Learning and Burning

[RedZelenka]

Hello everyone, call me Zel. I've been interested in leftist politics since I was fairly young. My interest started with the French Revolution and the various Marxist parties. I got into contact with various social democrat and socialist parties in my country (Canada), but found that many of them lacked the focus or drive that I found so appealing about the 'Old Left' or revolutionary socialist movements. They had largely become middle-of-the-road, interventionist parliamentarians who were not really interested in achieving socialism or worker democracy, but instead at maintaining their own offices in the capitalist governments.

Their focus was often on things I consider extraneous or downright irrelevant - 'gay' rights, environmentalism, irrational feminism, economic controls that simply served to entrench the power and position of capital. I became more and more dissatisfied with them and the general scene of 'socialism' in my country, and became convinced that they were basically useless.

My general views of egalitarian democracy, internationalism and economic communism. I have somewhat mixed views within that, I am definitely not a Marxist (I do not accept his metaphysic of history) and I am not an anarchist, but I am not entirely sure of what system and theories best explain the world and the economy. One of the reasons I came here was to learn more.

Anyways, thanks

[RedZelenka]

Double post :| Please delete this one.
Sorry!

[Zanthorus]

Welcome :)


One of the reasons I came here was to learn more.

Well then you won't mind if I comment on one of the points in your post :)


I do not accept his metaphysic of history

This is a clear misconception, Marx did not really deal with metaphysics of any sort, let alone have a 'metaphysic of history'. Such would be in clear violation of his stated opposition to any attempts to arrive at an understanding of history by "the universal passport of a general historico-philosophical theory, the supreme virtue of which consists in being super-historical." (Letter to the Editor of the Otecestvenniye Zapisky)

[Volcanicity]

Welcome to Revleft.How are Gay rights irrelevant?

[RedZelenka]

This is a clear misconception, Marx did not really deal with metaphysics of any sort, let alone have a 'metaphysic of history'.
Dialectical materialism and its evolution towards socialism is a metaphysical proposition. By this I do not mean magical, but merely a proposition about the nature of reality and the general forces within it; specifically a metaphysic of socio-physical organization.

In any case, whatever you call it, I accept neither dialectical materialism nor the inevitability of socialism. I am a social rationalist, and I believe the ordering of society depends upon the ideas people hold about how to achieve their ends. Obviously various material and accidental historical factors will affect how and what ideas people form, but it is a purely conscious choice to go from, say, feudalism to communism - or back again.


How are Gay rights irrelevant?
There is no such thing as 'gay' rights. There are human rights, which are basically going to be trampled on so long as a non-communistic society exists. Though I am in favor of equal rights for all people I am not in favor of the interventionism and meddling of the parliamentary left; all this simply creates pointless tensions, screws up the economy and does absolutely nothing towards actually establishing human rights. It's a distraction and totally misguided to begin with.

[red cat]

Welcome.

For security reasons it is against the policies of revleft to have one's pic displayed anywhere here.

EDIT : How are you an RCP affiliate and yet not a Marxist ? :confused:

[RedZelenka]

For security reasons it is against the policies of revleft to have one's pic displayed anywhere here.
Fixed.

How are you an RCP affiliate and yet not a Marxist ?
Opportunism. They're the only half coherent revolutionary party in Canada that isn't 'loony left' Bob Black type of nonsense. I'm a Communist, they're Communists, and so far they haven't noticed that I don't believe in dialectical materialism or the inevitability of socialism. :blushing:

[red cat]

Opportunism. They're the only half coherent revolutionary party in Canada that isn't 'loony left' Bob Black type of nonsense. I'm a Communist, they're Communists, and so far they haven't noticed that I don't believe in dialectical materialism or the inevitability of socialism. :blushing: :lol:

[Volcanicity]

RedZelenka as long as Capitalism exists there will always be an inequality in peoples rights.How does ignoring one section of the populace in this case the LGBT community help them overcome peoples bigotry towards them?This is my point,until Capitalism is abolished it is our duty to stand with them and anyone who is being discriminated against until we have complete equality which can only exist when Communism has been achieved.

[RedZelenka]

RedZelenka as long as Capitalism exists there will always be an inequality in peoples rights.How does ignoring one section of the populace in this case the LGBT community help them overcome peoples bigotry towards them?This is my point,until Capitalism is abolished it is our duty to stand with them and anyone who is being discriminated against until we have complete equality which can only exist when Communism has been achieved.
I'm not disagreeing with you, I'm talking about the liberal-left and their obsession with forcing people to integrate, trying to impose on people's property. You can not fix these problems in capitalism, interventionism creates problems and solves none. Socialization of capital or laissez-faire, an intentional stand in the middle ground is all the problems of capitalism and none of the advantages of socialism.

[Q]

Welcome :)


Their focus was often on things I consider extraneous or downright irrelevant - 'gay' rights, environmentalism, irrational feminism, economic controls that simply served to entrench the power and position of capital.
Communists see and support such struggles within the context of a wider class struggle. The working classhas after all all to benefit from a society in which one is free in their sexual orientation, a clean environment and equality of women. Without this context you end up with "soft-left" liberalism, which is indeed silly.


My general views of egalitarian democracy, internationalism and economic communism. I have somewhat mixed views within that, I am definitely not a Marxist (I do not accept his metaphysic of history) and I am not an anarchist, but I am not entirely sure of what system and theories best explain the world and the economy. One of the reasons I came here was to learn more.


Dialectical materialism and its evolution towards socialism is a metaphysical proposition. By this I do not mean magical, but merely a proposition about the nature of reality and the general forces within it; specifically a metaphysic of socio-physical organization.

In any case, whatever you call it, I accept neither dialectical materialism nor the inevitability of socialism. I am a social rationalist, and I believe the ordering of society depends upon the ideas people hold about how to achieve their ends. Obviously various material and accidental historical factors will affect how and what ideas people form, but it is a purely conscious choice to go from, say, feudalism to communism - or back again.
Perhaps you're not expressing yourself well, but dialectical materialism has nothing to do with "metaphysic of socio-physical organization", it is a thorough materialist conception of how society changes (dialectics being a study of processes).

[red cat]

This thread is asking for something (or someone). :D

[Zanthorus]

Dialectical materialism and its evolution towards socialism is a metaphysical proposition.

Marx's dialectic has nothing to do with speculations on the nature of being or reality. It is the study of capitalism and the laws and tendencies immanent within the capitalist social form. By abstracting from external forces acting upon capitalism, Marx can show how capitalism engenders crisis by itself instead of these crises being 'imposed' from the outside by the changing of the seasons, the actions of sunspots or the particular mood of individuals within the system (All of which have been advanced as potential theories of capitalist crisis). The conclusion of his analysis of capitalism in it's immanent development is that it engenders the conditions for it's own supersession by the creation on the one hand of a whole mass of productive forces which exist on a world scale and the creation of a society which is internationally linked and inseperable, and on the other a mass of dispossessed wage-labourers. This is far from being a theory of the 'inevitability' of socialism, and talk of 'inevitability' only occurs in various rhetorical flourishes in propaganda documents.


Obviously various material and accidental historical factors will affect how and what ideas people form, but it is a purely conscious choice to go from, say, feudalism to communism - or back again.

Well, Marx says basically the same thing in The German Ideology when he notes that the transformation of capitalism into communism requires the existence of 'communist consciousness on a mass scale', so it's difficult to see what your complaining about. Marx of course does not think that individuals have self-determining wills which exist outside society, but that on the contrary the consciousness of individuals is inextricably linked with their material, social existence. The main example of this is commodity fetishism. Continual participation in capitalist social relations, where useful goods carry their price tags with them everywhere (Exchange-value being the mechanism through which productive intercourse is regulated in capitalist societies), leads to this characteristic of useful objects as exchangeable values appearing as something natural and inherent to those objects as useful goods, and the social relations between men appear instead as social relations between things. This view of capitalist social relations as natural and inherent in the nature of things is only broken through the periodic commercial crises which prove with inexorable force that capitalism is a historically specific form of society in which internally contradictory forces preponderate. You seem to accept this when you say that various material and historical forces affect the ideas that people form, although it is not clear. If you don't then, again, it is difficult to see what is being criticised here.

[RedZelenka]

Perhaps you're not expressing yourself well, but dialectical materialism has nothing to do with "metaphysic of socio-physical organization", it is a thorough materialist conception of how society changes (dialectics being a study of processes).
I deny the material-production conception. Ideas are created by people, not imposed on them by historical circumstances. Ideas really do determine social conditions (though they may be mistaken), they are not some secondary phenomena to the 'material productive forces'.

Between some blantantly false economics and dialectic mongering this is why I consider most Marxism (so-called) to be pseudoscience.


By abstracting from external forces acting upon capitalism, Marx can show how capitalism engenders crisis by itself instead of these crises being 'imposed' from the outside by the changing of the seasons, the actions of sunspots or the particular mood of individuals within the system (All of which have been advanced as potential theories of capitalist crisis). The conclusion of his analysis of capitalism in it's immanent development is that it engenders the conditions for it's own supersession by the creation on the one hand of a whole mass of productive forces which exist on a world scale and the creation of a society which is internationally linked and inseperable, and on the other a mass of dispossessed wage-labourers. This is far from being a theory of the 'inevitability' of socialism, and talk of 'inevitability' only occurs in various rhetorical flourishes in propaganda documents.
I can almost agree with this, though it is utterly nonsensical to abstract away from the ideas people have. No conditions or circumstances can 'cause' people to have any particular theoretical idea, theoretics are the only method by which we can interpret historical data. They are a priori to experiential interpretation.
That being said, what you just said has been directly contradicted by two dozen other Marxists I've talked to, which is another reason I don't care for it; interpretations are totally inconsistent and all over the place. I simply lack any kind of reverence for Marxism, I think it's just as often wrong or hopelessly vague as it is right. I know Marxists will want to argue all day and 'interpret' it all, but I just don't care, I think it's apologetics. You can make the Bible seem consistent of you 'interpret' it enough.


Marx of course does not think that individuals have self-determining wills which exist outside society, but that on the contrary the consciousness of individuals is inextricably linked with their material, social existence.
Society is nothing but various individuals. It has no properties or actions which are not directly attributable to individuals. As far as them being material, of course, everything is material. It is neither 'inside' nor 'outside' of their wills, it consists of nothing but the intentions and relations various people have to one another. There are no 'material' facts about society beyond the brute ones that people do, in fact, engage in cooperation rather than ignoring or attacking one another.