Describing the Soviet Union in a nutshell

[Hexen]

So what was the Soviet Union (and others like North Korea, China, Cuba, etc) knowing that their were/are never communist/socialist? I heard terms like "State Capitalist" and "Deformed Workers State" before what is it really how can we sum it up when everytime someone says "USSR was communist" and how can we respond to that?

[Crimson Commissar]

It's fucking idiotic to say the USSR was never socialist. Just because American propaganda says that they were "an oppressive totalitarian regime" doesn't mean you pussy out and completely abandon any support for them.

[Blackscare]

It's fucking idiotic to say the USSR was never socialist. Just because American propaganda says that they were "an oppressive totalitarian regime" doesn't mean you pussy out and completely abandon any support for them.


Enjoy your infraction for sexist language as soon as someone with the ability reads this. I'll make a thread in the mod forum, I don't want you to feel neglected.

[PhoenixAsh]

What??? How the hell was that sexist? Oversext much???

The word pussy used
here comes from "pusilanious" a word derived from two latin words meaning both "small" and "spirit". And has NOTHING to do with gender or genitals from a pure entymological position.

I suggest less pron and more study into the nature, history of words before you start your witch hunt against sexism.

[ComradeOm]

So what was the Soviet Union (and others like North Korea, China, Cuba, etc) knowing that their were/are never communist/socialist? I heard terms like "State Capitalist" and "Deformed Workers State" before what is it really how can we sum it up when everytime someone says "USSR was communist" and how can we respond to that?There are many labels applied to the USSR, as you note, but few of them appeal to me. The USSR was essentially something different - clearly not capitalist or socialist. Whatever label you do apply (and if pushed I'd probably go with 'bureaucratic despotism') the only response needed to your particular question is to stress what the USSR was not. That is, that the Russian Revolution, for whatever reasons, failed and was unable to usher in a socialist/communist society


It's fucking idiotic to say the USSR was never socialist. Just because American propaganda says that they were "an oppressive totalitarian regime" doesn't mean you pussy out and completely abandon any support for them.Which is not quite as stupid as insisting that it was socialist on the basis that Washington said that it was not. Anyone who believes that the USSR was socialist is ignorant (wilfully or not) as to either the realities of the Soviet existence or Marxist theory

But please, by all means go ahead and prove to us that the Stalinist regime was socialist. Here's a tip: you might want to gloss over the collapse in working class living standards and the introduction of draconian labour laws

[Sentinel]

My opinion is that the USSR was genuinely socialist in the early times, when the original bolsheviks exercised state power. The democratic aspect of the revolutionary state started to disappear during the civil war and foreign interventions, due to the circumstances, but was never fully re-established afterwards like Lenin and Trotsky had wanted it to be, and meant to do.

Instead Stalin's faction of the party seized control over the state. The authoritarian development, which had been meant to be a set of temporary measures, was cemented and made to look like an integral part of socialist ideology by Stalin and his followers. During Stalin's rule the country was a nominally socialist dictatorship of the inner circle of the party's central committee, ie the circle around Stalin.

It had certain socialist characteristics such as a planned economy, (not always optimally performed) excessive nationalisations etc. But it lacked the most important aspect that had been present during it's birth: political democracy and working class power. The power was centralised in the hands of the party, from which ranks more democratically oriented members were purged and either exiled or executed.

Moreover Stalin's USSR failed to support the international communist movement in spreading the revolution worldwide, due to Stalin's very unfortunate position of 'socialism in one country'. Instead of helping the revolutionary left in countries like Germany, Britain, France, USA and Spain to topple their capitalists and seize power in the 20's and 30's, the USSR cooperated and signed pacts with the capitalist and fascist governments of Europe, and in many cases told the revolutionaries to lay low, until it was too late.

The disastrious result of this line was the WWII. The workers of Europe, and then the entire world, were once more sent out to fight their brothers from other countries. And while the USSR stood amongst the winners in 1945, the losses had been incredibly huge.

After Stalin died in 1953 the situation improved somewhat, and some progress was made, but not much. The USSR -- and now also it's satellite states in eastern Europe -- were still bureaucratic dictatorships of the party, and were finally toppled by the capitalist counterrevolutionaries in the 90s due to the unattractiveness and ineffiency of such systems.

Of the two successor parties of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union the main one is the Communist Party of the Russian Federation, which has some rather questionable positions, such as support of Russian patriotism/nationalism and homophobia. The second largest one, called the Russian Communist Worker's Party-Revolutionary Party of Communists has been characterised as more like the old CPSU ideologically.

The CWI is present in several former soviet republics, struggling to rally the workers around the ideas of authentic, internationalist and democratic socialism as taught by Vladimir Lenin and Leon Trotsky once more.

[Das war einmal]

Enjoy your infraction for sexist language as soon as someone with the ability reads this. I'll make a thread in the mod forum, I don't want you to feel neglected.

@Crimson Commisar

Off to the tolerance death camp with you!

[Marxach-Léinínach]

1917-1953: socialist
1953-1965: still socialist but being undermined to greater and greater extents
1965-1991: state capitalist

[Rooster]

1917-1953: socialist
1953-1965: still socialist but being undermined to greater and greater extents
1965-1991: state capitalist

Stalin fan much?

That's a really simple way of putting it. The NEP and Lenin's Ascending a High Mountain, saying that they must return to zero to start again the ascent to socialism. Stalin even saying "we can can build socialism in one country" counter point to Trotsky's permanent revolution. "We can build socialism" imples that socialism hasn't happened yet, not by your time frame anyway.

[Crimson Commissar]

Enjoy your infraction for sexist language as soon as someone with the ability reads this. I'll make a thread in the mod forum, I don't want you to feel neglected.
Oh get over it. No one ever uses the word "pussy" in a way that is sexist. I've only ever heard it used to describe someone who is cowardly or weak. Besides, I doubt you'd give as much of a shit if I was using the word dick instead. (Even though that wouldn't make sense in that sentence...)


1917-1953: socialist
1953-1965: still socialist but being undermined to greater and greater extents
1965-1991: state capitalistCare to explain why? The best reason Stalinists seem to come up with about why the cold-war era USSR was state capitalist is that "they didn't like Stalin". I'm not much of a fan of Stalin at all, but I'm not stupid enough to think that the USSR during Stalin was "state capitalist" or whatever the hell other crap you guys come up with.

[Marxach-Léinínach]

Care to explain why? The best reason Stalinists seem to come up with about why the cold-war era USSR was state capitalist is that "they didn't like Stalin". I'm not much of a fan of Stalin at all, but I'm not stupid enough to think that the USSR during Stalin was "state capitalist" or whatever the hell other crap you guys come up with.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1965_Soviet_economic_reform

[Crimson Commissar]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1965_Soviet_economic_reform
I really, REALLY don't see how that is capitalist.

[Marxach-Léinínach]

I really, REALLY don't see how that is capitalist.

Here's a more detailed analysis on how capitalism was restored via those reforms - http://www.marx2mao.com/Other/RCSU75.html

[Black Sheep]

Defining socialism as "a society where the means of production are collective property, and production is collectively managed by the workers themselves", then no.
Sorry.

[Blackscare]

The word pussy used
here comes from "pusilanious" a word derived from two latin words meaning both "small" and "spirit". And has NOTHING to do with gender or genitals from a pure entymological position.

I suggest less pron and more study into the nature, history of words before you start your witch hunt against sexism.


To be totally honest, nobody gives a flat fuck about the etymological basis of a word that in common parlance is used in reference to female genitalia. Ask any person on the street the meaning/origin of the word pussy and you'll find probably no one that says "pusillanimous".



No one ever uses the word "pussy" in a way that is sexist. I've only ever heard it used to describe someone who is cowardly or weak.

Yes, people call people a pussy because it references a woman's vagina. Women are commonly regarded "cowardly or weak".




Besides, I doubt you'd give as much of a shit if I was using the word dick instead.

You're absolutely correct here, because men are not an oppressed group stifled by institutional and cultural discrimination.

Redklok:


@Crimson Commisar

Off to the tolerance death camp with you!

Far from a death camp, he simply deserves an infraction in order to enforce a culture of mutual respect and intolerance of bigoted language.

Maybe he didn't "mean it" in a sexist way, but he's perpetuating the use of sexist language as a substitute for a real argument, and that is unacceptable on a radical left forum such as this. If you cant muster the decorum to follow a few simple rules on an internet forum, or you don't agree, feel free to take your bullshit elsewhere.

[Blackscare]

Upon discussing this with some other moderators, this instance probably warrants a warning since it seems to be the first offense. I'm honestly not sure if I'm qualified to issue one myself outside of the subforum that I moderate, so I'll await some else's action in this regard.

[Le Libérer]

It's fucking idiotic to say the USSR was never socialist. Just because American propaganda says that they were "an oppressive totalitarian regime" doesn't mean you pussy out and completely abandon any support for them.

Sexist language, Formal warning.

[PhoenixAsh]

To be totally honest, nobody gives a flat fuck about the etymological basis of a word that in common parlance is used in reference to female genitalia. Ask any person on the street the meaning/origin of the word pussy and you'll find probably no one that says "pusillanimous".

Yes, people call people a pussy because it references a woman's vagina. Women are commonly regarded "cowardly or weak".


I am not going to debate it seeing as you guys alreadyu made a ruling...
But I do want to remark this:

The word is in fact derived from the latin word pusus...meaning weak...or...in fact little BOY...as a derivitate from peur...meaning boy. Pussilanimous means weak of spirit. The word is shortened in common parleance because tat is what happens to words.

Ironic given your ruling.

If the Latin word for weak would have been duckarius...we would all say...don't be a ducky.



Maybe he didn't "mean it" in a sexist way, but he's perpetuating the use of sexist language as a substitute for a real argument, and that is unacceptable on a radical left forum such as this. If you cant muster the decorum to follow a few simple rules on an internet forum, or you don't agree, feel free to take your bullshit elsewhere.Perhaps you should post a list. Seeing as there isn't any...safe from some words in the rules (and yes...I searched) I would pretty much like to know which words are deemed sexist or disciminatory...seeing as it turns out that the subjective meaning of words basically is subjectively overruled by adhoc decissions....

Finre if you make a subjective decision...its your forum. But do not refer to the rules if you are going to make them up as you go along....and since offcial evolution of language doesn't count.

And I am sure to tell all women that use the word...which is basically all women I know under the age of 40...allthough my mom uses this word...and she is 73....that it is in fact sexist. They will laugh their heads off. ;-)

[Blackscare]

The word is in fact derived from the latin word pusus...meaning weak...or...in fact little BOY...as a derivitate from peur...meaning boy. Pussilanimous means weak of spirit. The word is shortened in common parleance because tat is what happens to words.

If the Latin word for weak would have been duckarius...we would all say...don't be a ducky.


Like I said, the ancient roots of a word whose current meaning is well known is less than irrelevant.


Perhaps you should post a list.

Perhaps you should exercise some common sense rather than shitting up the forums with your needless abstraction of very simple concepts.





And I am sure to tell all women that use the word...which is basically all women I know under the age of 40...allthough my mom uses this word...and she is 73....that it is in fact sexist. They will laugh their heads off. ;-)

Plenty of women oppose abortion rights, economic autonomy, political autonomy, and cultural autonomy for women, as well as feminism in general. That doesn't mean any of the above is acceptable on this forum.

[ComradeOm]

To be totally honest, nobody gives a flat fuck about the etymological basis of a word that in common parlance is used in reference to female genitalia. Ask any person on the street the meaning/origin of the word pussy and you'll find probably no one that says "pusillanimous"You think that he was calling someone a vagina? :confused:

Ask "any person on the street" and I'm sure that they won't consider the word to mean 'female genitalia' when used in this context. 'Pussy' in this usage means 'wimp' or 'coward' or, as hindsight has pointed out, 'boy'. There is no connection with genitalia in either the etymology or "current meaning" of the insult

[bailey_187]

ITT: Mods get a chance ot show their importance

[PhoenixAsh]

Like I said, the ancient roots of a word whose current meaning is well known is less than irrelevant.

Yes...its very ancient...*sigh*. The word pusilanimous is still in use. The word banned here has been used ever before it was used as slang as an indicator for female genitalia.

The words current meaning in all dictionaries...refers to the word pusilanimous. So basically you asign connotation of ignorance to be sexist...which is fine...however...a sign of ignorance ;-)


Perhaps you should exercise some common sense rather than shitting up the forums with your needless abstraction of very simple concepts.

I am. In fact...I pretty much backed it up with solid arguments. Are you? Because so far the only one I have seen is an erroneois reference to "the common man on the streets" FYI...7 out of 10 people interviewd when asked if serious legal action should be taken about Hydrants...do not know the meaning of the word Hydrant. Thinking it is a form of criminal behaviour...so...is it?

If you are going to subjectively change the meaning of words, which is fine, then a list would be in order since you basically want common sense to dictate that a word doesn't actually mean what it means in the real world ;-) See my point?

It was a very simple concept until you did that...and brought it into the debate...which included some very subtile ad hominems btw (do not think I didn't notice ;-) ) Since your entire post was about it and you felt the need to react with specific quotes you made it a legitimate point of debate.

[L.A.P.]

Enjoy your infraction for sexist language as soon as someone with the ability reads this. I'll make a thread in the mod forum, I don't want you to feel neglected.

And yet people are allowed to say "dick" without being sexist?

[L.A.P.]

It all went downhill since 1964.

[Rafiq]

Was the working class in control over the means of production, Crimson Commisar?

No.

The State was.

Therefore, the State controlled Capital, and extracted surplus value from the working class.

Therefore it is State Capitalism.

I don't care if they used to surplus value to "Spread across the motherland like a rainbow of love" they still extracted it, without the working class in power..

So there you have it.

Just call it state capitalist.

[Rafiq]

It all went downhill since 1964.

More like 1922

[Unclebananahead]

Was the working class in control over the means of production, Crimson Commisar?

No.

The State was.

Therefore, the State controlled Capital, and extracted surplus value from the working class.

Therefore it is State Capitalism.

I don't care if they used to surplus value to "Spread across the motherland like a rainbow of love" they still extracted it, without the working class in power..

So there you have it.

Just call it state capitalist.

And here again, we have the common refrain of the 'state capitalist' theorists. They might as well call the FSU, 'Soviet Union Inc.' I've for one, have never been convinced that the Soviet Union was capitalist at any point in its existence, with the possible exception of Lenin's NEP. Private ownership of the means of production was demolished, and replaced by a centrally planned economy of various state enterprises.

Was it socialist? That's debatable, though I lean pretty strongly towards a 'no' answer on that question. Whatever it was, it wasn't capitalism. If it was, it wouldn't have been anywhere near as threatening to the real capitalist powers (UK, France, US). It was threatening to them because they knew it was *something different.*

[bots]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hWTFG3J1CP8

[Hexen]

This is only adding to the confusion, if it's not State Capitalist then what the fuck it is it then? There needs to be a clear answer what the USSR actually was.

[PhoenixAsh]

Well...it was threatening because it was a form of capitalism that did not allow private ownership. Individual capitalists were threatenend by the fact that the state took away ownership from the individual.

It in essence was a fight between different viewpoint within a capitalist system. One favoring individual property and the other favoring centralized state monopoly.

[Unclebananahead]

My understanding is that it was a bureaucratized, deformed worker's state. I generally go by Leon Trotsky's analysis on this question. I don't think anyone originally in the Bolshevik movement had material accumulation as their objective, and Soviet leaders, while living somewhat better than the average citizen, hardly lived the sort of opulent, decadent lifestyles of those in the commanding heights of real capitalist societies. I'm just not convinced that what existed in the Soviet Union was some variation of capitalism.

[ColonelCossack]

man... everyone's stopped talking about Russia and started talking about sexism! lol... its gotten out of hand. there was a warning. IT'S DONE

[The Idler]

the social and economic system in Russia did exhibit the basic features of capitalism: minority control of the means of production (via nationalisation); generalised commodity production (i.e. generalised production for sale and the use of money); the accumulated of capital valued in money out of profits; and, in particular, yes, the exploitation of wage-labour by those who monopolised the means of production. Of course there were differences from what Mandel called here “classic” capitalism, due to the specific circumstances under which the system had come into being and developed which had resulted in a hugely increased economic role for the state. Hence state capitalism. In any event, even if Mandel’s narrow definition of capitalism as private enterprise is accepted, that would not make Russia into any kind of “Workers State”, only some new form of exploitative class society.Workers State? (http://theworldsocialist.blogspot.com/2009/11/workers-state.html)
Plus the fact that Lenin himself conceded it was state-capitalist.

[Unclebananahead]

Workers State? (http://theworldsocialist.blogspot.com/2009/11/workers-state.html)
Plus the fact that Lenin himself conceded it was state-capitalist.

State capitalism? Maybe under the NEP, but no one has ever given me any sufficiently compelling reason to believe that this was the case afterwards. You know, as well as I, that Marx himself argued that any society born from capitalism will bear the birthmarks of the system from whence it came. Additionally, a revolution of workers against the predominating global social order is not a genteel tea party. It doesn't happen under ideal circumstances, and the imperialists are more than glad for the opportunity to bleed it white, or 'strangle the baby in its cradle' as Winston Churchill remarked. Socialism will never be allowed to develop unmolested so long as imperialism exists. The adversity faced by the Soviet Union in its first several years is pretty much enough to kill or severely maim just about any country. The expression 'degenerated worker's state' is pretty applicable to my mind. The FSU began its existence as a workers state, and then, isolated, beaten up, and battered, it became twisted into a shadow of its original self, particularly after the opportunistic Stalin.

[Jose Gracchus]

I composed a lot of this in response to a prompt about state capitalism, but it is even more fitting here, so I will re-provide it:

I think a lot of this angst comes out different perspectives on terminology, definitions, and also, at-times, dogmatic adherence to "canon".

Marxism, as I see it, has sometimes differing or parallel theories of capital, of capitalism, definitions of "socialism", and the like. When Marx was writing, it seemed fair that society developed productive forces and then the superstructure arising out of the relations therein evolved accordingly. Therefore capitalism is identified with Western capitalist states in stages of economic and political modernization pars para toto. Hence the origin of remarks of "democracy in the bourgeois sense", "dictatorship in the bourgeois sense", etc. There is also the deeper understanding of capitalism and capital from his eponymous work, and this is also identified with the bourgeoisie and the bourgeois state. Now, the problem is encountered in Russia is that the empirical bourgeoisie and capitalism was annihilated, the workers and peasants brought briefly to political power, the market was suppressed, planning of economy based on politically determined needs and directives. (Not necessarily in correct order and very simplistic, I know, stick with me) Sounds good, right?

The problem was that conditions of alienated labor were rapidly reimposed, organs of workers' democracy quashed, the dictatorship of a single party established, the abandonment of the norms of a popular militia and recallable election of all officials, and the establishment of significant antagonistic relations with the peasantry. There was the alienation reminiscent in ways of capitalism, though the industrial bourgeoisie was annihilated, the market partially repressed, the economy subordinated to mass politics in a society where the workers' and peasants' had - at least briefly - came to power. There was "dictatorship in the bourgeois sense." Yet there was the crystallization of a nascent ruling class (or a sui generis formation in analogue of previous ruling classes, "caste" if we must be Orthodox). It was, as Moshe Lewin has said "it was a superstructure suspended in a kind of vacuum, having to re-create its own base" (quoting from pg. 9, The Russian Revolution in Retreat 1920-24: Soviet workers and the new communist elite by Simon Pirani; Pirani is a historian of Russian history and a former Trotskyist).

Even after the major exigencies of the Civil War had dissipated by 1921, the revolution continued to degenerate thereafter. The relative power and influence and remaining activity of independent groups within the party, mass organizations, unions, and - though only briefly and weakly - even soviets, was replaced by a bureaucratic and increasingly privileged layer. The major problems that cause libertarians, "state capitalist" Marxists like Left Coms and Cliffite Trotskyists, and Orthodox Trotskyists have in analyzing the USSR and its degeneration is a common agreement on basic Marxian analysis of history and the synergy between the unfolding logic of capital on one hand and the changing character of society and politics on one hand, but stark disagreement on its implications. Libertarians and Left Coms tend to fixate on the lack of a change in basic labor relations and wage labor, continuing restrictions in political democracy and liberty and a top-down regimentation in the development of the revolutionary state. Some might focus on an insistence on the importance of the continuing commodity character of labor, and certain technical qualities characterizing the logic of capital (despite the annihilation of the bourgeoisie and the increasing at-directed, anti-market planning).

So what was the USSR? Well clearly it was different things in different times. In 1917 the workers' and peasants' successfully mounted a revolution and achieved political party, and began remaking institutions of production and tearing down the old state order, only to be interrupted by a Civil War, the restriction of all political liberties and democracy and even pro-soviet power socialist opposition groups, and a 'forced-march' to nationalization and state-directed production known as war communism. With a resurgence of workers’ organization and activity, there were strong repressions and increasing exclusions of rank-and-file workers in 1920-1922. In the NEP, the regime rapproached with petty merchants, international capital, and the peasantry (including the kulaks). The subsequent policies also strengthened the party-state bureaucracy at the workers’ expense. Though Stalin’s ‘revolution from above’ abolished the many of the property forms that suggested compromises with old-fashioned capitalism, it also led to a physical destruction of much of the original workers’ party (compromises as it was by increasingly serving to serve other class interests, and to be filled by other class elements than the proletarian and poor peasant classes). There was an increase in privileges and luxuries for the ruling class or caste, there was the imposition of increasing terror and open coercion in social life. There was an exclusion of self-management in favor of regimented authoritarian measures in economy.

Worse yet, as the most vicious and austere qualities of the Stalinist regime abated, often the economy was loosened to allow capitalistic and bureaucratic tendencies yet more power and freedom. The Kosygin reforms following the rise to power of Khrushchev and immediately preceding “de-Stalinization” and the Secret Speech are not the semi-farcical “silent counterrevolution” that Anti-Revisionists claim. Nonetheless, this strengthening of managerial elements and increased independence of enterprises allowed the gradual re-emergence of capitalistic incentives and economic relations. Market reforms and ideology were increasingly adopted within the strongholds of Soviet economic management. To the extent politicized, at-directed, non-market modes of economic investment, allocation, distribution, and production were adopted, this did represent real victories in restraining capital in the Marxian sense. In this sense there is something to the old Orthodox Trotskyist canard of the ‘degenerated workers’ state’. A better way to look at it is while there was a new enemy, perhaps worse (workers’ movements weren’t exactly more successful in the Soviet-inspired states), but that traditional elements of capitalist repression had been eliminated. Clearly this was subjectively a kind of step forward for workers. I do imagine that ideally we could have had something like the anti-Stalinist workers who formed workers’ councils in the Hungarian uprising of 1956 being the leading element in recapturing an alienated public property for workers’ power, without having to go through the motions of repressing capitalism, which had been already eliminated in its traditional form.

With these changes, the Soviet-style states began less and less to resemble failed or diverted revolutions and more authoritarian petty Great Powers with novel bureaucratic regimes legitimized by a kind of radical social democracy, but nothing more than that. The ultimate outcome of the “social contract” tacit in Leninism in power by 1924, as Pirani explains. Initiative and power and access in public and social decision-making was to be ceded to the party; in exchange generally living standards were to go up. Eventually the contradictions in this kind of society boiled over, and many of the privileged elements failed to see any reason to keep up the Cold War model, felt like enriching themselves, or were just themselves enticed by Hayekist ideology. The market reforms became acceleratingly radical until finally traditional capitalism was restored in Russia and its clients. Like the German ruling class before it, the Chinese ruling class has embraced through the state progressive reform and adaptation in order to go along with the tides of capitalism internationally, even if they originated in something else (Junker landed aristocracy, and Bolshevikoid party-state bureaucratic despotism, respectively).

Ultimately, most of us talk past each other, I think. We all try to narrow in on what we think the quintessential quality of socialism versus capitalism is, usually in such a way as to most benefit our sectarian heritage. The fact is, I think the broad revolutionary left agreed that the 19th century innovations in the rise of modern liberalism and the development of capitalism, the introduction of electoral bourgeois democracy and republicanism. All these things seemed to follow an essential logic. It seemed also tempting that simply removing the barriers to free association in the relations of production would part-and-parcel lead to dramatic rolling change in the other institutions of social life. I think that anarchists and other "anti-Leninists" simply choose to identify capitalism in this quasi-19th century sense with "the old way of doing things". They mean that the USSR is a "dictatorship in the bourgeois sense". I don't think this is very helpful. Trotsky contrariwise, was under personal political pressure to avoid noting the troubles prior to 1923. He also I think was laboring under the fair - at the time - belief that the Stalinist regime was some sort of great deviation that could not last. There was a conviction either workers' would move as a class to restore the revolution or the degenerate qualities would overwhelm the revolution's meager surviving gains against old-fashioned capitalism and restore it. Stalinism by virtue of geopolitics came out dramatically ahead, and with a new buffer of satellite states that - while not exploited in the capitalist imperialist sense, apart from overspecialization, and early machine transfers and reparations - helped prop up the Stalinist economy, ideology, and regime. As time went on it seems that with increasing bureaucratization and even introduction of market-type tools in the Soviet economy that this was no brief "wrong turn" kind of institution. Also strange in the Orthodox Trotskyist outlook is the seeming disconnect in Marxian terms between superstructure and base. How is a bureaucratic caste elevated over a "workers'" economy, and especially in such extended fashion? Anti-Revisionists on the far other hand fixate on the most non-revolutionary "palace intrigue" kind of politics between competing cliques. However, the logic of the lines that won out does seem to suggest that intrinsic institutional commitment to suppressing capital and market relations abated with time (and lagging economic performance).

In the end, no one has really synthesized this into a thorough theory of class and politics. So there's a lot of impressionistic looks, and nit-picking of quotes. Clearly things did not end up as they were thought to. I think Marx thought that crude failures or missteps in revolution would probably either fail outright and result in French-style restorations or the waves of workers' revolutions would render premature attempts irrelevant ("fifty years of civil war" to train themselves to rule, I believe he said). History ended up painting a very different picture, though not one at all that renders old theories useless. But there is a need to move forward and to digest all facts, not just those that presuppose our sectarianism.

Socialism and workers' power existed briefly in the revolution, 1917-1918. Various forms of radical social democracy or state capitalism were toyed with beside an authoritarian society with dissipating workers' control and participation through the 1920s as the party leadership and bureaucracy consolidated its control of the entire society. Stalin eliminated previously existing compromises with capital and property forms, though arguably generalized commodity production continued. However the market was deeply repressed, as was the role of capital in Russia. Non-capitalist economy reached its arguable peak in this period, though I would not call it socialism due to the repression of workers' power and workers' control. It was a kind of state-bureaucratic planned forced-march to extensive industrialization. Following the rollback of Stalinist institutions, the introduction of market forces and enterprise autonomy, the USSR began to simply resemble a particularly authoritarian and bureaucratic Great Power legitimizing itself through token sponsorship of America and the West's capitalist imperialist victims and a domestic social contract that basically in essence boiled down to very radical social democracy. Eventually the privileged strata lost any allegiance to even this as the economy lagged and the opportunities for capitalist restoration expanded, until finally they reached first through the party, and then without it, to restore capitalism.

[Sam_b]

I've only ever heard it used to describe someone who is cowardly or weak

What word do you use to describe people who run away from arguments they can't back up?

[the last donut of the night]

Oh get over it. No one ever uses the word "pussy" in a way that is sexist. I've only ever heard it used to describe someone who is cowardly or weak. Besides, I doubt you'd give as much of a shit if I was using the word dick instead. (Even though that wouldn't make sense in that sentence...)



Precisely because the word "pussy" is used to describe cowardly or weak makes it a sexist term. And you've pointed out the word issue here clearly, too: you wouldn't use "dick" because dick means rude, arrogant, brutish, but not weak. It's pretty simple.

[Jose Gracchus]

Are we really going to debate the use of casual homophobic language in this thread? Don't we have moderators to deal with this formally if merits? At least split the topic?