Joseph Stalin's Right Wing Leanings

[Misanthrope]

He was in no way a fascist.

[Raúl Duke]

He wasn't a fascist in any proper sense...
Although he might have had "right-wing ideas", some on the left have made certain claims to this direction...

I heard that under Stalin abortion was allegedly banned, etc.

[Manifesto]

He wasn't a fascist in any proper sense...
Although he might have had "right-wing ideas", some on the left have made certain claims to this direction...

I heard that under Stalin abortion was allegedly banned, etc.
And homosexuality was outlawed.

[Nolan]

Stalin fucked up big time on some things, but he was by no means a right-winger.

[gorillafuck]

And homosexuality was outlawed.
And before anyone says it like I've seen before, it was legalized under Lenin so the times having more backwards values isn't an excuse.

But yeah, he was definitely not a fascist. He had some right-wing social values. He wasn't a "right-winger", though.

[I Can Has Communism]

Stalin put the Soviet Union on the path to socialism by collectivizing agriculture and industrializing a backward economy. How is that "right-wing"? It was Trotsky who opposed the collectivization and thus should rightly be called right-wing. There may have been plenty of misdeeds under the bureaucracy, but Stalin's Soviet Union was the greatest example of a socialist country (and I don't mean that in a sarcastic sense).

[Vendetta]

Stalin's Soviet Union was the greatest example of a socialist country

Oh boy.

[The Ben G]

Stalin's Soviet Union was the greatest example of a socialist country

I can see a few things wrong with this one....

[Nolan]

I can see a few things wrong with this one....

That's right, Stalin ate babies while the mothers were forced to watch. Which is why he outlawed abortion. That was his primary food source.

[The Ben G]

That's right, Stalin ate babies while the mothers were forced to watch.

Ha ha ha!:laugh:

[Nolan]

Oh boy.

Cool argument bro :cool:

[Bright Banana Beard]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j9ScChTcCag

Glory to Stalin! :lol:

[punisa]

He was extremely authoritarian, but still a leftist.
This could come as a surprise, but many idolized him because of that.




Glory to Stalin! :lol:

Hooray ! :lol::lol:
We should glorify Stalin on a daily basis.
How can you not tremble with admiration in front of man that was actually made of steel. I think he actually was y'know.

Btw, this should be appropriate time and place to ask this..
regarding the available smiley faces: :trotski::marx::castro::che:

Umm, you notice some important face missing? Ahm, Khm.. (!!!)STEEL
Bad Revlfet, bad :lol:

[ArrowLance]

Of course 'the times' are not an excuse for outlawing this and that. Many (all, even) leftists had and still have their flaws. When we analyze what Stalin did for the advancement of socialism towards the end goal of communism we have to look at both what was done right, and what was done wrong.

But what is right and wrong in the even more specific context of the Soviet Union? We have to look at the rather poor situation that was not at all conducive to the advancement of socialism and democracy. There were large counter-revolutionary and reactionary groupings that could easily have exploited a more 'total and free' democracy had it been made available.

Unfortunately some poor organizational choices by those with influence eventually led to the reformists seizing control; and so that is my largest gripe. These are the flaws we must look out for in our own movements, although they will not be as much of a problem if revolution takes place in a more modern nation.

Russia and the other members of the U.S.S.R. had far from conducive class environments. Not only was the industry still much less modernized than other western nations, but peasants were still a very large class, and much of the territories of the Soviet Union were still largely agrarian. So besides the class conflicts between the bourgeoisie and its allies, and the proletarian class (including the peasantry), there was large conflict between the industrial and agrarian working classes.

Stalin and other members of influence obviously made mistakes handling this situation, no doubt, but by far Stalin was not a rightist. We can argue if corrective labour facilities, purges, 'cults' of personality, and other 'atrocities' were incorrect choices and then further if Stalin should be held accountable for them, but you can't call him anything other than a Communist.

He led the Soviet forces against the Fascist powers of Germany. He modernized his nation. He empowered his people. He uplifted the souls of the days leftists. He encouraged the disgruntled of other nations to claim what they deserved. He provided aid to the global revolutionary movement. And last, he left for all of us the legacy; we can be powerful, we can destroy our enemies. He was a Communist.

[Guerrilla]

The real reason why Stalin banned abortion and homosexuality was because he wanted to boost production and rebuild a labor force. He attempted to increase the Russian birthrate to make Russia a workers' state.

[FSL]

"Soviet Union during that time was the best example of a socialist state."
What are the arguments people have against this claim?

[Wanted Man]

What kind of "right-wing"? Right-wing as in bourgeois politics, like liberalism or conservatism? Or the right-wing of the Bolshevik party? (if anything, he was in the "centre")

[Rousedruminations]

No he didn't have any right wing policies, .. exactly .. wanted man

and i don't think he was a moderate, probably more left wing i would say...

[robbo203]

Stalin put the Soviet Union on the path to socialism by collectivizing agriculture and industrializing a backward economy. How is that "right-wing"? It was Trotsky who opposed the collectivization and thus should rightly be called right-wing. There may have been plenty of misdeeds under the bureaucracy, but Stalin's Soviet Union was the greatest example of a socialist country (and I don't mean that in a sarcastic sense).

Stalin's Soviet Union was perhaps the greatest example in history of what NOT to do to realise a socialist society. It was a disgustingly authoritarian anti-working class state capitalist regime presided over by a corrupt and extremely privileged red bourgeoisie that did untold harm to the cause of socialism. It never ceases to amaze me that the cult of Stalin still manages to attract the odd (very odd) neophyte even today. But the if the moonies can do it why not the stalinists I guess

[Kléber]

Stalin put the Soviet Union on the path to socialism by collectivizing agriculture and industrializing a backward economy. How is that "right-wing"? It was Trotsky who opposed the collectivization and thus should rightly be called right-wing.Actually it was Trotsky who initially advocated both collectivization and industrialization (the Five-Year Plan was initially a Left Opposition demand). Stalin opposed them at first, because he wished to keep the Right Opposition on his side against the Left Opposition, so Stalin seems like more of a right-opportunist to me. Trotsky never opposed collectivization, he opposed the fact that it was postponed until the absolute latest while the kulaks consolidated themselves, and then that it was carried out in a military bureaucratic fashion.


There may have been plenty of misdeeds under the bureaucracy, but Stalin's Soviet Union was the greatest example of a socialist country (and I don't mean that in a sarcastic sense).Stalin legitimized the rule of the bureaucracy by declaring "socialism" to exist in 1938 while wage differences between workers and high bureaucrats were still 1:10 or more and there was no democracy, a system which Lenin had in fact called as "state capitalism." Therefore revisionism started with Stalin and there has never been socialism.

[Chambered Word]

The real reason why Stalin banned abortion and homosexuality was because he wanted to boost production and rebuild a labor force.

Whether this was the real reason or not, it's a pretty stupid idea. Do you think all homosexuals would suddenly become straight if homosexuality was illegal? How many more people would be having children if abortion was outlawed?


He attempted to increase the Russian birthrate to make Russia a workers' state.

Because a fully industrlialized state gives more control to the workers than one where people have rights?

For the record, he would not be considered to be on the economic right, although I think the way he treated society was very rightist.

[ArrowLance]

The real reason why Stalin banned abortion and homosexuality was because he wanted to boost production and rebuild a labor force. He attempted to increase the Russian birthrate to make Russia a workers' state.

LOL! Great answer! However, it's ridiculously hard to believe without some quotation of him addressing the issue as such; even then it isn't an all absolving excuse.

[Guerrilla]

I don’t think Stalin was really against homosexuality or abortion, but because of the high death rates and people fleeing there needed to be more children so socialism wouldn’t be overthrown by other countries in the future. Banning abortion was one way to do this because abortion was very common back then, it was the major method of birth control because it was almost impossible to get contraceptives.

As for homosexuality, gay people would have to get a lot of children. And if it was still legal to be a homosexual then they wouldn’t feel the pressure to reproduce. Stalin did everything to increase the population of the USSR. He even gave women subsidies and medals who had many children.

So it’s pretty foolish just to say that he was a sexist homophobe. I wish there would have been another way but you have to consider that nazis and capitalists did everything to terrorize the country, so maybe there was no other way to maintain a strong USSR.

[Chambered Word]

I don’t think Stalin was really against homosexuality or abortion, but because of the high death rates and people fleeing there needed to be more children so socialism wouldn’t be overthrown by other countries in the future. Banning abortion was one way to do this because abortion was very common back then, it was the major method of birth control because it was almost impossible to get contraceptives.

Possibly, but does that excuse the act itself?


As for homosexuality, gay people would have to get a lot of children. And if it was still legal to be a homosexual then they wouldn’t feel the pressure to reproduce. Stalin did everything to increase the population of the USSR. He even gave women subsidies and medals who had many children.

Sorry, but they're homosexual. They wouldn't just switch back to being straight as soon as homosexuality is outlawed.


So it’s pretty foolish just to say that he was a sexist homophobe. I wish there would have been another way but you have to consider that nazis and capitalists did everything to terrorize the country, so maybe there was no other way to maintain a strong USSR.

'Oh look, those fascists and cappies are printing mean stories about us, we'd better curb our people's rights.' Sounds a little like something Bush would have done.

[ZeroNowhere]

Sorry, but they're homosexual. They wouldn't just switch back to being straight as soon as homosexuality is outlawed.Presumably what the poster was trying to get across was that if homosexuality were outlawed, homosexuals would be under more pressure to act heterosexual. Meaning, among other things, having sex with members of the opposite sex, children, etc.

[Guerrilla]

Possibly, but does that excuse the act itself?

The act to ban abortion? It maybe doesn't justify it, but it does explain it.


Sorry, but they're homosexual. They wouldn't just switch back to being straight as soon as homosexuality is outlawed.Of course they would still be homosexual, but because of the fear of being persecuted they needed to reproduce to make it look like they were straight.


'Oh look, those fascists and cappies are printing mean stories about us, we'd better curb our people's rights.' Sounds a little like something Bush would have done.I'm not talking about stories, I'm talking about terrorist attacks towards the USSR which made a lot of people die.

[Chambered Word]

I'm not talking about stories, I'm talking about terrorist attacks towards the USSR which made a lot of people die.

I don't think that would explain or be a justification for the matter.


Presumably what the poster was trying to get across was that if homosexuality were outlawed, homosexuals would be under more pressure to act heterosexual. Meaning, among other things, having sex with members of the opposite sex, children, etc.

Put it this way, if heterosexuals were suddenly being persecuted I wouldn't start having sex with men.

[FSL]

Actually it was Trotsky who initially advocated both collectivization and industrialization (the Five-Year Plan was initially a Left Opposition demand). Stalin opposed them at first, because he wished to keep the Right Opposition on his side against the Left Opposition, so Stalin seems like more of a right-opportunist to me. Trotsky never opposed collectivization, he opposed the fact that it was postponed until the absolute latest while the kulaks consolidated themselves, and then that it was carried out in a military bureaucratic fashion.

Stalin legitimized the rule of the bureaucracy by declaring "socialism" to exist in 1938 while wage differences between workers and high bureaucrats were still 1:10 or more and there was no democracy, a system which Lenin had in fact called as "state capitalism." Therefore revisionism started with Stalin and there has never been socialism.


If you start with false facts, you'll obviously end up with false conclusions.

[Guerrilla]

I don't think that would explain or be a justification for the matter.

Well, at the time it was one of the most progressive countries. If millions of people died because of right wing scum, would you deny it the right to keep existing? Sometimes you have to take a step backwards to take two steps forward.


Put it this way, if heterosexuals were suddenly being persecuted I wouldn't start having sex with men.That's your decision. I would do it though. And I'm sure a lot of homosexuals in the USSR did it too.

[Raúl Duke]

Put it this way, if heterosexuals were suddenly being persecuted I wouldn't start having sex with men.


That's your decision. I would do it though. And I'm sure a lot of homosexuals in the USSR did it too.

A lot, but probably not all...

Also, considering the population of homosexuals relative to the rest of the population (I've seen figures that they're like...10% or something?) among many countries...such a law ("banning homosexuality") for the effects of increasing population would have been irrelevant/worthless/stupid.

[Dragonsign]

Stalin was the biggest nutcase of them all, but in his younger days, he looked kinda hawt :P (before he got that awfull mustache)

I would say that he was neither left or right, just good old plain cracy :thumbup1:

[9]

Revleft discussion level reaches an all-time high.



Originally Posted by Guerrilla
The real reason why Stalin banned abortion and homosexuality was because he wanted to boost production and rebuild a labor force. He attempted to increase the Russian birthrate to make Russia a workers' state.So basically, to you, a high number of workers working hard = a workers state? And, as if that weren’t absurd enough, a viable means to this end, in your mind, is imposing reactionary laws which place sweeping restrictions specifically upon socially oppressed layers of the working class in order to ensure a larger pool of laborers to be exploite— er… I mean, to be liberated?

And then there is the question of why it would be necessary (let alone possible) for Stalin to “make a workers’ state” when the Russian workers, led by the most conscious and advanced among them, had done this for themselves – as only they could have done - a number of years before Stalin ever came to power.

So please enlighten me: how can one man “make a workers’ state”, and how can a workers’ state be ‘made’ at the expense of the working class?




Put it this way, if heterosexuals were suddenly being persecuted I wouldn't start having sex with men.
That's your decision. I would do it though. And I'm sure a lot of homosexuals in the USSR did it too. A lot, but probably not all...

Also, considering the population of homosexuals relative to the rest of the population (I've seen figures that they're like...10% or something?) among many countries...such a law ("banning homosexuality") for the effects of increasing population would have been irrelevant/worthless/stupid.

To be honest, it should really not be of any consequence whether prohibiting homosexuality truly did have some effect on the size of the population; there is no justification for it, and it is just one of countless indications that the working class was no longer fully running the show at that point.

[Mike Russell]

If you start with false facts, you'll obviously end up with false conclusions.

I was going to ask what the 'real' facts are then, But i already know you you truely believe trotsky and the rest of the bolsheviks where social-fascist that had to be put down like dogs to pave the way for the great union of 'socialist' states.

socialism in the ussr was passports, money, police, & no direct democracy over what was produced? bullshit.

But, before you start foaming at the mouth, understand that i not a utopian that thinks that they could have moved to socialism within the USSR. the revolution had to spread to the rest of the world. But, if stalin was such a great socialist militant leader, why did he set up the anglo-soviet trade union council and unite with the amsterdam 'international' instead of capitalizing on the pro-soviet pro commuinst mood of the workers throughout the world. the answer is because, if the revolution spread then that would have regenerated soviet democracy. if that happend, would people let the 'miltant' leaders of the TUC and of the Supreme Soviet control the struggle?

yes, stalin was such a great militant leader, forming pacts with hitler, uniting with the liberals in china. what a great man! he got rid of that right wing of the soviet union, who filled out the ranks of the bolsheviks. Had lenin been alive by 1927, he would have be shot by molotov himself.

[FSL]

I was going to ask what the 'real' facts are then,


Let's assume you did the right thing and did in fact ask.



Claim 1: Stalin legitimized the rule of the bureaucracy by declaring "socialism" to exist in 1938 while wage differences between workers and high bureaucrats were still 1:10 or more and there was no democracy, a system which Lenin had in fact called as "state capitalism." Therefore revisionism started with Stalin and there has never been socialism.

Products are distributed according to needs in communism. In socialism they are distributed according to work, so differences are bound to exist. Also, it wasn't bureaucrats that earnt the highest wages (neither then nor later) but specialists. Obviously, commisars earnt more money than the unexperienced, non-specialized worker.
Therefore when Stalin argues that the capitalist class has been eliminated in the USSR, he's correct. There exist a working class and small producers organized in collectives, none of which exploits the other.

Marx in "Critique of the Gotha Programme" where he adresses wrong views regarding socialism.



In spite of this advance, this equal right is still constantly stigmatized by a bourgeois limitation. The right of the producers is proportional to the labor they supply; the equality consists in the fact that measurement is made with an equal standard, labor.

But one man is superior to another physically, or mentally, and supplies more labor in the same time, or can labor for a longer time; and labor, to serve as a measure, must be defined by its duration or intensity, otherwise it ceases to be a standard of measurement. This equal right is an unequal right for unequal labor. It recognizes no class differences, because everyone is only a worker like everyone else; but it tacitly recognizes unequal individual endowment, and thus productive capacity, as a natural privilege. It is, therefore, a right of inequality, in its content, like every right. Right, by its very nature, can consist only in the application of an equal standard; but unequal individuals (and they would not be different individuals if they were not unequal) are measurable only by an equal standard insofar as they are brought under an equal point of view, are taken from one definite side only -- for instance, in the present case, are regarded only as workers and nothing more is seen in them, everything else being ignored. Further, one worker is married, another is not; one has more children than another, and so on and so forth. Thus, with an equal performance of labor, and hence an equal in the social consumption fund, one will in fact receive more than another, one will be richer than another, and so on. To avoid all these defects, right, instead of being equal, would have to be unequal. But these defects are inevitable in the first phase of communist society as it is when it has just emerged after prolonged birth pangs from capitalist society. Right can never be higher than the economic structure of society and its cultural development conditioned thereby.

Lenin described as state capitalism the very different from 1938 soviet economy of the early 20s. A step up from capitalism and a step before socialism, an economy where not the state but the petty bourgeoisie was the main danger.



Claim 2:Actually it was Trotsky who initially advocated both collectivization and industrialization (the Five-Year Plan was initially a Left Opposition demand). Stalin opposed them at first, because he wished to keep the Right Opposition on his side against the Left Opposition, so Stalin seems like more of a right-opportunist to me. Trotsky never opposed collectivization, he opposed the fact that it was postponed until the absolute latest while the kulaks consolidated themselves, and then that it was carried out in a military bureaucratic fashion.


The split with the left opposition did not happen on whether central planning is a good thing. It happened on whether the USSR should/could set forth and start building socialism.

Judging from what Kleber is saying here, Trotsky's answer on that is a definite "Yes!"
But then we have you say "i not (sic) a utopian that thinks that they could have moved to socialism within the USSR"

Here is what Trotsky had to say on the matter:



Is it true that the Opposition denies the possibility of building socialism in our country?
Answer: This accusation is false and it is based upon an erroneous formulation of the question itself. Decades are required to build socialism solely with our own forces in our backward country. To presuppose that in the course of such a long period of time capitalism will be maintained and will continue to develop in other countries while we are in the meantime building socialism is to deny the ties of world economy and of world politics and to fall into crude national narrow-mindedness. The building of socialism in our country is an integral part of the world proletarian revolution. The success of socialist construction in our country is inseparable from the success of the revolutionary movement in the entire world. The Opposition is profoundly convinced of the victory of socialism in our country not because our country can be torn free of world economy and world revolution but because the victory of the proletarian revolution is guaranteed the world over.
The shift from the proletarian line inevitably leads to national narrow-mindedness, to an underestimation of our dependence on world economy and the crude embellishment of the NEP.


Trotsky was accusing the majority of the party of "national narrow-mindedness". He considers building socialism in Russia a work that would take "decades". He says he's certain of the eventual success of socialism in Russia because he's certain of the success of socialism abroad. He purposely confuses the effort to build socialism with achieving socialism's final victory (which is of course only possible on a global scale). He considers it impossible for the country to be "torn free of world ecomomy".
In other words, while with one face he argues for the need to advance to socialism, to a planned industrialized economy, with his second he's saying that any effort to build socialism in the USSR can only happen as part of the global revolution. He at first threatens the Kulak only to "wink" at him a moment later.



An excellent reading on Trotsky is his much celebrated "The revolution betrayed" where one can find gems like



"Twenty-five million isolated peasant egoisms, which yesterday had been the sole motive force of agriculture– weak like an old farmer’s nag, but nevertheless forces – the bureaucracy tried to replace at one gesture by the commands of 2,000 collective farm administrative offices, lacking technical equipment, agronomic knowledge and the support of the peasants themselves"

and also



They could have, and should have, adopted tempos better corresponding to the material and moral resources of the country.
“Under favorable circumstances, internal and external,” wrote the émigré organ of the “Left Opposition” in 1930, “the material-technical conditions of agriculture can in the course of some 10 of 15 years be transformed to the bottom, and provide the productive basis for collectivization.”



This from the man who according to Kleber couldn't wait to deal with the Kulaks. So as you see I was fairly right when I said Kleber drew wrong conclusions based on wrong facts.

[Kléber]

Are you implying that I misrepresented Trotsky's opinion?

Trotsky never opposed collectivization, he opposed the fact that it was postponed until the absolute latest while the kulaks consolidated themselves, and then that it was carried out in a military bureaucratic fashion.
I fail to see how that contradicts it? Trotsky predicted an agricultural crisis years before it happened and wanted to avoid it by starting the collectivization program ASAP. The Soviet government did not go through mass collectivization until it was surprised by a massive food shortage in 1932. If you put Trotsky in charge right then, in 1932, sure, he probably couldn't have done much better. But it is ridiculous to suggest that the ruling clique at the time didn't know any better when it was their decision to ban Trotsky's justified warnings.


Lenin described as state capitalism the very different from 1938 soviet economy of the early 20s. A step up from capitalism and a step before socialism, an economy where not the state but the petty bourgeoisie was the main danger.Petty bourgeoisie? I think Nepmen had been purged by 1938.

That quote from the Critique of the Gotha Programme that you used is very inappropriate. Marx was arguing against absolute wage equality. He in no way defended capitalist wage differentials. Lenin thought 1:10 was a capitalist differential, in a 1918 meeting of the CEC he said "If we pay 2,000 ... that is state capitalism." http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1918/apr/29.htm

In 1938 the pay difference between workers and managers had not changed since Lenin called it capitalist. Managers still got as much as 2,000, sometimes more, and workers got 100-300. Those figures may not have been officially confirmed, but they are the only estimates I have seen and there is convincing documentation behind them. If there was transparent wage data (you would expect transparent data in a democratically run economy right?) then you should be able to disprove me. Elite commodities and services like dachas, limousines, schools, summer camps etc. that cost entire months of workers' pay were therefore only accessible to the elite. On top of that, special stores and restaurants existed, like the hated "Gastronom," that ordinary workers were not allowed to enter, shop or eat inside. Those stores were established under Stalin, not Khrushchev. Factories were no more democratically-run than they had been under Lenin. Society was even less democratic in 1938 since, while the Stalin Constitution had supposedly given universal suffrage and freedom to criticize the government, hundreds of thousands of people, many of them good Party members, were rounded up and shot from 1937-38 for often very minor criticisms of party policy. Minor things, or things that would actually make you a good, intelligent socialist, like having fought in Spain, or believing in evolution, could get you executed in 1937. So please explain how is that is democratic, and therefore socialist?


The split with the left opposition did not happen on whether central planning is a good thing. It happened on whether the USSR should/could set forth and start building socialism.If anyone, Stalin was the one who was against building socialism, because by declaring it to exist when it didn't really, his clique abandoned the work of constructing it. Stalin won a lot of popularity early on by bashing Trotsky's socialist five-year plan, and saying it would be like a peasant "buying a gramophone instead of a cow."

[Turinbaar]

After the invasion by Hitler, Joseph Stalin re-organized the Orthodox church as the state religion, and began a campaign of ultra-nationalism and anti-semitism, using euphemistic codewords like "cosmopolitan" and "doctor" in place of "jew" to illustrate a global conspiracy within the finance industry and the world of medicine. He had concentration camps built along the chinese boarder, where he planned to send all jews in the soviet union, after murdering all of the jewish doctors as accomplices in the conspiracy. Had he lived to carry it out, the world would have seen the Holocaust redux. Stalin was a Fascist, and is currently the hero of the Russian Neo-Nazi movement (the largest in the world).

[Dimentio]

I can see a few things wrong with this one....

Well, probably the geographically greatest example of a country of that time, but that part with socialism is debatable.

:lol:

[FSL]

Are you implying that I misrepresented Trotsky's opinion?

I fail to see how that contradicts it? Trotsky predicted an agricultural crisis years before it happened and wanted to avoid it by starting the collectivization program ASAP. The Soviet government did not go through mass collectivization until it was surprised by a massive food shortage in 1932. If you put Trotsky in charge right then, in 1932, sure, he probably couldn't have done much better. But it is ridiculous to suggest that the ruling clique at the time didn't know any better when it was their decision to ban Trotsky's justified warnings.


I'm implying you hardly know what that is, in the same way you hardly know what the collectivization is or when/why it happened.



Petty bourgeoisie? I think Nepmen had been purged by 1938.

That quote from the Critique of the Gotha Programme that you used is very inappropriate. Marx was arguing against absolute wage equality. He in no way defended capitalist wage differentials. Lenin thought 1:10 was a capitalist differential, in a 1918 meeting of the CEC he said "If we pay 2,000 ... that is state capitalism." http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1918/apr/29.htm



Yes, they had been purged by then. They were still around when Russia was state capitalist, which was when private property and the market in the shape of small owners and merchants were still around.

From the 11th party congress in 1922




First of all about state capitalism.
“State capitalism is capitalism,” said Preobrazhensky, “and that is the only way it can and should be interpreted.” I say that that is pure scholasticism. Up to now nobody could have written a book about this sort of capitalism, because this is the first time in human history that we see anything like it. All the more or less intelligible books about state capitalism that have appeared up to now were written under conditions and in a situation where state capitalism was capitalism. Now things are different; and neither Marx nor the Marxists could foresee this. We must not look to the past. When you write history, you will write it magnificently; but when you write a textbook, you will say: State capitalism is the most unexpected and absolutely unforeseen form of capitalism—for nobody could foresee that the proletariat would achieve power in one of the least developed countries, and would first try to organise large-scale production and distribution for the peasantry and then, finding that it could not cope with the task owing to the low standard of culture, would enlist the services of capitalism. Nobody ever foresaw this; but it is an incontrovertible fact.



From the same party congress again on remarks from Preobrazhensky



What a magnificent thing our Programme is, but how frightfully we garble it! How is that possible? Because some people read it word for word and line by line, and beyond that they will not look. They pick out a passage and say: “There was a controversy over this.” Some say that the line of the Workers’ Faculties and of the Communist local cells was correct, but the line of those who said: “Go easy, treat those specialists more carefully”, was wrong. True, the Communist cells are splendid and so are the Workers’ Faculties, but they are not infallible; they are not saints. . . .
Yes, the Communist cells are the representatives of our Party, and the Workers’ Faculties are the representatives of our class; but the fact that they make mistakes and that we must correct them is an elementary truism. How they are to be corrected I do not know, because I did not attend the meetings of the Central Committee at which this question was discussed. But I do know that the Workers’ Faculties and the Communist cells overdo things in the line they have taken against the professors.


It was therefore a necessity to improve the conditions for those who had a higher level of knowledge, or the state would just die, suffocating itself with its stubborness. I don't know what is a "right" wage differential in socialism, maybe you can tell us. But the conditions of the time were peculiar. In that regard they were still peculiar in 1938. Would a neurosurgeon be willing to work for 5 times the minimum wage? He would surely be much less willing to do so, when capitalist states provide more.


The rest seems mostly like written screaming.

[Mike Russell]

humm, i think i may have misunderstood your postions before.. I generally agree with your saying now (i think). hahah. Discussing over a forum is the worst way to communicate. some times misunderstand what people are trying to say.

But, Could you provide where lenins quote about state capitalism is? I know you said, "From the 11th party congress in 1922", but is that the title of the document?

Im going to try to find it in the "collected works".

comradely,
mike.

[Kléber]

Would a neurosurgeon be willing to work for 5 times the minimum wage? He would surely be much less willing to do so, when capitalist states provide more.Wow, you sound just like a right-wing libertarian. Why even reply to such an idiotic bourgeois-reminded remark?


It was therefore a necessity to improve the conditions for those who had a higher level of knowledgewhere did Lenin say dachas and limousines for "those who had a higher level of knowledge" is socialist? next time you quote Lenin make sure it actually applies to your point


or the state would just die, suffocating itself with its stubborness.Yes, that's what Trotsky wanted. The state to just sit around, pretend to build socialism in one country, but actually die in 1991 of its stubbornness. Turns out Trotsky was in charge the whole time. You are so smart man i owe you for teaching me the truth about Trotskyism.



I don't know what is a "right" wage differential in socialism, maybe you can tell us. But the conditions of the time were peculiar. In that regard they were still peculiar in 1938. You don't even care about rational argument.

Nobody said that the USSR could have established socialism by 1938. nobody said pay neurosurgeons the same as street sweepers. stop shoving fucking words in my mouth. 10:1 is not a natural differential for within the working class unless you are a dishonest cigar-puffing limo-driving dacha-owning bureaucrat, living the life of a western bourgeois at the expense of workers with no political freedom.

the question was WHETHER OR NOT THE USSR WAS EVER SOCIALIST. lenin was honest about this question, stalin was not.

[Old Man Diogenes]

And homosexuality was outlawed.

Really? I did not know this. Then again wasn't it outlawed in most countries at the time.

[Manifesto]

Really? I did not know this. Then again wasn't it outlawed in most countries at the time.
Yes but as BucketOfCows said


And before anyone says it like I've seen before, it was legalized under Lenin so the times having more backwards values isn't an excuse.

[Bright Banana Beard]

Yes but as BucketOfCows said

It is not a good thing. It will not be repeat again in another socialist state. This is a criticism that is shared across Stalinists, but understands it in historical context that homophobia was common than today. Nobody are saying that it is a correct position, but are trying to provide the content why it had happened.

[Jimmie Higgins]

Judging from what Kleber is saying here, Trotsky's answer on that is a definite "Yes!"
But then we have you say "i not (sic) a utopian that thinks that they could have moved to socialism within the USSR"


Originally Posted by Leon Trotsky
Is it true that the Opposition denies the possibility of building socialism in our country?
Answer: This accusation is false and it is based upon an erroneous formulation of the question itself. Decades are required to build socialism solely with our own forces in our backward country. To presuppose that in the course of such a long period of time capitalism will be maintained and will continue to develop in other countries while we are in the meantime building socialism is to deny the ties of world economy and of world politics and to fall into crude national narrow-mindedness. The building of socialism in our country is an integral part of the world proletarian revolution. The success of socialist construction in our country is inseparable from the success of the revolutionary movement in the entire world. The Opposition is profoundly convinced of the victory of socialism in our country not because our country can be torn free of world economy and world revolution but because the victory of the proletarian revolution is guaranteed the world over.
The shift from the proletarian line inevitably leads to national narrow-mindedness, to an underestimation of our dependence on world economy and the crude embellishment of the NEP.

I don't see this as a contradiction especially as the USSR in "building socialism in one country" eventually turned it's back on radical worker movements in other countries and argued for maintaining the cold-war balance of forces rather than risk war due to a worker uprising in a Western Bloc country.


The Opposition is profoundly convinced of the victory of socialism in our country not because our country can be torn free of world economy and world revolution but because the victory of the proletarian revolution is guaranteed the world over.This makes it pretty clear that Trotsky and the opposition were banking on revolutions elsewhere to make socialism fully possible but that in Russia, it was possible to "hold out" for workers in other regions to "catch up". Considering the strike waves, rise to power of democratic-socialists in some countries, worker rebellions, that happened in 1919 and the 1920s, I think it was a fair assumption that worker movements in other countries would follow the Russian worker's example.

[gorillafuck]

As for homosexuality, gay people would have to get a lot of children. And if it was still legal to be a homosexual then they wouldn’t feel the pressure to reproduce. Stalin did everything to increase the population of the USSR. He even gave women subsidies and medals who had many children.
So you're argument that he was not a sexist homophobe is that he thought women were human incubators, and he wanted societal norms to pressure homosexuals into having heterosexual sex...

[fatboy]

Hasnt every government or political theory had some sort of right wing leanings in them?

[FSL]

Wow, you sound just like a right-wing libertarian. Why even reply to such an idiotic bourgeois-reminded remark?

where did Lenin say dachas and limousines for "those who had a higher level of knowledge" is socialist? next time you quote Lenin make sure it actually applies to your point

Yes, that's what Trotsky wanted. The state to just sit around, pretend to build socialism in one country, but actually die in 1991 of its stubbornness. Turns out Trotsky was in charge the whole time. You are so smart man i owe you for teaching me the truth about Trotskyism.

You don't even care about rational argument.

Nobody said that the USSR could have established socialism by 1938. nobody said pay neurosurgeons the same as street sweepers. stop shoving fucking words in my mouth. 10:1 is not a natural differential for within the working class unless you are a dishonest cigar-puffing limo-driving dacha-owning bureaucrat, living the life of a western bourgeois at the expense of workers with no political freedom.

the question was WHETHER OR NOT THE USSR WAS EVER SOCIALIST. lenin was honest about this question, stalin was not.


You're tiring. Last time I checked no bourgeois got by making just 10 times the miminum wage. I have no idea how they managed to accumulate billions that way.
The USSR was in deed not socialist in 1921. It very much was a socialist proletarian state in 1940 when all exploiting classes had been done away with.
And it's not a right wing libertarian thing to actually try to see what can work in a revolution. If it is, then the whole party allowing private property in 1921 were way more libertarian than Thatcher.

[FSL]

Yes but as BucketOfCows said


BucketOfCows has also asked for a restriction on the very sound basis that he's a social democrat but instead of getting one, here he is condeming Stalin, the USSR and the general ruthlessness of evil commies.

[Manifesto]

BucketOfCows has also asked for a restriction on the very sound basis that he's a social democrat but instead of getting one, here he is condeming Stalin, the USSR and the general ruthlessness of evil commies.
What does that really have to do with anything?

[gorillafuck]

BucketOfCows has also asked for a restriction on the very sound basis that he's a social democrat but instead of getting one, here he is condeming Stalin, the USSR and the general ruthlessness of evil commies.
I don't really know what my political views are, I'm pretty torn. And it's really hilarious that you said I condemned evil commies.

And I condemned Stalins views on abortion and homosexuality, I didn't say anything besides that. Would you not condemn his views on abortion and homosexuality? Or are you homophobic and anti-choice?

[FSL]

I don't really know what my political views are, I'm pretty torn. And it's really hilarious that you said I condemned evil commies.

And I condemned Stalins views on abortion and homosexuality, I didn't say anything besides that. Would you not condemn his views on abortion and homosexuality? Or are you homophobic and anti-choice?


I'm anti-anti-Stalin, as it represents the most backward set of principles within the workers movement.

[The Ben G]

j9ScChTcCag

Glory to Stalin! :lol:

How the Hell can you admire a mass murduring, half mad tyrant that oppressed the people that he was supposed to help? For the love of God the man used work camps, Secret police and Cult of Personality to keep control of his people! He gives the Left a bad name and is a disgrace to Socialism and Communism.

[fatboy]

Read "Another view on Stalin". Much of what some say of Stalin is grossly out of proportion.

Watch the video *THe USSR under Stalin". Would give a link but it wont let me. It is the very first video if you type that into Youtube

[I Can Has Communism]

Ah, the typical knee-jerk liberal reactions to Marxism. We've seen the typical accusations, all thrown around by people who don't understand the meaning of these terms and who do not see the class context within which the historical events around Joseph Stalin took place. By abandoning a class analysis and giving way to liberal "critiques", these people move away from scientific Marxism to nonsense. I'm a big critic of the Stalinist bureaucratic excesses under Stalin myself, but some of the responses here are ridiculous.

[Chambered Word]

It is not a good thing. It will not be repeat again in another socialist state. This is a criticism that is shared across Stalinists, but understands it in historical context that homophobia was common than today. Nobody are saying that it is a correct position, but are trying to provide the content why it had happened.

Enlighten us then, instead of just saying 'LOL BUT YOU NEED TO SEE IT IN CONTEXT!' .


Hasnt every government or political theory had some sort of right wing leanings in them?

Not necessarily. That doesn't excuse Stalin really.


BucketOfCows has also asked for a restriction on the very sound basis that he's a social democrat but instead of getting one, here he is condeming Stalin, the USSR and the general ruthlessness of evil commies.

Argument ad hominem.

[Nolan]

How the Hell can you admire a mass murduring, half mad tyrant that oppressed the people that he was supposed to help? For the love of God the man used work camps, Secret police and Cult of Personality to keep control of his people!

Spoken like a true right-wing reactionary.

[Bright Banana Beard]

How the Hell can you admire a mass murduring, half mad tyrant that oppressed the people that he was supposed to help? For the love of God the man used work camps, Secret police and Cult of Personality to keep control of his people! He gives the Left a bad name and is a disgrace to Socialism and Communism.

Because I studied extensively about him and his policy before passing out the judgment? I upholds him, but he still has my criticism such as criminalizing homosexuality, not giving the rights to abortion, being naive about western's security, not fighting cult of personality enough, not doing enough to review his stamping, etc., but he wasn't a perfect man, but he showed the world that socialism is possible and way better than capitalism and the experiment was credited to Stalin's leadership.

As it was the first socialist state ever, many died as the results of putting the first socialism into practice as it had never happen before, you don't hear the horror stories of starving death in Eastern Europe and the rest of the revolution such as Cuba, Nicaragua, Vietnam, etc. beside China. (They actually succeed, but that another story.) How do they prevent the famine, by studying all actions in various "socialist" states. In other word, they were learning to pick the good action and drop the failed actions.

For your information, I depend on historical materialism instead of moralism and justice. Do your study and understand why the bourgeois hated him. He simple show that bourgeois isn't needed to lead to new society.

[Kléber]

It very much was a socialist proletarian state in 1940 when all exploiting classes had been done away with.So socialism was destroyed by the subjective forces of a few bad apples one fateful day in 1953? riiight..


And it's not a right wing libertarian thing to actually try to see what can work in a revolution.Once again, the point was not that the economy was any less democratic or fair for workers under Stalin than it had been under Lenin. The point was that its classification was changed, therefore the definition of socialism was revised, and the social inequality in the USSR was legitimized. Don't you see how that would empower the bureaucracy, and enable even greater feats of revisionism?


Last time I checked no bourgeois got by making just 10 times the miminum wageWage inequality figures from the Western world in 2010 are the most extreme in world history, you can't compare pay ratios today to conditions in 1918-1938.. the US in the 1930's would look socialist compared to itself today. As Lenin said in that same CEC speech, "capitalism is not money but social relations." The point isn't how much more the capitalist makes than the workers, but the fact that the capitalist profits from the workers' labor.

Furthermore, ten-to-one was not the most extreme ratio that existed between two individuals in Soviet society. If you have ever tried to find info about wages in the USSR (apparently you don't care), you would notice that economic officials were always complaining about "big bonuses" paid in excess of the meaty 2,000 monthly salaries. On top of that you have graft and corruption which were given a free hand by the undemocratic political setup. Also, the term "10-1 ratio" was based on the fact that most workers got paid twice the minimum wage. Actually some workers only got paid 100 rubles a month so the social difference could be as high as 20 to 1. I'm sorry my figures are so imprecise, most of the data on Soviet wages has been guessed by foreigners. Why isn't there such data available? Isn't socialism democracy? How can you have a democratic economy without transparent data?

And also, the wage inequality was compounded by the fact that the bureaucracy had more stable access to better goods. Every major city had shops and restaurants that ordinary workers were not allowed to enter unless they were employees. Don't you think that would encourage bourgeois thinking among officials?

[Comrade_Stalin]

It seems that we are no exception to the rule that we like to put everything evil on the other side. Before I came to this site, I found out that there were people who were trying to put Hitler on the Left. Now those who see Stalin as evil are trying to put him on the right. Evil is not a left or right only thing, the difference, is that the left does not accept it, and the right does.

[Nwoye]

I don’t think Stalin was really against homosexuality or abortion, but because of the high death rates and people fleeing there needed to be more children so socialism wouldn’t be overthrown by other countries in the future. Banning abortion was one way to do this because abortion was very common back then, it was the major method of birth control because it was almost impossible to get contraceptives.

As for homosexuality, gay people would have to get a lot of children. And if it was still legal to be a homosexual then they wouldn’t feel the pressure to reproduce. Stalin did everything to increase the population of the USSR. He even gave women subsidies and medals who had many children.

So it’s pretty foolish just to say that he was a sexist homophobe. I wish there would have been another way but you have to consider that nazis and capitalists did everything to terrorize the country, so maybe there was no other way to maintain a strong USSR.
Capitalist states in the 18th and 19th century did those same exact things for the same exact reasons. You're really not helping your "the USSR was socialist" argument here.

[Nwoye]

btw: can we not talk about stalin anymore?

[robbo203]

You're tiring. Last time I checked no bourgeois got by making just 10 times the miminum wage. I have no idea how they managed to accumulate billions that way.
The USSR was in deed not socialist in 1921. It very much was a socialist proletarian state in 1940 when all exploiting classes had been done away with.
And it's not a right wing libertarian thing to actually try to see what can work in a revolution. If it is, then the whole party allowing private property in 1921 were way more libertarian than Thatcher.

From http://wspus.org/in-depth/russia-lenin-and-state-capitalism/


The Capitalist Class in Russia
If, as the SPGB asserted, capitalism existed in the Soviet Union under the political dictatorship of the Communist Party, and not 'socialism' or some sort of 'workers' state', it was reasonable for the Party's opponents to demand who or what constituted the exploiting capitalist class there. 45 Clearly, the fledgling bourgeoisie had been expropriated after the Bolshevik seizure of power and no longer had private ownership rights and property titles to the rapidly developing means of production. As the SPGB pointed out, however, this did not mean that all investment was conducted through state channels and the SPGB devoted much time, especially in the inter-war period, towards publicizing the amount of investment by private capitalists in the Soviet economy. As one writer in the Socialist Standard commented:

... investment, in the National Debt, in the cooperatives, and in the trading concerns, etc. are forms of exploitation of the Russian workers. They, like the workers everywhere, carry on their backs a class of property owners, receiving incomes from property ownership.46
In the early years of the SPGB's analysis of Soviet Russia, the Party concentrated on the more peripheral, though not insignificant, forms of non-state ownership in the Soviet economy and the manner in which the Communist Party rulers were forced to compromise with investors and financiers from both inside and outside Russia. More significantly, the SPGB also argued that the capitalist nature of Soviet Russia and its necessary trading and investment relations with the rest of the capitalist world meant that it had a developing internal class system that was far removed from the amicable relationship between "the only two classes in Russian society, workers and peasants" referred to by Stalin in his statement on the new Constitution of 1936. The Socialist Standard claimed:

... this statement... dismisses the cleavage of interests between peasants and workers, and it leaves out of account, as if they did not exist, the elaborate arrangements by means of which an officially favored minority of Russian citizens can enjoy a very high standard of living, which stands in increasing contrast to the conditions of the great majority. In this, and in the investment system, and in the laws which permit the inheritance of property, Russia is facing a progressive differentiation into classes.47
Ammunition for the SPGB's view of the class nature of Soviet Russia was provided by supporters of the Russian dictatorship such as Reg Bishop in his book Soviet Millionaires,48 where it was claimed that the existence of 'rouble millionaires' was proof of economic success and the rapid progress of Russia under the Communists.
Inequality of wealth was a chief target of the SPGB and as the Russian state became even more centralized and dominant this increasingly necessitated an analysis of what under Stalin became the most noticeable source of privilege, the party/state machinery itself and the nomenklatura system based on it. The SPGB was not slow to attack the privilege and riches accruing to the top Communist Party bureaucrats, military officials and factory managers who were variously referred to as "the ruling clique", the "new bureaucracy" and "the ruling class". This latter term became the SPGB's standard reference to a Russian elite clearly privileged both in control of the means of living and in consumption. Strangely, however, it was not until well after the departure of Khrushchev that the SPGB systematically referred to this ruling elite as a specifically capitalist class. In earlier SPGB texts this was sometimes implied,49 but the Party always stopped short of actually labeling this privileged group openly 'capitalist'. This was, in fact, a fundamental contradiction in the SPGB's analysis that tended to mar the Party's otherwise clear critique of Soviet state capitalism. How could, for instance, a privileged ruling class in a major capitalist country, in the very epoch of world capitalism, not be a capitalist class? A ruling class, taken to mean a social class exercising control of the state machine through its hold on political power, could not rise to its dominant position in society divorced from the material conditions of production. Given the by now large-scale development of capitalist industry in Russia, the ruling class certainly was not the peasantry and explicitly not the working class, which had not in Russia or anywhere else won the "battle of democracy" and was not in a position to socialize production. As the SPGB itself had affirmed early on, the Bolsheviks in Russia had been forced by circumstances to take the capitalist road and to perform the historic functions of the capitalist class in their attempts to defeat backwardness through the development of industry and the forced accumulation of capital.
The failure of the SPGB to identify the Soviet ruling elite as a specifically capitalist class paradoxically stemmed from the view that capitalists lived off unearned income accruing from the exploitation of the working class which was consequent on their ownership of the means of living. The Russian ruling elite did not possess legal property titles to the means of production in Russia, and furthermore appeared to receive their income in the form of wages and salaries rather than in the 'holy trinity' of rent, interest and profit. To compound the Party's theoretical contradiction, many SPGB members therefore judged that the Communist Party bureaucrats were members of the working class dependent on the sale of their labour power - who also constituted a privileged 'ruling class' keeping the working class as a whole in subjection.
This issue of the nature of the Russian ruling class was not resolved until the SPGB's Annual Conference in 1969, when a motion was carried that "the ruling class in state capitalist Russia stands in the same relationship to the means of production as does the ruling class in any other capitalist country (viz. it has a monopoly of those means of production and extracts surplus value from the working class) and is therefore a capitalist class". 50 The proponents of the motion, generally younger members who had entered the Party in the 1960s, argued that the Communist Party bureaucrats, enterprise managers and other top officials performed the functions of a capitalist class in that they monopolized the means of living by only allowing others access to it via the operation of the wages system, and also accumulated capital out of the value created in the sphere of production by wage labour, a value greater in magnitude than that paid in wages and salaries as the price of labour power. Although it was not essential to their status, capitalists invariably had greater incomes on average than workers because of their privileged position in the productive process as the "functionaries of capital". These SPGB members argued that the state capitalist class, like the privately owning capitalist class in the West, was privileged in consumption, receiving bloated 'salaries' that were not the price of labour power but a portion of the total surplus value created by the working class. The state capitalist class in Russia was also judged to be privileged because of the multitude of benefits and perks open to them, including access to exclusive consumption outlets such as expensive shops and restaurants from which the working class was physically denied access. 51 The opponents of this view in the SPGB pointed out the extent to which private enterprise operated in Russia, with 'non-official' economic activity accounting for up to one quarter of the total. These members claimed that a private enterprise capitalist class certainly existed in Russia, and that to say that it was the bureaucracy who were the collective capitalists overlooked this. Indeed, it was prophetically argued that the long-term ambition of many in the bureaucracy was probably to convert themselves into a privately-owning capitalist class' on Western lines operating in a mixed state/private enterprise economy that would be more efficient than the then already stagnating Soviet system. 52 .'
Those who took this position and opposed the 1969 Conference motion, largely the older Party members with more formal and legalistically based definitions of the capitalist class, argued that both Marx and Engels had opposed the view that privileged managers and bureaucrats were actually capitalists. Edgar Hardcastle ('Hardy'), a member particularly revered by the membership for his extensive knowledge of economics and who had been an editor of the Socialist Standard for most of the period since the early 1920s, said that Marx and Engels had held that under state-owned capitalism the capitalists were forced out of control by salaried officials. 53 Engels had commented that although the transformation of enterprises into state concerns "does not do away with the capitalistic nature of the productive forces" and also that "the more [the state] proceeds to the taking over of the productive forces, the more does it actually become the national capitalist, the more citizens does it exploit”, at the same time” All the social functions of the capitalist are now performed by salaried employees. The capitalist has no further social function other than tearing off coupons, and gambling on the stock exchange… “54 Marx, too, had written of the progressive separation of the functions of the capitalist on the one hand as a manager, and on the other as “a mere owner, a mere money capitalist”, saying that “the manager’s salary is or should be simply the wage for a certain kind of skilled labour, its price being regulated in the labour market like that of any other labour.” 55 In one particularly apposite passage of Capital Marx had written that:

Capitalist production has itself brought it about that the work of supervision is readily available, quite independent of the ownership of capital. It has therefore become superfluous for this work of supervision to be performed by the capitalist. A musical conductor need in no way be the owner of the instruments in his orchestra, nor does it form part of his function as a conductor that he should have any part in paying the ‘wages’ of the other musicians. 56
Given the structure of the nineteenth century English industrial capitalism analyzed by Marx, it can hardly be surprising that he identified the capitalist class as the private owners of capital with legal property titles to the means of living. There was, though, a definite recognition on Marx’s part that even in the ‘1840s a “new swindle” of dubious management and supervision was arising in joint-stock companies, the remuneration of which was not the price of labour power at all, and ‘wages’ in name only. Directors and managers were already beginning to use their position of control to command a portion of the surplus . value for their own consumption needs, with Marx wryly stating that “the wages of supervision are in inverse proportion, as a rule, to the actual supervision exercised by these nominal directors.” 57
As the majority in the SPGB pointed out, the view that. the Russian ruling bureaucracy simply carried out the role of managers and trustees clearly overlooked their emergence as a controlling class holding sole responsibility for the accumulation of capital, making key decisions about what to produce, how much to produce, where to produce it, and, if possible, the rate at which it should be produced. This controlling class could not be equated with the supervisors and managers referred to by Marx who received a wage based on the amount needed to produce and reproduce their labour power. On the contrary, this class of bureaucrats was using its position of control to perform the functions carried out by individual capitalists in earlier phases of capitalism’s development and to command a privileged income derived from surplus value. Though it did not have legal title to the means of production, and was not able to bequeath property, it was, as the proponents of the motion at SPGB Conference argued, clearly a possessing class of the type mentioned in the SPGB Declaration of Principles, exercising a “monopoly… of the wealth taken from the workers”.
The prevailing view in the SPGB came to be that the nature of a class could not be determined simply by legal forms or even by methods of recruitment (the Soviet possessing class was not recruited via inheritance but by other, more meritocratic methods, that have not been entirely unusual for possessing classes in history). 58 The Party, or certainly the vast body of its membership, ultimately concluded that although the state capitalist class did not have legal property titles to the means of production, it nonetheless constituted a capitalist class exercising a collective ownership of the means of production and distribution. What was judged to be of prime importance, therefore, was the social reality of capitalism rather than a particular legal form. The opponents of the theory of state capitalism, to the SPGB, had never been able to see beyond the latter

[FSL]

Argument ad hominem.


I didn't call him a jerk. I called him a social democrat and he admits to being something like that. If someone's political views aren't important, there wouldn't be restrictions in the first place. The point in having them was that for some people's opinion the revolutionary left doesn't really care, no?




Wage inequality figures from the Western world in 2010 are the most extreme in world history, you can't compare pay ratios today to conditions in 1918-1938.. the US in the 1930's would look socialist compared to itself today.


This was golden. The US in the 30s when people were eating in soup kitchens and magnates lived in 50 bathroom mansions?

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

That's right, Stalin ate babies while the mothers were forced to watch. Which is why he outlawed abortion. That was his primary food source.

Why do you automatically get defensive of Stalin?

Nobody suggested that he ate babies or was 'evil', a la Hitler, per se.

However, the consensus amongst those of us who critically examine the period under Stalin, rather than those of us who excuse all his mis-deeds, will say that although he made monumental strides forward in terms of the success of economic planning, his attitude to human life and to power was simply unacceptable, for a Socialist. No Socialist crushes their enemies under a barrage of war-rhetoric (accusations of counter-revolutionaries, reactionaries, collaberating with the bourgeoisie) in order to stay in power for over two decades. It simply isn't Socialist. You should accept this and move on. Nobody says Stalin was 'evil'. We simply critically examine the period under his rule and say that we must learn from his mistakes - most notably the purges of the party, the excesses of the secret police, and the logistical problems of mass, rapid collectivisation - notably the violence of the 25,000 workers, the opposition of the kulaks who then ate all their livestock (numbers of livestock halved between 1928-32).

Until you accept that Stalin was not a demi-god, and that in fact he was culpable for some awful mistakes and misdeeds, you cannot take part in an objective history of the period. To accept his shortcomings as a Socialist and as a leader is not to become a revisionist or an anti-Stalinist out of principle, it is because of a calm view of the facts of the matter.

It shows that you get edgy because somebody dares suggest that Stalin's view on abortion was wrong. Indeed, i've seen Marxist-Leninists on here defend Stalin's anti-abortion stance because of the most ridiculous, outdated and simply anti-Socialist arguments.

Stop having such a dogmatic view of Stalin and of Marxism-Leninism as an anti-revisionist entity so that we can get on with implementing Socialism, rather than having to periodically resort to this factionalist bullshit.

[gorillafuck]

I'm anti-anti-Stalin, as it represents the most backward set of principles within the workers movement.
You didn't answer me.

Do you condemn Stalins views on the specific topic of abortion and homosexuals, or are you an anti-choice homophobe?

It's hilarious that if someone asks you to condemn just two policies that even most anti-revisionists admit were wrong about Stalin, you start changing the subject and avoiding the question because you don't dare criticize any aspect whatsoever of Stalin.

[FSL]

You didn't answer me.

Do you condemn Stalins views on the specific topic of abortion and homosexuals, or are you an anti-choice homophobe?

It's hilarious that if someone asks you to condemn just two policies that even most anti-revisionists admit were wrong about Stalin, you start changing the subject and avoiding the question because you don't dare criticize any aspect whatsoever of Stalin.


I'm not an anti-choise homophobe but I am pro-Moscow trials. And this is your beef with him and the proletarian state, no matter how much you like to hide it. Your freedom to see markets in all their glory would be supressed so you can't help but think of what an evil dictatorship it must have been.
Sadly, next time around, it will be just as much an evil dictatorship for some people so you might as well drop the pretence and side with those who will be your comrades in such a case -and that's definitely not the workers.

[Mike Russell]

I'm not an anti-choise homophobe but I am pro-Moscow trials. And this is your beef with him and the proletarian state, no matter how much you like to hide it. Your freedom to see markets in all their glory would be supressed so you can't help but think of what an evil dictatorship it must have been.
Sadly, next time around, it will be just as much an evil dictatorship for some people so you might as well drop the pretence and side with those who will be your comrades in such a case -and that's definitely not the workers.


How very marxist of you to assume that a future workers state will take on the exact same form of the soviet states. And its even going to degenerate too! wow. what a bright future we have and how very wrong it is for us to try to fight against that.

any more persepectives you wanna share?

uncomradely,
mike

[Kléber]

This was golden. The US in the 30s when people were eating in soup kitchens and magnates lived in 50 bathroom mansions? Yes, inequality was lower in the US in the 1930's than it is today. That doesn't mean the US was socialist. Answer my other points.


Your freedom to see markets in all their glory would be supressed so you can't help but think of what an evil dictatorship it must have been.The Bolsheviks executed in the purges were not capitalists. So where is the proof that the USSR was socialist? Gloating about the purges doesn't count.


I'm not an anti-choise homophobe but I am pro-Moscow trials. And this is your beef with him and the proletarian state, no matter how much you like to hide it.What kind of proletarian state does not have political freedom for the proletariat, even within the CPSU? Socialists have every reason to worry at the fact that all the outstanding leaders of 1917, military heroes of Spain, even great scientists like Vavilov were shot for minor political disagreements, and after the entire socialist opposition had been wiped out, "socialism" was declared to exist.

[bailey_187]

No Socialist crushes their enemies under a barrage of war-rhetoric (accusations of counter-revolutionaries, reactionaries, collaberating with the bourgeoisie) in order to stay in power for over two decades. It simply isn't Socialist

How is that "not socialist"? im not saying it is socialist, but how does that contradict wanting elevate the working class to the new ruling class of society?

Also, im not going to defend or even justify banning homosexulatiy or abortion; i cant. But, all that is part of the superstructure, it does not conflict with the economic mode of production being socialist. Capitalism is capitalism whether abortion is allowed or not, fuedalism is fuedalism etc etc

[bailey_187]

The Bolsheviks executed in the purges were not capitalists. .

No but those executed were more lilkley to be high ranking bureacrats. (According to JA Getty)



So where is the proof that the USSR was socialist? .

We can see in the change in Economic relation (although not as thorough going as they should have been, i admit)



Walter Reuther, later the anti-Communist president of the United Auto Workers, who worked in a Soviet auto factory in the 1930s said, "Here are no bosses to drive fear into the workers. No one to drive them in mad speed-ups. Here the workers are in control. Even the shop superintendent had no more right in these meetings than any other worker. I have witnessed many times already when the superintendent spoke too long. The workers in the hall decided he had already consumed enough time and the floor was given to a lathe hand who told of his problems and offered suggestions. Imagine this at Ford or Briggs. This is what the outside world calls the 'ruthless dictatorship in Russia'. I tell you ... in all countries we have thus far been in we have never found such genuine proletarian democracy"... (quoted from Phillip Bonosky, Brother Bill McKie: Building the Union at Ford [New York: International Publishers, 1953]).
David Granick in his book, "The Red Executive":


"Management is operating under severe ideological and practical
handicaps in its efforts to keep down worker criticism. One factory director . . . implied that production meetings were a real ordeal for him. But at a question as to whether workers dared to criticize openly, he said, 'Any director who suppressed criticism would be severely punished. He would not only be removed, he would be tried.'" (New York, 1960, p. 230)
As i said, not as far going as they should have been but still a rupture with Capitalist economic relations

We can also see how state power was rebuilt to favour and strengthen the working class:
As the British bourgeois scholar Mary McAuley writes (in "Labour Disputes in the Soviet Union," Oxford 1969), there were special courts to hear industrial disputes to which only workers had access; managerial personnel could appear there only as defendants and were barred from initiating cases (pp. 54-55). Even before matters came to court, there were ways that the workers on the shop floor could let a troublesome director know who was boss.


Twenty six emigre factory employees [were] interviewed by J.K. Zawodny in the early 1950s....a former accountant spoke positively of the way grievences were handled “Honestly, i have to say that the People’s court usually rendered just sentances favouring the workers, particularly with regard to housing cases” Robert Thurston – Life and Terror pg 185



What kind of proletarian state does not have political freedom for the proletariat, even within the CPSU?.

One in need of improvement and/or under severe danger.

Although there was some criticism etc



“The regime regularly urged people to criticise local conditions as well as leaders... For example, in March 1937 Stalin emphasized the importance of the party’s “ties to the masses”. To maintain them it was necessary to “listen carefully to the voice of the masses, to the voice of rank and file members of the party, to the voice of the so-called ‘little people,’ to the voice of the ordinary folk”. Pravda even went as far as to indentify lack of criticism with enemies of the people “Only an enemy is interested in seeing that we, the Bolsheviks....do not notice actual reality....Only and enemy....strives to put rose-coloured glasses of self-satisfaction over the eyes of our people”. As the Zawodny materials and a mass of over evidence show, these calls were by no means merely a vicious sham that permiated ony carfully chosen, reliable individuals to make safe criticisms” - Robert Thurston – Life and Terror pg 185-6
Theres also a letter from the Soviet Judge Vyshinkii to Stalin criticising the NKVDs liberal application of Article 58-10. It isnt know if Stalin acted on Vyshinkii's criticisms, but he remained vocal in his criticisms (and was never executed etc). You can read more about this rather boring incident in Robert Thurston's Life and Terror in Stalin's Russia

After Riutin's arrest after calling for the overthrow of the Soviet govt. in 1932, "Stalin demanded that Riutin be executed. The motion failed in the politburo, however." So instead Riutin was sent to a GULAG until 1938. So there was the freedom to disagree on stuff within the party.



“A civil engineer interviewed after the war remembered that people frequently complained about the poor quality of construction materials and that he had to spend considerable time responding. Citizens protested to the city Soviet “and then when they see it doesn’t help they write direct to Stalin” “ - Robert Thurston – Life and Terror pg 186
So Stalin and the Party accepted criticisms on practical issues as shown above.


Socialists have every reason to worry at the fact that all the outstanding leaders of 1917

Statistically, "Old Bolsheviks" were no more likley to be executed than anyone else in the party. I am concered though.


great scientists like Vavilov were shot for minor political disagreements
This (the whole science thing in USSR) is something i am very much concerned about.


The damage and extent of the purges was also of concern to Stalin:
"It cannot be said the the purgues were not accompanied by grave mistakes. There were unfortunatly more mistakes than might have been expected." - Stalin - Report to the 18th Congress

[gorillafuck]

I'm not an anti-choise homophobe but I am pro-Moscow trials. And this is your beef with him and the proletarian state, no matter how much you like to hide it. Your freedom to see markets in all their glory would be supressed so you can't help but think of what an evil dictatorship it must have been.
Sadly, next time around, it will be just as much an evil dictatorship for some people so you might as well drop the pretence and side with those who will be your comrades in such a case -and that's definitely not the workers.
The Moscow trials didn't once cross my mind when I saw this thread. The first thing that came to my mind was, in fact, his policies on abortion and homosexuality. And that's what this thread has become a discussion about.

You can keep on trying to convince yourself that when I say "I disagree with Stalins policies on abortion and homosexuality" I mean "God I wish I was out murdering some commies right now", be my guest. You've demonstrated yourself to be someone who can't dare bring himself/herself to criticize any of Stalin's policies even when the general consensus among people who uphold him is that he was wrong on these two issues. I'm not going to try to engage with you anymore.

[Kléber]

Walter Reuther, later the anti-Communist president of the United Auto Workers, who worked in a Soviet auto factory in the 1930s said, "Here are no bosses to drive fear into the workers. No one to drive them in mad speed-ups. Here the workers are in control.Not surprising to hear such hagiographic stuff from an AFL-CIO shyster, they're great at providing anecdotes about how the workers are in control in their yellow unions. I'm sure he totally repudiated these statements and said he was under pressure after he sold out. However, there is some truth there, but note that Reuther was in the USSR from 1933-35. There was a brief period called "Neo-NEP" from 1934-36 when competition and incentives were reintroduced to the industrial economy, and the militarization of labor was temporarily relaxed. Reuther's observations do not reflect the economy or history as a whole.


Twenty six emigre factory employees [were] interviewed by J.K. Zawodny in the early 1950s....a former accountant spoke positively of the way grievences were handled “Honestly, i have to say that the People’s court usually rendered just sentances favouring the workers, particularly with regard to housing cases”I'm sorry but the anecdotal evidence of an administrator here, a foreign sympathizer there, is absolutely useless. There exist many more, stronger anecdotes that indicate things were in the other direction. For example, Khrushchev said in his memoirs that "when some disturbances—I wouldn't want to call them a revolt—broke out in Aircraft Plant No. 30," Stalin personally suggested "We should organise the stronger workers, give them cudgels and, when the working day is over, they can beat up those Jews."

What concerns me most is that a "socialist" economy couldn't produce transparent data about wage discrepancies. Capitalist governments offer much more detailed information about their own social inequalities.. shouldn't socialism be more honest than the US Census Department? The French Monarchy on the eve of the 1789 revolution, of all reactionary governments, published its own (slightly inaccurate) financial records, couldn't Stalin do better than Necker?

The struggle for socialism must be the conscious action of the whole working class. How can we fight inequality without knowing it, without categorizing it and publishing the data for all to see?


Theres also a letter from the Soviet Judge Vyshinkii to Stalin criticising the NKVDs liberal application of Article 58-10. It isnt know if Stalin acted on Vyshinkii's criticisms, but he remained vocal in his criticisms (and was never executed etc).Vyshinsky, a vocal critic? For Vyshinsky to criticize the purges would be like Michael Jackson criticizing nose jobs. Vyshinsky was Menshevik swine who lived the life of a petty-bourgeois until 1920. He joined the Bolsheviks after they had already won, and he had the nerve to convict to death men like Zinoviev and Kamenev, who for all their faults had been with the Revolution in its darkest hours. Vyshinsky even ridiculed Kamenev for writing favorably of the political theories of Machiavelli, and said this proved that Kamenev was a traitorous Machiavellian schemer.. despite the fact that Marx and Engels had praised Machiavelli in very similar terms as Kamenev.


After Riutin's arrest after calling for the overthrow of the Soviet govt.Ryutin's platform called for a slowdown of industrialization and a halt to forced collectivization, the restoration of democratic centralism in the party, and Stalin's removal from the post of General Secretary. Nowhere did it say anything about the overthrow of the Soviet government.


"Citizens protested [about the poor quality of building materials] to the city Soviet 'and then when they see it doesn’t help they write direct to Stalin'" So Stalin and the Party accepted criticisms on practical issues as shown above.So you could criticize the quality of bricks and mortar.. I guess that's better than nothing. Who needs democracy, really, when an entire nation of 150 million can write to Santa Claus and he will fly out and solve the problems!

[Nolan]

Why do you automatically get defensive of Stalin?

Nobody suggested that he ate babies or was 'evil', a la Hitler, per se.

However, the consensus amongst those of us who critically examine the period under Stalin, rather than those of us who excuse all his mis-deeds, will say that although he made monumental strides forward in terms of the success of economic planning, his attitude to human life and to power was simply unacceptable, for a Socialist. No Socialist crushes their enemies under a barrage of war-rhetoric (accusations of counter-revolutionaries, reactionaries, collaberating with the bourgeoisie) in order to stay in power for over two decades. It simply isn't Socialist. You should accept this and move on. Nobody says Stalin was 'evil'. We simply critically examine the period under his rule and say that we must learn from his mistakes - most notably the purges of the party, the excesses of the secret police, and the logistical problems of mass, rapid collectivisation - notably the violence of the 25,000 workers, the opposition of the kulaks who then ate all their livestock (numbers of livestock halved between 1928-32).

Until you accept that Stalin was not a demi-god, and that in fact he was culpable for some awful mistakes and misdeeds, you cannot take part in an objective history of the period. To accept his shortcomings as a Socialist and as a leader is not to become a revisionist or an anti-Stalinist out of principle, it is because of a calm view of the facts of the matter.

It shows that you get edgy because somebody dares suggest that Stalin's view on abortion was wrong. Indeed, i've seen Marxist-Leninists on here defend Stalin's anti-abortion stance because of the most ridiculous, outdated and simply anti-Socialist arguments.

Stop having such a dogmatic view of Stalin and of Marxism-Leninism as an anti-revisionist entity so that we can get on with implementing Socialism, rather than having to periodically resort to this factionalist bullshit.

Nice strawman. Last time I checked, the sectarian bullshit was coming mostly from people attacking Stalin, not defending him (yeah you know who you are, I don't have to mention any names). Marxist-Leninists defend Stalin, but are not uncritical of him. Stop acting like we're the manifestation of his misguided cult in modern times. It just amazes me how low anti-stalinists will go to smear him and other ML leaders (again, you know who you are).

Seriously, can we just trash this thread or something?

[The Red Next Door]

Stalin put the Soviet Union on the path to socialism by collectivizing agriculture and industrializing a backward economy. How is that "right-wing"? It was Trotsky who opposed the collectivization and thus should rightly be called right-wing. There may have been plenty of misdeeds under the bureaucracy, but Stalin's Soviet Union was the greatest example of a socialist country (and I don't mean that in a sarcastic sense).

You need some sense slap into you.

[Nolan]

You need some sense slap into you.

If you're not going to make an argument or some kind of logical statement, just fuck off.

[The Author]

It is always interesting to see how many people will denounce Stalin merely because he banned abortion and homosexuality. Yes, he seriously fucked up on that count. But that doesn't mean all of a sudden I'm abandoning Marxism-Leninism (a tendency with countless gains and successes for the working peoples of the world in spite of the mistakes and losses) and shall convert to anarchism- a tendency which failed 100 percent of the time and is not even worthy of my attention (wasn't in 1848, it's not now in 2010) and should not be for any serious thinking worker's attention when it comes to class struggle and liberation.

No, I tend to learn from Cuba's example of keeping abortion legal and legalizing homosexuality (and even have sex transfer surgeries for free which is a great accomplishment) and using that as an example of how future socialist countries should act in regards to these two important issues.

[Kléber]

It is always interesting to see how many people will denounce Stalin merely because he banned abortion and homosexuality. Yes, he seriously fucked up on that count. But that doesn't mean all of a sudden I'm abandoning Marxism-Leninism (a tendency with countless gains and successes for the working peoples of the world in spite of the mistakes and losses) and shall convert to anarchism
Stalin's administration also censored the works of Marx and Lenin. Parts of their books were removed from official versions. So, far from defending Stalin being an integral part of Marxism or Leninism, the only way you can be a true Marxist or Leninist is to abjure Stalinist revisionism.


anarchism- a tendency which failed 100 percent of the time
We all failed 100% of the time. Stalinists, Trotskyists and anarchists. Nobody has any soap box to get up on here.

[Lacrimi de Chiciură]

Ah, the typical knee-jerk liberal reactions to Marxism. We've seen the typical accusations, all thrown around by people who don't understand the meaning of these terms and who do not see the class context within which the historical events around Joseph Stalin took place. By abandoning a class analysis and giving way to liberal "critiques", these people move away from scientific Marxism to nonsense. I'm a big critic of the Stalinist bureaucratic excesses under Stalin myself, but some of the responses here are ridiculous.

If you look at the abolishment of the Volga German Soviet Republic in 1941, among other racist ethnic cleansing programs in the 30s, 40s, and 50s, clearly it was the Soviet bureaucracy who was giving up class analysis in favor of working within bourgeois social constructs. This degeneration and devaluation of Marxist class analysis is what led to the USSR's corruption and disintegration. I don't blame Stalin for everything that went wrong for the USSR, but it's clear that he played a part setting up the conditions for continuing corruption by not taking a firm stance in favor of communism and internationalism. Let us acknowledge these mistakes while defending the progressive gains made by the workers of the USSR and continuing the struggle; we should be defending ideas and actions, not figureheads.

[bailey_187]

Krushcehvs memoirs a credible source? Be serious.

What the Vyshinskii letters show is that there was opposition, you can detract from thispoint all you want by raising critcisms of Vyshinskii, i dont care. I was showing how opposition existed to Stalin.


Riutin called for the killing of the Parties elected General Secrtary IIRC. Again, you are ignoring the point it was intended to make; that there was opposition. It shows that Stalin could be voted down in the Politbureo (spelt wrong i dont know why i just cant seem to spell it right)

[bailey_187]

You need some sense slap into you.

About sense. I been reading your posts and they are usualy nothing but nonsense tbh

[Kléber]

Krushcehvs memoirs a credible source? Be serious. Duh, neither are the memoirs of an AFL-CIO fat cat credible. My point was that I can call up as many anecdotes as you have. What you don't have is transparent Soviet wage data, because it doesn't exist, because the USSR wasn't socialist.


Riutin called for the killing of the Parties elected General Secrtary IIRC.He called for Stalin's removal from the post.


It shows that Stalin could be voted down in the PolitbureoSo? That doesn't change the fact that Stalin was the theoretical spokesperson for bureaucratic revisionism.

[sarmchain]

It is always interesting to see how many people will denounce Stalin merely because he banned abortion and homosexuality. Yes, he seriously fucked up on that count. But that doesn't mean all of a sudden I'm abandoning Marxism-Leninism (a tendency with countless gains and successes for the working peoples of the world in spite of the mistakes and losses) and shall convert to anarchism- a tendency which failed 100 percent of the time and is not even worthy of my attention (wasn't in 1848, it's not now in 2010) and should not be for any serious thinking worker's attention when it comes to class struggle and liberation.

No, I tend to learn from Cuba's example of keeping abortion legal and legalizing homosexuality (and even have sex transfer surgeries for free which is a great accomplishment) and using that as an example of how future socialist countries should act in regards to these two important issues.
ummm do to the fact that every ML / Maoist country ever to exist has either
A:converted to capitalism
B:converted to capitalism buts still pretends to be communist (aka china)
i really would not talk about how anarchism fails, look at your own ideology first......

[The Ben G]

He was extremely authoritarian, but still a leftist.
This could come as a surprise, but many idolized him because of that.




Hooray ! :lol::lol:
We should glorify Stalin on a daily basis.
How can you not tremble with admiration in front of man that was actually made of steel. I think he actually was y'know.

Btw, this should be appropriate time and place to ask this..
regarding the available smiley faces: :trotski::marx::castro::che:

Umm, you notice some important face missing?

Your right. A jello Smile would be nice.

[Comrade_Stalin]

ummm do to the fact that every ML / Maoist country ever to exist has either
A:converted to capitalism
B:converted to capitalism buts still pretends to be communist (aka china)
i really would not talk about how anarchism fails, look at your own ideology first......

Can you name for us any were the anarchist have been in power, or clam to be in power. No you can't as there as never been any time in history when the anarchist have been in power.

[The Ben G]

Can you name for us any were the anarchist have been in power, or clam to be in power. No you can't as there as never been any time in history when the anarchist have been in power.

Few things wrong with this one.

1. Anarchists having Power. Kinda Hypocritical, dont you think?
2. Anarchy has never had a foothold because, well, havnt you thought about the fact that anarchy doesnt need power? Unlike Communism, anarchy can be anywhere. Hell, Anarchists can go out and make their own Communes, Squats, ect.

[sarmchain]

spain in the 30s but "in power" is not really the word i would use anarchists really arn't into the whole "iron fisted , killl everybody who doesnt think like you do" thing bu the fact remains anarchists have had only a few times to try there ideas on a large scale ML / maoists on the other hand have come to power in over a dozen countrys each one ending a transition back to capitalism
so on the list of failed revolutions its
Anarchists: Spain
ML/Maoist: China,Vietnam,U.S.S.R.,Cambodia, Laos, Cuba,N. Korea

[gorillafuck]

spain in the 30s but "in power" is not really the word i would use anarchists really arn't into the whole "iron fisted , killl everybody who doesnt think like you do" thing
I can't tell if you're equating power with killing dissent, but if you are then that's stupid. Also, the countries you named were/are authoritarian, but even that doesn't amount to "kill everyone" (except for probably Cambodia...).


2. Anarchy has never had a foothold because, well, havnt you thought about the fact that anarchy doesnt need power? Unlike Communism, anarchy can be anywhere. Hell, Anarchists can go out and make their own Communes, Squats, ect.
I'd like to imagine a world where we don't all live in squats, to be honest. Squats don't seem fun and I hope I never end up having to live in one.

[The Red Next Door]

If you're not going to make an argument or some kind of logical statement, just fuck off.
I just did, Anyone who thinks that shithead did anything good for communism do not have any sense at all. I will admit that he did good things like turn Russia into a superpower and fight off the Nazis, who he had made a deal with in the first place. but otherwise he was a murderous fuck who people associate communists with. Along a few other nut balls.

[The Red Next Door]

About sense. I been reading your posts and they are usualy nothing but nonsense tbh
Opinions are like assholes everyone have one.

[Chambered Word]

I didn't call him a jerk. I called him a social democrat and he admits to being something like that. If someone's political views aren't important, there wouldn't be restrictions in the first place. The point in having them was that for some people's opinion the revolutionary left doesn't really care, no?

Do you even know what an ad hominem is? It's an argument against the character of your opponent as opposed to addressing their arguments. Name-calling is not an argument and therefore is not an ad hominem.



The damage and extent of the purges was also of concern to Stalin:
"It cannot be said the the purgues were not accompanied by grave mistakes. There were unfortunatly more mistakes than might have been expected." - Stalin - Report to the 18th Congress

'Oh woops, I fucked up and killed a couple of million people! Oh well, at least I'm learning!'


It is always interesting to see how many people will denounce Stalin merely because he banned abortion and homosexuality. Yes, he seriously fucked up on that count. But that doesn't mean all of a sudden I'm abandoning Marxism-Leninism (a tendency with countless gains and successes for the working peoples of the world in spite of the mistakes and losses) and shall convert to anarchism- a tendency which failed 100 percent of the time and is not even worthy of my attention (wasn't in 1848, it's not now in 2010) and should not be for any serious thinking worker's attention when it comes to class struggle and liberation.

Oh yes, everybody who isn't an ML/Stalinist and believes that workers should be allowed to organize and govern themselves - whether by a party, councils or unions - is an anarchist, not that I really have anything against anarchists anyway.


Can you name for us any were the anarchist have been in power, or clam to be in power. No you can't as there as never been any time in history when the anarchist have been in power.

This made me facepalm so hard.

Ever heard of the Greek anarchists? 30s Spain? So far the anarchists haven't produced dictatorial and/or revisionist failures like the USSR or China.


I just did, Anyone who thinks that shithead did anything good for communism do not have any sense at all. I will admit that he did good things like turn Russia into a superpower and fight off the Nazis, who he had made a deal with in the first place. but otherwise he was a murderous fuck who people associate communists with. Along a few other nut balls.

The Molotov-Ribbentrop pact was necessary IMO, but you're pretty much right.

[FSL]

Do you even know what an ad hominem is? It's an argument against the character of your opponent as opposed to addressing their arguments. Name-calling is not an argument and therefore is not an ad hominem.


You rock my world.



This made me facepalm so hard.

Ever heard of the Greek anarchists?

Anarchists are in power in Greece? Some people need to get back to reality.



*(You've also misquoted something to me)

[bailey_187]

Duh, neither are the memoirs of an AFL-CIO fat cat credible..

My other sources are though, right?
Besides, you admit yourself what he said had some truth to it.



What you don't have is transparent Soviet wage data, because it doesn't exist

And i wish i did...



He called for Stalin's removal from the post.

Ok i looked it up and he called for the "struggle for the destruction of Stalins dictatorship", which sure could be interepreted as through voting him out of position as General Secretary, but these words could have been taken as advocating terrorism as there was no organised movement against the government. The Party, paranoid as it was, opted for the second - maybe they were wrong?
Funny though isnt it, Stalin's dictatorship voted against Stalin's wishes to have Riutin executed in 1932.



So?

You said "what kind of workers state has no opposition, even within the party. I showed you your statement was wrong.

[bailey_187]

'Oh woops, I fucked up and killed a couple of million people! Oh well, at least I'm learning!'

Well done, you proved not only you know fuck all about Soviet History but have willfully ingnored all other Stalin threads.

[Invincible Summer]

ummm do to the fact that every ML / Maoist country ever to exist has either
A:converted to capitalism
B:converted to capitalism buts still pretends to be communist (aka china)
i really would not talk about how anarchism fails, look at your own ideology first......

So what's your point? It's not Mao/Lenin/Stalin/Castro/etc's fault that their attempts at socialism/communism turned into capitalism. And how is it the fault of ML/Maoist theory/action that China nowadays "pretends to be communist" which they don't really. They have the party name still, but I'm pretty sure they don't even pay lip service to Marx/Lenin/Stalin, and only acknowledge Mao as a forefather of their party really.


spain in the 30s but "in power" is not really the word i would use anarchists really arn't into the whole "iron fisted , killl everybody who doesnt think like you do" thing bu the fact remains anarchists have had only a few times to try there ideas on a large scale ML / maoists on the other hand have come to power in over a dozen countrys each one ending a transition back to capitalism
so on the list of failed revolutions its
Anarchists: Spain
ML/Maoist: China,Vietnam,U.S.S.R.,Cambodia, Laos, Cuba,N. Korea

Anarchist Catalonia lasted what.. 4 years? Good job, I guess. And I believe the Anarchists did actually carry out some anti-reactionary executions. I can't imagine them not doing so and being able to maintain control for 4 years.

Also, I really don't see how Cuba and N Korea have "reverted to capitalism." It's also arguable that Cambodia and Laos were never even close to socialism/communism anyway, so it's impossible for them to have "reverted."

Why have anarchist "only had a few times to try their ideas," yet ML/Maoists have had many? Perhaps it's just telling of how effectual/attractive/realistic the theory is?


Few things wrong with this one.

1. Anarchists having Power. Kinda Hypocritical, dont you think?
2. Anarchy has never had a foothold because, well, havnt you thought about the fact that anarchy doesnt need power? Unlike Communism, anarchy can be anywhere. Hell, Anarchists can go out and make their own Communes, Squats, ect.
1) Don't ask me.. you're the anarchist.

2)If your goal is to have world-wide lifestylism where people squat and live in isolated communes, then your movement is ineffectual especially in this day and age.

You're basically shooting yourself in the foot when you're saying that anarchism never has and never will have a foothold because "it doesn't need power." "Power" doesn't have to mean killing people or the dictatorship of the proletariat or whatever... in this context, it can mean having a strong influence that can establish change.

[bailey_187]

spain in the 30s but "in power" is not really the word i would use anarchists really arn't into the whole "iron fisted , killl everybody who doesnt think like you do" thing bu the fact remains anarchists have had only a few times to try there ideas on a large scale ML / maoists on the other hand have come to power in over a dozen countrys each one ending a transition back to capitalism
so on the list of failed revolutions its
Anarchists: Spain
ML/Maoist: China,Vietnam,U.S.S.R.,Cambodia, Laos, Cuba,N. Korea

Yet still Marxism-Leninism proves more popular than your obscure ideology.

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

How is that "not socialist"? im not saying it is socialist, but how does that contradict wanting elevate the working class to the new ruling class of society?

Also, im not going to defend or even justify banning homosexulatiy or abortion; i cant. But, all that is part of the superstructure, it does not conflict with the economic mode of production being socialist. Capitalism is capitalism whether abortion is allowed or not, fuedalism is fuedalism etc etc

The economic mode of production being that of a centrally commanded, state owned economy does not, vis a vis, mean Socialism. That is folly of the type spouted by Old Labourites, who are clearly not revolutionaries in any sense of the word.

Also, surely it is obvious that one Socialist banishing all other Socialist tendencies is an act of power struggle, not class struggle, and thus, because the cause of Socialist tendency, rather than the working class of a whole, is being advanced, this can be termed Anti-Socialist.

You still manage to find excuses for Stalin's wrongs. I wish not to talk about the Moscow Trials and the debacle of 1937-38, as clearly that will not produce a productive discussion. However, I find it incredible that even in your condemnation of Stalin's homophobia and his anti-abortion views, you still have to qualify it with a comment on the 'superstructure', or whatever. Can you not just produce for me a response in which you recognise the unqualified mistake that Stalin made in outlawing abortion, and in his homophobic attitude, without trying to rescue him with some comment about 'prevailing conditions of the time' or 'cultural attitudes' or whatever.

As much as I dislike people who seem to have a blanket gag on themselves praising anything that Stalin did - and he clearly did a lot for Socialism -, it is equally as harmful to see the old dogmatic defences and excuses rolled out for Stalin, because he clearly also did a lot of harm to Socialism. The fact is that over half a century has passed since his death and still, many, many Socialists are critical of him. This should tell you that he was a man of many mistakes, as well as of bona fide achievements -that we must learn from his mistakes, rather than defend him to the hilt -, rather than any anti-Stalin Socialist being some sort of reformist, bourgeois, Capitalist lackey.

[Kléber]

My other sources are though, right?
Besides, you admit yourself what he said had some truth to it.Yes, some truth to it, but it's still a clear exaggeration. I only said that because he was in the USSR (1933-35) during the Neo-NEP period (1934-46), when labor discipline was temporarily relaxed among other, semi-capitalist, economic experiments. So the fact that he said labor discipline was relaxed during an abnormal period of relaxed labor discipline does not exactly answer broader questions of Soviet history and economics.

As for your other quotes, no, they weren't any more credible. Why should I doubt Khrushchev (whose little story may even be correct for all we know) any more than stuff written by pro-Soviet folks pre-Khrushchev? There is tons of stuff published by the Soviet government during the "revisionist" years after 1953 that has anecdotes about how wonderful, democratic and socialist life in the USSR is. Why did pro-government documents stop being reliable with the death of one leader? Isn't that a bit subjectivist?


Ok i looked it up and he called for the "struggle for the destruction of Stalins dictatorship", which sure could be interepreted as through voting him out of position as General Secretary, but these words could have been taken as advocating terrorism as there was no organised movement against the government.Organized movement against the government? Ryutin was writing from a position of loyalty to the Soviet government.

There was no organized movement against the government when Lenin suggested Stalin be removed from that post, could Lenin have been taken as advocating terrorism?


Funny though isnt it, Stalin's dictatorship voted against Stalin's wishes to have Riutin executed in 1932.I never said that Stalin the one man is responsible for everything, you might think that since his death in 1953 could supposedly change the entire social system. My point was that he served as the theoretical spokesperson for bureaucratic revisionism.


You said "what kind of workers state has no opposition, even within the party. I showed you your statement was wrong. That Menshevik weasel Vyshinsky letting out a meek little whimper before his master Stalin isn't a real opposition. It was impossible to form groups advocating any sort of progressive reform. The proletariat was not politically independent.

There were channels for individuals to protest in feudal states, individual nobles and even groups of poor peasants could remonstrate to the king about this or that as long as they didn't attack the underlying appropriation of wealth by the nobility. So the channels of protest didn't make feudal society democratic. I am afraid the "workers could write to Stalin about poor building materials" anecdote doesn't make the USSR socialist. Communists who criticized not just the quality of bricks, but bureaucratic privilege, or called for a return to democratic centralism were purged and shot. And groups of people formed to do something about either of those things were driven out of the Party. The ban on factions that had been undertaken during the utmost crisis was used to justify a permanent dictatorship of the Central Committee over the Party and the working class.

P.S. Do Stalinists not see any problem with special stores and restaurants for bureaucrats and officers that ordinary workers were not allowed to enter unless they were employees?

[Comrade_Stalin]

Few things wrong with this one.

1. Anarchists having Power. Kinda Hypocritical, dont you think?
2. Anarchy has never had a foothold because, well, havnt you thought about the fact that anarchy doesnt need power? Unlike Communism, anarchy can be anywhere. Hell, Anarchists can go out and make their own Communes, Squats, ect.

I was talking about a location where we could go or time, where we could see you anarchists’ utopia. I did not mean any time when you were in control of government, as you guy don't believe in one.

[Kléber]

spain in the 30s but "in power" is not really the word i would use anarchists really arn't into the whole "iron fisted , killl everybody who doesnt think like you do" thingActually, the anarchists carried out the most political killings in Spain.. at least until the NKVD showed up and the Popular Front betrayed and devoured them.

[bailey_187]

You still manage to find excuses for Stalin's wrongs.
I already fucking said i can not excuse defend or offer justification for his banning on homosexuality and abortion. I offer not defense! It was wrong! GET THAT IN YOUR FUCKING HEAD


I wish not to talk about the Moscow Trials and the debacle of 1937-38, as clearly that will not produce a productive discussion..

Neither is your inability to read what i write. It is a productive discussion. You see, i dont buy that everyone who was killed was a crypto-Nazi, nor do i think it was Stalin sitting in his office signing death warents. So how could the USSR descend into such chaos and terror? Its an interesting question. It could repeat itself too one day, and other than a few nutters, most Marxist-leninists dont want another 700,000 executed.



However, I find it incredible that even in your condemnation of Stalin's homophobia and his anti-abortion views, you still have to qualify it with a comment on the 'superstructure', or whatever
You didnt get the point did you? You know what superstructure of society is right? Its the laws, culture, institutions of the state etc. A shit part of the superstructure (banning abortion etc), does not change the economic base of society.





Can you not just produce for me a response in which you recognise the unqualified mistake that Stalin made in outlawing abortion, and in his homophobic attitude, without trying to rescue him with some comment about 'prevailing conditions of the time' or 'cultural attitudes' or whatever.

Never have i tried to justify at all, let alone on "cultural attitude". What i said was, the superstructure of a society does not determine its economic mode of production.



As much as I dislike people who seem to have a blanket gag on themselves praising anything that Stalin did - and he clearly did a lot for Socialism -, it is equally as harmful to see the old dogmatic defences and excuses rolled out for Stalin, because he clearly also did a lot of harm to Socialism. The fact is that over half a century has passed since his death and still, many, many Socialists are critical of him. This should tell you that he was a man of many mistakes, as well as of bona fide achievements -that we must learn from his mistakes, rather than defend him to the hilt -, rather than any anti-Stalin Socialist being some sort of reformist, bourgeois, Capitalist lackey.

You're arguing against a character you constructed in your head. I dont praise Stalin for everything he did. I kind of argree with what you wrote here. I dont think he really did harm to Socialism though, any Revolution is portrayed as some sort of crazy mass blood letting.

[Zanthorus]

Yet still Marxism-Leninism proves more popular than your obscure ideology.

Stalin disagrees with your argument ad populum:


Nor are we the kind of people who console themselves with the thought that the Anarchists "have no masses behind them and, therefore, are not so dangerous." It is not who has a larger or smaller "mass" following today, but the essence of the doctrine that matters.

[bailey_187]

your other quotes, no, they weren't any more credible. Why should I doubt Khrushchev (whose little story may even be correct for all we know) any more than stuff written by pro-Soviet folks pre-Khrushchev? There is tons of stuff published by the Soviet government during the "revisionist" years after 1953 that has anecdotes about how wonderful, democratic and socialist life in the USSR is. Why did pro-government documents stop being reliable with the death of one leader? Isn't that a bit subjectivist?

David Granick, Mary McAuley are both Bourgeois historians.
The Zawodny interviews were with emigres who were critical of the Soviet Government and had not reason to apologise for it. The only source i used that you could say that about is the Trade Union one.



Organized movement against the government? Ryutin was writing from a position of loyalty to the Soviet government.

By calling for its destruction. Ok.



There was no organized movement against the government when Lenin suggested Stalin be removed from that post, could Lenin have been taken as advocating terrorism?

Lenin advised people to vote Stalin out of his position as general sec. Riutin called for the "destruction" of what he called "Stalin's dicatotorship" - you can see how that can be taken?



I never said that Stalin the one man is responsible for everything, you might think that since his death in 1953 could supposedly change the entire social system. My point was that he served as the theoretical spokesperson for bureaucratic revisionism.
You are arguing against a charicature. I never said nor think that.



P.S. Do Stalinists not see any problem with special stores and restaurants for bureaucrats and officers that ordinary workers were not allowed to enter unless they were employees?

Im not a "Stalinist" but yes, i do see a problem with that. I see many problems with the USSR. If there was no problems we would most likley still have it here today.

[bailey_187]

Stalin disagrees with your argument ad populum:

Nice to know. Arguing against who you want to is fun init.

I hereby renouce my statement earlier as part of revisionist element i have, all praise to Stalin the beneficient and merciful, and my sincere apologies for ever contradicting his words. Please might Stalin, send me to Siberia.

[gorillafuck]

Stalin disagrees with your argument ad populum:
If we're gonna be in the business of pointing out logical fallacies, that's an appeal to authority. Whether or not people get behind a certain idea does matter to whether it will be effective or not.


I hereby renouce my statement earlier as part of revisionist element i have, all praise to Stalin the beneficient and merciful, and my sincere apologies for ever contradicting his words. Please might Stalin, send me to Siberia.
Don't make fun of FSL.

[Zanthorus]

Nice to know. Arguing against who you want to is fun init.

I hereby renouce my statement earlier as part of revisionist element i have, all praise to Stalin the beneficient and merciful, and my sincere apologies for ever contradicting his words. Please might Stalin, send me to Siberia.

Sorry, but my general experience with M-L's is that they're quasi-religous devotees to Stalin. I apologise for mischaracterising you. You're statement about marxism-leninism's success vs the obscurity of anarchism was still silly though. Last time I checked neither idea has had much success although I would argue that anarchisms failures were better than M-L's failures.


If we're gonna be in the business of pointing out logical fallacies, that's an appeal to authority. Whether or not people get behind a certain idea does matter to whether it will be effective or not.

My point was more along the lines of correctness not effectiveness. The two are not necessarily linked.

[bailey_187]

Don't make fun of FSL.

FSL and the KKE dont view Stalin like that either from what i seen

[sarmchain]

So what's your point? It's not Mao/Lenin/Stalin/Castro/etc's fault that their attempts at socialism/communism turned into capitalism. And how is it the fault of ML/Maoist theory/action that China nowadays "pretends to be communist" which they don't really. They have the party name still, but I'm pretty sure they don't even pay lip service to Marx/Lenin/Stalin, and only acknowledge Mao as a forefather of their party really.
my point was i was responding to the guy who said anarchism fails 100% but MLism has made huge successes, :rolleyes:

[Kléber]

Lenin advised people to vote Stalin out of his position as general sec. Riutin called for the "destruction" of what he called "Stalin's dicatotorship" - you can see how that can be taken?
That's a pretty incomplete quote. What did he say exactly and what was the context? It is a total surprise to me that Ryutin called for a coup against the Soviet government, but I'd love to be enlightened.

Ryutin might have favored rightist economic policies but he was entirely correct to call for political freedom.