User:Cullen328/sandbox/Platypus draft

The Platypus Affiliated Society is a Marxist Leftist political organization that organizes reading groups, public fora, research and journalism. Platypus's stated mission is to focus on "problems and tasks inherited from the Old (1920s-30s), New (1960s-70s) and post-political (1980s-90s) Left for the possibilities of emancipatory politics today."

History
Platypus was established in December, 2006, and has published The Platypus Review, an open-submission monthly broadsheet paper, since November, 2007.

Platypus was started by Chris Cutrone and several other graduate students of Moishe Postone at the University of Chicago, and included students from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, where Cutrone teaches.

Platypus has chapters in Chicago (University of Chicago, School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Loyola University Chicago, University of Illinois at Chicago), New York (New School for Social Research, New York University), Boston (Harvard University, Massachusetts College of Art and Design), Philadelphia (Temple University), Canada (Dalhousie University, University of Toronto), Germany (Goethe University Frankfurt), and Greece.

The "Platypus synthesis"
Platypus describes its own approach to Marxism as a "synthesis" of Trotskyism and Frankfurt School Critical Theory, via the two more recent approaches of the International Communist League (Fourth Internationalist) and the reinterpretation of Marx's critical theory by Moishe Postone. Platypus sees its role as "hosting the critical conversation on the Left that is presently lacking." This includes inviting speakers with varied and opposing views as panelists debating issues in public forums, and publishing writings from various viewpoints on the Left in The Platypus Review. The degree to which members of Platypus have offered definite statements as public speakers or writers, they have been restricted to critiques of the existing Left.

Activities
Platypus has hosted public talks or published articles by: Ervand Abrahamian, Manan Ahmed, Michael Albert, Tariq Ali, Kevin Anderson, Siyaves Azeri, Jairus Banaji, Jason Barker, Maziar Behrooz, Paul Berman, J. M. Bernstein, Bruno Bosteels, Nicholas Brown, Noam Chomsky, T. J. Clark (as part of the Retort collective), Hamid Dabashi, Carl Davidson, Barbara DeGenevieve, Stephen Duncombe, Kaveh Ehsani, Stephen Eisenman, James Elkins (art critic), Mike Ely, Andrew Feenberg, Hal Foster (art critic), Coco Fusco, Terry Glavin, Lydia Goehr, David Graeber, Raja Halwani, David Harvey, James Heartfield, Rohini Hensman, Doug Henwood, Brian Holmes, Gregg Horowitz, Dick Howard, Peter Hudis, Hussein Ibish, Naomi Klein, Andrew Kliman, Joel Kovel, Ernesto Laclau, Paul LeBlanc, Lars Lih, Domenico Losurdo, Michael Löwy, Staughton Lynd, Mike Macnair, James Miller, Osha Neumann (of Up Against the Wall Motherfuckers), Bryan Palmer, Leo Panitch, Claire Pentecost, Robert Pippin, Danny Postel, Moishe Postone, Mel Rothenberg, Mark Rudd, George Scialabba, Issam Shukri, Ayesha Siddiqa, Tim Wohlforth, Sherry Wolf (activist), Richard D. Wolff, and Slavoj Zizek, among others.

Leftist organizations that have participated in Platypus public fora include: the Communist Party of Great Britain, the Democratic Socialists of America, the International Bolshevik Tendency, the International Socialist Organization, Kasama Project, News and Letters Committees (as wells as various U.S., Canadian and British tendencies of Marxist humanism that have split from News and Letters), NEFAC, Progressive Labor Party (United States), the Revolutionary Communist Party, USA, Solidarity (U.S.), the new Students for a Democratic Society (2006 organization), the Worker-communist Party of Iran, the Left Worker-communist Party of Iraq, and The World Can't Wait, among others. Labor organizations that have participated in Platypus public fora include: UNITE HERE, and United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America, among others.

Platypus has participated in the Rethinking Marxism conference in Amherst, Massachusetts in 2006 and 2009, the Left Forum in New York City in 2009, 2010, 2011 and 2012, the 8th and 9th annual Cultural Studies Association conferences in Berkeley (2010) and Chicago (2011), the Historical Materialism (journal)'s conference in Toronto in 2010 and London in 2011, the United States Social Forum in Detroit in 2010, and the Marxist Literary Group summer 2011 Institute on Culture and Society.

Haseeb Ahmed and Ian Morrison represented Platypus at the Hyde Park Art Center's forum Pedagogical Factory: How We Learn, Building an Educated City, in July 2007.

Members of Platypus have produced and hosted the weekly radio show Radical Minds, interviewing prominent intellectuals and activists on the international Left, on WHPK-FM in Chicago.

Spencer Leonard and Chris Cutrone presented on behalf of Platypus at the Communist Party of Great Britain (Provisional Central Committee)'s Communist University 2011 at Goldsmiths, University of London, August 13–20, 2011. Cutrone presented "Capital in history" on August 16.

Platypus has held an international convention in Chicago annually since 2009.

Criticisms
The anarchist Mayday magazine (U.K.) took special note of Platypus in their inaugural (November 2007) and 2nd (May 2008) issues. (selected quote needed)

The Trotskyist International Communist League (Fourth Internationalist) published a critique of Platypus, "Platypus Group: Pseudo-Marxist, Pro-Imperialist, Academic Claptrap," in February 2008, which argued that "For Platypus, the fundamental social divide is not the class struggle of proletariat vs. bourgeoisie, but an amorphous and classless contest of 'Left' vs. 'Right.'"

The British Situationist International journal influenced by the German Krisis group, Principia Dialectica, has published several "anti-Leninist" critiques of Platypus, "I Don't Wanna Go to Rehab, No, No, No!" in June and "Dr. Frankenstein of Chicago, We Presume?" in December 2008, and 2 further critiques, "No Excuse for Lenin in 2010," and "Curtains for Cutronics" in February 2010.

Mitchel Cohen interviewed Chris Mansour and Ian Morrison of Platypus for NYTalkRadio.net's Steal This Radio show (#106) in March 2010, triggering contentious discussion on Doug Henwood's LBO-talk list. (who says it was "contentious?")

Louis Proyect published a critique, "Q: What is a Platypus? A: An American Eustonite," comparing Platypus to the signatories of the 2006 Euston Manifesto, on his blog The Unrepentant Marxist, in April 2010. (Who is Proyect and why should we cite his blog?)

Slavoj Žižek's critical engagement with Moishe Postone's work cites the interview with Postone by Platypus members Benjamin Blumberg and Pamela C. Nogales C.

The Kasama Project republished and critiqued the interview with Jairus Banaji conducted by Spencer A. Leonard and Sunit Singh for the Platypus Review #26 (August 2010), triggering a contentious and lengthy discussion thread. Louis Proyect followed up on comments on the Kasama site with a critique, "Thoughts provoked by the Platypus." (Who is Proyect and why should we cite his blog?)

The October 2010 publication of an English translation of the article "Communism and Israel" (2002), written by the anti-german group Initiative Sozialistisches Forum of Freiburg, prompted Louis Proyect to announce on The Unrepentant Marxist that the "Platypus Review publishes racists," reposting a message by "Angelus Novus" from the Marxism email list Proyect moderates. A number of other blogs noted the controversy over the Platypus publication.

In May and June 2011, the Communist Party of Great Britain (Provisional Central Committee)'s Weekly Worker published a series of articles, written by Mike Macnair after his participation in the 3rd annual Platypus convention in Chicago, criticizing Platypus for falling into the trap of the anti-"anti-imperialist" Left that leads to tacit support for imperialism, and being stuck in the borderlands between the "academic" and "activist" Left, but failing to be adequate to either, and, as "academic," doing "sloppy" work on the history of the Left and manifesting a "theoretical dead end." Chris Cutrone responded, defending Platypus in letters to The Weekly Worker on May 19 and 26, 2011. In an article of June 2, 2011, Macnair critiqued Platypus on the philosophy of history. The Weekly Worker published Cutrone's response to Macnair on the philosophy of history as an article in the June 9, 2011 edition. Macnair rejoined discussion of the philosophy of history in an article in the June 30, 2011 edition, to which Cutrone responded in a letter in the July 7, 2011 edition. Andrew Coates followed up on this exchange on July 12, 2011, with a discussion of "Negative Dialectics." The August 11, 2011 edition of The Weekly Worker featured a critique by Cutrone of Macnair's approach to "Marxist Hegelianism."

On July 3, 2012, Die Tageszeitung columnist Micha Brumlik wrote an article on "Adorno, Lenin and the Platypus," noting the activities of Platypus internationally and raising questions about the attempt to build a Left of the future by returning to the past.

The publication in The Platypus Review of an article by Stephan Grigat, "To know the worst: Anti-Semitism and the failure of the Left on Iran" (September 2012) elicited the response critical of Platypus by Maciej Zurowski, "Anti-Germans: Not part of the Left" in The Weekly Worker 932 (October 4, 2012). Chris Cutrone wrote a letter in response defending The Platypus Review editorial policy published in Weekly Worker 933 (October 11, 2012). This was followed by further criticisms from Zurowski in Weekly Worker 934 (October 18, 2012) and another reply from Cutrone in Weekly Worker 935 (October 25, 2012). In the same month, five of six sponsoring organisations voted to remove Platypus' co-sponsorship of the London conference, 'Up the Anti: Reclaim the Future', prompting Cutrone to write another letter to the Weekly Worker. In December 2012, The Platypus Review published a refutation of Grigat's article by Yassamine Mather of Hands Off the People of Iran (HOPI).

In April 2013 former Platypus member Ben Campbell released Platypus internal statements relating to the organization's strategy and positions. In the Weekly Worker 964 (May 30, 2013) Campbell criticized Platypus for its "unprincipled" "anti-leftism" and "Chris Cutrone’s 'closeted position' in defence of the Israeli 'settler colonial state' and the 'rational kernel of such racism'." Campbell encouraged leftists to "decline from participating in the activities of the Platypus Affiliated Society." This letter was in response to an article by former member Corey Ansel in Weekly Worker 963 (May 23, 2013) critical of both Platypus and Campbell. Cutrone replied to his "disingenuous 'critics'" by stating that his statements had been "deliberately distorted." In Weekly Worker 964 (May 30, 2013) Cutrone reiterated that it was "untrue" that Platypus held "pro-imperialist" positions.

On June 7, 2013 an open letter was posted on Richard Seymour's blog "Lenin's Tomb" encouraging leftists to decline participation in Platypus public fora. Signatories included Seymour, Bruno Bosteels, Jodi Dean, Andrej Grubačić, Doug Henwood, Deepa Kumar, and Sherry Wolf.