Steve Best's Manifesto

[KaliMama]

Manifesto for Radical Abolitionism: Total Liberation By Any Means Necessary (http://thomaspainescorner.wordpress.com/2009/11/13/manifesto-for-radical-abolitionism-total-liberation-by-any-means-necessary/)

[grog]

What I took from that is Steve does not :heart: Gary.

If he wants to really critique and provide a viewpoint, he'll have to do it without all the adhominen for me to pay attention. Folks with Dr. in their titles are supposed to know how to do that.

[stegan]

I am not impressed. The personal attacks dilute his point and short-circuit any attempts to have a proper debate about the approach he's advocating. I read it as "if you're not with us, you're against us." F**k that sh*t.

[nauthiz]

Folks with Dr. in their titles are supposed to know how to do that.

http://www.google.com/#hl=en&q=laura+schlessinger

[vegankitty]

^ That link is taking me to the Google search page.

[nauthiz]

hmm. It's getting me to the search results.

Iunno. Google mucked with their URL scheme at some point, I think. I can't figure it out anymore.

[KaliMama]

Best is pretty abrasive in this "manifesto." I haven't read him much. Is this his usual tone?

[nauthiz]

Iunno. I just went to his website to look up some other stuff; I'll report back.

Right off the bat I notice that the page's title is 'DR. STEVE BEST, PHD'. :rolleyes:

[vegankitty]

Yes, it is kind of boastful. But I guess it is his website. If you don't promote yourself, who will?

[KaliMama]

Francione, with whom I agree about a lot of things, also spends a good deal of time promoting himself. I'm finding the whole feud thing distracting and irritating, and I'm afraid that they are baiting people to choose a side based on rhetoric, hyperbole, ad hominem attacks, etc. rather than encouraging people to read both of them critically. But maybe that's just what people do anyway. :blank:

[nauthiz]

He seems to like to call people fascists and throw around terms like "the system" and "hegemony" a lot. Seems kind of foamy-mouthed in general. Complains about divisiveness and preaches about the need for diversity of opinion within the movement out of one side of his mouth while using the other to hurl a constant stream of aspersions at anyone who don't share his views.

It'd be kind of fun to watch him go toe-to-toe with Ingrid Newkirk, but I fear that letting them be in the same room together would count as negligent homicide.

If I had to pigeonhole him, he'd go in the slot marked "angry white upper-middle-class male who's deeply ashamed of adjectives 2,3, and 4 and deals with it by channeling into adjective 1."

[gladcow]

nauthiz, are you talking about Francione or Best?

[nauthiz]

Best

[gladcow]

ok, thanks. I'm not a fan of either of theirs, so I couldn't tell :p

[vegankitty]

I think they both have somep good points but I also find the name calling and arguing annoying, on both sides.

[nauthiz]

I can't shake the feeling, though, that some of these points come down to manufacutring bogeymen and then railing against them. Steve Best seems to fault HSUS for being one massive betrayal of everything the animal rights movement stands for. There's been a lot of complaining about that sort of thing in the past year or two. And all keep thinking is, "Since when was HSUS ever an animal rights organization?" I've never thought of them as AR; I've never thought of them as welfarists-in-the-Francione-sense. . . I've always thought of them as a straight-up animal welfare group.

It feels like they were invited into the fold just because we needed someone to kick out.

And apparently picking fights with everyone else got boring, since now the prominent Abolitionists-with-a-capital-A seem to have started squabbling with each other. It's a wonder they ever find any time to do any vegan advocacy.




oh, wait. . .

[vegankitty]

I actually didn't mean that. I meant his veganism as a consumer movement thing and the need to be more inclusive. Though I didn't read any solutions to these points other than the need to reach out to poor nonwhites and to smash capitalism.

[nauthiz]

The very last thing I want to see get smashed is capitalism. There's no doubt in my mind that my precious vegan B12 and omega-3 supplements would be a hell of a lot harder to get a hold of in a non-market economy. In fact, I'd like to see our country get a lot more capitalist in certain respects - ending the dairy subsidy comes to mind.