anticap
24th June 2009, 22:39
Hello!
First I just want to say that I registered here because of Kwisatz Haderach; specifically, her/his posts in the "Anarcho-Capitalism and Anarcho-Communism are not entirely Mutually Exclusive" thread, among others. I was browsing the forum and got caught up in her/his (which does she/he prefer?) devastatingly lucid rebuttals of capitalist/Austrianite tripe (I live for such debates). I caught myself literally laughing out loud and clapping at times. Kwisatz Haderach says things that I'd say if I were as eloquent and obviously well-educated as she/he (seriously, I hate doing the gender-slash-thing, so I need that pronoun, please, if you're reading).
Anyway, as for me, I don't actually agree with Kwisatz Haderach on everything, from what I've gathered so far. The Christian thing isn't my thing, and I used to like to argue about such things, but finally concluded that I was tilting at windmills, since none of it can be proved any which way. To each their own, on that front at least.
More importantly though, I'm not yet sure where I stand regarding the state. I'm fervently anti-capitalist -- communist, actually -- but I'm constantly flip-flopping between Marxism and anarchism. I just can't seem to find a home on that front. But, that's an old and bitter split, so at least I'm not alone. Most of the time I defer to Marxists on economics and anarchists on politics, but I often succumb to disillusionment on the anarchist front and look back to Marxism, only to become disillusioned there and flop back to anarchism. So as you can see, I'm a bit of a basket case. :D
To put it visually, as inspired by a comment I read somewhere on this forum, if I list the four quadrants of the "Political Compass" in order of my ultimate preference (I've renamed the axes to better make my point):
1. Stateless-Socialism
2. State-Socialism
3. State-Capitalism
4. Stateless-Capitalism
It may appear that I'm more Marxist than anarchist, in that I fear the State less than Capitalism, but I use "State" here to mean a democratic monopoly on force limited to the enforcement of the stated economic system. This is why I list State-Capitalism before Stateless-Capitalism, the latter being the ultimate expression of unfettered capitalist tyranny. At least with a state we have a cage between us and the tiger, as Chomsky put it, even though we're the ones inside the cage.
On the Socialist side, a democratic State limited to enforcing a collectivized economy doesn't sound at all like a cage to me -- unless you consider the poor oppressed former-capitalists, but being forced to earn your living rather than steal it isn't the sort of "punishment" that's going to cause me any guilt.
That latter point I think is where any possible reconciliation between Marxism and anarchism will lie: what's the difference between a state where everyone has a say in the things that affect them, versus that same society without a flag and a national anthem? Not a lot, that I can see. It seems to me sometimes that it's almost a matter of semantics that divides the two, but I'm neither eloquent nor educated enough to bridge the gap (and I don't suppose it's quite so simple, or it would've been done by now). Sometimes, though, I can almost feel the solution percolating away in my brain....
As to the suggested stuff:
- Where are you from, whats the leftist scene there like?
I actually have a favorite answer I sometimes give to the first part, but it pinpoints my location to a place with a low population, which might go against the recommendation not to get too personal, so I won't. I'll just say the US. The leftist scene here is depressingly limited. In fact I wouldn't say there is one at all, although there's always a "least right-wing" position to agitate within, and I do what I can.
- What branch of leftism do you subscribe to?
Described above... sort of. It'll have to suffice!
- How did you become a leftist?
Somewhat uniquely, I think. You know the old chestnut attributed (mistakenly) to Churchill? "If you're not a socialist at 20, you have no heart; if you're still a socialist at 40, you have no brains." This suggests that most people naturally and gradually move rightward as they age. I moved in the other direction.
I started out apolitical, but I was basically sold on the capitalist propaganda that kids in the US are inculcated with. I grew up in an apolitical home so there was not even the potential for counters to the propaganda. I wasn't gung-ho about it, but I believed that capitalism represented freedom, because, hey, the US represents freedom! And the US is capitalist! Q.E.D.!
I also swallowed the bill of goods that said the Democratic Party is "socialist," and since that's the opposite of capitalism it must be the opposite of freedom! And the Republicans are the opposite of the Democrats, so the Republicans represent freedom! (Are you vomiting yet? I know, it's quite depressing. For those of you not familiar with the US, this is essentially the political situation. My history is not especially unique. What's doubly sad is that most of us never move beyond what I'm describing.)
As I became more political, I fell under the spell of "Libertarianism" (the false, right-wing variety, which hijacked the term from its leftist tradition and tainted it forever). This was only logical, since cultural conservatism is intolerable even in most of the US, so when you combine cultural freedom with economic "freedom" [sic], you get "Libertarianism"! (Again, this is, pathetically, the extent of the thinking of most US "Libertarians." It actually represents a fairly sophisticated position, as US politics goes.)
From there it flowed rather easily from right-"libertarianism" to left-(i.e., proper)-libertarianism: after steeping myself in "Founding Fathers" quotes (which go part-and-parcel with right-"Libertarianism"), a lightbulb began to flicker in my brain, where I caught glimpses of the irreconcilability of capitalism -- which was structurally similar to monarchism -- with all the flowery talk I was getting from those illustrious (slave-holding) "Fathers of Freedom." So the scales were lifted from my eyes and it was either seek the consistency of the left (participatory control over all spheres of life, political, social, AND economic), or that of the right (capitalism and monarchy).
I made my choice and the rest is (as yet unfinished) history. Once you begin to mistrust the mythology surrounding capitalism, you naturally seek comfort in the words of Marx, which are very comforting indeed. He hammered the nails in the coffin of capitalism for me. The last relevant point I should make (is this the longest introduction ever? I'm feeling self-conscious about it), is that I'd begun to get a taste of anarchism while a right-"libertarian," which of course means "anarcho"-capitalism, but I was never sold on it (not for the capitalism, which I was still down with, but for the statelessness, which I wasn't ready to throw down with yet). But once I started seeking anti-capitalist materials, I naturally found anarchism as well as Marxism. That, and the fact that Marxism is ultimately pushing for anarchy, which is what communism is, helped sell me on (proper, anti-capitalist) anarchism. And that's where I stand today, wavering between those two great schools of anti-capitalist thought.
Well, I hope that suffices as a general introduction to give you a basic picture of where I stand, comrades!
P.S. Kwisatz Haderach, I don't mean to gush, but you're my RevLeft hero (so far!). I wish to learn at your knee, my guru. :D
First I just want to say that I registered here because of Kwisatz Haderach; specifically, her/his posts in the "Anarcho-Capitalism and Anarcho-Communism are not entirely Mutually Exclusive" thread, among others. I was browsing the forum and got caught up in her/his (which does she/he prefer?) devastatingly lucid rebuttals of capitalist/Austrianite tripe (I live for such debates). I caught myself literally laughing out loud and clapping at times. Kwisatz Haderach says things that I'd say if I were as eloquent and obviously well-educated as she/he (seriously, I hate doing the gender-slash-thing, so I need that pronoun, please, if you're reading).
Anyway, as for me, I don't actually agree with Kwisatz Haderach on everything, from what I've gathered so far. The Christian thing isn't my thing, and I used to like to argue about such things, but finally concluded that I was tilting at windmills, since none of it can be proved any which way. To each their own, on that front at least.
More importantly though, I'm not yet sure where I stand regarding the state. I'm fervently anti-capitalist -- communist, actually -- but I'm constantly flip-flopping between Marxism and anarchism. I just can't seem to find a home on that front. But, that's an old and bitter split, so at least I'm not alone. Most of the time I defer to Marxists on economics and anarchists on politics, but I often succumb to disillusionment on the anarchist front and look back to Marxism, only to become disillusioned there and flop back to anarchism. So as you can see, I'm a bit of a basket case. :D
To put it visually, as inspired by a comment I read somewhere on this forum, if I list the four quadrants of the "Political Compass" in order of my ultimate preference (I've renamed the axes to better make my point):
1. Stateless-Socialism
2. State-Socialism
3. State-Capitalism
4. Stateless-Capitalism
It may appear that I'm more Marxist than anarchist, in that I fear the State less than Capitalism, but I use "State" here to mean a democratic monopoly on force limited to the enforcement of the stated economic system. This is why I list State-Capitalism before Stateless-Capitalism, the latter being the ultimate expression of unfettered capitalist tyranny. At least with a state we have a cage between us and the tiger, as Chomsky put it, even though we're the ones inside the cage.
On the Socialist side, a democratic State limited to enforcing a collectivized economy doesn't sound at all like a cage to me -- unless you consider the poor oppressed former-capitalists, but being forced to earn your living rather than steal it isn't the sort of "punishment" that's going to cause me any guilt.
That latter point I think is where any possible reconciliation between Marxism and anarchism will lie: what's the difference between a state where everyone has a say in the things that affect them, versus that same society without a flag and a national anthem? Not a lot, that I can see. It seems to me sometimes that it's almost a matter of semantics that divides the two, but I'm neither eloquent nor educated enough to bridge the gap (and I don't suppose it's quite so simple, or it would've been done by now). Sometimes, though, I can almost feel the solution percolating away in my brain....
As to the suggested stuff:
- Where are you from, whats the leftist scene there like?
I actually have a favorite answer I sometimes give to the first part, but it pinpoints my location to a place with a low population, which might go against the recommendation not to get too personal, so I won't. I'll just say the US. The leftist scene here is depressingly limited. In fact I wouldn't say there is one at all, although there's always a "least right-wing" position to agitate within, and I do what I can.
- What branch of leftism do you subscribe to?
Described above... sort of. It'll have to suffice!
- How did you become a leftist?
Somewhat uniquely, I think. You know the old chestnut attributed (mistakenly) to Churchill? "If you're not a socialist at 20, you have no heart; if you're still a socialist at 40, you have no brains." This suggests that most people naturally and gradually move rightward as they age. I moved in the other direction.
I started out apolitical, but I was basically sold on the capitalist propaganda that kids in the US are inculcated with. I grew up in an apolitical home so there was not even the potential for counters to the propaganda. I wasn't gung-ho about it, but I believed that capitalism represented freedom, because, hey, the US represents freedom! And the US is capitalist! Q.E.D.!
I also swallowed the bill of goods that said the Democratic Party is "socialist," and since that's the opposite of capitalism it must be the opposite of freedom! And the Republicans are the opposite of the Democrats, so the Republicans represent freedom! (Are you vomiting yet? I know, it's quite depressing. For those of you not familiar with the US, this is essentially the political situation. My history is not especially unique. What's doubly sad is that most of us never move beyond what I'm describing.)
As I became more political, I fell under the spell of "Libertarianism" (the false, right-wing variety, which hijacked the term from its leftist tradition and tainted it forever). This was only logical, since cultural conservatism is intolerable even in most of the US, so when you combine cultural freedom with economic "freedom" [sic], you get "Libertarianism"! (Again, this is, pathetically, the extent of the thinking of most US "Libertarians." It actually represents a fairly sophisticated position, as US politics goes.)
From there it flowed rather easily from right-"libertarianism" to left-(i.e., proper)-libertarianism: after steeping myself in "Founding Fathers" quotes (which go part-and-parcel with right-"Libertarianism"), a lightbulb began to flicker in my brain, where I caught glimpses of the irreconcilability of capitalism -- which was structurally similar to monarchism -- with all the flowery talk I was getting from those illustrious (slave-holding) "Fathers of Freedom." So the scales were lifted from my eyes and it was either seek the consistency of the left (participatory control over all spheres of life, political, social, AND economic), or that of the right (capitalism and monarchy).
I made my choice and the rest is (as yet unfinished) history. Once you begin to mistrust the mythology surrounding capitalism, you naturally seek comfort in the words of Marx, which are very comforting indeed. He hammered the nails in the coffin of capitalism for me. The last relevant point I should make (is this the longest introduction ever? I'm feeling self-conscious about it), is that I'd begun to get a taste of anarchism while a right-"libertarian," which of course means "anarcho"-capitalism, but I was never sold on it (not for the capitalism, which I was still down with, but for the statelessness, which I wasn't ready to throw down with yet). But once I started seeking anti-capitalist materials, I naturally found anarchism as well as Marxism. That, and the fact that Marxism is ultimately pushing for anarchy, which is what communism is, helped sell me on (proper, anti-capitalist) anarchism. And that's where I stand today, wavering between those two great schools of anti-capitalist thought.
Well, I hope that suffices as a general introduction to give you a basic picture of where I stand, comrades!
P.S. Kwisatz Haderach, I don't mean to gush, but you're my RevLeft hero (so far!). I wish to learn at your knee, my guru. :D