cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ml/post/29804343
Those who enjoy the wages of imperialism are more likely to have disdain for, or disinterest in, the complex struggles for national liberation in the periphery, which is dismissed as “the savage barbarism of the East,” in the choice words of Max Horkheimer.
This chauvinistic attitude has become so foundational to Western Marxism that theorists in this tradition often behave as if there were no need to actually study the history of socialist states in any serious manner. In fact, the attempt to do so is often looked upon with suspicion, as a sign that one might be a boor siding with the slaves, rather than a professional intellectual with a keen sense of what is worthy of scholarly inquiry.
- Gabriel Rockhill - From the introduction to Losurdo's Western Marxism
I often feel that western marxists dismissal of AES is also rooted in unchallenged western exceptionalism.
After plenty of times being exposed to those people in Latin America, it seems that privilege also fuels that purist notion that is prevalent within westerners.
It really is.
If a USian realizes that the US government is shit, they conclude that all governments, currently existing or even theoretically possible, must also be shit. Because obviously "America is #1" so if "even" our government is bad then imagine how bad governments in other countries must be. This chauvinism cuts across a lot of cultural/political lines, radlibs aren't aware that they have that bias so they don't question or correct for it.
This is a twelfth type of liberalism 🧅