Pol Pot

[MarxistAlliance]

what do Rev Left users generally think of Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge?

[Pirate Utopian]

I want to make sweet love to Pol Pot.

[Prairie Fire]

Pol Pot was the glorious leader of the Khmer proletariat, who established a workers state in Democratic Kampuchea.

Now, with the inva$ion of Vi€tname$e r€a¢tionarie$ and and the backing of western imperiali$t power$, Kampuchea has been transformed into the imperiali$t possesion of KKKambodia.

The works of comrade Pol Pot and the declaration of year zero represent the highest advance towards communism of humynity, and armed with Pol Pot ideology, the glorious Khmer people will bring year zero to the world, and purge the world of the white Am€rikkkan imperiali$ts and their little eichman labour Aristokkkrat$.

Don't you agree?

[Raúl Duke]

Pol Pot was the glorious leader of the Khmer proletariat, who established a workers state in Democratic Kampuchea.

Now, with the inva$ion of Vi€tname$e r€a¢tionarie$ and and the backing of western imperiali$t power$, Kampuchea has been transformed into the imperiali$t possesion of KKKambodia.

The works of comrade Pol Pot and the declaration of year zero represent the highest advance towards communism of humynity, and armed with Pol Pot ideology, the glorious Khmer people will bring year zero to the world, and purge the world of the white Am€rikkkan imperiali$ts and their little eichman labour Aristokkkrat$.

Don't you agree?

:lol:

Be nice!

First, to the OP (you, MarxistAlliance), you post that kind of question in the learning section. This section is for the usual intros.

Hi, welcome to revleft.

Despite this, Most/Virtually all in this forum have a negative opinion on Pol Pot.

[LOLseph Stalin]

what do Rev Left users generally think of Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge?

Only thing that was even remotely left about him were his economics.

Anyway, welcome. :)

[RHIZOMES]

Only thing that was even remotely left about him were his economics.

Anyway, welcome. :)

keyword remotely

[Q]

lolwut

Welcome.

[Pogue]

Welcome to the boards

My view of Pol Pot is the same as my view of any mass murderer of ordinary people. I think if you look at what he did you don't really need to ask other people what our opnions of him are.

[F9]

Pol Pot was the glorious leader of the Khmer proletariat, who established a workers state in Democratic Kampuchea.

Now, with the inva$ion of Vi€tname$e r€a¢tionarie$ and and the backing of western imperiali$t power$, Kampuchea has been transformed into the imperiali$t possesion of KKKambodia.

The works of comrade Pol Pot and the declaration of year zero represent the highest advance towards communism of humynity, and armed with Pol Pot ideology, the glorious Khmer people will bring year zero to the world, and purge the world of the white Am€rikkkan imperiali$ts and their little eichman labour Aristokkkrat$.

Don't you agree?

I would like to see your reactions if someone did the same when a newbie came in and ask about stalin, or hoxha and someone answered in this attitude.

[scarletghoul]

Welcome.

I don't think we've ever had a member here who supports the Khmer Rouge as far as I remember. Pol Pot is something of an icon for some of us though, and though I dislike the Khmer Rouge's politics, I think a lot of people see it incorrectly, as a pure evil regime that wanted nothing but primitive fascism or whatever. In reality the situation is more complicated (and very interesting) and the picture for me is more of tragedy than evil

[Prairie Fire]

Fuserg9

I would like to see your reactions if someone did the same when a newbie came in and ask about stalin, or hoxha and someone answered in this attitude.

I wasn't making fun of Pol Pot/the Khmer Rouge, though. I was making fun of the newbie and what I percieved as the liberal undertones of his question (and the way that he phrased it).

Oddly enough, aside from the over the top MIMinese that I employed for that satirical post, some of what I said was historically true (re: the Vietnamese invasion, and the intereference of western capital in the situation. I suppose I could have commented more in depth about the current horrid state of things in Cambodia.).

Pol pot wasn't my target, and neither were his contemporary supporters; I was actually taking a stab at knee jerk liberal-prejudices against certain historical figures, that are based on the dominant bourgeois narrative of events and reject critical thinking (like Pogue's post, for example).

I'm not a supporter of Pol pot or the Khmer rouge (I do sympathize with the Khmer people's revolution, and reject the Lon Nol puppet government and the American military and political interference in Indochina). That said, I am still going to try and take a rational, historical, and Materialist outlook on the events in Democratic Kampuchea, as un-popular as it may be.

I'm not an apologist for every breath taken by the regime , just a critical thinker and a Marxist-Leninist.

Also, I despise liberalism, and this new persyn's post dripped with it. My inability to deal with new revleft posters and their vestigial traces of bourgeois ideology is why I generally stay out of 'Learning'.

Pogue


My view of Pol Pot is the same as my view of any mass murderer of ordinary people. I think if you look at what he did you don't really need to ask other people what our opnions of him are.


(sigh). As usual, Pogue types when he shouldn't.

Pogue, I know you're not a Maoist, and neither am I, but seriously take into consideration that "No investigation, no right to speak" adage.

Your post here shows total contempt for discussion and critical thinking. If we "look at what he did"? How? With a crystal ball, presumably?

All you know on the subject is what the mainstream historical sources (aka the dominant narrative of the bourgeoisie) tell you. That is hardly the equivilant of "looking" at the deeds of Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge.

I have heard all of the "killing fields", "OMFG genozide!!!" narrative, and in addition to that, I have also read MIM's polemic on Kampuchea (most of it consists of them trying to drive the point home that Pol Pot was not a Maoist, but some parts are still insightful historical commentary http://web.archive.org/web/20070820020037/www.etext.org/Politics/MIM/faq/polpot2.html), I have studied many of the written works and documents from the Khmer Rouge, via their contemporary supporters (http://geocities.com/groupstpp/), and I have watched interviews of Saloth Sar before he died, and viewed some of the only existing authentic film clips of the Khmer Rouge.

The archetype pictures of "piles of skulls" in cambodian museums is aepolitical. Remember, 600,000 Cambodian people were killed just in American bombing raids and excursions into Cambodia alone, before the Khmer Rouge took power. How difficult would it be for the present administration to produce a pile of skulls?

Again, I'm not completely denying all of the allegations against the Khmer rouge, but in my research, I have tried to reach a revolutionary stand point on the subject.

You, on the other hand,espouse a view that states that empirical reality is irrelevent to your disdain for this historical figure, as you have achieved all of the information you require on the subject just from stated death tolls (which are accumlated by far from impartial sources.).

Also, your inability to recognize (or, at least, take into account) Class divisions leads to clown tactics like your post on this thread.

"Mass murderer" is a word without class analysis, and without politics. I suppose the term "mass murder" could be used to describe any scenario where several people die, so every tragic genocide would fall under that definition, but so would every triumphant act of armed liberation by the exploited.

"Ordinary people" is another one of those class vague terms. What constitutes "ordinary people"? A WASP Nuclear family, with a white picket fence in front of their home?

There is nothing out of the ordinary about wage labour exploitation, on the contrary, it can be found everywhere that humyns reside.

Are the bourgeoisie "ordinary", then? There is nothing unusual about the way that they exploit, it is quite common.

In the world that I live in, there aren't any "ordinary people", just exploiters and
exploited, and the antagonistic struggle between the two in every sphere.

[Il Medico]

Welcome to revleft comrade.:thumbup1: I can see your introduction thread being turned into a debate between the Marxist-leninist crowd and everyone else, I think I should stay out of it. (I'd advise you to do the same, these can get nasty)

[LOLseph Stalin]

I can see your introduction thread being turned into a debate between the Marxist-leninist crowd and everyone else,

Not really. Most AR's don't even support Pol Pot. It would be more of a "which tendency thinks Pol Pot was worse?" kind of debate.

[Pogue]

Fuserg9


I wasn't making fun of Pol Pot/the Khmer Rouge, though. I was making fun of the newbie and what I percieved as the liberal undertones of his question (and the way that he phrased it).

Oddly enough, aside from the over the top MIMinese that I employed for that satirical post, some of what I said was historically true (re: the Vietnamese invasion, and the intereference of western capital in the situation. I suppose I could have commented more in depth about the current horrid state of things in Cambodia.).

Pol pot wasn't my target, and neither were his contemporary supporters; I was actually taking a stab at knee jerk liberal-prejudices against certain historical figures, that are based on the dominant bourgeois narrative of events and reject critical thinking (like Pogue's post, for example).

I'm not a supporter of Pol pot or the Khmer rouge (I do sympathize with the Khmer people's revolution, and reject the Lon Nol puppet government and the American military and political interference in Indochina). That said, I am still going to try and take a rational, historical, and Materialist outlook on the events in Democratic Kampuchea, as un-popular as it may be.

I'm not an apologist for every breath taken by the regime , just a critical thinker and a Marxist-Leninist.

Also, I despise liberalism, and this new persyn's post dripped with it. My inability to deal with new revleft posters and their vestigial traces of bourgeois ideology is why I generally stay out of 'Learning'.

Pogue


(sigh). As usual, Pogue types when he shouldn't.

Pogue, I know you're not a Maoist, and neither am I, but seriously take into consideration that "No investigation, no right to speak" adage.

Your post here shows total contempt for discussion and critical thinking. If we "look at what he did"? How? With a crystal ball, presumably?

All you know on the subject is what the mainstream historical sources (aka the dominant narrative of the bourgeoisie) tell you. That is hardly the equivilant of "looking" at the deeds of Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge.

I have heard all of the "killing fields", "OMFG genozide!!!" narrative, and in addition to that, I have also read MIM's polemic on Kampuchea (most of it consists of them trying to drive the point home that Pol Pot was not a Maoist, but some parts are still insightful historical commentary http://web.archive.org/web/20070820020037/www.etext.org/Politics/MIM/faq/polpot2.html), I have studied many of the written works and documents from the Khmer Rouge, via their contemporary supporters (http://geocities.com/groupstpp/), and I have watched interviews of Saloth Sar before he died, and viewed some of the only existing authentic film clips of the Khmer Rouge.

The archetype pictures of "piles of skulls" in cambodian museums is aepolitical. Remember, 600,000 Cambodian people were killed just in American bombing raids and excursions into Cambodia alone, before the Khmer Rouge took power. How difficult would it be for the present administration to produce a pile of skulls?

Again, I'm not completely denying all of the allegations against the Khmer rouge, but in my research, I have tried to reach a revolutionary stand point on the subject.

You, on the other hand,espouse a view that states that empirical reality is irrelevent to your disdain for this historical figure, as you have achieved all of the information you require on the subject just from stated death tolls (which are accumlated by far from impartial sources.).

Also, your inability to recognize (or, at least, take into account) Class divisions leads to clown tactics like your post on this thread.

"Mass murderer" is a word without class analysis, and without politics. I suppose the term "mass murder" could be used to describe any scenario where several people die, so every tragic genocide would fall under that definition, but so would every triumphant act of armed liberation by the exploited.

"Ordinary people" is another one of those class vague terms. What constitutes "ordinary people"? A WASP Nuclear family, with a white picket fence in front of their home?

There is nothing out of the ordinary about wage labour exploitation, on the contrary, it can be found everywhere that humyns reside.

Are the bourgeoisie "ordinary", then? There is nothing unusual about the way that they exploit, it is quite common.

In the world that I live in, there aren't any "ordinary people", just exploiters and
exploited, and the antagonistic struggle between the two in every sphere.

Wait, your actually criticising me for not liking Pol Pot? You are beyond a joke, I am sorry, but you are pathetic.

[Prairie Fire]

Literacy isn't your strong point, is it?

Those who can read may have noticed that in my above post, I specifically said
" ... I'm not a supporter of Pol pot or the Khmer rouge...."

My criticism of you was not that you were rejecting the Khmer Rouge, but the methodology, thought process and complete lack of class analysis that went into the position that you took.

Somehow, from my detailed post, you painted me as a Pol Pot apologist, and gave me the "you're pathetic" one-liner in place of a counter-argument, which is a tactic that I have become so acustomed to from capitalist forum posters who can't refute my points, but still want the last word in the argument.

Re-read my above post as necesary to comprehension, because you obviously didn't get it, and if you are going to make a criticism of my posts, actually criticize the content of my post rather than making up some ridiculous positions in your own head and then attributing them to me as the essence of my position.

[Pogue]

Literacy isn't your strong point, is it?

Those who can read may have noticed that in my above post, I specifically said
" ... I'm not a supporter of Pol pot or the Khmer rouge...."

My criticism of you was not that you were rejecting the Khmer Rouge, but the methodology, thought process and complete lack of class analysis that went into the position that you took.

Somehow, from my detailed post, you painted me as a Pol Pot apologist, and gave me the "you're pathetic" one-liner in place of an argument, which I have become so acustomed to from capitalist forum posters who can't refute my points, but want the last word in the argument.

Re-read my above post as necesary to comprehension, because you obviously didn't get it, and if you are going to make a criticism of my posts, actually criticize the content of my post rather than making up some ridiculous positions in your own head and then attributing them to me as the essence of my position.

Why does everything have to be a class analysis? I'd object to the mass murder of millions of people the way he did whoever did it and when. He was scum, I don't see the need to use a 'class analysis' to deduce this.

[scarletghoul]

It's not just a question of liking Pol Pot or not. To interpret it that way shows a complete ignorance. Practically no one "likes pol pot", but we should not juzt accept the bourgeois media's bullshit one sided propaganda about cambodia like certain members named pogue seem to do

[Pogue]

It's not just a question of liking Pol Pot or not. To interpret it that way shows a complete ignorance. Practically no one "likes pol pot", but we should not juzt accept the bourgeois media's bullshit one sided propaganda about cambodia like certain members named pogue seem to do

So if one sides propoganda is bourgeois does that mean pro-Pol Pot sources are proletarian?

[scarletghoul]

no it means youre a nob

[Pogue]

OK, enjoy being a Maoist in a first world country then.

[LOLseph Stalin]

OK, enjoy being a Maoist in a first world country then.

Just thought I would point out that there is more to Maoism than just Third worldism. However, since I'm not a Maoist I'll leave that up to them to talk about.

[Blackscare]

Welcome to revleft, prepare for such infantile bullshit in almost every thread you read. :/

It's not uncommon to see two people/trolls on the same side of an issue but still insist on fighting like cats and dogs over minutia, this is the left after all.

[Pogue]

Yes, this is the 'left', in all its Pol Pot apologising glory, and some people might wonder why working class people don't give a fuck about what you have to say.

[gorillafuck]

Pol Pot was a terrible leader, I don't care if the bourgeois also dislike him. I hate what his regime did.

[Hit The North]

Welcome to revleft comrade.:thumbup1: I can see your introduction thread being turned into a debate between the Marxist-leninist crowd and everyone else, I think I should stay out of it. (I'd advise you to do the same, these can get nasty)

What the fuck are you talking about? Anyone on this forum who seriously supports Pol Pot needs to be banned. He is a million miles away from the political traditions embraced by all the different strands of thought which contribute to Revleft.

Pol Pot murdered anyone with an education, marched everyone else back into the medieval shit of the Cambodian countryside and had the indecency to call himself a communist. Thank fuck for the Vietnamese army! It's a shame they didn't catch the pigfucker.


Originally posted by Scarletghoul
Pol Pot is something of an icon for some of us though
Wut??? He could only be an icon for primitivists, who are banned from Revleft, anyway, or deeply disturbed teenagers who's hatred for their teachers is giving them an itchy trigger-finger. Which one are you?

[rednordman]

Yes, this is the left, in all its Pol Pot apologising glory, and some people might wonder why working class people don't give a fuck about what we have to say.I know that this post has a bit of sarcasm in it, but surely, no-one tries to excuse what his regime did. Even the far-right consider him as nothing near a communist, i swear. Sadly you are not being sarcastic about the working class people not giving a fuck about what we have to say though, its really bad times unfortuanetly. Ironically this actually has nothing to do with pol-pot though.

[Pogue]

I know that this post has a bit of sarcasm in it, but surely, no-one tries to excuse what his regime did. Even the far-right consider him as nothing near a communist, i swear.

I edited my post to refer to Stalinist scum who do try to excuse what he did.

I agree, Hoxhaists/Stalinists are not communists.

[LOLseph Stalin]

Even the far-right consider him as nothing near a communist, i swear.

But there are many right-wingers who say Pol Pot is Communist though, in fact as communist as Stalin, Mao, Lenin, or Trotsky. It doesn't make much of a difference in their eyes if they see their own class interests being threatened.

[rednordman]

I edited my post to refer to Stalinist scum who do try to excuse what he did.

I agree, Hoxhaists/Stalinists are not communists.Yep, but are even Stalinists or Hoxhaists even excusing him? Pol Pot for me represented something that went beyond even the worst stalinism, imo. It was a total tragedy.

The KR originally were not the same party as the one that got power, that is for sure. One could sympathise with the one that fought for the revolution. What happened once they achieved victory, even god would get confused (sorry for using a theist phrase there).

Rumour has it that they even printed their own money for the new communist economy, and had plans on how to structure it to, but then reverted to what can only be compared to Nazi occupied countres.

Even after reading books about them, I cannot find an author who can explain what actually happened.

[Hit The North]

Wow, this is turning into a real "WTF?" thread.


Welcome to revleft, prepare for such infantile bullshit in almost every thread you read. :/

It's not uncommon to see two people/trolls on the same side of an issue but still insist on fighting like cats and dogs over minutia, this is the left after all.

It's neither infantile not a point of minutia to strongly object to any claim this mass-murderer has to being a part of out tradition.

On Revleft we stand for the liberation of mankind, not its enslavement to the whims and barbarities of dictators. This is fundamental.

There's a lot of intellectualising horseshit going on in this thread from people who should know better:


Originally posted by Prairie Fire
Also, I despise liberalism, and this new persyn's post dripped with it.Funnily enough I only like liberalism when it objects to the wilful and malicious murder of millions of human beings in the name of some fool's misguided utopia.

[rednordman]

But there are many right-wingers who say Pol Pot is Communist though, in fact as communist as Stalin, Mao, Lenin, or Trotsky. It doesn't make much of a difference in their eyes if they see their own class interests being threatened. Yes I know, but these people are just silly partisan idiots who literally do not know any other political way since they where born.

I was even reading a 'Daily Mail' review of 'Che' the movie, and loads of really, really daft people, who used the word 'rightious' alot, and said that all the attention should have gone to that stupid Tom Cruise movie, Valkryie (who they saw as a true patriotic hero, and familly man).

They said that 'Che' was the South American version of Pol Pot, in the waiting. And that he got killed in time to do any more wrong:rolleyes:!

[Blackscare]

It's neither infantile not a point of minutia to strongly object to any claim this mass-murderer has to being a part of out tradition.

On Revleft we stand for the liberation of mankind, not its enslavement to the whims and barbarities of dictators. This is fundamental.



This was my point; both sides deny that they support Pol Pot or that he is a leftist. One side is insisting on arguing for god knows what reason, I suppose because Pogue didn't take some circuitous route to the same conclusion he would have anyway, considering that Pol Pot was batshit.

[scarletghoul]

Urgh, you totally miss point. your conclusion itself is incorrect. There is a huge differance between not supporting pol pot and dismissing him as insane

[scarletghoul]

Anyway, by saying that Pol Pot was a mass murderer who was responsable for all the suffering in cambodia, you are subscribing to the Great Man Theory of History. And I think this is detrimental to our movement.

[Pogue]

Anyway, by saying that Pol Pot was a mass murderer who was responsable for all the suffering in cambodia, you are subscribing to the Great Man Theory of History. And I think this is detrimental to our movement.

I'm sorry but being accused of subscribing to the great man theory of history by someone who is a self declared 'Marxist-Leninist-Maoist' is hilarious.

[Hit The North]

Anyway, by saying that Pol Pot was a mass murderer who was responsable for all the suffering in cambodia, you are subscribing to the Great Man Theory of History. And I think this is detrimental to our movement.

I get your point. But are you suggesting that Pol Pot was not the chief architect and executor of the Khmer Rouge regime? Granted, he stood at the head of a movement and this movement came to power due to the genocidal actions of Uncle Sam. Nevertheless, we cannot wish away the dirty fingerprints of human intention. Pol Pot was in full control of his actions, and in the liquidation of the middle class and the emptying out of the cities, and the destruction of means of production, and the turning away from technology, and the systematic attempt to strip people back to their bare essentials, Pol Pot had no apology to the end of his life.

This is not an exercise in abstract theorising around agency-structure dichotomies. Sure we can reduce it to that. We can turn it into another narrative about the evil empire of imperialism; or an exercise in unmasking bourgeois propaganda. But at the root of it, as Pogue has so rightly insisted in this thread, is a human tragedy - the direct opposite of what we work for. If you can't see to the bottom of this essential fact, then you lack the compassion necessary for a revolutionary disposition.

And if you require a 'class analysis', Pol Pot was the perpetrator of some of the greatest crimes against the world proletariat in the past century. Not only did he unapologetically oversee the murder of a million of his own people, he also polluted our cause by stealing our rhetoric and our symbols. This is why it is so essential that we distance ourselves from his ugly shadow. To not do so is even more detrimental to our movement.

[Vargha Poralli]

Anyway, by saying that Pol Pot was a mass murderer who was responsable for all the suffering in cambodia, you are subscribing to the Great Man Theory of History. And I think this is detrimental to our movement.

Hilarious.

If you wanted a material understanding of the reactionary genocide of Polpot then you have to look at for which class's interest he served for. He served for an petty bourgeoisie Utopian sect under which both the working class and the peasantry suffered.

Funny enough his regime is also supported by the US and its client states(Thailand and South Korea) against the Communist Vietnam. Even after his regime was ousted by th Vietnamese Army US,China and UN continued to recognise his govt as the legitimate government.

Of course it is not strange for Maoists to support this ultra reactionary. After all they have supported the reactionary mujhadeen's along with US in Afghanistan.

This post has link to some 12 thread in this forum with regards to Pol Pot (http://www.revleft.org/vb/showpost.php?p=959983&postcount=1)

[Vargha Poralli]

this movement came to power due to the genocidal actions of Uncle Sam.

Actually Khmer Rouge was supported by US and its SE Asian client states against Vietnam.

[Revy]

Pol Pot was a brutal dictator with a primitivist streak. He was a Stalinist when he was younger and studying in France. As for his early life, he grew up in a well-off farming family with social connections to royalty.

[LOLseph Stalin]

Pol Pot was a brutal dictator with a primitivist streak. He was a Stalinist when he was younger and studying in France. As for his early life, he grew up in a well-off farming family with social connections to royalty.

Well to be fair you can't really take the piss out of him for being a Stalinist as a young man. During Stalin's regime and even after most Communist parties were supported by Moscow thus were expected to follow their views. Besides, most Communists during that time supported Stalin anyway. However, it's the primitivism that causes problems for alot of people. You can't have worker's control of the economy when you don't have industrialization. One could argue that he wasn't trying to build a Communist society at all.

[Revy]

Well to be fair you can't really take the piss out of him for being a Stalinist as a young man. During Stalin's regime and even after most Communist parties were supported by Moscow thus were expected to follow their views. Besides, most Communists during that time supported Stalin anyway. However, it's the primitivism that causes problems for alot of people. You can't have worker's control of the economy when you don't have industrialization. One could argue that he wasn't trying to build a Communist society at all.

Yes, but most Stalinists never got to be rulers of a regime.

You can't have workers' control of the economy with autocrats and bureaucrats in power. Industrialization does not automatically give you socialism, obviously, since the development of capitalism coincided with it. You have to have the democratic will of the working class and peasants assert itself.

You can't just reduce all the problems in Cambodia to its insane primitivism. Clearly, primitive societies were and are able to live without the same level of brutality. Certainly, the project there would have failed even if Pol Pot took on a more benevolent tone. But people wouldn't have been killed off every minute for whatever petty reason.

[LOLseph Stalin]

Yes, but most Stalinists never got to be rulers of a regime.

You can't have workers' control of the economy with autocrats and bureaucrats in power. Industrialization does not automatically give you socialism, obviously, since the development of capitalism coincided with it. You have to have the democratic will of the working class and peasants assert itself.

You can't just reduce all the problems in Cambodia to its insane primitivism. Clearly, primitive societies were and are able to live without the same level of brutality. Certainly, the project there would have failed even if Pol Pot took on a more benevolent tone. But people wouldn't have been killed off every minute for whatever petty reason.

Well Pol Pot wasn't really a bureaucrat, but he certainly wasn't a Socialist either. And no, industrialization of course doesn't automatically lead to Socialism, but it certainly helps. Of course there were early primitive societies that were communistic, but not in the modern Marxist sense which often tends to focus on industry. Pol Pot went against this aspect of Marxism and basically tried to reverse all advances in Cambodian society. Last time I checked Socialism was supposed to be something to improve society.

[Prairie Fire]

The Liberals seem to have breached the perimeter wall.

Pogue

Why does everything have to be a class analysis? I'd object to the mass murder of millions of people the way he did whoever did it and when. He was scum, I don't see the need to use a 'class analysis' to deduce this.

Bob the builder

Thank fuck for the Vietnamese army! It's a shame they didn't catch the pigfucker.


Funnily enough I only like liberalism when it objects to the wilful and malicious murder of millions of human beings in the name of some fool's misguided utopia.

Black scare

considering that Pol Pot was batshit.

Bob the builder

and in the liquidation of the middle class

"Middle class" is not a Marxist/socialist class analysis. The so called "middle class" is actually an amalgamation of classes, from the proletariat to the petty bourgeoisie to even some of the Lumpenproletariat.

The "Middle class" has no relations to the means of production, and encompasses many classes, so it is not a class at all, just a yardstick of bourgeois economic analysis.

Stencil

Pol Pot was a brutal dictator


But people wouldn't have been killed off every minute for whatever petty reason.


Okay...

I'll start with Pogue, because he is just not getting it.

Let's start with this:

Pogue

Why does everything have to be a class analysis?

When you wrote this, I kind of smirked a bit. I didn't think I needed to reply, because I thought you had just discredited yourself more thoroughly than I could. Really, for someone on a revolutionary left forum to say "why does everything have to be class analysis?"

Not only was he not met with laughter/restriction, some posters thanked his total rejection of a materialist class war outlook on social phenomenon.
Ugh...revleft.

The short answer to pogue's rhetorical question is because all social phenomenon is a manifestation of class struggle, so in order to understand something properly, everything requires class analysis.

Long answer:
In a world divided by class and class society, by the contradiction between exploiters and exploited, all social phenomanon is generally a manifestation of class struggle, of the struggle between the ideology and aspirations of the exploiters and those of the exploited.

If you try and view events "neutrally", without or above class analysis, then you will never come to a correct conclusion on any situation. You try and substitute the class struggle with superficial and subjective words (ie. "dictators" vs "ordinary people", rather than bourgeoisie vs Proletarians.) that don't properly identify the class contradictions at the root of the issue.

In a world divided by class, you can't simply be in favour of "people" as an absolute, of all of humynity, because humynity is not one cohesive whole(at this time). We are fractured into antagonistic warring classes, who can only achieve their own objectives at the expense of the other class.

No position that you take is neutral, as they either support the interests of one class or the other, of the bourgeoisie or the proletariat.

By continuing to insist on trying to view events, both past and present, without class analysis, you inevitibly continue to make liberal statements, and continue to fall into the default narrative of the bourgeoisie, and knowingly or un-knowingly, you support their political line on most issues.

I'm quite cetain that you will interpret what I just said in black and white, binary terms of "for or against" pol pot as a historical figure, but I have allready told you that this is not my point of contention that I take issue with.

I take issue with how you come to your conclusions, because if you reject a class-struggle view of history, and continue to use class-vague absolutes ( "people", "ordinary people", "mass murderer", etc) to try and explain events in 2-D terms, a revolutionary position on events will always elude you.

You continue to use a liberal method for coming to your conclusions, and henceforth all of your conclusions will not suprisingly be liberal.

I'm well aware that you probably have no idea what I'm on about, and you will probably invent an imaginary conversation in your own head where I defend pol pot (as you have been doing this entire thread), but if by chance you do have a spark of intellectual curiosity, you'll see that what I have written here is a constructive criticism, meant to be helpful rather than derogatory.




I'd object to the mass murder of millions of people the way he did whoever did it and when.


This ties into what I was talking about above. As a textbook example, this is a pretty basic liberal analysis of a situation.

In this analysis, there are no classes, only "people", divided along lines of morality rather than anything that can be materially substantiated.

There are some good people, some bad people, and who knows why any of them do what they do.

Killing, in this analysis, is an immoral taboo ,rather than the mechanism by which political power is taken and held. In this analysis, taking humyn life is seen as an abstract and irrational action (as I said, in liberal analysis there are no antagonistic classes engaged in struggle, so who knows why anyone does anything?), rather than the logical outcome of class contradictions and a paradigm of exploiters and exploited.

Because this analysis outright rejects class struggle as a motive force, and embraces metaphysical moralism as it's new basis, the conclusion that you come to is a cartoonish, Black and white "good people vs Bad people" polemic, where in the end you oppose "mass murder" in an absolute.

To me, a Marxist, this is why Class is so important, like I told you.
It is not the act itself, but which class it serves, as the act is a manifestation of asserting political power.

You may remember earlier that I said that the Americans killed 600,000 people in Cambodia during the war. When I said this, I was not making a class-neutral (as though such a thing exists) analysis, nor was I taking a moral stand against killing as an absolute.

I clearly understood which class intiated this action, and which class it served. In this case the killers are the American imperialists ( so, the American bourgeosie,), and the victims are Cambodians of a disproportionately exploited class background, many of which were revolutionary fighters, and most of which were most likely of the peasant class.

I am not opposing killing in a moralistic way here; had it been reversed, and had the Cambodians killed 600,000 American marines, not only would I not oppose this killing, but I would justify and favour it.

That isn't hypocrisy, that is class stuggle.

Now, before you mis-interpret, I'm not claiming that Pol Pot was the proletariat (as Vargha and stencil pointed out, he didn't come from that class) or represented their interests, nor am I claiming that everyone who was executed by the Khmer rouge was bourgeoisie (or represented their interests).

What I am saying is that you should have employed this method to come to your conclusions on Pol Pot. Because you did not, you came to conclusions that were built with metaphysical moralism and staunch rejection of class struggle as their basis, and henceforth it is not surprise that you return to the default political line of the bourgeoisie.

You use liberal methods of analysis, you will come to liberal conclusions.



He was scum, I don't see the need to use a 'class analysis' to deduce this.


Adding "scum" to your anti-materialist,anti-class struggle rant now, are you? By all means, don't feel like you need to elaborate on your emotional and simplistic positions.

And yes, you do need class analysis to come to revolutionary conclusions (see above).


So if one sides propoganda is bourgeois does that mean pro-Pol Pot sources are proletarian?

Again, your inability to break away from this "for" or "against" 2-dimensional view of Pol pot as a historical figure is impairing your ability to come to a rational or revolutionary conclusion on Democratic Kampuchea.



Yes, this is the 'left', in all its Pol Pot apologising glory,

When you are done arguing with weak fictional characters of your own creation, we can continue this.

No one here has taken a definitive "Pro- Pol Pot" stance, and your bullying attempt to try and corral the discussion within these perimeters is impeding understanding rather than facilitating it.

While no one has taken a definitive stand in "favour" (I have remained objective, and my research on Pol Pot has been diverse,) of the Khmer Rouge, you have taken a definitive stance "against" ,with no rational basis that you can provide except for a class vague death toll (you have yet to quote a specific number/estimate, but have aluded to "millions"), heavilly padded with bourgeois moral absolutes.



and some people might wonder why working class people don't give a fuck about what you have to say.


....Says the guy from the IWW. :rolleyes:

"We're workers, in a revolutionary union"

No,you're a niche-market club for anarcho-syndicalist university students

( I say anarcho-syndicalist; in reality, the lack of organizational discipline is such that theoretical and political consistency is practically impossible, but there is a common thread of juvenile petty bourgeois "leftism").



I edited my post to refer to Stalinist scum who do try to excuse what he did.


"Stalinist scum", like myself, have provided no excuses, nor endorsments for Democratic Kampuchea (in fact, I specifically denounced their theory and practice not long ago in a previous thread.).

What we have provided is a solid materialist outlook on the historical situation in Cambodia, in sharp contrast to your emotional, irrational, metaphysical parroting of the official version of events.


I agree, Hoxhaists/Stalinists are not communists.

Go ahead and divert the discussion into sectarian in-fighting, away from it's original purpose. Why not?

You can't defend your uninformed and anti-materialist point of view of the historical legacy of Kampuchea, so I suppose changing the subject is a viable option for you.

Blackscare:



Welcome to revleft, prepare for such infantile bullshit in almost every thread you read. :/


Erm, I thought that this was a theoretical forum, for discussion.

I've been here since 2006, and maybe I still don't "get" revleft.

I don't see anything "infantile" about arguing out our political positions. I was under the impression that this was the purpose of revleft .

Some of the reply posts have been infantile, perhaps, but other than my original satirical post, I have been keeping my posts political ever since a debate developed on this thread.


this is the left after all.

Props for repeating a lazy, "Monty python-esque" ( the 'peoples front of Judea' gag) criticism of left sectarianism, that makes you seem like you are above it, rather than actively involved in it and propagating it.

Hammer and Pickle:


Pol Pot was a terrible leader, I don't care if the bourgeois also dislike him. I hate what his regime did.

Someone owes me damages for all of the notches and dents that I have put in my computer desk with the vigorous banging of my own head, everytime someone puts out a proudly ignorant post. Visa or Mastercard is fine.

As with the trend, Hammer and Pickle has decided to suspend critical thinking and intellectual curiosity that, if left un-checked, might have lead to research and learning.

I am going to go ahead and guess that Hammer and pickle is not Cambodian, so any information that he has on events there is anecdotal. Now, the same thing can be said for me, but at least I have done some deeper digging on the subject.

I think if this individual, or any others, actually had done some serious research, they would have a position on the issue that was longer than one or two sentences. :rolleyes:

Also, as per the general trend, class analysis is not necessary, and neither is elaborating on anything that you say. All points raised against the theory and practices of the Khmer rouge will be inferred in subtext, I suppose.


Bob the builder:


Anyone on this forum who seriously supports Pol Pot needs to be banned.

" Yer either Fer us or agin' us." Critical thinking is reactionary.

Instead of using administrative action to enforce your prejudices, maybe try developing a position on the subject that you could defend (preferably using materialist reasoning and class analysis as your starting point) ?

Just a thought.


He is a million miles away from the political traditions embraced by all the different strands of thought which contribute to Revleft.

Perhaps so, but I came to my conclusion on Pol Pot through research, investigation, and analyzing conflicting class interests in Democratic Kampuchea.

You, on the other hand, opted for the "emotional knee jerk reponse" approach.

As a socialist, you might want to work on phaseing that out.


Pol Pot murdered anyone with an education, marched everyone else back into the medieval shit of the Cambodian countryside and had the indecency to call himself a communist.

Finally, some specific references to historical events.

First of all, anyone educated in a country like Cambodia wasn't likely to come from working class heritage. Education was a privilege there, so the spheres of eductated tended to over-lap with the wealthy (ironically, Pol Pot himself is a prime example).

The rest of Cambodias peasant majority, on the other hand, tended to remain peasants for generations.

Second, why did they march into the countryside? You maintain, as liberal scholars do, that this was an aesthetic decision on the part of the Khmer rouge (and to some extent, Angkar later justified it theoretically).

However, other historians raise the the issue that the cities of Cambodia (especially Phnom Pehn,), were at risk of mass starvation, as 1/3 of the population of Cambodia had become refugees from previous American attacks, the cities were crowded, and the countryside (which had previously sustained them) was left idle and unproductive, or was devastated by air attacks.

At this time, Kampuchea emerged from the war as possibly the poorest nation in the world, according to some sources. For this reason, with the lack of capital, importing staple foods to stabilize the starvation until the crops were productive once more was out of the question (just look at the trouble Haiti is in today,in a similar predicament).

The Khmer rouge panicked, the cities were emptied, and agricultural production became the primary pre-occupation of the country. All of the film and literary sources that I have seen, regardless of political allegiance, all aknowledge that during the time period, the Khmer rouge was for the most part increasing the harvest, and stock piling it.

As I said, perhaps this is not another case of a "Crazy asian" dictator,making eccentric decrees based on whims.

As for that "indecency to call himself communist" thing, I'm too tired at this time of night to rehash my old polemic about how it is not communists (or even pretenders who claim that mantle) that tarnished the name of socialism; it is the bourgeoisie of all countries who tarnished the name of socialism.



Thank fuck for the Vietnamese army!


Yes, because as with other more contemporary imperialist powers that have entered countries to "liberate the people" from a despot, the Vietnamese military only went after the regime.:rolleyes:

In the back and forth border probings between Vietnam and Kampuchea, it wasn't uncommon for un-armed peasants and working people on both sides of the border to be killed by enemy skirmishers.

Several of those wonderful Cambodian working people, the ones who's deaths you find unacceptable, were killed in the Vietnamese invasion and subsequent occupation (to the tune of 90,000 losses, as of 1988).

You cheer for some forces that kill Cambodian working people, but not others?

I suppose that is one way to save people from being killed by despot: Kill them yourself.


It's a shame they didn't catch the pigfucker.


Yeah, it is a shame. It's a shame that Vietnamese political and economic hegemony in Indochina (over both neighbouring Laos and Cambodia) was robbed of their "Saddam" to hang, to make their invasion and occupation complete.


Wut??? He could only be an icon for primitivists, who are banned from Revleft, anyway, or deeply disturbed teenagers who's hatred for their teachers is giving them an itchy trigger-finger. Which one are you?

Bullying for compliance, caricatures of any percieved dissenters, and the discussion gets lost in the process.


...this mass-murderer ...

I'm not sure if you got that phrase from pogue, but again, you are using liberal, class- vague terminology.



On Revleft we stand for the liberation of mankind


Again, see my posts above. "Mankind" (humyn-kind, would probably be better, and I allready anticipate you making a big deal out of my spelling variant, because you can't counter my other points), or all of humynity, is not one un-divided whole, liberal.

Humynity is divided into classes in almost every corner of the globe, into exploiters and exploited.

To state that you are in favour of the liberation of "mankind"
glosses over and ignores the fact that a minority of the humyn species doesn't need, want or desire liberation. The people I speak of are the bourgeoisie, and why would they wish to be emancipated from a society in which they exercise control and their interests dominate?

You may say "well, obviously, I didn't mean them". Well, then, why did you say you are in favour of the liberation of "mankind", all of the humyn species, rather than just the exploited, oppressed, and otherwise wretched of the earth (which number in the billions)?

Karl Marx said "Workers of all countries, unite", not "humyns of all countries, unite" and with good reason. To say otherwise is to deny contradiction and oppression where it exists.

Maybe it was the wrong choice of words, but I'm just reminding you to keep class war on your mind, first and foremost.


not its enslavement to the whims and barbarities of dictators.

We have allready talked a bit about how, maybe, even the most notorious policies were not "whimsical". Incorrect perhaps, but I don't believe that those that hold political power, wether it be bourgeoisie or proletariat, do things without material basis, especially not large scale operations like evacuating the national capital city.

For better or for worse, the actions of the ruling class have a logic to them.


There's a lot of intellectualising horseshit going on in this thread from people who should know better:

We should know better than to exercise critical thinking? The correct course of action is to fall into ignorant lock-step, and gnash our teeth at all of those who are despised within the dominant narrative of bourgeois analysis?

Hoxha forbid we "intellectualize" our political positions. Impulsive, knee-jerk statments are good enough for you, they should be good enough for all of us, hmmm?


Funnily enough I only like liberalism when it objects to the wilful and malicious murder of millions of human beings in the name of some fool's misguided utopia.

I've allready covered all of this, mostly with pogue, some with you.

In this sentence:

1. You reject class analysis, in favour of the all encompassing, class-conciliationist advocacy of a supposedly united humynity.

2. You continue to deny that material conditions and empirical reality played a part in Khmer Rouge decisions, and continue to hold the line that these actions were still the "whims" of a leader

3. You take a moralistic, rather than class, outlook on taking humyn lives.

All of these points have been addressed and covered above.

It is not only that you agree with liberals under these circumstances; it is that you are a liberal.

So, next comes your grocery list of crimes:



and in the liquidation of the middle class

I allready talked about why "middle class" is un-scientific bullshit, a bourgeois economic marker rather than an actual "class".

What he liquidated were exploiters and those who lived on the labour of others.



and the emptying out of the cities,

We talked about this also.



and the destruction of means of production,

Ummm... I seem to recall that Kampuchea emerged from the American war in Indo-china as the most heavilly bombed country on the planet earth, with the United States dropping over 2,756,941 tonnes of bombs on Cambodia, on 113,716 different sites.

With 10% of the population dead as part of the war, the country-side scarred, and another 1/3 of the population turned into refugees , the productive forces of an allready un-industrialized country were either destroyed or left to idle un-productively.

Actually, the Khmer rouge,with Chinese help, did build some light industry in Kampuchea.



and the systematic attempt to strip people back to their bare essentials,

What non-essentials had not allready been stripped by the devastating war?

Millions of working people were starving, homeless and displaced when the Khmer Rouge came to power.

The only people in Kampuchea with any privilage were the same ones who always had it, and surely you are not a socialist who frowns on expropriating exploiters!

As I said before though, I'm not acquitting him of all allegations, nor advocating the Khmer Rouge as the best that Cambodia had to offer.

I'm just trying to get you to take a rational, materialist and class concious stand on events in Kampuchea, and I ask the same for others.


But at the root of it, as Pogue has so rightly insisted in this thread, is a human tragedy - the direct opposite of what we work for.

You don't think reactionary soldiers have families? Bourgeoisie exploiters?
Landlords, death-squad members, CIA agents.... Most of them probably have someone to cry over their casket.

Still, they fight to take and hold political power for the bourgeoisie. They stand in the way of political power and emancipation of the workers, of the proletariat, and other oppressed people.

Their deaths would be a tragedy to someone, I suppose, but the deaths and suffering existence of millions every day is not also a "humyn tragedy"?

As a necesary pre-condition to ending the suffering of the exploited people, there will be suffering on the part of the exploiters. "In order to put down the gun, it is necesary to take up the gun", right?

Your appeals to bourgeois moralism and emotion are trying in vain to trump sober materialist analysis of a class war situation, but not succeeding.


If you can't see to the bottom of this essential fact, then you lack the compassion necessary for a revolutionary disposition.


A revolutionary disposition doesn't require "compassion", in the anti-class struggle, bourgeois metaphysical way that you mean.

If you are a servant to irrational bourgeois moralism and your own emotions, and are willing to suspend scientific thinking and class analysis in slavish obedience to your own impulsivness, than you will find that a revolutionary disposition will elude you instead.


And if you require a 'class analysis', Pol Pot was the perpetrator of some of the greatest crimes against the world proletariat in the past century.

:lol:

Against the World proletariat!

My oh my, a leader of a tiny, impoverished country, doing that kind of damage.

Do tell.



Not only did he unapologetically oversee the murder of a million of his own people


The actual figures range from 75,000 to 150,000.

And what is this "his own people" shit? That smacks of nationalism, not socialism.


he also polluted our cause by stealing our rhetoric and our symbols.

I'm way too tired for the "(X) fucked up the name of socialism" non-argument at this time of night, although I briefly touched upon why that is wrong in this post.

I'm not being lazy, I've just tackeled that one too many times, and I'm a bit sick of repeating myself.

This is the monumental crime against the proletariat of the world?

In that case,everyone from the naz-bols to the NBPP, to the fucking yippies should be lined up at Nuremburg to stand trial for "crimes of symbol-appropriation against humynity".

A little too dramatic in that last sentence, maybe?


Prairie fire is really tired. sleepy time.

(Continued?)

[Dimentio]

Fuserg9


I wasn't making fun of Pol Pot/the Khmer Rouge, though. I was making fun of the newbie and what I percieved as the liberal undertones of his question (and the way that he phrased it).


Really, if you people were smart, you would probably even ditch the very colour red as a mean of expressing political sympathies. And to apologise for Pol Pot is probably the height of arrogance. It will not bring us any closer to a working class takeover of the resources.

While you might like Stalin and Pol Pot, don't tell the people that. If you really are a proponent for the working class, and the working class dislike Stalin and Pol Pot, then pretend to dislike them you too, just to not alienate potential support.

[Hit The North]

PF:

"Middle class" is not a Marxist/socialist class analysis. The so called "middle class" is actually an amalgamation of classes, from the proletariat to the petty bourgeoisie to even some of the Lumpenproletariat.No shit. Thanks for the ABC but you really shouldn't bother on my account.

Btw, after Pol Pot had finished, the middle class was none of the above, it was this:

http://www.genocides.eu/img/001_pre.jpg



What he liquidated were exploiters and those who lived on the labour of others.

School teachers?


I allready talked about why "middle class" is un-scientific bullshitAnd I've dealt with why your position is intellectual horse-shit. Ironic that you think the slaughter of other intellectuals is justifiable.


(Continued?)
No. I have neither the time not inclination to enter into a fruitless debate with a black-hearted Stalinist and apologist for genocide.

[bricolage]

Aint it beautiful when the anarchists and the trotskyists can find something to unite over!

This is why I always think we need to stick a conservative or a fascist or a (dare I say) Stalinist in the corner of intra-left arguments, just to remind us how similar we actually all are.

[Ismail]

Pol Pot didn't engage in "genocide," certainly not willingly. He was, if anything, incredibly racist towards the Vietnamese and promoted Cambodians as members of a superior race.

From http://www.aworldtowin.org/back_issues/1999-25/PolPot_eng25.htm:

Nonetheless, Democratic Kampuchea set out to face this threat in a reactionary manner. Phnom Penh radio broadcast an appeal to "purify our armed forces, our Party and the masses of people... in defence of Cambodian territory and the Cambodian race.... One of us must kill 30 Vietnamese... two million troops would be more than enough to fight the Vietnamese, because Vietnam has only 50 million inhabitants.... We need only two million troops to crush the 50 million Vietnamese, and we would still have six million people left. We must formulate our combat line in this manner, in order to win victory."That link is quite good for learning about Pol Pot. By no means is it a pro-Pol Pot read (which is fine by me because no one here is praising Pol Pot as a good Marxist), so anyone should be able to learn from it.

Also, Bob, you're pretty much just appealing to emotions. "Middle class you say? Well they turned into THIS! *Gruesome image*"

For some reason Hoxha praised the Vietnamese invasion of Kampuchea, I think mainly because China invaded Vietnam in response, and Hoxha condemned the Chinese invasion. Hoxha called Pol Pot a "fascist." Appealing to emotions isn't good, which is what you and (in this case) Hoxha did. The Vietnamese invaded for imperialist reasons, and the Chinese invaded Vietnam in response to defend their interests in Kampuchea.


Why does everything have to be a class analysis? I'd object to the mass murder of millions of people the way he did whoever did it and when. He was scum, I don't see the need to use a 'class analysis' to deduce this.Everything deserves a class analysis, that's how historical materialism works.

Pol Pot's beliefs were basically that Cambodia was too backwards to have its relations to the means of production and such become socialist in industrial matters, so he advocated "starting from scratch" from an agricultural basis, where it would allegedly be easier to build up socialist relations of production, then industrialization occurs after socialist relations are established in agriculture, etc. It's obviously a flawed theory, but Pol Pot wasn't really a primitivist in the sense that he hated industry or whatever. He just believed that having a simultaneous agricultural-industrial economy would not result in the construction of socialism. He was wrong and he clearly carried out things wrongly, as the link notes.

Here's a bunch of materials from Kampuchea which explain Pol Pot's views a bit: http://www.geocities.com/groupstpp/study.html

Most of it is boring, though the diary of Ieng Sary does show that the Khmer Rouge adhered to Mao's Three Worlds Theory and such. Also, a Kampuchean slogan: "Be committed to smashing hidden enemies burrowing inside—CIA and KGB agents!" So yeah, the Khmer Rouge had some Maoist influence.

[Wanted Man]

This was my point; both sides deny that they support Pol Pot or that he is a leftist. One side is insisting on arguing for god knows what reason, I suppose because Pogue didn't take some circuitous route to the same conclusion he would have anyway, considering that Pol Pot was batshit.
Yeah, I don't get it. I doubt that any actual supporters of the Khmer Rouge are going to emerge in this discussion. One would hope that none of them even exist on the left in the first place, but that's not entirely true either.

Several maoist groups were quick to declare solidarity with "Democratic Kampuchea" once it was founded, and continued to do so well after incontrovertible evidence of its "achievements" became known to the public, after which nobody could claim ignorance of them. Some still hold this position "internally".

Luckily for the rest of us, said regime no longer exists, so that these people (who also collected money for the Khmer Rouge) no longer have a subject for their horribly misguided over-identification with Brother #1.

Edit: I think Hoxha was pretty much on the money there, Ismail.

[Ismail]

Edit: I think Hoxha was pretty much on the money there, Ismail.Defending Vietnamese imperialism was a bad move. It's like defending an Iranian invasion of Afghanistan in 1997 or something because the Taliban led it.

[Il Medico]

What the fuck are you talking about? Anyone on this forum who seriously supports Pol Pot needs to be banned. He is a million miles away from the political traditions embraced by all the different strands of thought which contribute to Revleft.

Pol Pot murdered anyone with an education, marched everyone else back into the medieval shit of the Cambodian countryside and had the indecency to call himself a communist. Thank fuck for the Vietnamese army! It's a shame they didn't catch the pigfucker.

There are those here who support him and those who will defend him. These threads can get nasty and I was just saying I was going to stay out of it. But to clarify, I completely agree with you.
Love,
Captain Jack

[Pogue]

When you wrote this, I kind of smirked a bit. I didn't think I needed to reply, because I thought you had just discredited yourself more thoroughly than I could. Really, for someone on a revolutionary left forum to say "why does everything have to be class analysis?"

Not only was he not met with laughter/restriction, some posters thanked
his total rejection of a materialist class war outlook on social phenomenon.
Ugh...revleft.

The short answer to pogue's rhetorical question is because all social phenomenon is a manifestation of class struggle, so in order to understand something properly, everything requires class analysis.

Long answer:
In a world divided by class and class society, by the contradiction between exploiters and exploited, all social phenomanon is generally a manifestation of class struggle, of the struggle between the ideology and aspirations of the exploiters and those of the exploited.

If you try and view events "neutrally", without or above class analysis, then you will never come to a correct conclusion on any situation. You try and substitute the class struggle with superficial and subjective words (ie. "dictators" vs "ordinary people", rather than bourgeoisie vs Proletarians.) that don't properly identify the class contradictions at the root of the issue.

In a world divided by class, you can't simply be in favour of "people" as an absolute, of all of humynity, because humynity is not one cohesive whole(at this time). We are fractured into antagonistic warring classes, who can only achieve their own objectives at the expense of the other class.

No position that you take is neutral, as they either support the interests of one class or the other, of the bourgeoisie or the proletariat.

By continuing to insist on trying to view events, both past and present, without class analysis, you inevitibly continue to make liberal statements, and continue to fall into the default narrative of the bourgeoisie, and knowingly or un-knowingly, you support their political line on most issues.

I'm quite cetain that you will interpret what I just said in black and white, binary terms of "for or against" pol pot as a historical figure, but I have allready told you that this is not my point of contention that I take issue with.

I take issue with how you come to your conclusions, because if you reject a class-struggle view of history, and continue to use class-vague absolutes ( "people", "ordinary people", "mass murderer", etc) to try and explain events in 2-D terms, a revolutionary position on events will always elude you.

You continue to use a liberal method for coming to your conclusions, and henceforth all of your conclusions will not suprisingly be liberal.

I'm well aware that you probably have no idea what I'm on about, and you will probably invent an imaginary conversation in your head where I defend pol pot (as you have been doing this entire thread), but if by chance you do have a spark of intellectual cutiosity, you'll see that what I have written here is a constructive criticism, meant to be helpful rather than derogatory.

Before I was an anarchist I analysed people based on common sense. I do not think I need a class analysis to recognise someone was a mass murderer. For example, I think it is possible for a non class strugglist to deduce that Hitler was filth. Same goes for Pol Pot. You are talking rubbish usual for marxists who think that the only ttruth comes from their own analysis.

Some posters thanked me because they recognise I have a sound critique, i.e. that pol Pot was a nutty fuck. I do not want to use your pretentious Marxist analysis to try and excuse his behaviour. Dictators, psychos and mass mruderers exist and he was one of them. For you to say this is inaccurate because its not a 'class analysis' is pathetic. Pol Pot had nothing to do with communism, he was just another dictator who butchered ordinary people and the working class.

And please, if criticising someone who made people dig their own graves before ordering them to be beaten into them with the shovels they used is a 'liberal analysis' then I am a happy and comfortable liberal. Lucky for me its a common sense analysis shared by anyone who isn't into the cult of dictator worshipping freaks. If one deserves a restriction for opposing mass mruder then restrict away, sadly your pathetic calls will go unheeded in a CC full of people like you who don't defend the scum of the earth.


This ties into what I was talking about above. As a textbook example, this is a pretty basic liberal analysis of a situation.

In this analysis, there are no classes, only "people", divided along lines of morality rather than anything that can be materially substantiated.

There are some good people, some bad people, and who knows why any of them do what they do.

Killing, in this analysis, is an immoral taboo,rather than mechanism by which political power is taken and held. In this analysis, taking humyn life is seen as an abstract and irrational action (as I said, in liberal analysis there are no antagonistic classes engaged in struggle, so who knows why anyone does anything?), rather than the logical outcome of class contradictions and a paradigm of exploiters and exploited.

Because this analysis outright rejects class struggle as a motive force, and embraces metaphysical moralism as it's new basis, the conclusion that you come to is a cartoonish, Black and white "good people vs Bad people" polemic, where in the end you oppose "mass murder" in an absolute.

To me, a Marxist, this is why Class is so important, like I told you.
It is not the act itself, but which class it serves, as the act is a manifestation of asserting political power.

You may remember earlier that I said that the Americans killed 600,000 people in Cambodia during the war. When I said this, I was not making a class-neutral (as though such a thing exists) analysis, nor was I taking a moral stand against killing as an absolute.

I clearly understood which class intiated this action, and which class it served. In this case the killers are the American imperialists ( so, the American bourgeosie,), and the victims are Cambodians of a disproportionately exploited class background, many of which were revolutionary fighters, and most of which were most likely of the peasant class.

I am not opposing killing in a moralistic way here; had it been reversed, and had the Cambodians killed 600,000 American marines, not only would I not oppose this killing, but I would justify and favour it.

That isn't hypocrisy, that is class stuggle.

Now, before you mis-interpret, I'm not claiming that Pol Pot was the proletariat (as Vargha and stencil pointed out, he didn't come from that class) or represented their interests, nor am I claiming that everyone who was executed by the Khmer rouge was bourgeoisie (or represented their interests).

What I am saying is that you should have employed this method to come to your conclusions on Pol pot. Because you did not, you came to conclusions that were built with metaphysical moralism and staunch rejection of class struggle as their basis, and henceforth it is not surprise that you return to the default political line of the bourgeoisie.

You use liberal methods of analysis, you will come to liberal conclusions.

You are insane. Absolutely insane. What does that even mean? A liberal analysis? So what, as a communist, and as a human being, I can never conclude that someone responsible for the deaths of millions if scum because its 'not a class analysis'. Heres a class analysis - a member of a nations ruling class killed loads of members of the working, peasant and middle class. And it was totally brutal and unjustifiable. There is nothing controversial about this, and its only sick, sick people like yourself who think this is anything other than a correct analysis.


And yes, you do need class analysis to come to revolutionary conclusions (see above).


A revolutionary conclusion? I'm coming to a non psychotic Stalinist conclusion. Killing millions of people makes you scum. Its quite simple for people living in reality unlike you.

The rest of your post is the same veign of Stalinist analysis. I particularly lvoe your critique of the IWW. Ok, lets both go to a picket line, I'll talk about workers struggling together and you can talk about the Hoxhaist Union. What a fucking mess you tankies are. I remember when you made a thread cleberating your election to head of this group of sad cases. Its fun to celebrate virtual victories when one is not active in real life, isn't it?

You have nothing to offer the working class but justifications for the figures in history who have oppressed them the most. You Stalinists are not worth responding to, you are as bad as the fascists.

[The Ungovernable Farce]

The mighty people's wall of text will crush you, liberal revisionist!

[Ismail]

What a fucking mess you tankies are.In what way are you using that word? Because "fanatical pro-Soviet types who excuse imperialism" obviously doesn't apply, and Prairie Fire has always used the word against those who deserve it: Brezhnevites.


k, lets both go to a picket line, I'll talk about workers struggling together and you can talk about the Hoxhaist Union.In Ecuador the Hoxhaists have five seats (that they won in April of this year) and 4% of the electorate. In Mali they participate in the government. Just because someone is a Hoxhaist doesn't mean they go around speaking about Hoxha to everyone ever as their first lines to them. Hoxha is generally confined to theoretical discussions between party members, as he should be. Same with Stalin. Hoxha and Stalin upheld Marxism-Leninism, it is both Marxism and Leninism that workers need to understand.

http://www.mpd15.org.ec/

Those are the Ecuadorian Hoxhaists. Do they look like "tankies" to you?

[Pogue]

In what way are you using that word? Because "fanatical pro-Soviet types who excuse imperialism" obviously doesn't apply, and Prairie Fire has always used the word against those who deserve it: Brezhnevites.

In Ecuador the Hoxhaists have five seats (that they won in April of this year) and 4% of the electorate. In Mali they participate in the government. Just because someone is a Hoxhaist doesn't mean they go around speaking about Hoxha to everyone ever as their first lines to them. Hoxha is generally confined to theoretical discussions between party members, as he should be. Same with Stalin. Hoxha and Stalin upheld Marxism-Leninism, it is both Marxism and Leninism that workers need to understand.

http://www.mpd15.org.ec/

Those are the Ecuadorian Hoxhaists. Do they look like "tankies" to you?

I think someones ideology is defined by what they say and do, not what they look like. interesting to see these 'revolutionaries' joining the bourgeois government though.

Workers don't need to understand Leninism, its an anti-working class ideology, but thats another discussion.

[Ismail]

I think someones ideology is defined by what they say and do, not what they look like.Except you seem to be thinking that we all wave red flags with Stalin and Hoxha pasted onto them while shouting about the glory of Albania.


interesting to see these 'revolutionaries' joining the bourgeois government though.Their 10+ years of guerrilla warfare (through the Marxist-Leninist Communist Party of Ecuador) didn't succeed. Also, in Mali they overthrew the military government in a coalition in 1991. They operated clandestinely before that.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malian_Party_of_Labour

[Pogue]

Except you seem to be thinking that we all wave red flags with Stalin and Hoxha pasted onto them while shouting about the glory of Albania.

Their 10+ years of guerrilla warfare (through the Marxist-Leninist Communist Party of Ecuador) didn't succeed. Also, in Mali they overthrew the military government in a coalition in 1991. They operated clandestinely before that.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malian_Party_of_Labour

Yeh, so they sold out basically. It's not unusual for Marx-Leninists to betray the class, they spend most of their time doing it actually.

[Ismail]

Yeh, so they sold out basically. It's not unusual for Marx-Leninists to betray the class, they spend most of their time doing it actually.Would you agree that the Workers Party of Algeria (which is Trotskyist) and Lanka Sama Samaja Party (also Trotskyist, participates in government of Sri Lanka in a united front with the leading party) "sold out" too?

The MLCPE still advocates revolution and its 1999 Presidential candidate (Jaime Hurtado) for its electoral/governmental front (the Democratic People's Movement) was assassinated that same year, probably by the government. Not exactly selling out. Of course, for Anarchists and Left-Communists, "selling out" means participating in any way in the state, which as Lenin noted was ultra-leftist.

[Pogue]

Would you agree that the Workers Party of Algeria (which is Trotskyist) and Lanka Sama Samaja Party (also Trotskyist, participates in government of Sri Lanka in a united front with the leading party) "sold out" too?

The MLCPE still advocates revolution and its 1999 Presidential candidate (Jaime Hurtado) for its electoral/governmental front (the Democratic People's Movement) was assassinated that same year, probably by the government. Not exactly selling out. Of course, for Anarchists and Left-Communists, "selling out" means participating in any way in the state, which as Lenin noted was ultra-leftist.

I wouldn't say its always selling out. But I think how and why the Marx-Leninists do it is selling out yes.

[scarletghoul]

No. I have neither the time not inclination to enter into a fruitless debate with a black-hearted Stalinist and apologist for genocide.
Yes, we are all black-hearted stalinists with a thirst for human blood and hatred of humanity, who want nothing more than the mass murder of millions of people. We love Pol Pot and uphold him as a great socialist leader. After all, this is the only position left to take after rejecting the mainstream liberal narrative.
loool

[Pogue]

Shouldn't you be off encircling the cities with a peasant...

oh wait

[Bright Banana Beard]

Shouldn't you be off encircling the cities with a peasant...

oh wait
What, sidestepping again? Where does he said about peasant? Did your humor sense failed again? No wonder you're a liberal. You couldn't make a point beside saying STALINIST STALINIST OMG FUCKING EVIL STALINIST!

[Pogue]

What, sidestepping again? Where does he said about peasant? Did your humor sense failed again? No wonder you're a liberal. You couldn't make a point beside saying STALINIST STALINIST OMG FUCKING EVIL STALINIST!

I'm an anarcho-syndicalist actually, get it right.

[Ismail]

I wouldn't say its always selling out. But I think how and why the Marx-Leninists do it is selling out yes.The LSSP has enjoyed security within the Sri Lankan government for over 20 years. The MLCPE gets rocked by assassinations and still trains people to form militias and such because it only demobilized about 15 years ago. The Turkish Hoxhaists (the Party of Labour) have also been facing legal threats and unlike the MLCPE, the TDKP (Labour Party is their legal front) is illegal in Turkey. Most other Hoxhaist parties in Latin America have waged guerrilla warfare, such as in Brazil, Venezuela and Colombia. In Colombia some still engage in guerrilla warfare.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Labour_Party_%28Turkey%29
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Popular_Liberation_Army

Tell me how the MLCPE is "selling out" when the LSSP isn't? Not to mention the Worker's Party of Algeria (which as noted is Trotskyist), which is one of the few legal parties in Algeria that the government allowed to stand in elections and also, like the MPD (MLCPE electoral front), got 4% of the vote in latest elections.

Either both tendencies are "selling out" or you're being a hypocrite.

[Pogue]

Are you under some sort of idea that I am a Trotskyist?

[Ismail]

Are you under some sort of idea that I am a Trotskyist?No, you just seem to think that Marxist-Leninists parties in these situations are inherently more likely to "sell out" than Trotskyists, yet haven't offered any proof in light of what I've said.

[Wakizashi the Bolshevik]

I haven't thoroughly examined the Cambodjan situation, but I believe Pol Pot can't be called a true Communist.

[STJ]

Pol Pot was a madman and what he did is no way shape or form communism.We look to the future not the past like that crazy did.

[scarletghoul]

Liberal Trotskyists like pogue should be banned

[LOLseph Stalin]

Liberal Trotskyists like pogue should be banned

So apperently I'm a liberal now? :rolleyes: Hey, you did say "liberal Trotskyists".

[scarletghoul]

No I didnt say all trotskyists are liberals.

[Trystan]

He was basically a ****. There, I saved you all that reading.

[The Ungovernable Farce]

Liberal Trotskyists like pogue should be banned
Surely we should be rounded up and shot? If you're gonna be a Maoist, you should at least go all the way.

[Pol Pot]

Hello people, I am a newbie here... and I just saw this topic so I had to comment on it.

I have a positive opinion about Pol Pot, I myself am a moral nihilist to the bone and both my grandparents were in hardline leftist partisan guerillas fighting against italian fascists, croatian fundamentalist ustashas, serb chauvinist chetniks, and german nazis trying to destroy slavic peoples and subdue them to german production quotas and their "superior" classes (I got a bit carried away with this)... Anyhow I grew up in a very "left" enviroment that tought me to have hard and critical views about most subjects.

I am sorry for those people who had to die for revolution to keep going, :( but that was a huge and most radical social experiment that ever existed, I am really interested how would it all turn out. ALthough P.P. has a collosal stain over his name, I view him in the end more positive than negative.

About me, I am from Croatia, Balkan in Europe (ex-Yugoslavia) and I have 23 years, I am a college student and I hope to make a difference in world :)

Anyhow I am glad to be here, and I hope we will have fun reading each others posts and ranting about cons and thier BS. :thumbup:

[scarletghoul]

Welcome to the forums Pol Pot!

[Pol Pot]

Welcome to the forums Pol Pot!

Thanks :)

[Pogue]

No, you just seem to think that Marxist-Leninists parties in these situations are inherently more likely to "sell out" than Trotskyists, yet haven't offered any proof in light of what I've said.

I think trots are sell outs too

[scarletghoul]

Well trotskyists have never really led a successful revolution so they never had the chance to sell out in an important situation, unlike marxist-leninists who have led various revolutions and therefore had more opportunities to sell out.

[scarletghoul]

Surely we should be rounded up and shot? If you're gonna be a Maoist, you should at least go all the way. What do you base that on? Maoists are usually into criticism and self-criticism, or in the harshest cases sending people to work with the peasents n shit. Or maybe letting people get revenge and trial their former oppressors, which can result in popular executions. summary executions arnt really our thing

[OneNamedNameLess]

But didnt Pol Pot abolish money straight off the bat? If so, shouldn't he be glorified and given Godlike, eternal awesomeness, status like our comrade Kim Il Sung, our Dear Leader who fought against imperialism and founded the great Juche ideology?

[OneNamedNameLess]

But didnt Pol Pot abolish money straight off the bat? If so, shouldn't he be glorified and given Godlike, eternal awesomeness, status like our comrade Kim Il Sung, our Dear Leader who fought against imperialism and founded the great Juche ideology?

I digressed and admit that that post has nothing to do with the thread; I was just *****ing about Pol Pot sympathizers and DPRK supporters. Condemn me for derailing. Go on!

[scarletghoul]

Oh yeah he abolished money. Maybe thats why cambodia was so poor :lol:

[LOLseph Stalin]

I think trots are sell outs too

You think everybody is a sell out.


Oh yeah he abolished money. Maybe thats why cambodia was so poor http://www.revleft.com/vb/pol-pot-t113846/revleft/smilies2/laugh.gif

Haha, yep. We're supposed to wait for the communist stage for that. I guess Pol Pot wasn't very patient. :lol:

[Pogue]

You think everybody is a sell out.



Haha, yep. We're supposed to wait for the communist stage for that. I guess Pol Pot wasn't very patient. :lol:

I don't think left communists, anarcho-communists and any form of libertarian socialists are self outs.

[9]

Oy, this is a depressing thread.

[spiltteeth]

i feel this article clears up alot of misconceptions about cambodia. Enjoy.



New Cambodian Barnes & Noble

Will It Threaten Cambodia's Small Book Shops?

SIEM REAP, CAMBODIA—The paint is barely dry on the new Siem Reap Barnes & Noble, a gleaming, $6 million, 60,000-square-foot book store/coffeehouse that the American bookselling giant boasts is the finest in this rural village of 2,100. But already a serious question is being raised: Can the new bookstore—with its enormous selection, discount prices and chic espresso bar—peacefully co-exist with smaller, independently owned bookstores in the area?

Enlarge Image http://www.theonion.com/content/files/images/onion_news2304.article.jpg (http://javascript<b></b>:void(0);)

Store manager Amy Kleinert believes the answer is yes. "Barnes & Noble's presence will help local book sales," said Kleinert, who was previously regional manager for Barnes & Noble's Seattle-area stores. "Our store will stimulate an interest in reading, which can only be a good thing for all area book sellers."
Less optimistic is Tuel Cheng, a used-book dealer and small-press operator who was recently forced out of business. "Hun Sen's troops came in the night to burn my books and smashed my son's skull on the type racks," he said. "I ran and hid in the jungle. If they see me printing books again, they will torture me to death."
But for all the debate, the new Barnes & Noble has suffered from nothing so much as overcrowding. At the store's gala grand opening Monday, employees were pleasantly surprised to see thousands of Cambodians massed outside as early as 4 a.m. The instant the doors were unlocked, thousands of eager new customers charged through the doors to browse the latest best-sellers, check out CDs at the music section's 35 listening stations, and wash their clothes in the men's room urinals.
Open less than a week, the store is already drawing rave reviews from countless Cambodian book lovers. "There is good water here," said Lon Nai, a Batdambang-area farmer who journeyed 150 miles for the grand opening. "I can keep my pigs free of the sickness with this water."
"It is always the same temperature in here, not like the tent where my family lives in the jungle," said Pursat resident Chun Baro from a secluded spot deep within the bookstore's "Wellness And Nutrition" section. "I do not care if I am executed for being in a book store, as my father and three brothers were in 1979. I am cool and dry."
In addition to the low prices and friendly atmosphere, Baro praised the store's convenient hours, open until 10 p.m. weekdays and Saturday. "Nightfall is the worst time," he said. "That is when the death squads come out."
Speaking from Barnes & Noble's New York headquarters, John Day, company vice-president in charge of overseas expansion, said that Cambodia represents an outstanding new market for the book chain.
"Cambodia has all the signs of being a book-friendly country," Day said. "Did you know that only one Cambodian in 10,000 has a television set? That, to me, is the hallmark of a literate culture."
Day said that Barnes & Noble tends to do best in progressive, left-leaning cities like Berkeley, CA, and Austin, TX, qualities he sees in Cambodia. "They have that same sort of open-minded, hippie culture there—communes are very big in Cambodia."
Despite the company's enormous size, Barnes & Noble is very much committed to the communities in which it does business, Day said, and Siem Reap is no exception.
"The Cambodian government has established many exciting-sounding 're-education camps' where both intellectuals and everyday citizens can be sent at any time," Day said. "Well, we at Barnes & Noble have always supported re-education in America, and we intend to extend this policy to our new customers." For every hardcover book sold, Barnes & Noble will donate a dollar to the Cambodian government to help re-educate local children.
The store has also worked hard to be accessible to everyone, offering a ramp at the front entrance for its many legless customers.
"It's a helping hand, sure," Day said. "But we believe that a helping hand is just plain good business."
As at other Barnes & Nobles, the Siem Reap store has a Local Authors section, which is dominated by the political tracts of noted late-'70s writer Pol Pot.
"So far, there hasn't been a whole lot of customer traffic going through the section," assistant manager Ken Woodson said. "Perhaps we need to publicize it more. We've tried to get Pol in for a book signing, but we haven't been able to find him."
The community-centered approach is paying off: Shoppers have packed the store since opening day, taking advantage of Barnes & Noble's encouragement of casual browsing.
"This a friendly store," Woodson said. "Some places frown on what retailers call 'camping,' but we actually have a policy of putting comfy seats at the end of each aisle. They're very popular—I've seen entire families share one of our overstuffed sofas. Sometimes it seems like our regulars never leave."
So what books have been the biggest sellers at the new store? According to Woodson, most popular are 2,000-plus-page items, such as the Norton anthologies, the collected works of Proust, and the two-volume Riverside Shakespeare.
"I like this one," said Cheun Norresaprong of Phnom Penh, holding up David Foster Wallace's hefty, critically acclaimed novel Infinite Jest. "It will burn for hours, enabling me to cook life-giving grubs and twigs for my children."
Like Norresaprong, farmer Chira Samrong is also a voracious reader—and a serious lover of Tolstoi, to boot. Loading his ox cart with 54 copies of War And Peace, he said, "If I can obtain 200 of such books, I can build a house that will withstand the bullets of Hun Sen's guerrillas and Ranariddh's royalists. My wife was shot in the face last spring."
While Barnes & Noble officials would not comment on the possibility of additional Cambodian locations, store manager Kleinert foresees a bright future in the country.
"Everything about Cambodian bookselling has offered me an incredibly fresh challenge. It's wonderful to enter a market where your customer base has such a diversity of needs," Kleinert said. "The future holds bright promise. For Barnes & Noble in Cambodia, this truly is Year Zero."

[Ismail]

But didnt Pol Pot abolish money straight off the bat? If so, shouldn't he be glorified and given Godlike, eternal awesomeness, status like our comrade Kim Il Sung, our Dear Leader who fought against imperialism and founded the great Juche ideology?Both Kim (http://uk.geocities.com/juche007/taxabolition.html) and Hoxha abolished taxation, too. Pol Pot just decided to PUSH IT TO THE LIMMITTTTTTTTTT (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BhsTmiK7Q2M). Like true revolutionaries before him, he never sold out. He could have just let Kampuchea become a neo-colony of Vietnam (and thus be drawn into the Soviet sphere), or become a Dengist satellite of China, or just build some industry, but he went all "NEVAAAAAAAAAA" and acutely noted the rightist tendencies of every other Communist movement ever that got suckered into bourgeois means of production by refusing to abolish industrial development. In this way he blazed the trail of all subsequent ЯEVOLUTIONARY Communists throughout the modern world, who also condemn the selling out of the revolution, unmasking these sell outs by appearing as revolutionary and as awesome as humanly possible. "A state you say? Oh yeah? WELL FUCK YOU STALIANO-LENIMAOIST-TROTSKYIST, I'MMA PUSH IT TO THE LIMMITTSSSSSSSSSSSSAAAAAAAAAAGGGHDHSFHASHDADADAS!"

POLPOTISM FOR GLORY

[ls]

This whole thread is hilarious, sticky it!

[Hiero]

I hate this threads. These threads only serve as a sacrifical rititual where the most arrogant liberal leftists reiterate their commitement to bourgeosie concepts like human rights.

[Hit The North]

Alternately, these threads are hateful due to all the most arrogant and craven, black hearted Stalinists and other substitutionalists lining up to discredit our movement by asserting the right of the 'great leader' to sacrifice numberless human beings on the alter of their ambition.

I'd support the "bourgeois concept" of human rights over the dictator's concept of "historical necessity", any day.

[Pogue]

i feel this article clears up alot of misconceptions about cambodia. Enjoy.



New Cambodian Barnes & Noble

Will It Threaten Cambodia's Small Book Shops?

SIEM REAP, CAMBODIA—The paint is barely dry on the new Siem Reap Barnes & Noble, a gleaming, $6 million, 60,000-square-foot book store/coffeehouse that the American bookselling giant boasts is the finest in this rural village of 2,100. But already a serious question is being raised: Can the new bookstore—with its enormous selection, discount prices and chic espresso bar—peacefully co-exist with smaller, independently owned bookstores in the area?

Enlarge Image http://www.theonion.com/content/files/images/onion_news2304.article.jpg (http://javascript<b></b>:void(0);)

Store manager Amy Kleinert believes the answer is yes. "Barnes & Noble's presence will help local book sales," said Kleinert, who was previously regional manager for Barnes & Noble's Seattle-area stores. "Our store will stimulate an interest in reading, which can only be a good thing for all area book sellers."
Less optimistic is Tuel Cheng, a used-book dealer and small-press operator who was recently forced out of business. "Hun Sen's troops came in the night to burn my books and smashed my son's skull on the type racks," he said. "I ran and hid in the jungle. If they see me printing books again, they will torture me to death."
But for all the debate, the new Barnes & Noble has suffered from nothing so much as overcrowding. At the store's gala grand opening Monday, employees were pleasantly surprised to see thousands of Cambodians massed outside as early as 4 a.m. The instant the doors were unlocked, thousands of eager new customers charged through the doors to browse the latest best-sellers, check out CDs at the music section's 35 listening stations, and wash their clothes in the men's room urinals.
Open less than a week, the store is already drawing rave reviews from countless Cambodian book lovers. "There is good water here," said Lon Nai, a Batdambang-area farmer who journeyed 150 miles for the grand opening. "I can keep my pigs free of the sickness with this water."
"It is always the same temperature in here, not like the tent where my family lives in the jungle," said Pursat resident Chun Baro from a secluded spot deep within the bookstore's "Wellness And Nutrition" section. "I do not care if I am executed for being in a book store, as my father and three brothers were in 1979. I am cool and dry."
In addition to the low prices and friendly atmosphere, Baro praised the store's convenient hours, open until 10 p.m. weekdays and Saturday. "Nightfall is the worst time," he said. "That is when the death squads come out."
Speaking from Barnes & Noble's New York headquarters, John Day, company vice-president in charge of overseas expansion, said that Cambodia represents an outstanding new market for the book chain.
"Cambodia has all the signs of being a book-friendly country," Day said. "Did you know that only one Cambodian in 10,000 has a television set? That, to me, is the hallmark of a literate culture."
Day said that Barnes & Noble tends to do best in progressive, left-leaning cities like Berkeley, CA, and Austin, TX, qualities he sees in Cambodia. "They have that same sort of open-minded, hippie culture there—communes are very big in Cambodia."
Despite the company's enormous size, Barnes & Noble is very much committed to the communities in which it does business, Day said, and Siem Reap is no exception.
"The Cambodian government has established many exciting-sounding 're-education camps' where both intellectuals and everyday citizens can be sent at any time," Day said. "Well, we at Barnes & Noble have always supported re-education in America, and we intend to extend this policy to our new customers." For every hardcover book sold, Barnes & Noble will donate a dollar to the Cambodian government to help re-educate local children.
The store has also worked hard to be accessible to everyone, offering a ramp at the front entrance for its many legless customers.
"It's a helping hand, sure," Day said. "But we believe that a helping hand is just plain good business."
As at other Barnes & Nobles, the Siem Reap store has a Local Authors section, which is dominated by the political tracts of noted late-'70s writer Pol Pot.
"So far, there hasn't been a whole lot of customer traffic going through the section," assistant manager Ken Woodson said. "Perhaps we need to publicize it more. We've tried to get Pol in for a book signing, but we haven't been able to find him."
The community-centered approach is paying off: Shoppers have packed the store since opening day, taking advantage of Barnes & Noble's encouragement of casual browsing.
"This a friendly store," Woodson said. "Some places frown on what retailers call 'camping,' but we actually have a policy of putting comfy seats at the end of each aisle. They're very popular—I've seen entire families share one of our overstuffed sofas. Sometimes it seems like our regulars never leave."
So what books have been the biggest sellers at the new store? According to Woodson, most popular are 2,000-plus-page items, such as the Norton anthologies, the collected works of Proust, and the two-volume Riverside Shakespeare.
"I like this one," said Cheun Norresaprong of Phnom Penh, holding up David Foster Wallace's hefty, critically acclaimed novel Infinite Jest. "It will burn for hours, enabling me to cook life-giving grubs and twigs for my children."
Like Norresaprong, farmer Chira Samrong is also a voracious reader—and a serious lover of Tolstoi, to boot. Loading his ox cart with 54 copies of War And Peace, he said, "If I can obtain 200 of such books, I can build a house that will withstand the bullets of Hun Sen's guerrillas and Ranariddh's royalists. My wife was shot in the face last spring."
While Barnes & Noble officials would not comment on the possibility of additional Cambodian locations, store manager Kleinert foresees a bright future in the country.
"Everything about Cambodian bookselling has offered me an incredibly fresh challenge. It's wonderful to enter a market where your customer base has such a diversity of needs," Kleinert said. "The future holds bright promise. For Barnes & Noble in Cambodia, this truly is Year Zero."

this is comic genius, very clever idea

[Hiero]

Alternately, these threads are hateful due to all the most arrogant and craven, black hearted Stalinists and other substitutionalists lining up to discredit our movement by asserting the right of the 'great leader' to sacrifice numberless human beings on the alter of their ambition.

Who?

[Sarah Palin]

Pol Pot was a gangsta and y'all jealous of his madd skillz.

[The Ungovernable Farce]

Alternately, these threads are hateful due to all the most arrogant and craven, black hearted Stalinists and other substitutionalists lining up to discredit our movement by asserting the right of the 'great leader' to sacrifice numberless human beings on the alter of their ambition.

Imagine new people stumbling across threads like this one. "So, I don't really know what I'm in favour of, but the current system doesn't really seem to be working out for me, I think I'll check out what the alternatives are. This revleft site seems pretty informative..."
Five minutes later:
":blink: Holy shit. They actually think Pol Pot was good? That's it, I'm just gonna carry on voting for the lib dems."

[Janine Melnitz]

Imagine new people stumbling across threads like this one."So, I don't really know what I'm in favour of, but the current system doesn't really seem to be working out for me, I think I'll check out what the alternatives are. This revleft site seems pretty informative..."
Five minutes later:
":blink: Holy shit. They actually think Pol Pot was good? That's it, I'm just gonna carry on voting for the lib dems."
You mean posts like this one? The one you quoted? Because those are the only ones where the idea that "Pol Pot was good" is present in this thread (as a strawman). And yeah, I agree, that certainly will drive people away from the left, as will less-batshit forms of sectarianism.

Really, Bob, you're awesome most of the time; I didn't expect you to engage in the sort of willful illiteracy that's so rife on this board, certainly not for the purpose of stomping around and making the bold, daring claim that Pol Pot was a bad man. Jeeziz.

[Verix]

Pol pot had anybody who wore glasses killed because he thought wereing glasses made people smarter and before anybody whines thats it is just american propaganda POL POT WAS BACKED BY THE USA FUCKTARDS!!!!
but dont take my word for it ask the workers of cambodia themselves
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/9c/Choeungek2.JPG

[Janine Melnitz]

Good point, Verix, thanks

FFS RevLeft

[scarletghoul]

Funny, I don't see any glasses on those skulls.

Pwnd.

[spiltteeth]

Pol pot was a psychopath, regardless of what he spouted. He also lived as a Buddhist monk for a year, that doesn't mean he lived by Buddhist principles.

Real revolutionaries would eat him alive.
Pol Pot Pie

http://i971.photobucket.com/albums/ae191/spiltteeth/aaaj.jpg

[scarletghoul]

holy shit this is so my new wallpaper

[mel]

Pol pot had anybody who wore glasses killed because he thought wereing glasses made people smarter and before anybody whines thats it is just american propaganda POL POT WAS BACK BY THE USA FUCKTARDS!!!!
but dont take my word for it ask the workers of cambodia themselves

If this post is any indication, I think you would've been safe.

[Glenn Beck]

Both Kim (http://uk.geocities.com/juche007/taxabolition.html) and Hoxha abolished taxation, too. Pol Pot just decided to PUSH IT TO THE LIMMITTTTTTTTTT (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BhsTmiK7Q2M). Like true revolutionaries before him, he never sold out. He could have just let Kampuchea become a neo-colony of Vietnam (and thus be drawn into the Soviet sphere), or become a Dengist satellite of China, or just build some industry, but he went all "NEVAAAAAAAAAA" and acutely noted the rightist tendencies of every other Communist movement ever that got suckered into bourgeois means of production by refusing to abolish industrial development. In this way he blazed the trail of all subsequent ЯEVOLUTIONARY Communists throughout the modern world, who also condemn the selling out of the revolution, unmasking these sell outs by appearing as revolutionary and as awesome as humanly possible. "A state you say? Oh yeah? WELL FUCK YOU STALIANO-LENIMAOIST-TROTSKYIST, I'MMA PUSH IT TO THE LIMMITTSSSSSSSSSSSSAAAAAAAAAAGGGHDHSFHASHDADADAS!"

POLPOTISM FOR GLORY

POL POT WAS THE BEST AROUND (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Qae_TUTeGo&feature=related&fmt=18http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Qae_TUTeGo&feature=related&fmt=18)

[Hiero]

He also lived as a Buddhist monk for a year, that doesn't mean he lived by Buddhist principles.

What?
I am confused. I assume by you mention this you mean he is a reactionary cause he devoted time to a religion. However the last part is confusing, your saying that he didn't live by buddhist principles and this is bad too?

[spiltteeth]

What?
I am confused. I assume by you mention this you mean he is a reactionary cause he devoted time to a religion. However the last part is confusing, your saying that he didn't live by buddhist principles and this is bad too?


Oh no. I just meant Pol Pot may have said he was a revolutionary and a leftist, but his actions were purely dictatorial.
Likewise, he lived as Buddhist and claimed to be one and believe in peace and Buddha's eight fold path and not harming another creature etc but in reality he didn't believe in any of this, he didn't actually carry out Buddhist ideals (weather being a Buddhist is a good thing or bad)

[scarletghoul]

How do you know he didn't believe any of Buddha's teachings?

[Sarah Palin]

If this post is any indication, I think you would've been safe.

o snap.

[spiltteeth]

How do you know he didn't believe any of Buddha's teachings?

Well, alot of Pol Pot's thinking was, it seems to me, to be very Buddhist inspired, like seeing life as really a dream, comparing the suffering of masses of people to a people on stage who are really actors playing people who are suffering that simply forget its all fake so their suffering is an illusion, also he viewed people objectively, not from a human standpoint, ie outside 'the circumference of human meaning' (as Heidegger would put it) so that it didn't really matter how many died because life is Maya and it ultimately doesn't matter.
However, the Buddhism in Cambodia also has a strong moral aspect to it along with its philosophical views that stresses Buddha 10 precepts - such as not to kill. This moral dimension was ignored and ol' Pol Pot saw himself as transcending morality.

However, if you or anyone else knows a synpathetic bio or article on Pol Pot let me know, everything I've always read is horror, building his utopian vision on a mountain of corpses.

[Hiero]

Well, alot of Pol Pot's thinking was, it seems to me, to be very Buddhist inspired, like seeing life as really a dream, comparing the suffering of masses of people to a people on stage who are really actors playing people who are suffering that simply forget its all fake so their suffering is an illusion, also he viewed people objectively, not from a human standpoint, ie outside 'the circumference of human meaning' (as Heidegger would put it) so that it didn't really matter how many died because life is Maya and it ultimately doesn't matter.
However, the Buddhism in Cambodia also has a strong moral aspect to it along with its philosophical views that stresses Buddha 10 precepts - such as not to kill. This moral dimension was ignored and ol' Pol Pot saw himself as transcending morality.

However, if you or anyone else knows a synpathetic bio or article on Pol Pot let me know, everything I've always read is horror, building his utopian vision on a mountain of corpses.

But how did you know he thought that?

Pol Pot was just a vulagar peasant socialist.

[spiltteeth]

It's in his speeches

[Hiero]

It's in his speeches

Got any links?

[spiltteeth]

I actually read his speech, in all places, in a book by William F Buckley, but here is a link to some of his speeches http://padevat.info/2009/03/01/the-pol-pot-speech-part-two/

Also, comrade Bert was a member of his inner circle, so check out his stuff too,
http://i971.photobucket.com/albums/ae191/spiltteeth/pol.jpg

[robbo203]

Well, alot of Pol Pot's thinking was, it seems to me, to be very Buddhist inspired, like seeing life as really a dream, comparing the suffering of masses of people to a people on stage who are really actors playing people who are suffering that simply forget its all fake so their suffering is an illusion, also he viewed people objectively, not from a human standpoint, ie outside 'the circumference of human meaning' (as Heidegger would put it) so that it didn't really matter how many died because life is Maya and it ultimately doesn't matter.
However, the Buddhism in Cambodia also has a strong moral aspect to it along with its philosophical views that stresses Buddha 10 precepts - such as not to kill. This moral dimension was ignored and ol' Pol Pot saw himself as transcending morality.

However, if you or anyone else knows a synpathetic bio or article on Pol Pot let me know, everything I've always read is horror, building his utopian vision on a mountain of corpses.


An interesting observation. From what you seem to be saying Pol Pot's outlook was almost autistic in its anti-humanism. The problem is however not so much about what Pol Pot thought - I dont subscribe to the Great Man theory of history - but the material and social circumstances of Cambodian society at the time that inclined it towards the realisation of what was afterall a murderous and barbaric regime. Even today. some very ignorant individuals still cite Cambodia under the Khmer Rouge as an example of what might happen if you tried to establish a moneyless society. This was not even state capitalism - the usual outcome of so called "communist" revolutions - but a kind of pre-capitalist autocracy

[Pogue]

An interesting observation. From what you seem to be saying Pol Pot's outlook was almost autistic in its anti-humanism. The problem is however not so much about what Pol Pot thought - I dont subscribe to the Great Man theory of history - but the material and social circumstances of Cambodian society at the time that inclined it towards the realisation of what was afterall a murderous and barbaric regime. Even today. some very ignorant individuals still cite Cambodia under the Khmer Rouge as an example of what might happen if you tried to establish a moneyless society. This was not even state capitalism - the usual outcome of so called "communist" revolutions - but a kind of pre-capitalist autocracy

Sorry but how do material conditions force you to order millions of people to the countryside, where you make them dig there own graves before battering or shooting them into them?

Absolute Stalinist wankery. This magical 'material conditions' bullshit is the oft repeated justification for the crimes of authoritarian state capitalism - i.e. Leninism. I think you lot need to think a bit deeper why everytime your ideology has been practiced it has led to tyranny and the mass murder of innocents. Because its a shit ideology perhaps? Because your dictators, maybe, and stop me, before I blaspheme, too late, maybe its because your leaders are responsible for their own actions? I don't find it that hard ot believe that the new ruling class, masquerading as the leaders of the working class (and or peasants), under Lenin, Trotsky, Stalin, Pol Pot, Mao do tyrannical things to maintain or exercise power. Its what leaders do.

But of course, material conditions and all that, they completely rob individuals of the ability to not kill thousands of people.

[robbo203]

Sorry but how do material conditions force you to order millions of people to the countryside, where you make them dig there own graves before battering or shooting them into them?

Absolute Stalinist wankery. This magical 'material conditions' bullshit is the oft repeated justification for the crimes of authoritarian state capitalism - i.e. Leninism. I think you lot need to think a bit deeper why everytime your ideology has been practiced it has led to tyranny and the mass murder of innocents. Because its a shit ideology perhaps? Because your dictators, maybe, and stop me, before I blaspheme, too late, maybe its because your leaders are responsible for their own actions? I don't find it that hard ot believe that the new ruling class, masquerading as the leaders of the working class (and or peasants), under Lenin, Trotsky, Stalin, Pol Pot, Mao do tyrannical things to maintain or exercise power. Its what leaders do.

But of course, material conditions and all that, they completely rob individuals of the ability to not kill thousands of people.

Well, of course, I absolutely agree with you here and I would be horrified -not to say, mortified - if I thought you imagined for one second that what I was saying could ever be construed as a justification for the murderous brutality of the Pol Pot regime. The bottom line is we always have a choice.

What I was getting at was what were the circumstances that led the Cambodian people to embrace the Khmer Rouge. It is not to do with such bullshit ideas as the charismatic appeal of Pol Pot - that is just Great Man theory bunkum. So what was it then? There must have been some reason or reasons why the Cambodian people though obviously not in toto embraced the Khmer Rouge. Ideas dont spring out of thin air

Recognising that there might have been some reason for this is not at all the same thing as condoning or excusing what happened - or even implying the history is predetermined. This is not my view at all. History is a creative process to cite Castoriadis, in which ideas and material circumstances mutually impact upon and influence each other. Cambodia did not have to go the way it went but it went that way for some reason surely?

[milk]

But didnt Pol Pot abolish money straight off the bat? If so, shouldn't he be glorified and given Godlike, eternal awesomeness, status like our comrade Kim Il Sung, our Dear Leader who fought against imperialism and founded the great Juche ideology?

No they didn't. During the 1970-75 war, there had been some debate and agreement upon the introduction of a new currency in the 'liberated' areas of the country that the Communists (and Sihanoukists) had effective administrative control. They withdrew the Khmer Republic currency from these areas. As early as (I think) 1973, sample banknotes were sent from Peking to be inspected by the CPK central committee. The decision for using this new currency was put on hold until the war was over, but their own type of war communism, in these liberated areas, then formed the basis from which the path (or jump) to socialism would be made, and as we have seen was rolled out country-wide. Banknotes had been printed in China, sent down the Ho Chi Minh trail and used in two trial areas before their withdrawal in 1976, with the decision to do away with domestic markets and the use of money. Cooperatives (or villages put through a process of forced communalisation) were to be self-sufficient in their needs, and to provide a surplus for use by the central government, for the purposes of further development.

[milk]

Unfortunately, because of my post count I am unable to yet post links, but the poster splitteeth linked to my own blog, in post number 110 of this thread. My blog has a post entry in June which might be of some interest with regard to this topic of the Khmer Rouge, money, trade and development. It includes scans of a Khmer Rouge banknote. An earlier entry in the same month has another banknote scan.

[milk]

Sorry but how do material conditions force you to order millions of people to the countryside, where you make them dig there own graves before battering or shooting them into them?

Absolute Stalinist wankery. This magical 'material conditions' bullshit is the oft repeated justification for the crimes of authoritarian state capitalism - i.e. Leninism. I think you lot need to think a bit deeper why everytime your ideology has been practiced it has led to tyranny and the mass murder of innocents. Because its a shit ideology perhaps? Because your dictators, maybe, and stop me, before I blaspheme, too late, maybe its because your leaders are responsible for their own actions? I don't find it that hard ot believe that the new ruling class, masquerading as the leaders of the working class (and or peasants), under Lenin, Trotsky, Stalin, Pol Pot, Mao do tyrannical things to maintain or exercise power. Its what leaders do.

But of course, material conditions and all that, they completely rob individuals of the ability to not kill thousands of people.

The power for power's sake argument is rubbish. Even the Khmer Rouge, despite their having no qualms with using terror as a legitimate tool for mobilsiing the population and the elimination of those perceived as enemies, didn't foresee the magnitude of the disaster that awaited. That doesn't make them blameless, no, just they thought their path would take Cambodia along the path towards socialism, in a voluntarist Leninist-inspired context. Your post doesn't explain why there was a considerable amount of popular support for the Khmer Rouge, until their own policies began to alienate the very people the revolution had been carried out for, with their benefit (as silly as it sounds) over others in mind. If the Leninists, or quasi-Leninists got it very wrong in Cambodia, even if their revolution has been without historical precedent in that country (if you believe this volunatrism meant the overthrowing of a ruling elite with a whole strata led by a revolutionary vanguard born in war), then what other alternatives were there in the circumstances?