looking for a Huey Netwon quote on racism and marxism?

[Red Heretic]

A while back, I remember someone quoting Huey Newton where he discussed and debunked the accusations that Marxism was racist... can anyone dig up that quote by any chance?

Thanks so much!

[Buddha Samurai Cadre]

No sorry comrade, but he did debate with a BGF member who was distributing a pamphlet called were marx and engels white racists in prison

[ChrisK]

A while back, I remember someone quoting Huey Newton where he discussed and debunked the accusations that Marxism was racist... can anyone dig up that quote by any chance?

Thanks so much!

He didn't debunk accusations that Marx was a racist. He said it didn't matter if he was.



People say, "You claim to be Marxists, but did kyou know that Marx was a racist?" We say, "Well he probably was a racist..."

...If you are a Marxist, then Marx's racism affects your judgement...

...If you are a dialectical materialist, however, Marx's racismk does not matter.

The Huey P. Newton Reader 183-4.

I haven't ever seen the comments that Marx supposedly made, so if someone could find those that would be really interesting.

[bailey_187]

If you are a dialectical materialist, however, Marx's racism does not matter. You do not beleive in the conclusions of one person in the validity of a mode of thought; and we in the Party, as dialectical materialists, recognize Karl Marx as one of the great contributers to that mode of thought. Whether or not Marx was a racist is irrelevent and immaterial to whether or not the system of thinking he helped develop delivers truths about processes in the material world. And this is true in all disciplines. In eveyer discipline you find people who have distorted visions and are at a low state of consciousness who nonetheless have flashes of insight and produce ideas worth considering. For example John.B Watson once stated that his favourite passtime was hunting and hanging n*ggers, yet he made great forward strides in the analysis and investigation of conditioned response" - Intercommunalism, The Huey P. Newton Reader pg.184

[RED DAVE]

I haven't ever seen the comments that Marx supposedly made, so if someone could find those that would be really interesting.Marx referred to LaSalle as a "Jewish nigger." The 1862 letter does not make for pretty reading.

http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1862/letters/62_07_30a.htm

RED DAVE

[ChrisK]

Marx referred to LaSalle as a "Jewish nigger." The 1862 letter does not make for pretty reading.

http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1862/letters/62_07_30a.htm

RED DAVE

Well that is interesting. Now the question is were these statements malicious against Africans or was he just ignorantly racist?

[Coggeh]

Well that is interesting. Now the question is were these statements malicious against Africans or was he just ignorantly racist?

Could just be a product of the times and the conciousness of people. I don't believe marx was immune to what society deemed acceptable at that time. For example the tories were distributing leaflets telling people to vote labour or lib dems if they want a n*gger or paddy in their neighbourhood with no consequences and this was a recent as the 60's and maybe 70's.

Not comparing marx to the tories but I think it was just sociological ignorance of terms than affected marx here .

Also it has to be seem that marx was pretty pissed off in this letter

just imagine! This fellow, knowing about the American affair, etc., and hence about the state of crisis I’m in, had the insolence to ask me whether I would be willing to hand over one of my daughters to la Hatzfeldt as a ‘companion’, and whether he himself should secure Gerstenberg’s (!) patronage for me! The fellow has wasted my time and, what is more, the dolt opined that, since I was not engaged upon any ‘business’ just now, but merely upon a ‘theoretical work’, I might just as well kill time with him! In order to keep up certain dehors vis-à-vis the fellow, my wife had to put in pawn everything that wasn’t actually nailed or bolted down!

[Vanguard1917]

Marx referred to LaSalle as a "Jewish nigger." The 1862 letter does not make for pretty reading.

http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1862/letters/62_07_30a.htm

RED DAVE

To me, that's not evidence of racism in any political sense. He was letting off a bit of steam in a private letter to a friend, using language which may seem shocking to us but which was very much in common use back then, and not just by racists.

Regarding racism and the oppression of black people, Marx's political position was very clear:

"In the United States of America, every independent workers’ movement was paralyzed as long as slavery disfigured part of the republic. Labor cannot emancipate itself in the white skin where in the black it is branded."