I'm probably not really a leftist anymore but it's funny to be an ex- leftist because the scars on your brain never really go away...
like you are reading the fabulous Mighty Girl whom everyone agrees is much cooler than them or anyone with her red karman ghia and red hair to go with it and she says "So, months and months ago, the big plan was to be napping drunk in a hammock in Guatemala when I turned thirty. What with shuffling for work schedules and natural disasters (Please ease up for a while, God. Amen.), we decided to head for Belize instead."
and you think, does she know does she know about Guatemala? Totally forgetting that when you were in Guatemala you spent quite a lot of time napping in hammocks and drinking beer. And many Guatemalans, when not suffering from terrible oppression don't mind a good beer now and again.
and you'll be sitting in the lobby of a nice hotel in midtown manhattan and you've just gone to some clothing store and actually bought something nice, a suit, 75% off but still costing money (which torments you with horrendous guilt always, but not specifically leftist guilt. Except for the fact that you are prone to this constant crazy feeling of responsibility for everyone and everything might be why you were ever a leftist) you'll look at the bag and see that it has these nice handles. These handles, they are woven and shiny like ropes. There's something so aesthetically pleasing about these bags. They convey luxury, they convey sturdiness and the idea that you bought something that will enhance your life in oh-so-many ineffable ways, ways you can't quite articulate but you know are there...
OK, it was ANN TAYLOR GODDAMNIT but I only went there because my mother wanted to go there! Alright??? Alright??
And then you look at the knots that hold the handles onto the bag, and think: Gosh, it looks like that is the sort of thing that gets made in a factory. In fact, this whole bag was made in a factory! Oh, God a factory. I wonder what it is like in those bag factories. Is it hot? Primarily women? No bathroom breaks, just mindless empty repetition? Do they tie one knot on or do they tie both knots and pass it down to the next person, in a never ending (and repetitive stress injury inducing) cycle of mind and life destroying labor...going home to their weary and undernourished family every night...a little more beaten down...but smiling and laughing during those few festivals or the odd day off, the spirit maybe slowly snuffed out but there, just a little...
Also, you always ask yourself if workers everywhere are unionized and when they go on strike you have to (Actually, I do that now and will always do that. Do you? You better, damnit! I worry this is unusual though, because when I did this after talking to the white organizer with the hilariously bad Spanish accent and the very apathetic strikers they got my number and even called me on the phone later.)
And then I have to ask myself whether their union is one of the good ones or one of the corrupt ones that doesn't help the people.
Some thing I will never think this is: Oh, this is OK that I have a house and a car and lots of food to eat and nice clothes and other people are working 100 hours a week weaving rugs until they go blind after the toxic fumes have destroyed their respiratory system.
But the problem is that I can't even think this: Oh, it is OK that I don't work in a cubicle and you work in a cubicle. As much as I will have to kill myself if I do end up working in a cubicle I seem unable to stand the fact that one person has something good that someone else doesn't have.
the thing is, that no one will find this funny unless they too are an ex-leftist and there aren't too many of these out there...who have a sense a humor and have not become crazy right wing fanatics...
**Some reasons I'm not a leftist (1) Because I've become very practical. I want to know how, after the revolution, we're going to get gas for the car and toilet paper and floss and antibiotics.
and how we're going to make and distribute hand sanitizer...because when social change comes I draw the line at the loss of hand sanitizer!
****And (shudder) I have realized that capitalism in fact, has a creative (if earth destroying) aspect and that actually, if we could get everyone to have enough food and a good place to live and health care then that might not be so bad...and capitalism, if greatly modified, might contain some
****I think work often sucks no matter if you workers own the factory or not...if you own the factory and you have to eat boiled cabbage or if you don't own the factory and get to have a nice grilled steak and a Budweiser (TM) then I kind of wonder whether you really are better as a non-alienated cabbage eater. Note: I said--I WONDER...because I actually can see several ways in which controlling the factory as part of a workers' collective might actually make...this is probably why I never was such a good leftist in the first place. I am not sure about most things and leftists tend to be really, really sure. Although, I do have to say that back when I was a leftist, I did always feel much more sure.
*****Finally, I hate meetings. And I hate long meetings ever more. And the idea of going to a long meeting where everything is decided by consensus makes me want to dig my eyeballs out of my head with a spoon. No, I take that back. It always made me want to dig the eyeballs out of the head of the other people at the meetings. The ones who talked and talked. I also fantasized about using a spork, rather than a spoon.
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