Fake News (Lies) is....

Sat Aug 19 09:09:41 CDT 2017

In my magpie learning, I once heard there was an alternate (or additional)
phrase in Marx's original, after 'the mind of mindless conditions"
---Jochen would know---which was, in German, what I only read in English:
"the mindlessness of mindless pleasures".
Maybe this was known as the Wharfinger text? Anyone, anyone?

 Probably apochrypal.

On Sat, Aug 19, 2017 at 9:49 AM, Monte Davis <montedavis49 at gmail.com> wrote:

> Think also of *reception* context. When Marx wrote, opiates (primarily
> laudanum) were at every apothecary shop, in every home medicine chest,
> routinely used for severe pain by everyone from the scullery maid to Lady
> Brambleby-Montague. Addiction was recognized, of course, but if we read
> those words in 1844 and were asked to paraphrase, we'd likely say "religion
> is the painkiller of the masses" -- with the implications that (1) it dealt
> with symptoms rather than causes, but also (2) of course we all turn to it
> at need.
>
> A century later, when opium, morphine and heroin had been thoroughly
> criminalized, the paraphrase would be "religion is the addictive drug of
> the masses" -- with the implications that it was (1) purveyed by evil,
> greedy criminals to (2) the dregs of society and the weak-willed. Marx's
> phrase almost always came up in 20th-century rants about "godless
> communism": what kind of perverted ideology would compare our highest
> spiritual activity to the squalor of DRUG FIENDS!?!
>
> One might pursue this into Pynchon's "mindless pleasures" -- the working
> title of, and recurrent phrase in, GR. One might ask why both his preterite
> in general and many of his actual or potential "revolutionaries" spend so
> much of time with both pharmacological drugs from Mt. Vernon hemp onward,
> and with habitual/addictive analogs (the lighting-gas underground in AtD,
> Thanatoids and Tubefreex, assorted pre- and post-"Me Decade" lifestyle
> cults in IV and Vineland, absorbing virtual reality in BE, etc. etc.).
>
> But that would be to drag this forum into my own preoccupation with just
> one notoriously non-political, non-ideological cult writer, which is far
> from my intention.
>
> On Sat, Aug 19, 2017 at 1:32 AM, Jochen Stremmel <jstremmel at gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
>> I don't know, if you are all aware that the text ish provided was
>> originally written in German by a young man of 25 years. In German it's a
>> bit different. You can find the whole introduction in English here:
>> https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1843/critique-hpr/intro.htm
>>
>> Obviously it isn't clear who made the translation. The German, published
>> in February 1844, went like that:
>>
>> Das *religiöse* Elend ist in einem der *Ausdruck* des wirklichen Elendes
>> und in einem die *Protestation* gegen das wirkliche Elend. Die Religion
>> ist der Seufzer der bedrängten Kreatur, das Gemüth einer herzlosen Welt,
>> wie sie der Geist geistloser Zustände ist. Sie ist das *Opium* des
>> Volks. (emphasis by Marx)
>>
>> (You can find the whole German version here:
>> http://www.mlwerke.de/me/me01/me01_378.htm)
>>
>> Two differences you can see easily: Marx did write "das Gemüth einer
>> herzlosen Welt" and "der Geist geistloser Zustände".
>>
>> Perhaps, for the latter, "mind of mindless conditions" would be better?
>> Andrew McKinnon (http://aura.abdn.ac.uk/bitstream/handle/2164/3074/marx_
>> religion_and_opium_final_author_version.pdf;jsessionid=4C9E3
>> A2EEC9C2502023269AC3DBC1712?sequence=1)
>> translates: "spirit of a spiritless situation".
>>
>> In Geman the whole Introduction is one of the finest pieces of scientific
>> (philosophical) prose of the 19th century, in my eyes, although deeply
>> rhetorical. In English it's still very good, don't you think?
>>
>> 2017-08-19 5:24 GMT+02:00 Joseph Tracy <brook7 at sover.net>:
>>
>>> Really good contextualization. This decontextualization has been a
>>> frequent tactic of the right in recent decades and is a specialty of
>>> ideologues of many persuasions. The idea is always to put words in the
>>> mouths of those you disagree with tater than try to understand waht they
>>> are sayin. Where there is profudity in Marx, and I think he has some
>>> wrong-headed projections of how change might come, but where there is a
>>> deep truth was in his understanding and empathy with those suffering most
>>> under industrial capitalism. I’m going to save this for my little book of
>>> quotes.
>>>
>>>
>>> > On Aug 18, 2017, at 11:03 AM, ish mailian <ishmailian at gmail.com>
>>> wrote:
>>> >
>>> > "[fill in the blank] is the opiate of the people."
>>> >
>>> > It's worth re-reading Marx to see what he meant when he famously said,
>>> > "It is the opium of the people."
>>> >
>>> > Quoted like this, or, as is most often the case, with the antecedent
>>> > noun, Religion, in place of the pronoun, most readers assume that the
>>> > statement is fairly straightforward and simple.
>>> >
>>> > Religion is the opium of the people.
>>> >
>>> > Substituting other words or phrases has given the weight of Marx's
>>> > statement  to whatever a writer elects to compare with religion.
>>> >
>>> > A close look at the original text reveals that the pronoun "it" as
>>> > used by Marx carries far more than its immediate antecedent or
>>> > religion.
>>> >
>>> > In fact, as Marx says from the beginning of his essay, the critique of
>>> > religion, while essential, a prerequisite to all criticism,  is
>>> > complete.
>>> >
>>> > So is the famous sentence synoptic, a repetition for emphasis, or what?
>>> >
>>> >
>>> > First, Marx restates the critique of religion with confidence and
>>> finality.
>>> >
>>> > The opium sentence that follows the summary of the critique is not
>>> > synoptic and it does not merely add a flair of emphasis, an emphatic
>>> > metaphor.
>>> >
>>> > The sentence is about suffering, the real suffering of the oppressed
>>> > and the protest against suffering.
>>> >
>>> > Here is what Marx wrote:
>>> >
>>> > "Religious suffering is, at one and the same time, the expression of
>>> > real suffering and a protest against real suffering. Religion is the
>>> > sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and
>>> > the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people."
>>> >
>>> > When read with its preceding sentences the statement is not only more
>>> > profound, it is more germane to us, to our suffering, how we express
>>> > it and how we protest against it.
>>> >
>>> > When we read the famous statement with words substituted  for the word
>>> > religion we do well to recall the original context and what it is Marx
>>> > identifies. The opium or opiate epidemic plaguing the American white
>>> > working classes is an expression of suffering, of despair, and a
>>> > protest against the suffering, the losses of white privilege.
>>> >
>>> > Marx writes:
>>> > "To call on them to give up their illusions about their condition is
>>> > to call on them to give up a condition that requires illusions."
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>> > On Thu, Aug 17, 2017 at 10:39 PM, David Morris <fqmorris at gmail.com>
>>> wrote:
>>> >> ...the opiate of the people.
>>> > -
>>> > Pynchon-l / http://www.waste.org/mail/?list=pynchon-l
>>>
>>> -
>>> Pynchon-l / http://www.waste.org/mail/?listpynchon-l
>>>
>>
>>
>
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