Like Antonio Gramsci found himself confined to Mussolini's dungeons, having to jot down short lines of thought in small notebooks, I at times find myself confined to the kitchen table, by a laptop, forced by an uncontrollable impulse to comment on something I have seen or read, to write a few short lines about some subject.
I recently started reading Monthly Review Press’ edition of Antonio A. Santucci’s Antonio Gramsci. One of the best known concepts Gramsci developed is the concept of "common sense". Gramsci describes common sense as:
common sense identifies exact, simple, and practical causes through a set of judgments, and it does not allow itself to be drawn into metaphysical, pseudo-profound, pseudo-scientific, etc., quibbles and absurdities” (Q, p. 1334) (quoted in Santucci p 139).
This is a description which I find quite precise to this date. The focus on exact and simple causalities makes it difficult to introduce more complex ideas (or ideas that seem more complex) when you have political opponents that counter your ideas with more simple concepts.
Adresseavisen hadde i går en sak om hvordan den svært konservative organisasjonen Islam Net forsøker å etablere seg i Trondheim. Detstår selvsagt alle fritt å etablere seg der de vil, men jeg reagerer særlig på hvordan de framstiller seg som mainstreammuslimer.
