scarletghoul
7th June 2010, 04:10
These are some thoughts I've been having for a while now. Please let me know what you think.
Culture in capitalism is obviously full of reactionary ideals. So much sexism, racism, snobbery, and capitalistic dreams for those who own no capital, aswell as overwhelming alienation. While material conditions are of course the basis of people's consciousness, it must be admitted that culture plays a huge role in the shaping of this consciousness, and this in turn can have influence on the material conditions. In order for a communist/socialist mode of production to come about and to last, there must be a change in culture, an overthrow of capitalist ideals by proletarian ones. Usually cultural revolutions are only started after the seizure of state power, but I think that a cultural change can begin long before. I think it can start now. The production of culture, in its many forms, is not entirely in the capitalists' hands. It is perfectly possible for working class people to produce cultural matter, particularly things like music, films, graphic art, etc. As the proletariat are able to produce these things independantly, they are also able to make them with a proletarian ideology, to produce a revolutionary culture. This is often not the case, as so many proletarians are infected with capitalist culture that it flows through their own cultural products. However, the class-conscious (aka communist) workers like us are easily able to produce revolutionary culture.The situation is more favourable now; due to advances in technology, people are able to freely produce and distribute music and other things without the need for a capitalist sponsor, and are also able to share the capitalist-produced files for free. This totally undermines the capitalist music industry, and to a lesser extent film and so on. (It means that economically music is no longer dependant on capitalism to flourish - the only significant barrier to a proletarian music is the lingering bourgeois ideology.)
There are of course some groups and projects that try to make revolutionary proletarian cultural productions. However these are largely uncoordinated, small-scale, and therefore not very effective. Anyway now this is my idea-
What is needed is a wide-ranging and coordinated organisation of revolutionary artists/programmers/writers/musicians/etc from across the communist movement, which works on various cultural projects and serves as a strong shining star of revolutionary culture. Such an organisation would mean that funding and resources could be concentrated into certain things according to a kinda 'central plan', artists could work on a few projects using their skills differantly, there would be an obvious strength in numbers so that projects will not dwindle away and will get more publicity, and it will concentrate the proletarian culture so its more potent and less vulnerable to capitalist influence.
Here are the areas of culture I think we could hijack ideologically: music, film, fashion, broadcasting, graphics, literature, games..
Music as I said is mostly proletarian-produced and easily distributable now, so this has much potential. We could help revolutionary musicians get in contact, maybe organise gigs, publicise, and so on. Perhaps eventually start something resembling a record label. Music is extremely powerful especially among the youth.
Fashion. A revolutionary fashion line would be great, and not too hard. We could do shirts (not just freakin che shirts, i mean like proper designs), pin badges, hats and so on. It should not focus just on Che or some other dead person, but should revolve around the idea of revolution. These designs should connect with people, should be 'cool' too. A fashion project is something I really wanna do.. but it must be a proper fashion line and not a load of novelty t-shirts. If done right it would be so awesome.
Broadcasting.. A radio station would be cool. Like, a proper one, not just a music playlist streaming online.. There was a leftist radio project I think here but it died. Setting up a radio station is difficult (unless its an internet thing that most proletarians dont listen to). Perhaps this should wait until we have good funds.. But it would be cool, maybe something broadcasting on medium wave in a deprived community, with music and political discussions.
Also there are millions of leftist websites broadcasting news. We could add to this or just give them more publicity.
Films are difficult to make in hollywood quality, but we could do low-budget films and they can be pretty good. However this would require a lot of resources so could not be done right now.. Small Youtube things are good too. There's a leftist youtube group on here I think but im not sure they do a lot
Graphics. Lots of communists are good with graphic designs and such. We could make a load of propaganda posters, and general revolutionary art, aswell as assigning graphic artists roles in certain other projects, like fashion or game or film. It would be great to get this talent coordinated.
Literature is not the most popular cultural medium among workers, but it's still important. We have quite a few poets on the left it seems. It would be cool to publish some collections of revolutionary poetry, maybe do some readings and such. And of course promotion and distribution of already-existing literature.
Gaming. There is a Leftist Game Project already. It's going slowly but still going.. Anyway I think it would be awesome if the project was part of a larger cultural initiative for the reasons stated before (more publicity, better allocation of resources and so on)
Probably there are some important areas of culture that I've missed out. Some are things we have no hope of changing now, that will have to wait until we get state power (eg, city planning). But yeah I hope you get the general idea of what I'm saying ? It's entirely possible for us to disseminate revolutionary proletarian culture if we build up a strong organisation for it. What do you think ? Criticisms ? Additional ideas ? It's very sketchy right now, but hopefully we can build up the ideas, eventually into some practice.
Would anyone be interested in getting involved with something like this ? If so what are your talents or skills that could be useful ? I really think a large coordinated cultural campaign would be worthwhile, it would raise consciousness so much.
Culture in capitalism is obviously full of reactionary ideals. So much sexism, racism, snobbery, and capitalistic dreams for those who own no capital, aswell as overwhelming alienation. While material conditions are of course the basis of people's consciousness, it must be admitted that culture plays a huge role in the shaping of this consciousness, and this in turn can have influence on the material conditions. In order for a communist/socialist mode of production to come about and to last, there must be a change in culture, an overthrow of capitalist ideals by proletarian ones. Usually cultural revolutions are only started after the seizure of state power, but I think that a cultural change can begin long before. I think it can start now. The production of culture, in its many forms, is not entirely in the capitalists' hands. It is perfectly possible for working class people to produce cultural matter, particularly things like music, films, graphic art, etc. As the proletariat are able to produce these things independantly, they are also able to make them with a proletarian ideology, to produce a revolutionary culture. This is often not the case, as so many proletarians are infected with capitalist culture that it flows through their own cultural products. However, the class-conscious (aka communist) workers like us are easily able to produce revolutionary culture.The situation is more favourable now; due to advances in technology, people are able to freely produce and distribute music and other things without the need for a capitalist sponsor, and are also able to share the capitalist-produced files for free. This totally undermines the capitalist music industry, and to a lesser extent film and so on. (It means that economically music is no longer dependant on capitalism to flourish - the only significant barrier to a proletarian music is the lingering bourgeois ideology.)
There are of course some groups and projects that try to make revolutionary proletarian cultural productions. However these are largely uncoordinated, small-scale, and therefore not very effective. Anyway now this is my idea-
What is needed is a wide-ranging and coordinated organisation of revolutionary artists/programmers/writers/musicians/etc from across the communist movement, which works on various cultural projects and serves as a strong shining star of revolutionary culture. Such an organisation would mean that funding and resources could be concentrated into certain things according to a kinda 'central plan', artists could work on a few projects using their skills differantly, there would be an obvious strength in numbers so that projects will not dwindle away and will get more publicity, and it will concentrate the proletarian culture so its more potent and less vulnerable to capitalist influence.
Here are the areas of culture I think we could hijack ideologically: music, film, fashion, broadcasting, graphics, literature, games..
Music as I said is mostly proletarian-produced and easily distributable now, so this has much potential. We could help revolutionary musicians get in contact, maybe organise gigs, publicise, and so on. Perhaps eventually start something resembling a record label. Music is extremely powerful especially among the youth.
Fashion. A revolutionary fashion line would be great, and not too hard. We could do shirts (not just freakin che shirts, i mean like proper designs), pin badges, hats and so on. It should not focus just on Che or some other dead person, but should revolve around the idea of revolution. These designs should connect with people, should be 'cool' too. A fashion project is something I really wanna do.. but it must be a proper fashion line and not a load of novelty t-shirts. If done right it would be so awesome.
Broadcasting.. A radio station would be cool. Like, a proper one, not just a music playlist streaming online.. There was a leftist radio project I think here but it died. Setting up a radio station is difficult (unless its an internet thing that most proletarians dont listen to). Perhaps this should wait until we have good funds.. But it would be cool, maybe something broadcasting on medium wave in a deprived community, with music and political discussions.
Also there are millions of leftist websites broadcasting news. We could add to this or just give them more publicity.
Films are difficult to make in hollywood quality, but we could do low-budget films and they can be pretty good. However this would require a lot of resources so could not be done right now.. Small Youtube things are good too. There's a leftist youtube group on here I think but im not sure they do a lot
Graphics. Lots of communists are good with graphic designs and such. We could make a load of propaganda posters, and general revolutionary art, aswell as assigning graphic artists roles in certain other projects, like fashion or game or film. It would be great to get this talent coordinated.
Literature is not the most popular cultural medium among workers, but it's still important. We have quite a few poets on the left it seems. It would be cool to publish some collections of revolutionary poetry, maybe do some readings and such. And of course promotion and distribution of already-existing literature.
Gaming. There is a Leftist Game Project already. It's going slowly but still going.. Anyway I think it would be awesome if the project was part of a larger cultural initiative for the reasons stated before (more publicity, better allocation of resources and so on)
Probably there are some important areas of culture that I've missed out. Some are things we have no hope of changing now, that will have to wait until we get state power (eg, city planning). But yeah I hope you get the general idea of what I'm saying ? It's entirely possible for us to disseminate revolutionary proletarian culture if we build up a strong organisation for it. What do you think ? Criticisms ? Additional ideas ? It's very sketchy right now, but hopefully we can build up the ideas, eventually into some practice.
Would anyone be interested in getting involved with something like this ? If so what are your talents or skills that could be useful ? I really think a large coordinated cultural campaign would be worthwhile, it would raise consciousness so much.