Non-Doctrinaire Communism

[Taikand]

I've found this group on RevLeft and find it very interesting, and I was wondering how is it seen by the rest of the forum.
This is the "creed":
We are the non-doctrinaire communists;
We are the heterodox and heretical, but also the most faithful.
We subscribe to no "ism" but communism;
We accept no doctrine but the general doctrine of the liberation of the working class.

We recognize that even the worst of those who call themselves communist might have a point once in a while.
We recognize that even those who got it right most often got it wrong on occasion.
We accept no written word as gospel, no past position as eternally applicable.
We reject that there is any "unbroken thread" except the string of failures that has plagued our movement for a century.

We are the non-doctrinaire communists.
We prepare for the future by learning from the past.
We are not re-enactors of history, but makers of history.
We are capitalism's gravediggers.

[ed miliband]

Badass.

[Animal Farm Pig]

I like it, except for the bit:

We reject that there is any "unbroken thread" except the string of failures that has plagued our movement for a century.

Mentioning the failures without mentioning the successes bothers me.

[Muzk]

Communism is a doctrine.

[x371322]

Communism is a doctrine.


We subscribe to no "ism" but communism; We accept no doctrine but the general doctrine of the liberation of the working class.

I believe they have that point covered. :D

[mikelepore]

We subscribe to no "ism" but communism


As soon as someone asks what it means, how would it work, how would it be brought about, how does it differ from anything else, why do you want it, now you need another thousand words, probably more than that, and now you have another complicated "ism". This cannot be avoided.

[infraxotl]

Seem to be the communist equivalent of capitalist "independents". People too lazy to flesh out their beliefs yet too egotistical to admit it.

[ContrarianLemming]

They seem to me as dedicated anti sectarians.

[thomasludd]

They seem to me as dedicated anti sectarians.

I see them also as the communist equivalent of "anarchist without adjectives"...

I am curious though, there's also a revleft tendency "Independent Socialists" - shouldn't they be in one group?

[Proletarian Ultra]

The original non-doctinaire communist gives this project a thumbs-up:

http://library.thinkquest.org/17120/media/images/bios/users/stalin/stalin3.jpg
"When do we start the reeducation camps, bro?"

[Martin Blank]

Seem to be the communist equivalent of capitalist "independents". People too lazy to flesh out their beliefs yet too egotistical to admit it.

Or, communists who recognize contributions made by even those with whom they disagree overall and are honest enough to admit it, and refuse to be put into one of the pathetically narrow boxes others have set up.

[ContrarianLemming]

I see them also as the communist equivalent of "anarchist without adjectives"...

I am curious though, there's also a revleft tendency "Independent Socialists" - shouldn't they be in one group?

I assume they might share members, it doesn't really matter though.
If the admins actually cleaned up the tendencies section (like putting "syndicalists" and "anarcho syndicalists" into one group) we'd probably lose 90% of the tendencies (and find out that yes, there are slightly more marxist leninists here then anarchists)

[Martin Blank]

I am curious though, there's also a revleft tendency "Independent Socialists" - shouldn't they be in one group?

IIRC, the two were created within days (hours?) of each other, and I don't think either knew of the other until both were already established. As it is, there are IS people in NDC and vice versa. When the groups started, we didn't have the cutesy little bar at the bottom announcing new groups or the dashboard. You had to hunt through the lists to see what was there among the not-so-popular groups.

[infraxotl]

Or, communists who recognize contributions made by even those with whom they disagree overall and are honest enough to admit it, and refuse to be put into one of the pathetically narrow boxes others have set up.


If you made a post outlining your views, people wouldn't generally agree that you fit in some pathetically narrow box?

[Martin Blank]

If you made a post outlining your views, people wouldn't generally agree that you fit in some pathetically narrow box?

Not one of the name-ism boxes, no. There are influences from DeLeonism, Trotskyism, Maoism, Newton's intercommunalism, Myasnikovism, Left Communism and Leninism on top of the base that is commonly called Marxism within my political perspective (as well as non-communist/non-socialist influences, but that's another thread topic). This is because, in each area where each of these influences exist, I recognize the spark of communist theory and contribution. For me, and for other non-doctrinaire communists, it is the method that matters, not so much who got it right at a particular moment.