THE APOLOGISTS OF TAMIL RACISM
Dr. Vickramabahu Karunaratne in a recent article entitled "Nalin, Champika and Prabhakaran" published in "The Sunday Island" of 23rd June 2002, has tried to distort facts and attribute to me certain things that I have never said. For Vickramabahu, Marxism is the only social analysis and anything else cannot be considered as such. Once you attribute to your opponent what you want and not what the opponent has really said it becomes easy to reply as you are replying only to a thesis that you yourself has constructed. It is a case of fighting a straw man that one has created. In the present article, I speak for myself only and not for any other person Vickramabahu has mentioned in his article.
I met him at the University of Moratuwa at a seminar organised by the Sinhala Cultural Association, a student society of that university. It was on peace and I presented my case and said that the MOU and the present so-called peace process had to be defeated. Before I give my brief analysis, which is not a social analysis according to Vickramabahu who still clings on to outdated Marxism that cannot be considered as a theory but an imagination of Marx, let me contradict him (Vickramabahu) on the misquotations. Vickramabahu has said: "However , both (Nalin and Champika - NdeS)agree that there are no other community in Sri Lanka with national rights except the Sinhala community. All other communities should accept the supremacy of the Sinhala Nationality and adjust their community activities accordingly. They say there is no real , organic Tamil National uprising in Sri Lanka. The Tamil campaign is a planted uprising maintained by vested interest. Even after these two consecutive debates with them, still I am at a lost as to who these vested interests are. They referred to three different elements: firstly the Tamil international conspiracy , secondly, the Christian conspiracy and finally the Western conspiracy dating back to 1505 AD. Neither of them present a social analysis and both are equally opposed to Marxism and refer to it to as a part of the Western cultural conspiracy , spread through out the world."
Now I have never said or written anywhere, let alone at the University of Moratuwa that all the other communities living in Sri Lanka should accept the supremacy of the Sinhala community. It is true that I do not consider any community in Sri Lanka other than the Sinhalas to form a nation. I do not refer to them as nations but as ethnic communities. Even with the standard definition of a nation within the Marxist literature that was accepted by none other than Lenin, Vickramabahu would not be able to show that the Tamils in Sri Lanka constitute a nation. I challenge him to quote the definition of nation accepted by Lenin and establish that the Tamils are a nation, based on that definition. According to Vickramabahu and his comrades nations can appear only after capitalism is established and he has said on many occasions that the Sinhalas are not a nation as capitalism is not established in Sri Lanka. It is the self same Vickramabahu who advocates self determination to the Tamil nation. He must be thinking that capitalism is firmly established in Jaffna and Batticaloa. I have never stated that these are conspiracies. I present a coherent picture of the evolution of Tamil racism and I base my arguments on a the theory of political, economical and cultural colonialism of the western world. Vickramabahu refers to them as conspiracies, so that he could say that there is no social analysis. My understanding of Tamil racism is given in "Prabhakaran, Ohuge Seeyala, Baappala Ha Massinala" that has been translated into English as "An Introduction to Tamil Racism in Sri Lanka". Since its publication I have added a few details, in the recent years in my articles to the "Midweek Review" and the "Irida Divaina". It is true that there is no Tamil national uprising as such. The Tamil racists are fighting to deprive Sinhalathva, its rightful place in the country.The Tamil racism was created by the Dutch and was officially baptised by the British.(An Introduction to Tamil Racism in Sri Lanka deals with the evolution of Tamil racism since it was baptised by the British in 1833). I have not referred to vested interests but in their attempt to deprive the Sinhalathva its rightful place, the Tamil racists are being supported by the western colonial powers who created and baptised Tamil racism in this country and the other non national forces such as the Christian and Catholic churches, the NGOs financed by the western countries, most of the Marxists who are nothing but the agents of western cultural colonialism.
The master piece of Vickramabahu the Marxist and the Trotskyite who talks of social analysis comes in defense of the Christian involvement in the Tamil racist movement. Here it is: "Obviously Christian priests are interested in influencing the struggling Tamil youth with their Christian ideology. I believe, that is what they are for. At the same time there are Christian leaders and priests who are totally with either Nalin or Champika. At least having the same hate towards the Tamil liberation struggle. Mr. S L Gunasekara and Fr Oska Aberatne are two classic examples."
This is the weakest defense of Christian involvement I have come across in this ongoing debate on Tamil racism in the newspapers, magazines, so-called research journals, electronic media. If anybody thinks all these Bishops and other Christian and Catholic priests in Jaffna, Mannar, Colombo and other places are only interested in spreading Christian theology then he or she must be living in a different world altogether. The Christianity in our parts of the world plays two roles. One is the role of a religion, with which I have nothing against, and the other is the role of an ideology of colonialism. It is the second aspect that has become a problem in Asia, Africa and South America and I have no hesitation to say that I am against it.
The cultural colonialism of the western powers in countries such as Sri Lanka still revolves around the Catholic and Christian churches. Here I am not talking of individual Christians or Catholics but church as a social force. I am not talking of a Christian conspiracy here but the role of the churches as a social force and as an instrument in cultural colonialism, that is linked with political colonialism. It is interesting to see the social analyst Vickramabahu quoting individual cases in a feeble attempt to defend the church as an instrument of colonialism. It is not the individuals that count here but the role of the church as a whole. The Marxist Vickramabahu, I am sure still believes in the concept of a working class, though it has no validity at all even in the context of the "developed capitalist" countries. In Sri Lanka if one were to tell comrade Vickramabahu that there are workers and even leaders of workers (say for example in the trade unions) who not only vote for the UNP, but work for that party, would the comrade come to the conclusion that since some of the workers are with the UNP, the proletariat has given up the class struggle and the revolution that,I might add, according to the Marxists has been round the corner for the last so many decades. The corner has now been straightened and the comrades have been cornered. The comrades in Sri Lanka continue to enjoy a political existence thanks to the television networks and print media owned by the capitalists. They do not have a mass base but only a mass communication base. Vickramabahu refers to Fr. Oscar Abeyratne and Mr. S. L. Gunasekera. I have not seen any recent statement by the good Father against the so called peace process mediated by the Norwegians and I do not have much to say about him. However, I have a great respect for Mr.S. L.Gunasekera and also for some other Christians and Catholics who oppose and fight Tamil racism. But these individuals and the many innocent Sinhala Christians and Catholics who are opposed to Tamil racism do not represent the church as a social force. As a social force the Christian and Catholic churches support Tamil racism and are against Sinhalathva.
Let us turn to the so-called analysis of Vickramabahu on Global capitalism. He says: "Finally, the Western conspiracy theory is a monstrous caricature of the Marxist analysis of Global Capitalism. Global capitalism has to go along with nationalist movements in order to subvert them to their capitalist "Open" economic policies. There is a vast deference between the colonial policies of West European countries in the past centuries and the present polices of Global Capitalism. It is hilarious to claim on the onehand that a Western conspiracy is behind the Tamil liberation struggle , and then on the other hand to expect American, British and French forces to help Sri Lanka regime to suppress Tamil terrorism."
I have not mentioned any conspiracy as I said earlier. I base myself on a theory of colonialism that we have developed during the last fifteen years or so. It is not a western conspiracy but it is the way that the western colonialism has been working in the last five hundred years. According to the Marxist comrade the Global Capitalism has to go along with the nationalist movements. After Lenin no Marxist, including Vickramabahu has analysed the global trends at least in some consistent manner. Marxism died long time ago and the Marxists are unable to come to grips with the present global situation. Even the postmodern Marxists such as Jameson, are only uttering incoherent nonsense in the name of an analysis. Marxism that does not take into consideration the cultural component of colonialism is at a loss for a theory. Marxism was used by capitalism some time ago to weaken the nationalist forces in Asia and Africa with their so-called working class theories. They were used to undermine the nationalistic feelings of the people that helped the western colonial powers. In Sri Lanka it is the vulgar Marxism of the LSSP, CP, SLMP formed by Vijaya Kumaratunga that took the SLFP away from nationalistic politics. Today the SLFP is led by the wife of Vijaya who is implementing the SLMP policies through the SLFP.
Global capitalism or globalism is only the latest phase of colonialism that commenced in the fifteenth century. Colonialism has three components, Political, Economical and Cultural. When the Portuguese came to Sri Lanka ostensibly for trade (economics) they came with the sword (politics) and the Bible (culture). Imperialism was the next phase of colonialism and now we have globalism. From the fifteenth century the western powers have had only one ambition or shall I say aspiration. That is to get the whole world integrated into their economical(trade) network and control the economies of the other counties. That was economical hegemony. Secondly to control politically the whole world. The British and the other empires did this in their hay day. Today it is the President of the USA who plays the role of the political emperor of the world. No king or emperor in the history has had the powers that the President of the USA has. Under cultural colonialism the west has imposed on the others their knowledge, their cultural values, their human rights, their education, you name it you have it. Our cultures are increasingly becoming mere symbols. We are being forced to live in their culture occasionally going to the temple or lighting the so-called traditional oil lamp at the commencement of a beauty queen contest organised in a five star hotel. The five star hotel and the contest represent the western culture and our culture has been kicked upstairs to the lighting of the oil lamp at the beginning of the function and to be forgotten soon after.
If under imperialism the west had different centres that exercised influence over different regions of the globe under globalism the world has one centre that exercises its influence over the whole globe. The centres have shifted from London, Paris, Lisbon, Madrid and coalesced into Washington. Colombo has become a mere point (remember the definition of a point. no length, no breadth, no width and in case of Colombo no character as well due to characterless leaders whom the British selected for us. We never selected our leaders. We only elect, once in five or six years, a few from a lot given to us by the British.) Global capitalism or globalism does not go with the nationalist movements as Vickramabahu says. Globalism goes against the nationalist movements and in order to defeat the nationalist movements they select so-called nationalist leaders who are in essence non nationalists and make use of them. They also have the support of non nationalist Marxist movement in this connection. The globalists do not have to go with the non nationalist leaders. The latter have no choice but to go with the globalists. What is Mr. Ranil Wickremesinghe doing now? He is only following the line given by the western globalists. He has to dance to their tune. Vickramabahu has no imagination to create new theories and he just echoes a few phrases from Marx and Lenin who wrote, ignoring cultural colonialism, before the advent of globalism. It is Vickramabahu who does not understand the difference between the last few centuries and the present century for want of a good theory. Today the Marxists cannot come up with theories good or bad, and it has been left to the nationalists, not the nationalists Vickramabahu imagines, to formulate new theories. We in the Jathika Chinthanaya (JC) movement are just doing that and fighting globalism on many levels.
Professor Nalin de Silva
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