Concerning your story in "Our Life and Times" on the unrest in Indonesia (July N&L), the "correct" name of Irian Jaya is West Papua. Megawati has said plenty about the movements there and in Aceh and made it clear she is opposed and will crack down. Even The New York Times says she will "unleash the military" against them-not that it has ever been leashed. When I spoke with an activist from there, he said Megawati's taking over will mean the restoration to the military of the little power it had lost. It means a counter-revolution without there having been a revolution, Again we see the failure of reform that does not uproot the existing order. I asked him about the students that brought about "reformasi" three years ago, and he said they are so disillusioned with Wahid that they are doing nothing. Concerned BOSNIA AND THE ARREST OF MILOSEVIC After hearing the response of many leftists to the arraignment before The Hague Tribunal of Serbia's former ruler, Slobodan Milosevic, I find your pamphlet Bosnia-Herzegovina: Achilles Heel of Western 'Civilization' more important than ever. Both Stalinist-style apologists for Milosevic and "independent" left critics like Edward Herman are condemning the arrest of Milosevic as an example of "great power hypocrisy." Supposedly, since The Hague tribunal is a "bourgeois" court, leftists should oppose its effort to convict Milosevic for his genocidal actions. I would like to ask these gentlemen why they didn't object to the "bourgeois" Spanish court which had sought the arrest and arraignment of Pinochet for his crimes against humanity. Or is simple logical consistency too much to ask for? Balkans activist IS HEGEL'S ABSOLUTE HEURISTIC? I liked the essay article in the July N&L on Hegel's dialectic very much. Tom Jeannot was clear about how the three thinkers, Dunayevskaya, Marx and Hegel differed and shared ideas. He also made clear how Marxist-Humanism differs from every other tendency. However, I have a problem with his use of the word "heuristic" to describe Dunayevskaya's relation to Hegel's Absolute Idea. The definition of heuristic I get from the dictionary says it refers to a device for problem solving. I don't think Dunayevskaya's reading of Absolute Idea as a process was simply heuristic in the sense of making things come out OK. David REVOLT IN ENGLAND A drunken attack by racist whites could be partly blamed for the reaction of Asian youth in Oldham. However, much more important in my view is the "rioting" that took place in Leeds, supported by Black, white and Asian youth against the police. This kind of united action cut away at the base of potential fascist organization by issuing a challenge to the state across racial barriers. Patrick A GOOD IDEA! Some may be wondering what to do with their tax "rebate" but I have no trouble deciding. The minute I get mine, I'm sending it off to News & Letters. That's where it will do the most good in helping to transform this system. Retiree |
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