Fundamantalism, a challenge to the Left

2012-09-08 · first published in marxsite · 175 words

This was not a Socialist Resistance publication. marxsite was Phil Hearse’s own long-form site, run alongside the paper he helped edit. It is kept here with his agreement, recovered from the Internet Archive after the domain lapsed and was taken over by someone else; nothing here links to the address it now points at.

Only part of this piece survives. The capture it was recovered from is truncated, so the text below stops before the article did.

---

An interview with Farooq Tariq, Labor Party Pakistan, on the importance of the fight against religious fundamentalism. ( From kprm-prd-english )

Zely Ariane The idea of interviewing Farooq Tariq came from a lecture he gave during the Asian Global Justice School in Manila at the end of July 2012. I remember him stating firmly that Marxism is totally opposite of religion, particularly because the main basis of religion is private property, which is in line with class based society and capitalism. He also highlited the position of LPP towards religion, that they dont discuss religion nor make jokes about it, just as they oppose using religious arguments for socialism. At the same time, Farooq also gave inspiring examples of the role of socialists to defend religious freedom in Pakistan. For my context in Indonesia, a majority Mouslem country which sees an increase of religious intolerancy and violence, this conversation was very important, especially concerning the attitude of the left. I also took the chance to ask him on the recent left collaboration project in Pakistan.