Marcuse justified oppressed violence on historical-function not ethical grounds
Evidence
In terms of historical function, there is a difference between revolutionary and reactionary violence, between violence practiced by the oppressed and by the oppressors. In terms of ethics, both forms of violence are inhuman and evilbut since when is history made in accordance with ethical standards? To start applying them at the point where the oppressed rebel against the oppressors, the have-nots against the haves is serving the cause of actual violence by weakening the protest against it. — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School, 2589 (
#expands, via linked claim)
I believe that there is a
natural right' of resistance for oppressed and overpowered minorities to use extralegal means if the legal ones have proved to be inadequate. Law and order are always and everywhere the law and order which protect the established hierarchy; it is nonsensical to invoke the absolute authority of this law and this order against those who suffer from it and struggle against itnot for personal advantages and revenge, but for their share of humanity. — <cite>Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School, 2592</cite> (#expands`, via linked claim)
Categorization
- XREF: connects to: Marcuse distinguished revolutionary from reactionary violence by historical function — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School: Its History,…, 2589; Marcuse’s violent-sounding language needlessly misrepresented nonviolent civil disobedience — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School: Its History,…, 2596; Marcuse sought to reconcile historical necessity with the ethical value of freedom — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School: Its History,…, 420 (+4 more)
Related
- Marcuse distinguished revolutionary from reactionary violence by historical function (similarity 0.87)
- Marcuse asserted a natural right of minorities to extralegal resistance (similarity 0.87)
- Oppressed minorities hold a natural right to extralegal resistance against established hierarchies. (similarity 0.83)
- Marcuse sought to reconcile historical necessity with the ethical value of freedom (similarity 0.81)
- Marcuse held bourgeois democracy’s blocked change justified extra-parliamentary direct action (similarity 0.81)
- Marcuse’s call for repressive tolerance would only reinforce the powerful’s apparent impartiality (similarity 0.80)
- Marcuse’s violent-sounding language needlessly misrepresented nonviolent civil disobedience (similarity 0.80)
- Marcuse denied the student movement was revolutionary (similarity 0.79)
- Marcuse used Freud’s metapsychology to argue a repression-free culture is conceivable. (similarity 0.78)
Broader Connections
- Marcuse distinguished revolutionary from reactionary violence by historical function
#expands(0.92) — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School, 2589 - Revolutionary violence must be contextualized rather than used to dismiss its ideals
#expands(0.85) - Marcuse asserted a natural right of minorities to extralegal resistance
#expands(0.82) — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School, 2592 - Marcuse’s violent-sounding language needlessly misrepresented nonviolent civil disobedience
#complicates(0.80) — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School, 2596 - Marcuse sought to reconcile historical necessity with the ethical value of freedom
#contradicts(0.78) — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School, 420 - Marcuse termed co-opted liberation ‘repressive desublimation’
#expands(0.72) — Tim Wu, The Attention Merchants, 597