Hamjatta,

You just cannot asked me to proof my case and at the end of your piece
conclude that we should move ahead with other things,you must allow me to
get you mysource.
It is very interesting,indeed interesting,but first I must apologies for
giving you lot of pains in your struggle to understand what I was
saying,this is my level and there is very little I can do with it.I will
give you reference to my quotations but first we must start from the
beginning.Between Marx and Lassalle there was much more to their
intellectual discourse than the issue of race.This issue of race is
something that you and your likes and trying to make us believe that this
was why Marx was confronting this man ,when there were fundamental teorical
issues that these two gentle men were involved with,whether this was an
organisational issue,the Civil War in America(which you are still insisting
on that Marx at some point of his life was against the freedom of the
slaves)etc,reducing these fundamental issue to the question of racism is out
right opportunism.To have any historical benefit from the confrontation
between these two gentle men,we need to dig into the relevance and not on
tempered utterance,you excuse yourself for being ignorance by using the word
Jew with a negative meaning but Marx was a racist for using the same
word,this I will not call twisted logic,but opportunistic.Take the
organisational issue,the very fact that it is highly debated that the
vanguard Party to lead is Lassalian and not neither that of Marx nor of
Lenin,which both of them critic,but Lenin himself  in practice ended up
being a Lassallian on this question,today our generation can proof that the
organisational form of the Party to lead has been a disaster, it is not that
which can contain and developed the victory of the people,etc,etc.I would
have enjoy more discussing on such issues in relation to Marx and or
Ferdinand Lassalle than your "racism" of Marx.Do you know why,because this
is a fundamental question that which I have said in my last posting,is a
precondition to the advancement of our society and People.Listen here;

                   His attitude(Marx here referring to Lasaale) is that of a
future workers`dictator.He resolves the question between labor and capital
as easily as play.The workers are to agitate for universal suffrage and then
send people like himself armed with the shining sword of science into
Parliament.They will establish workers`factories,for which the state will
put up capital,and by and by these institutions will embrace the whole
country......."  A of Letter April 9,1863

Hamjatta,are this not the type of discussions that are more important to our
generation,in the battle of ideas that we are involved with in resolving the
crisis that our nation is under going,have people not raised issues,time and
time and time again in this forum as to what after APRC," a Yayaless
Gambia".How do we resolve the contradictions between capital and
labour,between the State and democracy ?
But let us continue on your level.First you have been quoting this same
letter from Marx to Engel's,time and time again,but your letter was writing
in 1862.I quotated a letter written my Marx on 11 January 1860,in which Marx
wrote to Engel's telling him what in his opinion ,are the most important
things happening in the world,and here I quote it again:
            "In my opinion,the biggest things that are happening in the
world today are on the one hand the movement of the slaves in America
started by the death of John Brown,on the other,the movement of the serfs in
Russia......"

If according to your own explanation,that Marx was against the liberation of
the slaves for biological reasons,which to be frank is the biggest nonsense
I have ever heard,I dismiss this by quoting Marx in saying:

          "Whiles the workingmen ,the true political powers of the
North,allowed slavery to defile their own republic;while before the
Negro,mastered and sold without his concurrence,they boasted it the highest
prerogative of the white-skinned laborer to sell himself and choose his own
master;they were unable to attain the true freedom of labour......"

This you could find on page 279-80,"The Civil war in The United State"by
KARL MARX.Since you are even question the source of some of these
quotation,I want to believe that you did not even know that this book is in
existence,I have been taking you too serious.
I don't think you have anything more to talk about the "racism" of
Marx,since this single letter is all  you are able to produce,which in my
opinion,is very irrelevant in discussing Marx,who himself a born Jew,on the
race question.Infarct some one I know is considering a detail work on the
issue of Marx and the struggle of racial minorities,which Marx wrote so
much,even before and after his stay in Africa and I will let you know when
ever he laboured through it.
When were you born Hamjatta ?I hope you don't believed that all of history
started with you ?because if you even assume that the word "Jew" so commonly
use in our urban languages,came into existence with your migration theory of
Gambians to Germany in 1980,is  a proof that you need to know the history of
your own country and self.You could have simply said that you yourself began
to use the word in the 1980s and that you will never use it again.Walk out
of your room and explain it to the first Jew you meet in the streets of
London and tell him/her that "This is
> understandable because the anti-Semitism to be still found in Germany does
> interchange 'Judentum' with the age old stereotypes of Jews, like
commercial
> and material greed."and listen to what he/she has to tell you,it is as
simple as that and no complicating theories.
My brother,I challenge,you to proof that Lassalle is more relevant to our
present world crisis and that of our nation included,than Marx,in my
opinion,we will be able to engaged in a more fruitful discussion.

For Freedom
Saiks

For Freedom
Saiks
----- Original Message -----
From: Hamjatta Kanteh <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Thursday, August 09, 2001 8:23 AM
Subject: Response To Brother Saiks


> Saiks,
>
> The principal defect in your piece was one of presentation of evidence and
> its concomitant effects of a logically disjointed sequence of arguments.
You
> tendered chunks of quoted passages as evidence but never gave directions
as
> to where they come from; insofar as this is case, one is in constant limbo
as
> to the head and tail of your argument that Marx wasn't a racist creep.
This
> made reading you very difficult. Since i do not, as a matter of principle,
> make wholesale comments on issues that need clarifications or on which i
have
> my doubts, i will refrain from commenting on the evidence you have
tendered
> until i get the evidence slotted in context and it is properly sourced.
>
> Be that as it may, i have a feeling that you did a very poor reading of
the
> letter i quoted from Marx to Engels revealing his racist bigotry. Herein,
i
> suspect the poor reading is as a result of my failure to explain why Marx'
> despicable racist attacks on Lassalle - which can be refuted on the
grounds
> of Jewish self-hatred or jeudischer Selsthass [its German equivalent and
> forerunner coined by Theodor Lessing, a German-Jewish writer of
distinction]
> - is in fact, sui generis, an oeuvre of racism. Let me bring the aforesaid
> quote again albeit in a simpler language and i'll explain appropriately
the
> racist context:
>
> "It is now quite plain to me - as the shape of his head and the way his
hair
> grows also testify - that he is descended from the negroes who accompanied
> Moses's flight from Egypt (unless his mother or paternal grandfather
> interbred with a nigger). Now,  this blend of Jewishness and Germanness,
on
> the one hand, and basic negroid stock, on the other, must inevitably give
> rise to a peculiar product. The fellow's importunity is also niggerlike."
> [Letter of 30 July 1862, Karl Marx, Friedrich Engels, Works, Vol. 30
(1974),
> pp. 257-9]
>
> Now, it is a typical intellectual fashion amongst Marx hagiographers to
> downplay the racism here and start on the false premise that the worst
that
> could be said of Marx here is Jewish self-hatred and most likely he was
just
> suffering from bouts of snobbery when he was stereotyping Lassalle in the
> aforequoted passage from an 1862 letter to Engels. This is nonsense. As
> Isaiah Berlin commented on this same passage quoted here, Marx, at the
very
> least, is justly accused of anti-Semitism:
>
> "There is somthing odd, to say the least, in the assertion made in a
> publication of the Marx-Engels Institute in 1943 that 'Marx denounced
> anti-Semitism in the strongest terms.' It is difficult to resist Thomas
> Masaryk's judgement that Marx is justly described as anti-Semitic."
[Isaiah
> Berlin, Benjamin Disraeli and Karl Marx in Against the Current, p. 278,
> Pimlico, 1997]
>
> To my mind and moral appropriations, anti-Semitism is justly described as
> racism. Therewith, and to my knowledge, none has explored the reasons why
> Marx invoked the Negro stereotyping here to make his point against
Lassalle;
> or what the relevance, if any, was the Negro stereotyping Marx alluded to
> Lassalle to make his point. For Marx certainly was aware that Lassalle has
no
> known Negro ancestral lineage or one that he [Lassalle] proudly proclaims.
> For instance, Lassalle was never known - unlike Marx - to suffer from
> inferiority complex, especially when it comes to his Jewish origins.
Indeed,
> Lassalle was amongst the few prominent intellectual German-Jews of that
> period who, albeit being assimilated, never ridiculed or gave up their
> ancient Hebrew culture; Lassalle proudly tells anyone who would listen
that
> he is Jewish. So it stands to reason that if Lassalle did have Negro
origins
> he wouldn't have shun from it. Of course, in appearance it is true that
> Lassalle was certainly not a German blond with blue eyes; rather, he most
> certainly was darker in complexion to any other German and his hair was
curly
> and dark. But i have read no historian, as of yet, positing that
Lassalle's
> ancestors intrebred with Negroes which explains his dark complexion or
curly
> hair to warrant the 'niggerlike' stereotyping that came from Marx. I'm all
> ears.
>
> To understand why Marx was a racist, especially from the tendered
evidence,
> we ought to question: What is the Negro or 'niggerlike' connection that
Marx
> waxed lyrical and indignant to make his point about Lassalle? The answer
lies
> partly in this sentence from the tendered evidence: "The fellow's
importunity
> is niggerlike." Importunity - a nounal construction meaning here someone
> persistently and pressingly pursuing something yet to be within his
grasp -
> especially as it relates to one who is assumed to be a "socially
ambitious"
> commoner. Importunity, as the nounal construction is understood by Isaiah
> Berlin in Lassalle's case, refers to the "socially ambitious, at times
> intolerably showy and vain." Let  me place this in a historical context
and
> my thesis would be clearer. Now, it is true that one way of describing
> Lassalle, amongst his many laudable characteristics, is his importunity.
This
> is no caricature. To the extent that this is true, Lassalle did become
> involve in the lenghty legal soap opera of a Countess von Hatzfeldt which
> explains to some extent his importunity. Let Francis Wheen narrate the
> history:
>
> "While he was still a philosophy student Lassalle had taken up the cudgels
on
> behalf of the Countess von Hatzfeldt, who was fighting a celebrated
divorce
> case. She seemed an unlikely heroine of the socialist cause, but for this
> ambitious barrack-room lawyer her plight demonstrated the larcenous
villainy
> of the upper classes: the Count had effectively stolen his wife's dowry,
and
> under German law at the time she had little chance of retrieving it.
Lassalle
> hurled himself into the case with a fine disregard for legal niceties -
> suborning witnesses, stealing documents - until, after ten years and
dozens
> of lawsuits, the exhausted husband handed over the loot. Lassalle's share
of
> the spoils set him up for life: he installed himself in a palatial Berlin
> residence, furnished in the most exotic and expensive style; his box at
the
> opera was next to that of the King, and no less." [Karl Marx, Francis
Wheen,
> p. 230, Fourth Estate, London, 1999]
>
> As Wheen narrated above, Lassalle's importunity is easily placed in
context:
> ruthlessly persistent commoner using underhand tactics to gain entrance to
> the world of the rich and the famous. The question becomes: how is such
> importunity 'niggerlike'? This is just like me mocking Jammeh's
importunity
> and concluding that it is very Jola-like. Or similarly commenting that
Essa
> Bokarr Sey's importunity is very Tukulor-like. That is tribalism talking.
> What has Jammeh or Sey's ethnicity got to do their importunity? Similarly,
> what makes importunity 'niggerlike'? If this is not racist nonsense, what
is
> it? Imagine a Pat Buchanan or Bill Buckley saying that importunity is
> 'niggerlike' in today's America. Would anyone have anyone doubts about the
> latent racism inherent in such a detestable caricature of black people?
> Besides, why bring Negroes into something that, on the face of it, has got
to
> do with a Semite or their stereotype. Granted, Marx was even in that
letter
> playing his great past-time of being a virulent anti-Semite. But more than
> virulent anti-Semitism, Marx was showing how he also believed the racist
> stereotypes of that era that he uses it publicly and privately to great
> effect. How else do we explain his juxtaposition or linking of importunity
to
> being Negroid or 'niggerlike' - as he and his racist types would put it?
>
> On Marx and the ambivalence he had tended to extend towards the abolition
of
> slavery, i never said that Marx was up to the day he died against the
> abolition of slavery. Rather, i merely pointed out that Marx was AT SOME
> STAGE opposed to the abolition of slavery in America on the grounds that
it
> would impede the evolutionary progress of white American males from their
> working class status to a proletarian one without which the violent he had
> predicted would never come to pass. This is a sharp contrast from the
> position held by free trade classical liberals like Richard Cobden; who
> outrightly and unequivocally condemned slavery on moral grounds and
> campaigned for it to be scrapped.
>
> Finally, i noted how in your attempts to brush aside Marx' use of the
racist
> jibe, 'niggerlike', you argued that it is on the same wave-lenght as
Gambians
> distorting the word Jew to refer to negative attributes. Where to begin?
The
> etymology or historical origins of 'nigger' and 'Jew'? For starters,
slavery
> and the subjugation of the blackman gave birth to the word 'nigger';
whilst
> the word 'Jew' has always been around: as long as the ancient Hebrew
scribes
> have bothered to note down the history of the Hebrew peoples. Suffice to
say
> that the two words are dissimilar in their etymology insofar as the word
> 'nigger', denotes the suppression of a race whilst 'Jew' was until fairly
> recently in written history largely referred to the Hebrew peoples and
most
> certainly didn't denote the negative attributes ascribed to it. It was the
> anti-Semitism of the late 17th century that insidiously interchanged the
word
> 'Jew' for greed and vanity. Indeed, during this period, the German word
for
> 'Jew' - Judentum - came to derogately refer to greed in commerce and was
> always in reference to Jews. It may well be the case that Gambian
immigration
> to Germany in the 80s and 90s is largely responsible for the reason why
'Jew'
> has come refer to derogative characterics in Gambian local parlance. This
is
> understandable because the anti-Semitism to be still found in Germany does
> interchange 'Judentum' with the age old stereotypes of Jews, like
commercial
> and material greed. And Gambians might have just picked it up from there.
> Which is not to say that it is acceptable. This is deplorable and should
be
> condemned as racist. But it is more a racist of the ignorant nature than
the
> one Marx was engaged. Which is not to say that anyone of them is
acceptable.
> Point being that most Gambians using the word 'Jew' derogatively do so
> ignorant of its racist permutations or connotations; whilst Marx was
always
> aware of the racist permutations or connotations of the word 'nigger'.
>
> I have always said that it was never Marx' racism that had turned me
against
> him; rather, my objection is a philosophical one. Being a racist doesn't
mean
> that people shouldn't read the relevant works of Marx. The point is that
we
> should never engage in intellectual subterfuges and make attempts to
downplay
> the racism of Marx. Marx was indeed a racist creep and no amount of
> intellectual scheming and subterfuges can change that fact. I hope this
time
> around, i can persuade you that arguing about the relevance or lack
thereof
> Marxism is an exercise in futility and we can move on to other topical
issues
> of immediate importance. Let's for now respectfully shelve this debate
until
> fate blesses us with a future face-to-face conversation.
>
> All the best,
>
> Hamjatta Kanteh
>
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