What are we seeing here--knee-jerk defensiveness or just bad analysis? When
is a critique of the SYSTEM of racial domination merely "stereotyping" (the
catch-all no-no Paula and others wield) and when it the systemic analysis
oppression deserves? When will whites, and many who have integrated into
white bourgeois culture, realize they are of course not responsible for ALL
the oppression that goes on (so stop feeling guilty!) but that they have, of
course, experienced IMMENSE skin and class privilege? God, this all seems
so elementary--the complex issues go beyond this.
And as for the population bombers out there (Lee seems to be the head): the
effect of population on the earth, compared to the effects of expansionary
corporate capitalism and state-sponsored hyper-development designed to
"conquer nature," is quite minimal. The simple fact that the countries with
the LOWEST population rates and density consume the greatest amount of
resources and engage in the most destructive ecological projects flatly
disproves the population argument. SOCIAL RELATIONS, over all, are the
determinant factors; it's not too many babies that causes the earth's ills--
an argument which blames the poor for their own suffering--but largely what
the owners of economic and political power do.
One more thing: population rates decline when women have more choice over
their lives--both for contraception and against it, but also FULL equality.
Chris