u/parwa - originally from r/GenZhou
I know this is more of a Dengist sub than a Maoist one, but I was hoping I could find some insight here as it’s a book I’ve seen praised across many leftist tendencies. I read through some sections of it recently (mostly skipped over the historical stuff because I knew about most of it already) and while I went in with an open mind I’m really torn on it. I’m mostly just unsure of what the conclusion is. If revolution must be led by the colonized, where does that leave everyone else that wants a revolution? Are descendants of settlers supposed to just sit back and wait? Besides, just in terms of pure numbers isn’t that nearly impossible? From my understanding you need mass support to pull off a successful revolution, not just a fraction of the population. I don’t want to just write it off as an op as I’ve seen many others do, because it has some good points, yet I can’t help but think it might be. It seems like both a great way to get people of color to distrust white leftists and refuse to organize with them, and to get white leftists to refrain from organizing in fear of speaking over the colonized. I also feel like it kinda fails to take manufactured consent into account. What are your thoughts on it?

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      5 years ago

      u/parentis_shotgun - originally from r/GenZhou

      not suggest that there are moral forces at work which drive human behaviour, a claim which is actually central to the text.

      At no point does sakai use a human nature argument, this is the same shit pulled on people like malcolm x for saying white devils.

      It’s quasi-materialist and reflective of the continued purchase that Trotskyism has on the academy.

      Sakai : there are super exploited internal colonies in the US. Here’s a history of the settler colonial conquest of the US by european capitalists and their settler garrison recruits.

      White leftists: That’s quasi materialist!!!

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          5 years ago

          u/ScienceSleep99 - originally from r/GenZhou
          Can you give an example? I mean his analysis is pretty strong and bears resemblance to Zak Cope’s Divided World, Divided Class. Expecting white workers in a settler colonial society like the United States to take up the cause of the global south and the internal colonies is like asking Israelis to link arms with Palestinians to dissolve the state of Israel.

          The book is vital to waking Americans up to the notion that it isn’t just a mere matter of propaganda rained from above, but that there are real material forces at work here that prevent total worker solidarity. What I find more undialectical is how the left in the West keeps coming up with way to excuse white workers with the idea that they’re just misinformed.

          Then the white western leftist berates workers of color who want to take a step back and reassess what we are doing and come up with better strategies. They tell us that we need to go into fascist strongholds as though we are Christian missionary martyrs to spread the good word.

          The criticisms against Settlers are always shallow.

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            5 years ago

            u/parentis_shotgun - originally from r/GenZhou
            Thanks comrade, you hit the nail on the head. I also agree that divided world divided class (I recorded the audiobook for that one too!) is a better theory book for labor aristocracy theory overall ( and of course cope cites settlers plenty ), but settlers is excellent US history.

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          5 years ago

          u/parentis_shotgun - originally from r/GenZhou

          but he also doesn’t draw on Marx, Engels, Lenin, Stalin, Guevara et al. and the heavy engagement with the questions of Imperialism and colonialism in their foundational texts.

          Absolutely false. Yet another person who hasn’t read the book.

          veer off the rails into academic “leftist” eclecticism.

          Settlers is pretty much the antithesis of academic leftism. Its one of the first books to turn a mirror on the empire’s loyal citizens, and look at their history through a materialist lens.

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              5 years ago

              u/parentis_shotgun - originally from r/GenZhou

              quasimaterialist because of the conclusions that it draws. The undialectical aspect of his central thesis…

              What conclusion does it draw, and why is it “quasi-materialist”? What is undialectical about it?

              because he’s either ignorant of these texts or choosing to ignore them

              Source?

              I’m saying that at no point does he make a human nature argument, but he also doesn’t draw on Marx, Engels, Lenin, Stalin, Guevara et al. and the heavy engagement with the questions of Imperialism and colonialism in their foundational texts.

              Do you have anything to back up that statement? Its clear you haven’t read the book.