Mikhail Bakunin an Anti-Semite?

[Rood]

Bakunin is often seen as a notable anti-semite since his death.[38] Bakunin used Anti-Semitic arguments during his argument with Karl Marx. He repeated typical anti-semitic positions, imagining, for instance, the Jews as
“ …one exploiting sect, one people of leeches, one single devouring parasite closely and intimately bound together not only across national boundaries, but also across all divergences of political opinion…[Jews have] that mercantile passion which constitutes one of the principal traits of their national character ”
Bakunin's bigotry was shared by other radical socialists and anarchists of the time.[39] Proudhon's notebooks, for example, contain a passage in which he calls for the expulsion or extermination of the Jews from Europe.[40]

Source Wiki

Explanation?

[Pogue]

Alot of people were anti-semetic in this period. It was an of course still is an compeltely unjustifiable position and he was being an idiot. It didn't make him a fascist because the ideology of fasicsm did not exist then and even if it did he would not have adhered to it, because he was an anarchist with some really fucked up views.

It doesn't really matter. You can just take from the anarchist, serious and intelligent things he said and ignore them things. I personally see him as irrelevant, I haven't gained anything from him and to be quite frank the opinions of one self-declared anarchist mean nothing to the ideology, we do not hero worship individuals.

[yuon]

Haywood's Fingers has it about right I reckon. He was an anarchist with some unfortunately unanarchistic ideas. It doesn't mean we can't take the good from his work, and then ignore the bad.

It's the same with all most all theoreticians. Kroptkin supported the Allies during WW1, and Proudhon was also a anti-Semitic, misogynistic old bastard. Doesn't mean that we have to ignore the good contributions.

Oh, and I'm sure that Lenin has a few bad writings too, not to mention Mr Marx... Not that I've read enough of either of those two to recall off the top of my head any such writing. I've never seen the need personally.

[Pogue]

The working class of Paris rejected Proudhon for being too conservative. Go figure.

[RHIZOMES]

Oh wow Bakunin was anti-semitic tell us something we don't know.

Fascism didn't exist when he was alive.

[Holden Caulfield]

Oh wow Bakunin was anti-semitic tell us something we don't know.

Fascism didn't exist when he was alive.

Be nice to newbies.
On pain of death.

[Rood]

Sorry but form me that's the same like saying,
Yeah hitler killed some jews, but made germany a good nation and he was a nice guy..

[Pogue]

Sorry but form me that's the same like saying,
Yeah hitler killed some jews, but made germany a good nation and he was a nice guy..

Sorry, who said something thats the same as saying that?

We're syaing that you can take some of his ideas, i.e. anarchist communism, if you realy want too. I personally didn't get my anarchist ideology from reading his work, but some people did and he certainly inspired alot of thinkers.

No one is saying his anti-semetism is irrelevant compared to his anarchist writings when judging him as a person, we're saying when your trying to get ideas from someone, you can take some of them and ignore the others, because as a person they are not really relevant, its their ideas we want. This is not the same as saying 'His anti-semetism doesn't matter because he was an anarchist', which is what I think you thought we were saying, which is wrong.

I don't understand the fixation on Kropotkin, Proudhon and Bakunin anyway. Their writings ar eout of date, nothing spectacular and theres much better stuff out there.

[yuon]

Sorry but form me that's the same like saying,
Yeah hitler killed some jews, but made germany a good nation and he was a nice guy..

As HF pointed out though, that's just wrong...

Besides, if Hitler ever wrote anything that was worth salvaging, a proper intellectual would be willing to admit it, and accept it regardless of the rest of his writing. However, I very much doubt that Hitler ever wrote anything worth reading (I once tried to read "My Struggle", but couldn't).

All the anarchist authors mentioned have contributed something which can be added to the sum of anarchist theory, even if they also wrote rubbish. Newton was a god botherer and believed in alchemy, yet he still managed to contribute a heck of a lot to science, and we don't reject his good contributes.

[Bilan]

Antisemitism does not equate to fascism. Fascism is a political-economic system. It does not necessitate antisemitism.

[The Feral Underclass]

Sorry but form me that's the same like saying,
Yeah hitler killed some jews, but made germany a good nation and he was a nice guy..

How is it the same? Hitler exterminated European Jewry. Bakunin simply followed a popular view, which was obviously unjustified. Why does that mean we should reject his ideas about anarchism? I want you to answer that question.

Also, being an anti-Semite doesn't qualify you as a fascist. Mussolini was a fascist but he wasn't an anti-Semite.

[hammer and sickle]

First of all being racist doesnt make you a fascist the same way not all fascists are racists (though the majority nowadays are). Also the majority of Europeans were racist back then it was a typical view of the times. Karl Marx had Jewish ancestors and even he showed anti-semitism at times.

[Mälli]

Hey, but whats up with Stalin? There are guys on this forum that like him, and he was anti-semitic, a racist and a lots of ways fascist. How weird.

[x359594]

Oh wow Bakunin was anti-semitic tell us something we don't know.

Fascism didn't exist when he was alive.

Arizona is right, so shouldn't this thread be called "Mikhail Bakunin an Anti-Semite?"

I suppose one could start a thread called "Karl Marx a Self-Hating Jew?"

[Faust]

I suppose one could start a thread called "Karl Marx a Self-Hating Jew?"

That actually made me laugh! haha! It's so true though. :laugh:

[Sugar Hill Kevis]

I think fascism is thrown around too casually; anyone who's racist or authoritarian generally gets slapped with it. I'm not exhonorating racists or authoritarians, I'm just saying that people use the term without discretion and not necessarily understanding it. Autocracy doesn't necessarily mean fascism.

I don't necessarily think that the fact that fascism wasn't an established ideology necessarily negates someone who predates it from being a fasicst. People often label the diggers as 'communists', despite them predating the manifesto by a couple of centuries.

You could argue that fascism is characterised by its absence of ideology, with Mussolini's flip flopping and triangulation of ideas in order to prise power. Notwithstanding that, I think there are some key cornerstones of fascism such as nationalism, militarism and corporatism (vertical syndicalism) which give it some degree of ideology. These principles not exactly being applicable to Bakunin.

I'm not exhonerating Bakunin's anti-semitism either, or trying to simply ameliorate it - it's vulgar. The point is that we don't dogmatically worship Bakunin. Analyse and take on board his better philosophies, the rest is kind of irrelevant.

[welshboy]

I totally agree. The word Fascism/t is one of the most misused political words in the English language.
Lefitists, of all persuasions misuse it cos they're fucking muppets

you used physical force to stop the fash from organising so you is like teh Nazi'sand the right use it cos the left have played into their hands by repeatedly bandying it about to insult any moron they disagree with which allows the right to say

they iz attackin us just coz we wantz teh death campz, see they iz teh nazi's!