Do all M-L support stalin?

[StoneFrog]

Just wondering do all M-L support Stalin's methods he used in the USSR?

[blackwave]

No, absolutely not. Go look up 'Trotskyism' on wikipedia. :)

[Zanthorus]

No, absolutely not. Go look up 'Trotskyism' on wikipedia. :)

'Marxist-Leninism' does not necessarily refer to the ideas of either Marx or Lenin. It usually refers to the ideology promoted by the CPSU both within Russia and internationally via the Comintern after Stalin came to power. Trotskyists usually refer to themselves as 'Bolshevik-Leninists', or just 'Leninists', instead.

[PilesOfDeadNazis]

Just wondering do all M-L support Stalin's methods he used in the USSR?
Not necessarily, no. However, in what I've seen, most people who just call themselves Marxist-Leninist do support Stalin over Trotsky. Those who support Trotsky usually call themselves Trotskyists or Marxist-Bolshevists, if I'm not mistaken.

[Queercommie Girl]

'Marxist-Leninism' does not necessarily refer to the ideas of either Marx or Lenin. It usually refers to the ideology promoted by the CPSU both within Russia and internationally via the Comintern after Stalin came to power. Trotskyists usually refer to themselves as 'Bolshevik-Leninists', or just 'Leninists', instead.

Yes, terms are first and foremost historical ones rather than abstract philosophical ones. One can't analyse Marxist terms like chemical equations.

[Adil3tr]

I think they make some excuses more than support him, or mabe they think trotskism is too idealist. I'm a trotskiest, but MLs aren't the devil or anything, they're still comrades even though we disagree about... a lot of things, but mostly in history.

[The Red Next Door]

Not really, I am a Marxist-Leninist and I do not support Stalin but we don't overly generalize him as all bad, he had good points and very very bad points.

[bie]

There is some sort of relationship: the more brainwashed you are, the more you think you have against comrade Josef Stalin (not "stalin" btw).

[Queercommie Girl]

Not really, I am a Marxist-Leninist and I do not support Stalin but we don't overly generalize him as all bad, he had good points and very very bad points.

I agree.

On the one hand, to literally demonise Stalin like the ultra-leftists isn't right, but on the other hand, orthodox Maoists etc always tend to defend him too much. I mean, killing so many people, even though objectively some of it might be correct killings, cannot just be dismissed as "not a big deal at all". The Western liberals might make too much deal out of it, because they don't have the correct class analysis, but we can't go to the opposite extreme.

[bie]

I am sure that Stalin personally is taking responsibility for every single death from Vladivostok to Brest in 1923-1953. No, seriously, don't you think that constant fight to death between revolution and counterrevolution require more complex analysis? Millions of communists were killed worldwide at that time. Class struggle is not a picnic.

[Vampire Lobster]

He had some pretty successful and sound policies, some policies that could've been executed a tad better and some policies that were outright terrible. That's my personal opinion as someone, who's at least been influenced by the Marxist-Leninist thinking. As we do pride ourselves with our scientific thinking, we can't really make overly crude simplifications about Stalin. He was neither a bloodthirsty tyrant nor was he a great hero of the GREAT MOTHERLAND. Nobody is. Things have to be put in the right context, something Western liberals and many Anarchists usually don't do, but instead, they just dismiss what happened in the Soviet Union only because people died, which is rather naïve. In the other hand, many M-L folks mistakenly think that just putting things into context will eventually justify even the vilest of crimes. This, in the other hand, is blatant, utter intellectual dishonesty.

There happened some pretty nasty shit during Stalin era, and I personally do not regard Iosif Stalin highly as a person, but I do think the development during his administration was, for the most parts, somewhat positive, at least until late 1930's. But I'm pretty indifferent, as I don't see how similar development wouldn't have taken place without Stalin, so I don't really care about him that much there. In the end, he was pretty paranoid, cruel and especially later on pretty much a mess. As a human being, he's hardly worth reverence from my Marxist-Leninist arse. I don't need my Great Leaders, but the standard of living in the Soviet Union really went up then and material conditions for your average Soviet citizen improved notably. A feodal arseloch was dragged out of its archaic ways and transformed into a modern, industrial society. And that's what we're talking about here, not some douche with cool facial hair.

[Obs]

I don't support dead people.

[Vampire Lobster]

I don't support dead people.

You're making Triple Vampire Lenin really sad here.

[Queercommie Girl]

I am sure that Stalin personally is taking responsibility for every single death from Vladivostok to Brest in 1923-1953. No, seriously, don't you think that constant fight to death between revolution and counterrevolution require more complex analysis? Millions of communists were killed worldwide at that time. Class struggle is not a picnic.

Of course, class struggle is not a picnic. Western liberals don't have class analysis. Killing a revisionist or a capitalist clearly isn't the same as killing a worker, a peasant or a socialist.

Note that I'm talking about deaths due to direct political reasons, like the purges, not death due to war, famine etc which no one can really be held responsible for.

Of course, even political purges might not be wrong at all. If genuine reactionaries are removed for instance. However, Stalin killed many people who shouldn't have died during the purges, e.g. Trotsky.

Stalin himself was relatively subjectively genuine and frugal, the same cannot be said of the bureaucrats that succeeded him. Stalin didn't establish an effective democratic system of supervision and control to prevent the rise of revisionism in the party, and well, the rest is history.

The Cultural Revolution was Mao's genuine attempt to bring in more proletarian democracy in China, but for various reasons (yes partly Mao's own fault too) the CR failed, so now China is also on the brink of breaking apart.

Some explanation is required for the fall of the USSR, and you can't blame all of it on external factors. That's not dialectical. There are definitely internal factors involved too, namely bureaucratic revisionists within the Soviet communist party.

[bie]

Of course, class struggle is not a picnic. Western liberals don't have class analysis. Killing a revisionist or a capitalist clearly isn't the same as killing a worker, a peasant or a socialist.
No, they have class analysis and understand it very well (maybe even better than us). However, they are on the opposite side. And now - concerning historical case - it is necessary to look at the history of XX century socialism through the perspective of the dialectics of revolution and counterrevolution. And there were times of the biggest intensification of that war. Millions of people were killed during the imperialist intervention in 1918. Millions other starved to death as it result. There was a class struggle in the countryside, where rich peasants put fire under their crops that eventually brought famines and food shortages. There were trials of internal counterrevolution and coup de etats, that were successfully destroyed. And, unfortunately, there were victims on both sides all the way through. That is why it is fairly unjust to blame Stalin for the death of every single person, just because that he got the position of the first secretary!

Other things - Trotsky - he was killed by his former follower. As a dangerous traitor, who did a lot of harm, I my opinion, he deserved that.

Concerning opportunism - the rise of opportnism after XX congress of CPSU wasn't Stalin's fault. In order to defeat fascism it was necessary during the war to ally all the forces, including those, who were not friendly towards socialism. There was no other option, otherwise Nazism will exterminate all the Soviet population. If you look into Stalin's speaches e.g. from 1942 or 1943 - he never mentioned there the communism or the class war! These allies gained influence and became one of the basis for the rise of opportunism.

[fa2991]

Tito certainly didn't towards the end there.

[Weezer]

ITT: Murder is cool.

[ContrarianLemming]

This is turning into a bit of an ML circle jerk, it's pretty clear that not all of them support the policies of mister Stalin, how irrelevent

[Vampire Lobster]

This is turning into a bit of an ML circle jerk, it's pretty clear that not all of them support the policies of mister Stalin, how irrelevent

It just might have something do with the question being mostly targeted at M-Ls and those who actually know a lot about M-L thought. Which usually includes a lot of M-Ls when compared to other tendencies, for reasons totally unknown.

Point. Your post lacks one.

[Lacrimi de Chiciură]

Stalin was an anti-communist, homophobe, and a racist who appropriated the term "Leninism" much in the same way that Hitler appropriated the term "socialism." That is to say that they used the terms inaccurately to describe the bullshit they were doing to make it sound more appealing to the working class. If anyone is going to support Stalin, fuck them. That is why the true term for it is Stalinism. For the same reason, we don't call Hitler a socialist because he was a Nazi! Of course that is not to fall into the trap of "totalitarianism" which asserts that they were the same type of regime, but they were both right-wing who used our terms to be more appealing.

For me, Marxism-Leninism is about critical thinking and understanding our historic tasks as proletarians. It is impossible to reconcile the contradiction of that definition of M-L with the Stalinist interpretation of it, which is why they must be cut apart to be given coherency. Therefore, Marxism-Leninism =/= Stalinism; Socialism =/= Nazism; etc.

[LeninBalls]

Stalin was an anti-communist, homophobe, and a racist who appropriated the term "Leninism" much in the same way that Hitler appropriated the term "socialism." That is to say that they used the terms inaccurately to describe the bullshit they were doing to make it sound more appealing to the working class. If anyone is going to support Stalin, fuck them. That is why the true term for it is Stalinism. For the same reason, we don't call Hitler a socialist because he was a Nazi! Of course that is not to fall into the trap of "totalitarianism" which asserts that they were the same type of regime, but they were both right-wing who used our terms to be more appealing.

best post ever

[Palingenisis]

Just wondering do all M-L support Stalin's methods he used in the USSR?

No! His methods of making coffee were totally reactionary!

Which methods are you talking about in relation to achieving what?

Did it ever occur to you that Stalin might not have used the "methods" you have been told that he did?

[Vampire Lobster]

Stalin was an anti-communist, homophobe, and a racist who appropriated the term "Leninism" much in the same way that Hitler appropriated the term "socialism." That is to say that they used the terms inaccurately to describe the bullshit they were doing to make it sound more appealing to the working class. If anyone is going to support Stalin, fuck them. That is why the true term for it is Stalinism. For the same reason, we don't call Hitler a socialist because he was a Nazi! Of course that is not to fall into the trap of "totalitarianism" which asserts that they were the same type of regime, but they were both right-wing who used our terms to be more appealing.

For me, Marxism-Leninism is about critical thinking and understanding our historic tasks as proletarians. It is impossible to reconcile the contradiction of that definition of M-L with the Stalinist interpretation of it, which is why they must be cut apart to be given coherency. Therefore, Marxism-Leninism =/= Stalinism; Socialism =/= Nazism; etc.

It must be awesome to live in a world with only comic book villains and actually communist white knights in spandex.

[Lacrimi de Chiciură]

It must be awesome to live in a world with only comic book villains and actually communist white knights in spandex.

It must suck to not be able to analyze history and ideology for yourself and only regurgitate the shit you read on the internet.

[Vampire Lobster]

It must suck to not be able to analyze history and ideology for yourself and only regurgitate the shit you read on the internet.

yeah it does :(

[Marxach-Léinínach]

If by his "methods" you mean the practical implementation of Leninism then hell yes.

[Nanatsu Yoru]

I'm newish here, but I'm a definite M-L and strongly strongly disagree with Stalin. The Soviet Union was improving before he came along and was TBH kind of a ****hole when he left. The evidence is there... I don't see how people could promote him.

Actually that's a good question... Stalinists out there... why do you support him?

[Queercommie Girl]

I'm newish here, but I'm a definite M-L and strongly strongly disagree with Stalin. The Soviet Union was improving before he came along and was TBH kind of a ****hole when he left. The evidence is there... I don't see how people could promote him.

Actually that's a good question... Stalinists out there... why do you support him?

Yes, he made many serious mistakes, but frankly the revisionists that came after him were even worse.

[Marxach-Léinínach]

I'm newish here, but I'm a definite M-L and strongly strongly disagree with Stalin. The Soviet Union was improving before he came along and was TBH kind of a ****hole when he left. The evidence is there... I don't see how people could promote him.

Actually that's a good question... Stalinists out there... why do you support him?

Because maybe he was actually a fine Marxist-Leninist and helped set up a great dictatorship of the proletariat in the USSR. All that stuff the bourgeois media say about him killing 50 gazillion people, have you considered the possibility that maybe, just maybe, those might be lies and slanders to make communism seem bad?

EDIT: I see you're a Maoist like me. So you uphold Mao but not Stalin? What's that about?

[Queercommie Girl]

If Stalin never made mistakes, revisionism wouldn't have emerged in the USSR after him and today the USSR would still exist.

[Marxach-Léinínach]

Of course he wasn't meant to be some kind of god who could come out of every situation with the perfect line for each one. Point is, the good outweighs the bad by far.

Although the revisionists may have got into power after his death, it was hardly an effortless waltz into power with no obstacles.

[Nanatsu Yoru]

Because maybe he was actually a fine Marxist-Leninist and helped set up a great dictatorship of the proletariat in the USSR. All that stuff the bourgeois media say about him killing 50 gazillion people, have you considered the possibility that maybe, just maybe, those might be lies and slanders to make communism seem bad?

EDIT: I see you're a Maoist like me. So you uphold Mao but not Stalin? What's that about?

Sorry if I came across as offensive earlier, all I was saying was it seems the evidence suggests that there was more to Stalin than many M-Ls say, though I admit there was probably a lot less than what the media says. I believe in facts, and if you can give me a reliable source talking about the good points of Stalin then I would be glad to read it. Same deal with Mao - his revolutionary tactics and ideas for continuing battle against capitalism have merit, but I'm not sure about several things he did. For example, the Great Leap Forward seems a little suspect to me.

[Marxach-Léinínach]

Sorry if I came across as offensive earlier, all I was saying was it seems the evidence suggests that there was more to Stalin than many M-Ls say, though I admit there was probably a lot less than what the media says. I believe in facts, and if you can give me a reliable source talking about the good points of Stalin then I would be glad to read it. Same deal with Mao - his revolutionary tactics and ideas for continuing battle against capitalism have merit, but I'm not sure about several things he did. For example, the Great Leap Forward seems a little suspect to me.

No problemo.

Yeah, there's books you can read which expose the lies the bourgeois media tell about Stalin and Mao.

Here's a good one on Stalin - marxism.halkcephesi .net/Ludo%20Martens /index.html

And here's a good one for Mao - amazon .co.uk/Battle-Chinas-Past-Cultural-Revolution /dp/074532780X/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1285447870&sr=1-1 (can't find an online version sorry)

I can't post links properly yet, so just remove the spaces when you copy the links

[Nanatsu Yoru]

Thanks, I'll try and find time to read those pronto. In the meantime, could you outline the good things Stalin did, and maybe an explanation of the doctored photographs (especially the ones without Trotsky) supposedly coming out of the Soviet Union around that period?

[Marxach-Léinínach]

Well it was people in the NKVD who did the doctoring of images, rather than Stalin himself. Stalin actually criticised authors who didn't mention Trotsky at all in books about the civil war for example. Stalin's cult of personality was always promoted by others (one of the main promoters was Khrushchov funnily enough), not himself.

As far as some of the good things he did, well he took a war-devastated backwards country and made it a socialist powerhouse that saved the world by defeating both the Nazis and the Japanese and made the rest of the capitalist world shake in their boots. The USSR under his leadership was a beacon of hope for all the oppressed peoples of the world, and by the end of his life, the gains of the October Revolution had spread from Beijing all the way to Berlin.

[Marxach-Léinínach]

But I think Trotsky was a collaborator with Nazi Germany. So I don't care about the doctored photographs with him. The other famous doctored photographs were with Ezhov, one of the worst criminals and murderers who got into the Bolshevik party who was responsible for and conducted the Ezhovshchina or the so-called Great Terror. So I don't care about his photographs either.

Yeah, that as well.

[Nanatsu Yoru]

And what about the people who speak about the police beatings, disappearances etc? These have probably been blown out of proportion by the cappies, but do you think it didn't happen at all or was justified / didn't happen that much?

[Queercommie Girl]

I am critical of Stalin to a certain extent, but he lead the Soviet Union under times of duress and helped to industrialise it. Also, the war against fascism would not be won without Stalin's leadership.

But I think Trotsky was a collaborator with Nazi Germany. So I don't care about the doctored photographs with him. The other famous doctored photographs were with Ezhov, one of the worst criminals and murderers who got into the Bolshevik party who was responsible for and conducted the Ezhovshchina or the so-called Great Terror. So I don't care about his photographs either.

I think it would be difficult for you to seriously back up this kind of claim.

[Nanatsu Yoru]

That is true, but among Leninists, this is accepted as a fact.

By what logic??

[Obs]

That is true, but among Leninists, this is accepted as a fact.
No.

[Marxach-Léinínach]

And what about the people who speak about the police beatings, disappearances etc? These have probably been blown out of proportion by the cappies, but do you think it didn't happen at all or was justified / didn't happen that much?

Yeah a lot of that did happen during the Great Terror. It was Yezhov, who was executed himself afterwards, who was responsible for that though. That was why Stalin had Beria brought in from Georgia. Beria's first act as head of the NKVD was to release many people wrongly imprisoned and persecuted by Yagoda and Yezhov. Stalin even personally met and apologised to some of them.

Here's another good website about Stalin - redcomrades.byethost5 .com/redcomrades/

[Optiow]

Just wondering do all M-L support Stalin's methods he used in the USSR?
No, they do not. Stalin and his followers are considered 'Stalinists' by their fellow ML.

[Volcanicity]

And what about the people who speak about the police beatings, disappearances etc? These have probably been blown out of proportion by the cappies, but do you think it didn't happen at all or was justified / didn't happen that much?
Yeah these things happened but the figures are blown vastly out of proportion.People like Yezhov who was a well known drunk should never have been anywhere near a gun,the power went to his head,and he was over brutal,which is why Stalin had him shot.You always have to put these things into perspective,the "wreckers and saboteurs" were trying to bring down the party.Revisionists were a lot worse danger than Stalin. And to answer the OP I do support Stalin,sure he did some wrong things but the good far outways the bad.

[Queercommie Girl]

That is true, but among Leninists, this is accepted as a fact.

You just undermined the reputation of Leninists by suggesting that they all believe in something as serious as this accusation without sufficient evidence.

I think you would have trouble backing your statement here up as well, not least given that most Trotskyists are indeed Leninists.

[Ismail]

Basic answer: "Marxism-Leninism" is a very broad word. It was coined under Stalin's leadership, and the early Trotskyists called themselves "Bolshevik-Leninists" in response, but I've seen Trotskyists, Maoists, Hoxhaists, Brezhnevites (basically "Pan-Socialist" parties like the FRSO and WWP), the Khmer Rouge, modern-day China and the DPRK until the 1990's use(d) the word to describe their states at some point in time.

They often used the same word against each other, so you'd wind up with the Khmer Rouge calling Vietnamese leadership the "reactionary, chauvinist Le Duan clique which is against the Marxist-Leninist principles on relations between states" whereas the Vietnamese would counter with "the Marxist-Leninists of Vietnam are securing their own territory in battle with the fascist Pol Pot-Ieng Sary clique." Mao would call the USSR leadership a "revisionist renegade clique which has betrayed Marxism-Leninism," whereas Khrushchev or Brezhnev would call the Chinese leadership "an infantile, ultra-left, petty-bourgeois clique with hegemonist ambitions going against the great socialist family of nations united under Lenin's banner and the Party's Marxist-Leninist course," etc. Then you'd have some states like Cuba, Yugoslavia, Romania, the DPRK and to an extent the USSR going, "Hey, every country has a different variant of Marxism-Leninism to fit their material needs. Can't we all just get along?" But I doubt many Trotskyists would look up to Kim Il Sung or Ceaușescu (or even Castro in some cases) for advice, whereas Hoxha referred to Kim as a "vacillating, revisionist megalomaniac" and had no kind words for either Ceaușescu or Castro. What about Tito? Khrushchev and Brezhnev praised Tito for "constructing socialism" in Yugoslavia, as did Kim Il Sung, but you'll find nothing like that in the writings of Mao or Hoxha, or of course Stalin himself.

At some point you begin to recognize why so many "-isms" exist.

That's the basic answer to the thread title question. The best that can be said is that they are Marxists to some extent and follow Lenin to some extent.

A good example is Professor Grover Furr (http://chss.montclair.edu/english/furr/). He is undeniably an "anti-revisionist" "Stalinist," and would probably refer to himself as a Marxist-Leninist, but the party he belongs to is the Progressive Labor Party, which has been described as "Anarcho-" or "Left-Stalinist" (as a semi-joke) because they believe that the PLP must be a party of the international working class and advocate a direct drive towards communism more or less without the state. In an interview, Furr stated (http://chss.montclair.edu/english/furr/pol/averdade0710.html) that:

Socialism as it was understood in the late 19th and 20th centuries led to a return to capitalism. The communist movement – and, in fact, the Second International and even Karl Marx (who called it "the lower stage of communism") believed it would be the transitional period between capitalism and communism. Instead, socialism proved to be "the transition between capitalism and capitalism," as some cynical people have said.

In my view this failure of socialism in the 20th century is NOT due to personal failings of leaders like Lenin, Stalin, Mao Tsetung. These men, and a great many more communists in the were great, dedicated people who worked all their lives to bring about a communist society of justice and equality. They thought they could do this only by building "socialism" first.

And that’s what they did – build and lead socialist societies as they understood them. These societies all reverted to exploitative capitalism. But that was not because Lenin, Stalin, Mao, and others were stupid, ignorant, corrupt, "criminal", "power-hungry", or anything of the kind. These were the best people in the world and they led the greatest movement for liberation in human history.

The reversion to capitalism occurred because "socialism" contained within it the seeds of its own destruction. Socialism preserves too many aspects of exploitative capitalism, such as:


privileges for some at the expense of others;
differential pay;
the contradiction between mental labor more than manual labor, and the tendency to reward the first more than the second;
the contradictions between city and countryside;
capitalist relations of production;

All these contradictions grew up, or were deliberately fostered, within the communist party itself, too.

It’s clear that full-blown communism, with the very idea of class exploitation and inequality, will not come to pass until all vestiges of capitalism have been swept from the earth. That will take a whole historical epoch.

Still, it will never come to pass at all unless the concept of "socialism" is radically altered. If it isn’t, then future revolutions will be doomed to repeat the failure of the revolutions of the past. This would be not just tragic, but criminal – it would mean that our generation of communists had refused to learn the lessons of our forebears.

I think it’s clear that the retention of inequality and its perpetuation and growth through market mechanisms – money – was the central cause of the reversion of socialism to capitalism. After future revolutions inequality, and money, should be abolished. The principle of "to each according to his need" should be instituted immediately.

Some will object that this will decrease incentives for people to work hard. But remember the alternative: the reversion to capitalism.

As for what to call this first stage of communism after the revolution: I’d say we should abandon the term "socialism." Marx never used it. Its use came from the social-democratic parties out of which the Bolsheviks came. Marx referred to the "lower stage of communism." So we could call it that. Communism – a world of equality and solidarity, in which everyone is a worker and no one lives by exploitation – is the age-old goal of the working classes. It’s a good name. So, I propose changing "socialism" for "the lower stage" or "the first stage of communism."Obviously not many "Marxist-Leninists" are going to agree with Furr on that.

[Nanatsu Yoru]

Sorry Marxach - I'm not convinced. Beria doesn't seem an especially nice character either, and there does seem a bit more to Stalin than you're saying. I don't think we'll ever know what he did, but I'm still suspicious.

And marxistn00b - I am quite sure that this Leninist and many, many others are going to be a little annoyed by that comment. Feel like backing it up?

[Ismail]

Thinker, if you want to know about Stalin there are plenty of sources from all sides. If you want a "pro-Stalin" view check out Ludo Marten's Another View of Stalin as the most supportive (it can be found on Google), all-round analysis of Stalin available (from a semi-Maoist perspective). Good reads from bourgeois sources would include Origins of the Great Purges by J. Arch Getty and Life and Terror in Stalin's Russia by Robert W. Thurston. You could check our Grover Furr's articles, too.

For what it's worth, here's the official Soviet view of Stalin after he died (from the The History of the World in Two Volumes Vol. II, 1974, pp. 108-109.):

The period under review was marked by gross violations of Party and Soviet democracy and socialist legality in consequence of the Stalin personality cult, which were in direct contradiction with the principles of socialist democracy.

J. V. Stalin had held, since 1922, the post of General Secretary of the Communist Party Central Committee. He had made important contributions to the implementation of the Party’s policy of socialist construction in the USSR, and he had won great popularity by his relentless fight against the anti-Leninist groups of the Trotskyites and Bukharinites. Since the early 1930s, however, all the successes achieved by the Soviet people in the building of socialism began to be arbitrarily attributed to Stalin. Already in a letter written back in 1922 Lenin warned the Party Central Committee: "Comrade Stalin," he wrote, "having become General Secretary, has concentrated boundless authority in his hands, and I am not sure whether he will always be able to exercise that authority with sufficient discretion." During the first few years after Lenin’s death Stalin reckoned with his critical remarks. As time passed, however, he abused his position of General Secretary of the Party Central Committee more and more frequently, violating the principle of collective leadership and making independent decisions on important Party and state issues. Those personal shortcomings of which Lenin had warned manifested themselves with greater and greater insistence: his rudeness, capriciousness, intolerance of criticism, arbitrariness, excessive suspiciousness, etc. This led to unjustified restrictions of democracy, gross violations of socialist legality and repressions against prominent Party, government and military leaders and other people.

Harmful though it was, the Stalin personality cult was unable to change either the nature of the Soviet socialist system or the activities of the Party and the people, aimed at building socialism and communism in the USSR. The Soviet people, directed by the Communist Party, achieved outstanding successes in socialist construction, in the development of socialist relations within the society, and in following a consistent policy of peace, which opened up boundless prospects for the continued advancement of the Soviet society. The personality cult was something quite alien to the Soviet system of government. Marxism-Leninism holds that the people are the true makers of history, creating all material and spiritual values and building a new world under the guidance of the Communist Party. Socialism in the USSR was built by the working class, the working peasantry, the Soviet intelligentsia, under the leadership of the Communist Party and in accordance with the blue-print prepared by Lenin.The Albanian view (from Centenary of the Birth of J. V. Stalin, 1979):

J. V. Stalin's name and work are immortal. The attacks and slanders of the bourgeois and revisionist enemies can never obscure his historic merits in the eyes of the Soviet people, the international proletariat and the peoples of the world...

... he organized and led the struggle to implement the brilliant Leninist plan for the construction of socialist society, to defend and strengthen the dictatorship of the proletariat, in fierce and continuous struggle against the internal and external enemies of the Soviet Union, against the opportunists and revisionists of every hue — the Trotskyites, Bukharinites, bourgeois nationalists, etc. The construction of socialism in the Soviet Union under J. V. Stalin's leadership constitutes a rich experience from which Marxist Leninists have learned and will always learn.

J. V. Stalin sets a brilliant example of a determined fighter against class enemies, imperialism and reaction, in defence of the victories of the revolution, the dictatorship of the proletariat and the socialist Homeland....

To him belongs the historic merit of discovering and exposing the betrayal of the Yugoslav revisionist leadership, which was the first variant of modern revisionism in power. Contrary to the attempts of the Soviet, Chinese and the other revisionists to rehabilitate Yugoslav revisionism, life has fully vindicated Stalin's assessment that Titoism was and remains an agency of imperialism to split the communist movement, to sabotage the revolution and to undermine the liberation struggle of the peoples...

J. V. Stalin was and remains a great Marxist-Leninist. His work, despite the slanders of the Soviet, Titoite, Chinese revisionists and the Eurocommunists is and will continue to be a banner of struggle and victory for the international proletariat; it strikes terror into the enemies of the revolution, socialism, and the dictatorship of the proletariat. The campaign launched against J. V. Stalin by the Khrushchevite revisionists at their notorious Twentieth Congress, as our Party has long ago pointed out, had no other aim but to dethrone Leninism, to open the road for the restoration of capitalism in the Soviet Union and elsewhere, to attack the genuinely revolutionary Marxist-Leninist forces, to bring about the degeneration of the communist parties, and to sabotage the revolution. Following this road, the revisionist cliques of Khrushchev and Brezhnev liquidated the achievements of the October Socialist Revolution and the brilliant work of V. I. Lenin and J. V. Stalin, and transformed the Soviet Union from a centre of world revolution into a social-imperialist state.

Our Party has always considered the defence of J. V. Stalin and his work as a major question of principle. To defend the cause of J. V. Stalin means to defend Marxism-Leninism, the revolution, socialism and the dictatorship of the proletariat, to be a resolute fighter against imperialism, the international bourgeoisie and revisionism of every hue, to defend the banner of the freedom and independence of the peoples, to uphold the banner of proletarian internationalism.Mao's view in 1956 (from Mao's Selected Works Vol. V, 1977, p. 304.):

In the Soviet Union, those who once extolled Stalin to the skies have now in one swoop consigned him to purgatory. Here in China some people are following their example. It is the opinion of the Central Committee that Stalin's mistakes amounted to only 30 per cent of the whole and his achievements to 70 per cent, and that all things considered Stalin was nonetheless a great Marxist. We wrote On the Historical Experience of the Dictatorship of the Proletariat on the basis of this evaluation. This assessment of 30 per cent for mistakes and 70 per cent for achievements is just about right. Stalin did a number of wrong things in connection with China. The "Left" adventurism pursued by Wang Ming in the latter part of the Second Revolutionary Civil War period and his Right opportunism in the early days of the War of Resistance Against Japan can both be traced to Stalin. At the time of the War of Liberation, Stalin first enjoined us not to press on with the revolution, maintaining that if civil war flared up, the Chinese nation would run the risk of destroying itself. Then when fighting did erupt, he took us half seriously, half sceptically. When we won the war, Stalin suspected that ours was a victory of the Tito type, and in 1949 and 1950 the pressure on us was very strong indeed. Even so, we maintain the estimate of 30 per cent for his mistakes and 70 per cent for his achievements. This is only fair.

In the social sciences and in Marxism-Leninism, we must continue to study Stalin diligently wherever he is right. What we must study is all that is universally true and we must make sure that this study is linked with Chinese reality. It would lead to a mess if every single sentence, even of Marx's, were followed. Our theory is an integration of the universal truth of Marxism-Leninism with the concrete practice of the Chinese revolution.And in 1964, Mao stated (On Khrushchov's Phoney Communism and Its Historical Lessons to the World, 1964, pp. 15-16):

As the Soviet Union was the first, and at the time the only, country to build socialism and had no foreign experience to go by, and as Stalin departed from Marxist-Leninist dialectics in his understanding of the laws of class struggle in socialist society, he prematurely declared after agriculture was basically collectivized that there were "no longer antagonistic classes" in the Soviet Union and that it was "free of class conflicts", one-sidely stressed the internal homogeneity of socialist society and overlooked its contradictions, failed to rely upon the working class and the masses in the struggle against the forces of capitalism and regarded the possibility of restoration of capitalism as associated only with armed attack by international imperialism. This was wrong both in theory and in practice.

Nevertheless, Stalin remained a great Marxist-Leninist. As long as he led the Soviet Party and state, he held fast to the dictatorship of the proletariat and the socialist course, pursued a Marxist-Leninist line and ensured the Soviet Union’s victorious advance along the road of socialism.

Ever since Khrushchov seized the leadership of the Soviet Party and state, he has pushed through a whole series of revisionist policies which have greatly hastened the growth of the forces of capitalism and again sharpened the class struggle between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie and the struggle between the roads of socialism and capitalism in the Soviet Union.Of course a vast majority of Trotskyists wouldn't agree with practically any of this (though to be fair, I've seen few cases of Trotskyists who actually use "Marxism-Leninism" to describe themselves).

[Wanted Man]

Stalin was an anti-communist, homophobe, and a racist who appropriated the term "Leninism" much in the same way that Hitler appropriated the term "socialism." That is to say that they used the terms inaccurately to describe the bullshit they were doing to make it sound more appealing to the working class. If anyone is going to support Stalin, fuck them. That is why the true term for it is Stalinism. For the same reason, we don't call Hitler a socialist because he was a Nazi! Of course that is not to fall into the trap of "totalitarianism" which asserts that they were the same type of regime, but they were both right-wing who used our terms to be more appealing.

For me, Marxism-Leninism is about critical thinking and understanding our historic tasks as proletarians. It is impossible to reconcile the contradiction of that definition of M-L with the Stalinist interpretation of it, which is why they must be cut apart to be given coherency. Therefore, Marxism-Leninism =/= Stalinism; Socialism =/= Nazism; etc.

Stalin was a nazi! :mad::mad::mad::mad:

Anyway, as we've seen in this thread, perhaps it would be a good idea to define "M-L" and "support" first, since there are about 10 different viewpoints about each of those things alone.

[Ismail]

How was Stalin a "racist" in any way? It was his opponents who used terms like "Asiatic" to describe him, and I doubt that Lenin would support a racist being in charge of nationality issues (where his original fame in calling for self-determination and the preservation of national cultures came from).

As for homophobia, I'd like to see an example of a notable non-homophobic Soviet politician at the time. Engels referred to a homosexual man he disliked at one point as an "ass-fucker," and Lenin regarded Freud's views as "[springing] from the desire to justify one’s own abnormal or excessive sex life before bourgeois morality and to plead for tolerance towards oneself... No matter how rebellious and revolutionary it may be made to appear, it is in the final analysis thoroughly bourgeois."

In any case what does it matter that a person born around 130 years ago and ruled up until 57 years ago disliked homosexuals? Did Lenin support gay rights? Did Trotsky? Did Stalin incorporate into Marxist-Leninist theory the idea that homosexuality must be sternly combated or something? Did Soviet treatment of homosexuals (note: homosexuality was already being condemned by Soviet psychologists under Lenin as a so-called "bourgeois deviation") alter relations to the means of production? Furthermore do we actually even have examples of any extraordinary homophobia from Stalin? I'm pretty sure the laws altering homosexuality were passed by the Soviet state legislature and didn't pass Stalin's desk, as can be said for the Soviet law on abortion.

Homosexuality was not viewed like it is today. Maxim Gorky talked about how to "defeat fascism" it was necessary to "defeat homosexuality," whereas Enver Hoxha in Albania equated male homosexuality with feudal clan chieftains and lesbians as a reaction to male chauvinism, thus seeing through the arrests of male homosexuals and the toleration of lesbians as "necessary positive discrimination against centuries of inequality."

They lived in their own times, we live in ours. We know better. There's a reason why a lot of posters joke about how practically all the Marxists we look up to would be restricted on RevLeft if they were brought back from the dead.

[L.A.P.]

No, absolutely not. Go look up 'Trotskyism' on wikipedia. :)

Trotskyist aren't exactly Marxist-Leninist.

[L.A.P.]

I can't speak for everyone but most Marxist-Leninists, such as myself, believe in the Marxist-Leninist-Stalinist line and either Maoist or Hoxhaist.

[Nanatsu Yoru]

I can't speak for everyone but most Marxist-Leninists, such as myself, believe in the Marxist-Leninist-Stalinist line and either Maoist or Hoxhaist.

Not all of us do. There are some of us that are only Marxist-Leninists, and treat Stalin, Mao and Hoxha with extreme suspicion.

[Crux]

I am sure that Stalin personally is taking responsibility for every single death from Vladivostok to Brest in 1923-1953. No, seriously, don't you think that constant fight to death between revolution and counterrevolution require more complex analysis? Millions of communists were killed worldwide at that time. Class struggle is not a picnic.
Like this (http://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1936/revbet/index.htm) maybe?

[Zanthorus]

Enver Hoxha in Albania equated male homosexuality with feudal clan chieftains and lesbians as a reaction to male chauvinism, thus seeing through the arrests of male homosexuals and the toleration of lesbians as "necessary positive discrimination against centuries of inequality."

Funny, I was reading through The Men who stare at Goats today, and one of the main points the book seemed to make was that often horrific crimes get covered over as humorous incidents, like Iraqi prisoners being tortured with the 'I Love You' song from Barney the dinosaur. Strictly speaking, discrimination against Male homosexuals shouldn't be funny, but for some reason the lesbian thing just makes it seem almost like a light-hearted joke on Hoxha's part.

[Marxach-Léinínach]

Here's an article showing how Stalin tried hard to democratize the Soviet government in his later years. Shows his "dictator" characterisation is kinda unfounded.

clogic.eserver .org/2005/furr.html

[Lacrimi de Chiciură]

Well it was people in the NKVD who did the doctoring of images, rather than Stalin himself. Stalin actually criticised authors who didn't mention Trotsky at all in books about the civil war for example. Stalin's cult of personality was always promoted by others (one of the main promoters was Khrushchov funnily enough), not himself.

As far as some of the good things he did, well he took a war-devastated backwards country and made it a socialist powerhouse that saved the world by defeating both the Nazis and the Japanese and made the rest of the capitalist world shake in their boots. The USSR under his leadership was a beacon of hope for all the oppressed peoples of the world, and by the end of his life, the gains of the October Revolution had spread from Beijing all the way to Berlin.

How could the Stalinist USSR be a beacon of hope for all oppressed peoples of the world when it was under Stalin that several Turkish groups, Volga Germans, Nakh peoples, etc. were ethnically cleansed, homosexuality was criminalized, and uncritical alliances were forged with imperialist capitalist states (dissolving the Comintern and pursuing "socialism in one country"?) With so many obvious contradictions and betrayals, it was a pretty jaded "beacon of hope."


They lived in their own times, we live in ours. We know better. There's a reason why a lot of posters joke about how practically all the Marxists we look up to would be restricted on RevLeft if they were brought back from the dead.

That is the same line of reasoning that some Americans use to justify Thomas Jefferson's owning slaves and raping them. "it was normal for the times" :rolleyes: . Being a revolutionary is about being avant-garde, not following the bourgeois social norms of the times. Socialism is about building a movement of the oppressed, not a movement against the oppressed. How is it that we know better? By thinking as rational human beings; and there were rational human beings in those days. Popular ignorance is not an excuse.

Not to mention that it is impossible to build socialism if a quarter of the population is discriminated against for who they sleep with.

[Zanthorus]

Fly Pan Dulce, it was not just popular ignorance that played a part in the prejudices of many 19th and early 20th century revolutionaries. Many of these prejudices were accepted as scientific fact. Homosexuality was classified as a mental disorder by the DSMV until the 70's.

[Ismail]

How could the Stalinist USSR be a beacon of hope for all oppressed peoples of the world when it was under Stalin that several Turkish groups, Volga Germans, Nakh peoples, etc. were ethnically cleansed,Ethnically cleansed? They were moved (in harsh conditions, but it was war) into new areas where they could be away from the battlefields and were given new settlements to live in. There is no evidence that Stalin agreed to the proposal with racist intentions in mind.

See: http://ml-review.ca/aml/AllianceIssues/All42-Settlements.html


homosexuality was criminalized,It was criminalized everywhere by every nominally "socialist" state. The DPRK apparently has nothing in its laws against homosexuality, does that make the DPRK a beacon of hope for all oppressed peoples of the world?


and uncritical alliances were forged with imperialist capitalist statesAssuming this isn't Molotov-Ribbentrop (God, don't make it be M-R, that's so cliché), I assume you mean World War II. Was this the same alliance the capitalist powers didn't want, and who would rather have seen Hitler just march east and "take care" of the "Bolshevik menace" for them?


(dissolving the Comintern and pursuing "socialism in one country"?)"We now know that on 20 April 1941, at a closed dinner at the Bolshoi Theater, Stalin... [r]effering to the fact that the American Communists had disaffiliated from the Comintern in order to avoid prosecution under the Voorhis Act... declared,

'Dimitrov is losing his parties. That's not bad. On the contrary, it would be good to make the Com[munist] parties entirely independent instead of being sections of the CI. They must be transformed into national Com. parties under various names—Labor Party, Marxist Party, etc. The name doesn't matter. What is important is that they take root in their own people and concentrate on their own special tasks. The situation and tasks vary greatly from country to country, for instance in England and Germany, they are not at all the same. When the Com. parties get strong in this fashion, then you'll reestablish their international organization.'

Stalin continued:

'The [First] International was created in the days of Marx in anticipation of an early world revolution. The Comintern was created in the days of Lenin in a similar period. At present the national tasks for each country move into the forefront. But the status of Com. parties as sections of an international organization, subordinate to the Executive of the CI, is an obstacle.... Don't hold on to what was yesterday. Strictly take into account the newly created circumstances... Under present conditions, membership in the Comintern makes it easier for the bourgeoisie to persecute the Com. parties and accomplish its plan to isolate them from the masses in their own countries, while it hinders the Com. parties' independent development and task-solving as national parties.'"
(Alexander Dallin & Fridrikh I. Firsov. Dimitrov and Stalin: 1934-1943. Hew Haven: Yale University Press. 2000. pp. 226-227.)

Not to mention there were various issues with the efficiency of the Comintern at that point.

As for SIOC, that debate has been made thousands of times already. I don't need to touch on it again.


That is the same line of reasoning that some Americans use to justify Thomas Jefferson's owning slaves and raping them. "it was normal for the times".Slavery was exploitation, homosexuality was viewed by communists ("communists" as in people generally living 100-50 years ago in Eastern Europe or even Western Europe for the most part) as a product of capitalism (or in Albania's case, feudalism). Jefferson owned slaves because he was a bourgeois aristocrat, Stalin (and Lenin, and Trotsky, and everyone back then) opposed homosexuality because of a lack of knowledge. Homosexuals are not uniquely involved in relations to the means of production. The two cases are not comparable.


Being a revolutionary is about being avant-garde, not following the bourgeois social norms of the times.“I feel bound to make one point right away. I suggest you delete altogether paragraph 3 dealing with ‘the demand (on the part of women) for free love.’ This is, in fact, a bourgeois, not a proletarian demand. What do you really mean by it?” (Lenin, Jan. 17, 1915 letter to Inessa Armand, Collected Works vol. 34)


Socialism is about building a movement of the oppressed, not a movement against the oppressed. How is it that we know better? By thinking as rational human beings; and there were rational human beings in those days. Popular ignorance is not an excuse.Marx believed in phrenology (http://www.believeallthings.com/248/karl-marx-and-phrenology/), which was popularly believed at the time. Does this mean Marx was irrational? The first notable socialist to publicly express sympathy for homosexual tolerance was Bernstein, and considering that he founded reformism and criticized many aspects of Marxism as "wrong" and "outdated" I doubt that endeared many towards his views on the subject.


Not to mention that it is impossible to build socialism if a quarter of the population is discriminated against for who they sleep with.I don't necessarily see how. Relations to the means of production are what matter, per Marxist viewpoint. The persecution of homosexuals was due to, as I pointed out, popularly-conceived norms at the time which were never challenged to any significant extent in Eastern Europe. And when you got to places like Albania, as I said, you started seeing Hoxha talking about the "feudal oppressors; the homosexual bey" and such who were conspiring to oppress women (who had an almost slave-like status prior to the 1940's and 50's). Homosexuality was not seen as natural, it was seen as something that "infected" people or was caused by capitalist culture.

[Ned Kelly]

Not all of us do. There are some of us that are only Marxist-Leninists, and treat Stalin, Mao and Hoxha with extreme suspicion.
We know this mate.....you're a trot, therefore you aren't the kind of M-L being referred to, the majority of comrades that do identify as 'Marxist-Leninists' do follow the Marx/Engels-Lenin-Stalin then Mao or Hoxha line.

[Nanatsu Yoru]

I was an M-L when I wrote that. It's been all the Stalinists that have made me switch over :laugh:

[Apoi_Viitor]

Well, to be honest, I've read absolutely none of Stalin's theoretical works (although I've read large amounts of Lenin's). But if we are referring to the actual practice (and implementation of policies) not just theory, then I think Isaac Deutscher's quip: "only the blind and the deaf could be unaware of the contrast between Stalinism and Leninism" is particularly true.

[RED DAVE]

Sorry to jump in so late.


Just wondering do all M-L support Stalin's methods he used in the USSR?No. Trotskyists, who consider themselves to be Marxist-Leninists, or Bolshevik-Leninists to be more accurate, will not piss on Stalin's grave.

RED DAVE

[StoneFrog]

I wasn't referring to Trotskyists, since most seem to no call themselves Marxist-Leninists. Its pretty clear where the Trots stand on stalin.

[Ismail]

Well, to be honest, I've read absolutely none of Stalin's theoretical works (although I've read large amounts of Lenin's). But if we are referring to the actual practice (and implementation of policies) not just theory, then I think Isaac Deutscher's quip: "only the blind and the deaf could be unaware of the contrast between Stalinism and Leninism" is particularly true.Actually I think it's pretty obvious that Stalin's theoretical works (which aren't really "innovative," they just uphold Lenin) show that Stalin derived his theory and practice from Lenin. Perhaps you could try reading Stalin's works rather than reading Deutscher's pro-Trotsky accounts.

Trotskyists referring to themselves as "Marxist-Leninist" are odd anyway. It was Stalin who coined the term, which is precisely why the Trotskyists used "Bolshevik-Leninist" instead.

[Apoi_Viitor]

Actually I think it's pretty obvious that Stalin's theoretical works (which aren't really "innovative," they just uphold Lenin) show that Stalin derived his theory and practice from Lenin. Perhaps you could try reading Stalin's works rather than reading Deutscher's pro-Trotsky accounts.

Alright, which of his works should I start with?

[Ismail]

Alright, which of his works should I start with?As far as reading stuff from Stalin goes, there are basically three notable works that people cite:

The Foundations of Leninism (http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/stalin/works/1924/foundations-leninism/index.htm) (1924, Stalin answers various questions about Leninism that are generally widely known to us today. For example, did you know that Leninism isn't a Russia-only phenomena? Shocking. In seriousness, it's an introduction to Marxism-Leninism.)
"Dizzy with Success (http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/stalin/works/1930/03/02.htm)" (1930, criticizing ultra-leftism in collectivization policies)
Economic Problems of Socialism in the U.S.S.R. (http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/stalin/works/1951/economic-problems/index.htm) (1951, probably his most interesting work which dealt with the right-wing theoretical views of economists who would later predominate under Khrushchev, Brezhnev and onwards)

The rest of his works are divided into generic "Hello glorious comrades of X commune/factory, today is a glorious day....", party congress speeches, discussions on nationality issues, polemics with Trotskyists, and rather mundane letters. One work I strongly recommend you read (read it first, even) is his "On the Final Victory of Socialism in the U.S.S.R. (http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/stalin/works/1938/01/18.htm)" Another good read, which shows Stalin's grasp on Marxism, is his 1934 debate with H.G. Wells on social-democracy: see here (http://rationalrevolution.net/special/library/cc835_44.htm).

By his own admission Stalin was just a "pupil of Lenin." He disliked people using the word "Stalinist" even in a positive manner.

[fa2991]

The rest of his works are divided into generic "Hello glorious comrades of X commune/factory, today is a glorious day....",
:laugh::thumbup1:

Stalin himself didn't write it, but I highly recommended H. Bruce Franklin's intro to the collection of Stalin's writings "The Essential Stalin."

I just came across the book this past week and greatly enjoyed it. A quick Google search reveals that the M-L has apparently archived it here:

http://marxistleninist.wordpress.com/2009/08/28/bruce-franklins-introduction-to-the-essential-stalin/

[Ismail]

The Political Thought of Joseph Stalin (http://books.google.com/books?id=murUL3KaxOwC&dq=Erik+Van+Ree&source=gbs_navlinks_s) by Erik Van Ree is also a good read, and you can preview some of it in Google Books.