Anyone in the Quinte area in Ontario, Canada?

[Soseloshvili]

Hello comrades, I'm a Communist (I refrain from calling myself things like Maoist, Trotskyist or Marxist-Leninist because I consider that Factionalism) and a Canadian (anglophone, to be exact).

I live the Quinte area (that's not a town... it's kind of a general area around the cities of Belleville and Kingston) in a city called Trenton and I was wondering if there are any comrades in the area... it's lonely being the only known Marxist for 200km :(

I'm a highschool student, grade 11, if that matters. Please contact me if you think you live near me!

[Q]

Welcome :)

I know what it's like to be lonely, although I have other Marxists and anarchists closer to me, I'm the only revolutionary in my city.

And as I explained in the PCQ thread, you probably need to revise your definition on "factionalism". There is a longrunning myth that this is by definition a bad thing, but the contrary is true in my view, although this is not the right spot to debate it.

[Soseloshvili]

I define factionalism as an ideological break in a formerly unified ideology. We have all this infighting - Stalinism vs. Trotskyism, Communism vs. Anarchism, and in the case of Canada, Quebec Seperatism vs. Canadian Confederatism. It's all pointless, we can accomplish more in one central organization with many many different opinions than in a serious of small factions.

[Q]

I define factionalism as an ideological break in a formerly unified ideology. We have all this infighting - Stalinism vs. Trotskyism, Communism vs. Anarchism, and in the case of Canada, Quebec Seperatism vs. Canadian Confederatism. It's all pointless, we can accomplish more in one central organization with many many different opinions than in a serious of small factions.

I agree that we can achieve much more in a unified party than a collection of splinters. But a classparty will inevitably know disagreement. An ideologically united party is a myth and a dangerous one because actively persueing it means ensuring splits to happen.

So, disagreement is something I see as a given. The question then becomes: How do we deal with disagreements? Do we view them as a threat to our (imagined) unity or as a chance to enrich ourselves, the party and the class? I think the latter comes muchcloser to any kind of scientific process and a process of a political leadership, than building an ideological united cult.

Even stronger: In this view dissent is a good thing as it shows critical thought of politically capable leaders among the membership, something to be nurished and cultivated.

[Soseloshvili]

We should allow disagreements, it's for this reason that I disagree with anti-revisionism. A party is actually more constructive that way, I agree with you. It allows there to be no dogmatism as we have experienced in past working class parties.

[AK]

See, the thing is, revisionism in the past has mostly taken the form of an abandoning of socialism.*

*whether actually existing or not

[Soseloshvili]

We have to take that risk, don't we? And besides, not all "revisionism" was anti-Socialist, a lot of it was just progressive. Take Trotskyism, for example. There was no anti-Socialism in Trotskyism.

The alternative however is worse: a dogmatic, despotic regime that murders its opponents. Hardly Marx's dream.