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The Feral Underclass
18th November 2003, 14:20
There are many many arguments and debates that go on here. But are there actually people who change their minds on fundamental issues?

UnionofSovietSocialistRepublics
18th November 2003, 17:20
I try to be unbiased in my thoughts. I often can see where people are comming from with their arguments, but i guess my views on the whole are pretty stable.

Svartvit
18th November 2003, 18:57
If you can't you're not worthy of your opinion.

Morpheus
18th November 2003, 19:17
Yes, I would never have become an anarchist if I never admitted I was wrong. I wasn't always a radical, you know...

The Feral Underclass
18th November 2003, 22:17
I can not see my views on Anarchism changing though now I have understood them so well. Do you think your views on Anarchism could be fundamentally changed Morpheus?

Comrade Yars
18th November 2003, 22:45
Care to share on how elaborate your views are? I've never really been given the oppurtunity to speak with an Anarchist.

Revolution Hero
18th November 2003, 23:13
I had been anarchist, and then I became Marxist – Leninist. I think that each leftist, who tries to find the truth, will finally come to the conclusion that scientific theory of Marxism – Leninism is the only objective teaching, which opens the road to communism (stateless society)!

redstar2000
19th November 2003, 02:44
If one were to go back and dig up some of my old posts on this board, they would find that a year ago I was still grudgingly accepting the idea of a "transitional" state called "socialism".

Of course, I haven't accepted the idea of a vanguard party for more than 30 years...but I still thought that a kind of central quasi-state apparatus was necessary (though hardly the bloated oligarchy that's sacred to the hearts of Leninists).

In the course of argument, I have changed my mind...and now reject the "transitional" state altogether.

The more I thought about it--in Marxist terms--the more it became obvious that wielding centralized power would change the consciousness of those who were doing it.

It doesn't matter "what" your "good intentions" might be...material reality prevails.

In the final analysis (and no matter how many "verses" of Marxist "scripture" are quoted), Leninism is idealist...it is based on "good intentions", not on material reality.

History has demonstrated that "good intentions" are...not good enough.

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The RedStar2000 Papers (http://www.anarchist-action.org/marxists/redstar2000/)
A site about communist ideas

Pete
19th November 2003, 03:33
Originally posted by Revolution [email protected] 18 2003, 07:13 PM
I had been anarchist, and then I became Marxist – Leninist. I think that each leftist, who tries to find the truth, will finally come to the conclusion that scientific theory of Marxism – Leninism is the only objective teaching, which opens the road to communism (stateless society)!
:lol: Come on now, you can't replace one ruling class with another and expect it to ever roll over and disappate itself.

I myself have been transforming over the past year or so, but I've been where I am now for the past 6 months or so. Leninism just makes no sense and is definitely not "objective," such an opinion is extremely subjective in favour of Leninism.

Now I am more in line that it is only through consious class action that anything can happen and be sustained. I mean, if you try to force an armed revolution on a population who does not completely understand your motives, what are you acheiving? Are they just following you because you are giving them bread and are not as bad as the ones who came before you? What if they find out you are wrong? No, forcing these ideals on people can not succeed, that is the way of the past, and seeing it as the failure that it is we can learn from these mistakes and move on.

If the entire working class becomes consious of their plight and that they can make a change their will be no need for an elitist vanguard, as the people will speak for themselves. What is the point of going through someone else's mouth when yours is just as effective? Just as loud? Just as strong? Leninism is for the times when these conditions have not been met yet, and as we have seen, it has not been very successful.

The inflexible doctrine which most Leninists seem to present is hardly objective, but it always seems like they are looking through their own hero's glasses, and if not disregarding, not accepting anyother view point. Through open thought, and the acceptance of others open thought, change can come. Of course I don't accept Leninism, although at one time it seemed right for some situations. The Zapitista's changed my mind.

My doctrine may seem inflexible against Leninism, which it certaintly is, but I have accepted that I was wrong in believing that Leninism could accomplish anything substantial. Sure the USSR became a super power, and Cuba is now brighter than it was under Batista, but so what. That is hardly "democratic" centralism, but "bureaucratic" or even "authoritarian" centralism.

Centralization is not what we want, but decentralization so that each can have what the need. There need be no "invisible" (or in some cases highly visible) hand forcing (or coercing or even directing) people to do things they don't want to. If that exists, then obviously change came before it could be substained by those who it is supposively benifiting. This new elite is not helpful, but harmful.

If someone tells you what to do from birth to death, you may question it, but do you question it fundamentally? To the core of its "truth?" Or would you go forth believing that you are in the right just because, as so many people do today?

The left is not fundamentally right with out question. Niether is any one doctrine. Doctrines have flaws, all of them. So, then, what is the correct path? I think that question is not irrelevant, but irranswerable. The correct path would be the one that the masses sporatically see coming together before them, not the one that some petty group tells them is correct. I feel that the path will be one towards decentralization, lack of authority, and an acceptance of humanity for what it is: a part of nature.

And what is nature but a series of interactions between equally important pieces? Like an organism. Each part is important to the overall survival, if not vital. Class just doesn't fit well into this 'structure,' now does it? Yet every creature knows what it needs to do to survive, and does it. Selfishness does not have a place, and niether does a hierarchy, for the most part.

But the direction, the road, that we (not "educated elite" or "vangaurd" but "we the people") cannot be defined by anything, not even Marxist-Leninism, not even Marxism (although it gives a framework to think in, the class struggle), but by the actions taken en mass.

We may not be able to create the material conditions, but we are able to spread the seeds, like the Zapitistas, and allow a decentralized movement take evolve in many locations simultaneously against what is percieved as a threat. The threat, of course, is the "system" and all of its mechanicisms, right down to any and all forms of elitism.

Well that was a rather long ramble, I hope it is atleast thought provoking.

-Pete

suffianr
19th November 2003, 03:59
But are there actually people who change their minds on fundamental issues?

'Not sure, really. Maybe. But I think I've opened up to a lot more ideas, and not necessarily only those "liberal" ones, as a few people on ISF would say. :lol:

apathy maybe
19th November 2003, 08:07
I went from an ignorent 12 year old, through to an ignorent 15 year old. Then got communism, then anarchism now I think a mix of both would be just right. (And don't you dare say that I'm an ignorent 18 year old!)

Kez
19th November 2003, 17:52
first i was anarchist, then stalino, now for last 2 years trot

Xvall
19th November 2003, 17:56
I've been all over the place. I just call myself a socialist/communism right now. Don't care what I'm labeled as.

Bianconero
19th November 2003, 18:00
I started off as an Anti-Fascist, then I became a liberal-left Green market socialist, then I got more radical (Anarchist), then, finally, a Marxist-Leninist.

I agree with what Revolution Hero said, by the way. It fits with my experiences.

Bolshevika
19th November 2003, 20:11
Decentralization is for the uncivilized.Why are some of you Anarchists so pro-Marx yet anti-Lenin? Leninism is Marxism applied to Russia's, China's, Cuba's, etc material conditions. Marx himself admired the centralist parts of the French revolution (Ie, standing army, police force, fire dept, public transportation, etc), at first Marx was slightly opposed to centralism, but after observing examples of centralism he became in favor of it. Engels was definetly more of a centralist than Marx.

Revolution Hero
19th November 2003, 22:56
I agree with Bolshevika. Decentralization of socialist economy is a dream, which revisionists and enemies of socialism have.

The problem with decentralization of socialist economy is that it separates socialist enterprises from each other and thus makes them independent. This opens the way to the abandonment of system of central planning and recreates commodity production. And as long as commodity production exists we can’t even talk about the victory of socialism. (Lenin)

Morpheus
19th November 2003, 23:24
Originally posted by The Anarchist [email protected] 18 2003, 11:17 PM
I can not see my views on Anarchism changing though now I have understood them so well. Do you think your views on Anarchism could be fundamentally changed Morpheus?
Maybe, but doubtfull. Most critiques of anarchism are based on misrepresenting anarchism and the few that aren't are highly elitist. I can easily see myself changing from different forms of anarchism, though. Since I became an anarchist I went from anarcho-collectivist to anarcho-communist to anarcho-syndicalist to anarcho-primitivist to anarcho-communist.

redstar2000
20th November 2003, 03:04
I know I've made this point more than once, but it obviously needs to be hammered home again and again.

In the end, it does not matter if Marx and Engels were "centralists" in the controversies of their era.

We don't live in 1847 or 1891!

The Leninist habit of waving these scraps of quotations as if they were scripture is as far removed from the approach of Marx and Engels as it is possible to get.

I have no doubt of the sincerity of the major figures of 20th century Leninism...they thought they were doing "the right thing".

They were wrong! History has demonstrated that however good they were at selectively quoting Marx and Engels (among other things), their path did not lead to communism.

What could be more obvious?

Now the question really is: do Leninists want communism at all, in any kind of serious way?

Or do you just want a new form of class society "with a human face"?

And if the latter is the case, then your claim to be "heirs of Marx and Engels" is utterly preposterous.

http://anarchist-action.org/forums/images/smiles/redstar.gif

The RedStar2000 Papers (http://www.anarchist-action.org/marxists/redstar2000/)
A site about communist ideas

synthesis
20th November 2003, 05:09
I haven't really changed my mind on theoretical matters so much, but being on this board certainly shaped my opinion of Stalin and Mao; through the intelligent Stalinists I have learned that their crimes were greatly exaggerated by capitalist propaganda. I still remain as staunchly opposed to Stalinism (and more specifically Leninism) but I now know how to do this on a theoretical basis as opposed to such moronic claims as "Stalin killed more people than Hitler" or "Stalin sent nine million people to the gulags" or "Stalin ate babies" or "Stalin preferred male company" or anything of that sort.

sanpal
20th November 2003, 07:45
What a variegated spectrum of opinions!!!! But the truth is only one. Who can tell it? :lol:

Yazman
20th November 2003, 09:53
I don't care for labels. Too many people are caught up in their "oh I'm a trot" "oh I'm a stalinist" or whatever to just be a socialist person. The left scene is WAY too divided internally in order for any sort of action to be taken against anything.

I'm just a socialist/communist. I do like some of the anarchist stuff though.

sanpal
20th November 2003, 17:10
Originally posted by [email protected] 20 2003, 10:53 AM
I don't care for labels.
I don't care for labels too. It has no matter for me. All of these: capitalism, communism, socialism, anarchism, stalinism, leninism, etc. are true as far as these are the human historical experiences. Only the common sense and logic must be a label for the mind. Our task is to analyse all historical experience. I'm ready for taking any theory if I haven't found arguments to criticize it severely.

The Feral Underclass
21st November 2003, 08:19
Dyermaker&#33;&#33; Tut tut&#33; Sharing your company with a man can not be put in the same evil catagory as eating babies now can it? <_<

New Tolerance
22nd November 2003, 01:57
Concerning debates there&#39;s something I would like to bring up. The general impression that debates give to people seems to be that if two people are arguing then one of them has to be right, and therefore who ever wins must be the one with the truth. That&#39;s not always the case. The two people debating could both be wrong, one of them might just be better with rhetorics and sound more convincing, and wins the debate. The people would then believe that whatever this person argued for must be the truth, since he won.

I guess what I am trying to say is that there is a difference between admitting that you are wrong and admitting that the other guy is right. Just because you are wrong doesn&#39;t make the other person right.