Date: Sat, 26 Oct 1996 20:16:07 -0400 (EDT)
Subject: Re: M-TH: marxian, marxist


On Sat, 26 Oct 1996, j laari wrote:

> Yeah, it must be something like you said. That McCarthy reference is
> interesting... I've started to wonder how extensively it has affected
> in USA, seems like witch hunts pop up quite often when studying post
> WW2 era. I'm beginning to realise that I haven't paid much enough
> attention to USA earlier. In seventies I knew Nixon, Watergate and
> Carter but that's all...

	I think the tendency towards disassociation with the label of
Marxist in America goes with a general tendency towards dissociation from
all labels of association here. The false idea of value-free "objectivism"
(not to be confused with Rand's philosophy, but rather associate with the
objective rather than the subjective) is spread throughout America,
especially in the media and in the educational system. The media, and
school textbooks mask social reality by making a strange sort of "claim by
nature" of their objectivism. Many teachers buy into this, at least at the
high school level, and thus its much more trendy in the United States to
call one's self an "independent" rather than a Democrat, or a Republican;
or God forsake a liberal, conservative, or especially a socialist and
definitely not a communist! Calling yourself a label, or admitting
that you have some sort of ideology, implies that you are "un-objective" and
therefore biased. I wonder if this idea has something to do with the fact
that philosophy is rarely taught in secondary school in America. 

Kevin
Cols, Oh
			




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