communism, ideology vs necessity/self interest abd san niss

[black magick hustla]

i've been bothered lately by some proclamations in the forum that a worker communist can't desert "communism" because its survival depends on it etc., as opposed to petit bourgeois intellectuals etc. it bothers me because i think its a bit dishonest, because it comes from this idea that communist workers become communist because of their state and material conditions. i don't think this is true, at all, actually.

in the 1930s there was an american council communist called sam moss who wrote the following very interesting article, http://www.lettersjournal.org/moss.html . he argued that "communism" in the working class was acquired by a particular set of what he called "worker intellectuals", but that the accepted idea that communist militants are like an organic arm of the class is more or less wrong. i think its a very interesting idea, because i do also think that nobody, especially in this particular epoch in the west, becomes a communist because of "self interest", or "self preservation". in fact, in many ways it is quite stupid to be a communist, you will be blacklisted, in some places you will be thrown to jail/prison/tortured, you will have this weird ideological deadweight on your shoulders and you won't be able to function as a normal human being. if one does the math and the statistics, one probably finds out that it is better to not be a communist at all, no matter your socio economic background.

i think this whole, i am a communist because i am a worker, is a bigger part of this weird identity-politics like doctrine that has been adopted by some pro revolutionaries. there is this fake, constructed identity of what means to be a worker that is articulated by some pro-revs, it is also connected to this idea that there is such thing as a "working class consciousness" which is of course more or less reductionist. the only thing that pretty much workers share in times of class peace is pretty much just their relation to the economy.

my point is that communists are not the "working class" nor an extension of it, at least in a historical materialist sense. the working class creates its own organs and ways of fighting, and most of the time the people in those organs are not really communists, except in some specific historic situations, in a very vague sense.

[black magick hustla]

he reason for the apparent difference of objectives between the revolutionary groups and the working class is easy to understand. The working class, concerned only with the needs of the moment and in general content with its social status, reflects the level of capitalist culture - a culture that is "for the enormous majority a mere training to act as a machine." The revolutionists, however, are so to speak deviations from the working class; they are the by-products of capitalism; they represent isolated cases of workers who, because of unique circumstances in their individual lives, have diverged from the usual course of development in that, though born of wage slaves, they have acquired an intellectual interest, that has availed itself of the existing educational possibilities. Though of these, many have succeeded in rising into the petty-bourgeoisie, others, whose careers in this direction were blocked by circumstances have remained within the working class as intellectual workers. Dissatisfied with their social status as appendages to machines, they, unable to rise within the system, rise against it. Quite frequently cut off from association with their fellow workers on the job, who do not share their radical views, they unite with other rebellious intellectual workers and with other unsuccessful careerists of other strata of society, into organizations of changing society. If, in their struggle to liberate the masses from wage slavery, they seem to be acting from the noblest of motives, certainly it doesn't take much to see that when one suffers for another he has only identified that other's sorrow with his own. But whenever they have the chance to rise within the existing society they, with rare exceptions, do not hesitate to abandon their revolutionary objectives. And when they do so, they offer sincere and sound logic for their apostasy, for, "Does it require deep intuition to comprehend that man's ideas change with every change in his material existence?" Sports in the development of capitalism, the revolutionary organizations, small ineffectual, buzzing along the flanks of the broad masses, have done nothing to affect the course of history either for good or ill. Their occasional periods of activity can be explained only by their temporary or permanent forsaking of their revolutionary aims in order to unite with the workers immediate demands and then it was not their own revolutionary role that they played, but the conservative role of the working class. When the workers achieved their objectives, the radical groups lapsed again into impotence. Their role was always a supplementary, and never a deciding one.


sam moss

[piet11111]

I am a communist and i am a worker if i was bourgeois i doubt i would be a communist.

I also recognize that communism is in my own self interest and incidentally that of my working class comrades.
And i think that any working class comrade that has a thorough understanding of capitalism and its effects on the proletariat can not help but become a communist.

That being a communist while in the minority is not in my immediate interest does not make me wrong for pointing out the many ways capitalism is fucking us over to enrich the bosses.

After all "being determines consciousness" and i am sure we will all be learning a lot from our Greek comrades very soon as they are about to discover the meaning of "socialism or barbarism"

[black magick hustla]

I am a communist and i am a worker if i was bourgeois i doubt i would be a communist.

maybe, but you are not a communist because of "self preservation", i think.



And i think that any working class comrade that has a thorough understanding of capitalism and its effects on the proletariat can not help but become a communist.

that is an opinion, really. i am sure there are a lot of working class autodidacts that choose to not be communists.



That being a communist while in the minority is not in my immediate interest does not make me wrong for pointing out the many ways capitalism is fucking us over to enrich the bosses. nobody is saying that



After all "being determines consciousness" and i am sure we will all be learning a lot from our Greek comrades very soon as they are about to discover the meaning of "socialism or barbarism"

yea, but i am sure the mayority of people that will riot/fight there will not be "communists".

[9]

I agree with a lot of your original post, but I have a question on this
The working class, concerned only with the needs of the moment and in general content with its social status

Ironically this sounds sort of like Lenin in What is to be Done. At any rate, if this is the case, then isn't the implication that the working class is not a revolutionary class?

[black magick hustla]

I agree with a lot of your original post, but I have a question on this

Ironically this sounds sort of like Lenin in What is to be Done. At any rate, if this is the case, then isn't the implication that the working class is not a revolutionary class?
i am not really a sam mossist, so i dont agree with that. i just find the whole idea of "worker intellectuals" interesting. i think the working class fights because of "necessesity", now necessity is a very flexible word. the article assumes that capitalism can keep delivering demands, and therefore have a content working class, i think that is pretty optimistic lol

[Искра]

I think that there's was difference between 19th century (or whatever) when mass worker parties started to amerge and when first unions fought for better working conditions that with today. First of all, communism doesn't mean the same thing as it did back then and also, system is using a lot of more ideological weapons than it used to. I could also mention left wing of capital and their false promises etc. and also this decades of counter-revolution (almost a century...).

Also, it's quite naive to believe that workers in 19th cenutry become communists just because of "self-interest" or that they knew everything for what do their parties stand for.

I believe that there are allways different ways for someone to become communist. Sure, right now most of the communists are nerds like you and me or some old people (or some smelly ass crusties/hippies) i.e. people who got attracted to these ideas, but as class struggle will go on there'll be more and more people who will get attracted to certian ideas. All all that is partly based in "material conditions" (i.e. people are pissed off because they are on the dole and they see an answer in your ideas).

[Ostrinski]

If worker's self interest isn't what legitimizes communism, then communism is irrelevant.

[Искра]

That's true, but I don't think that workers care about communism in anyway. Their self interest goes more with what Lenin called "trade union concience".

[9]

Their self interest goes more with what Lenin called "trade union concience".

I think Lenin discovered pretty soon after he wrote that that he was wrong, and that under the right circumstances, the working class is a revolutionary force without needing to be imbued with communist consciousnesses from without.

[Искра]

Of course, I agree. But I was talking about this period where there are no "right circumstances" in which workers self interest is pretty rooted in reformism and leftists are trying to score points from that...

There's nice quote from Luxemburg (and I don't usually go with whole this quotes thing, cause it's kind of stupid, but I like this one) how in event of mass strike nice and quiet father becomes the most militant revolutionary. I believe that this is quite true and you can actually see something of that in OWS struggles, Greece etc.

[black magick hustla]

If worker's self interest isn't what legitimizes communism, then communism is irrelevant.

"self interest" struggle is what brings about communism at the end, but it certainly isn't what "legitimizes" it.

[gorillafuck]

it's kind of weird how the same people that assert that the only legitimate commies are the ones who are out of just self interest are the same people who will ream people out for not knowing the same gender theory theoretical intricacies as them.

[Franz Fanonipants]

i think that asserting that communism is the only ideology a "conscious" worker will come to is pretty problematic, so it makes sense but

[9]

it's kind of weird how the same people that assert that the only legitimate commies are the ones who are out of just self interest are the same people who will ream people out for not knowing the same gender theory theoretical intricacies as them.

Really...? I have never noticed this parallel... :confused: It seems like the sort of people who are into the whole artificial working class identity politics thing are the last people who would go on about 'gender theory'...

[gorillafuck]

Really...? I have never noticed this parallel... :confused: It seems like the sort of people who are into the whole artificial working class identity politics thing are the last people who would go on about 'gender theory'...it's not done only by them, but I've definitely noticed it.

I have no issue with gender theory stuff by the way. I just find it funny when someone who has a working class self interest or die attitude about communism also talks about social stuff which most people do not have a self-interest in.

[9]

Eh, I cant really respond, as I am not too sure what you are referring to.

[gorillafuck]

it is something I have seen. maybe you have not.

[Os Cangaceiros]

I've been thinking about this very subject lately. Specifically about people who aren't living hand-to-mouth in some dirty factory somewhere but are none-the-less attracted to communism. Like me. It's not really in my "self-interest" to support communist politics, but I still do, for reasons that are admittedly connected to ideology more than anything else. I try to make meaning out of an existence that more often than not seems pretty meaningless. Honestly often I'm severely tempted to just throw my hands up in the air and proclaim my eternal ignorance.

The only hope for communism ever to exist though is self-interest, if I know anything it's that. If it comes from "missionary work" than it'll succumb to the same rot that we all know and love: corruption, decay, thousands of equally insignificant left-wing orgs and parties, etc.

[black magick hustla]

i think the problem is that hipsters try to acknowledge they are "against morality" and therefore, the only amoral way to be a communist is if they make some dumb myth about self interest. While communism will come through necessity I think, its ultimate legitimacy rests in moral/human/ethical assumptions. men don't deserve to be treated like rats or be cold, hungry, and miserable.

[gorillafuck]

i think the problem is that hipsters try to acknowledge they are "against morality" and therefore, the only amoral way to be a communist is if they make some dumb myth about self interest.nailed it.

[DaringMehring]

Being a communist in capitalist society isn't in anyone's self-interest. As you say, you expose yourself to persecution from the powers that be.

But transforming capitalist society to communist is in almost everyone's self-interest (not the big bourgeoisie's).

And yes it is a matter of self-preservation. For people who die with insufficient health care, workers who are stressed to death, who are wrecked by on the job injuries, who are sent to the human scrap heap by unemployment. And for everyone -- environmental destruction, war, violence born from poverty -- all of that will be ended by communism.

Your mistake is thinking of being a communist only as an identity choice within capitalism. But the point of being a communist -- is revolution to end capitalism and establish socialism. And that makes perfect sense for the self-interest of just about everyone.

It is the scientifically established imperative next step for human civilization. The only alternative is barbarism (probably in the form of fascism).

[Os Cangaceiros]

i think the problem is that hipsters try to acknowledge they are "against morality" and therefore, the only amoral way to be a communist is if they make some dumb myth about self interest. While communism will come through necessity I think, its ultimate legitimacy rests in moral/human/ethical assumptions. men don't deserve to be treated like rats or be cold, hungry, and miserable.

Yes but alternately if you base your support for such-and-such program off moral perogative or whatever, there's a possibility there that the "contagion of class dominance" will carry over. Because as it stands today most people who claim to speak for the most exploited members of society are not the most exploited themselves.

[black magick hustla]

Yes but alternately if you base your support for such-and-such program off moral perogative or whatever, there's a possibility there that the "contagion of class dominance" will carry over. Because as it stands today most people who claim to speak for the most exploited members of society are not the most exploited themselves.

yea but i don't think its either a buncha nihilist idiots talking about how moral values won't stop a bullet or whatever

[MarxSchmarx]

i think the problem is that hipsters try to acknowledge they are "against morality" and therefore, the only amoral way to be a communist is if they make some dumb myth about self interest. While communism will come through necessity I think, its ultimate legitimacy rests in moral/human/ethical assumptions. men don't deserve to be treated like rats or be cold, hungry, and miserable.

I propose going further than that - that for all it's talk of a working class movement, most IRL communists don't so much see the abolition of capitalism as a uniquely working class objective, but see the working class, and its role in the class struggle, as the most promising vehicle by which capitalism will be transcended.

To me this point seems self-evident. Working class institutions like unions serve as powerful counterweights to the capitalists, and working class social organizations (like solidarity organizations, anti-racist action etc...) can in very real senses form the sort of prefigurative politics for a post-capitalist order in a way that the institutions and orgs of other classes patently cannot, or, when they try to, have disastrous results. Indeed, the glimmers of liberated alternative societies we have from the paris commune to the petrograd soviets to the catalonian syndicates to the occupied south american factories were all based on massive working class social networks that pre-dated the crises. Failures - e.g., Stalinist bureaucracy and pol pot were profoundly anti-working class petty bourgeois, agrarian, or even outright bourgeois (e.g., post wwii social democracy) led societies.

What is not clear is that the struggles of the working class need always be congruent with the abolition of capitalism - that point is well taken and as I read the moss quote you posted that's the gist of his argument. But the instrumentalist argument for the working class as ultimately the transformative engine away from capitalism, to put it bluntly, still seems quite compelling.

[Nothing Human Is Alien]

Sorry, but whatever you're reading into this piece just isn't there. The article (repeatedly) states that "the working class alone can wage the revolutionary struggle," that "the divided objectives of the workers are, despite the increasing ideological confusion, converging toward one objective: a fundamental change of present socio-economic forms of life," and that "when they do so, they will not rise from ideological factors, but from necessity, and their ideologies will only reflect the necessities then, as do their current bourgeois ideologies reflect the necessity today."

In other words, the working class is the only force that can carry out the communist revolution, and it will do so out of necessity (whether or not the specific term "communist" is ever used, this is "communism" in its realest sense).

The author states that the workings of the class struggle itself, uneven in its development, will cause communists to emerge from the ranks of the working class here and there even before the development of the working class revolution. He states that there is not much these workers can do to hasten that revolution, that they will probably group together simply because it's easier for them to make it through life when surrounded by like-minded individuals (i.e. necessity), that although these small groups are impotent they show that when workers began to become forced into direct and open conflict with capital they too will band together, and that the working class revolution will see the small groups meld with the larger working class movement for communism.

Not to mention that it was published in Living Marxism, which for all intents and purposes belonged to chief-editor Paul Mattick, and his politics and principles are a matter of public record.

If you want to make these claims, you're of course free to do so, but they're unrelated to the contents of "The Impotence of the Revolutionary Group." And quite frankly, I have a difficult time taking such arguments from folks who spend years studying abroad for advanced academic degrees seriously. That's like some sort small-scale inverted version of a rich bourgeois politician arguing against direct democracy.

Class and class struggle has literally nothing to do with the petty-bourgeois phenomenon of identity politics and is in fact key to any real understanding of the development of human history.

What you've done here is misappropriate a piece in order to attack a strawman. No one with a brain would argue that all workers are automatically communists, that it's in the immediate self-interest of individual workers to come out as open communist militants in reactionary periods, or anything approaching any of that. What has been argued is more or less the same thing that was argued in the very piece you linked to: that the working class is engaged in an inescapable life-or-death struggle against capital, that eventually the struggle will be forced into the open, and that victory of the working class in that struggle is the only possible road to actual communism as a genuine human community and not an ideological fig leaf for the actions of a bunch of careerists, activists and/or pseudo-intellectual weirdos.

[black magick hustla]

And quite frankly, I have a difficult time taking such arguments from folks who spend years studying abroad for advanced academic degrees seriously.

<3

anyway, i think there is a problem of miscommunication here. i never said communism will come through anything but necessity. second, not all the post was sam moss, but it had my ideas added to it.

finally, class struggle/class politics != "working class identity". you cannot take seriously this if you don't want, i could care less what some stranger in the internet thinks. the moon is not made of cheese regardless if the queen of england or a miner says so. i come from a family with a militant record, and their "ideas" did not help them at all. some of them winded up in prison, tortured, or dead. if that is what "self interest" is then there is some bad book keeping going on. similarly, there is really nothing one would gain from being a "communist" in the US, today, except perhaps access to some likeminded individuals to discuss and write with.

[Nothing Human Is Alien]

You're still arguing against a strawman. No one is arguing that there is any advantage to openly proclaiming yourself a communist militant in the U.S. in 2012. Literally no one.

The argument is that class is what matters, that anyone can claim to be "communist" at any time (and change their mind later) and mean anything by it from wanting to live in a sex commune to worshiping Kim Jong-il; but that only the working class is objectively communist in that it is the only force capable of actually bringing communism (in its real sense, "an objective end to all political leadership and to the division of society into economic and political categories," to quote the article you linked to) into being.

[black magick hustla]

The argument is that class is what matters,


what argument? the initial post wasn't necessarily aimed at you (although I admit, I was thinking somewhat about you and a couple other people).



the working class is objectively communist in that it is the only force capable of actually bringing communism (in its real sense, "an objective end to all political leadership and to the division of society into economic and political categories," to quote the article you linked to) into being.
And I don't disagree with that?

The post is linked to a lot of ideas/discussions i've had lately with tons of people, which indeed it seems to have resonated with some people as there where some thanks in the post so I assume I am not a crazy man talking to himself.

class matters in the sense that in the macroscopic level, it is class struggle that determines the outcomes of history. however, class is not a category that makes sense when attempting to argue about something of one individual person or individual persons. i.e. if a tiny council communist group is made up of 4 workers, or 3 workers and 1 petit bourgeois, or 2 train workers and 2 grad students, - it is meaningless to apply a class anaylsis to it. the communist grouplets, no matter their "class composition", are so tiny and insignificant and irrelevant/cut off from the general mindset of the class (doesnt matter if nutters/weirdos were born in the slums or in the suburbs). This is also the idea that one of this nutters/weirdos is a communist because of "self interest", of course not, that is preposterous.

[Die Neue Zeit]

my point is that communists are not the "working class" nor an extension of it, at least in a historical materialist sense. the working class creates its own organs and ways of fighting, and most of the time the people in those organs are not really communists, except in some specific historic situations, in a very vague sense.

The better point to be made in all your spontaneism, ad hoc-isms, etc. is the urgency of merging the communist program, revolutionary socialism, etc. with the worker-class movement.

But who creates the worker-class movement, as opposed to mere labour movements? The very "volunteers" and "substitutionists" derided by the likes of some posters here. These 19th-century organizers understood the imperative of behavioural political economy: http://www.revleft.com/vb/behavioural-political-economy-t161631/index.html


I propose going further than that - that for all it's talk of a working class movement, most IRL communists don't so much see the abolition of capitalism as a uniquely working class objective, but see the working class, and its role in the class struggle, as the most promising vehicle by which capitalism will be transcended.

To me this point seems self-evident. Working class institutions like unions serve as powerful counterweights to the capitalists, and working class social organizations (like solidarity organizations, anti-racist action etc...) can in very real senses form the sort of prefigurative politics for a post-capitalist order in a way that the institutions and orgs of other classes patently cannot, or, when they try to, have disastrous results. Indeed, the glimmers of liberated alternative societies we have from the paris commune to the petrograd soviets to the catalonian syndicates to the occupied south american factories were all based on massive working class social networks that pre-dated the crises. Failures - e.g., Stalinist bureaucracy and pol pot were profoundly anti-working class petty bourgeois, agrarian, or even outright bourgeois (e.g., post wwii social democracy) led societies.

What is not clear is that the struggles of the working class need always be congruent with the abolition of capitalism - that point is well taken and as I read the moss quote you posted that's the gist of his argument. But the instrumentalist argument for the working class as ultimately the transformative engine away from capitalism, to put it bluntly, still seems quite compelling.

Comrade, I don't know what magic hustla is up to now, to be honest. I don't think he's moving towards more pro-party politics.

[9]

Lets please not let DNZ derail what is, by recent revleft standards, a relatively interesting discussion, thnx

[Die Neue Zeit]

^^^ The merger formula is very relevant to the discussion, thanks. :glare:

[black magick hustla]

dnz proves my point. does it really matter if he is ultraprole or the haute bourgeosie? he is a fucking nutter, and the millieu is full of them

[Die Neue Zeit]

dnz proves my point. does it really matter if he is ultraprole or the haute bourgeosie? he is a fucking nutter, and the millieu is full of them

Honestly, you really need to get sober. I'm an organizational and institutional pragmatist.

[Nothing Human Is Alien]

what argument?

The actual argument that people have made, here and elsewhere. As opposed to the argument you concocted in order to tear down (e.g. that there is some material advantage to proclaiming yourself a communist militant in the U.S. in 2012).


class matters in the sense that in the macroscopic level, it is class struggle that determines the outcomes of history. however, class is not a category that makes sense when attempting to argue about something of one individual person or individual persons. i.e. if a tiny council communist group is made up of 4 workers, or 3 workers and 1 petit bourgeois, or 2 train workers and 2 grad students, - it is meaningless to apply a class anaylsis to it. the communist grouplets, no matter their "class composition", are so tiny and insignificant and irrelevant/cut off from the general mindset of the class (doesnt matter if nutters/weirdos were born in the slums or in the suburbs). This is also the idea that one of this nutters/weirdos is a communist because of "self interest", of course not, that is preposterous.

Right. People who grow up in well off petty-bourgeois families and send their kids to private schools surely have the same outlook on life as people who spend 60 hours a week breaking their backs in coal mines. People who never work a day in their lives and spend their time perusing the library at their $50,000-a-semester university no doubt have the same views and perspectives as the guy who tries in vein to support a family of four by working 30 hours a week for minimum wage at a gas station.

Materialism? Who needs it. :rolleyes:

All left-sects are irrelevant. The fact that they exists proves this more than anything else.

The difference between the petty-bourgeois "communist" professional thinkers and the communist truck driver is that at the pro-intellectual can hand in his "red card" whenever the going gets tough or the tide changes (or the mood strikes him) and take up a nice cushy position in a university or think-tank somewhere cranking out ideological air biscuits. The communist truck driver can forsake his communist outlook too, but he will still be exploited, he will still be in conflict with the bosses, and he will still have to fight to live. And eventually, the class he is a part of will be forced to take up the world-historic struggle to turn society upside down.

That's part of the reason petty-bourgeois "communists" can be so dangerous. The other part is that they are often driven by their own motives, careerist or worst, and have the management skills to intervene in class struggle at just the right moment to lead it down the road of good intention. And we all know where that leads.

[Die Neue Zeit]

Materialism? Who needs it. :rolleyes:

All left-sects are irrelevant. The fact that they exists proves this more than anything else.

Materialism is good, but who needs determinism? Radicalized workers don't.

[Nothing Human Is Alien]

Right. They need the Revolutionary-Democratic, Cesarean-Third-Worldist, Kautskyite-Worker-Class-Movement of Social-Proletocracy!

[Die Neue Zeit]

Right. They need the Revolutionary-Democratic, Cesarean-Third-Worldist, Kautskyite-Worker-Class-Movement of Social-Proletocracy!

I'll just say that every genuine class struggle is a political struggle ("politico-political" to be more accurate) and not an economic one.

I don't take your defamation of me as a "Third Worldist" (implying the reactionary MTW) very kindly.

[black magick hustla]

Right. People who grow up in well off petty-bourgeois families and send their kids to private schools surely have the same outlook on life as people who spend 60 hours a week breaking their backs in coal mines.Of course not. The guy who delivers pizzas in new york city doesn't have the same outlook as an indian worker rioting in the factory either. :People who never work a day in their lives and spend their time perusing the library at their $50,000-a-semester university no doubt have the same views and perspectives as the guy who tries in vein to support a family of four by working 30 hours a week for minimum wage at a gas station.

Of course not. Nor the urban bachelor that serves coffee in some metropolis have much to do psychologically with an indian worker rioting in some auto factory. Nor the white kid that grew up in a middle class union home has much to do psychologically with the black kid that has a crack addicted mom and his friends shoot some fuckers to push dope. We can play that stupid game all you want.



Materialism? Who needs it. :rolleyes:

:shrugs:, what you are talking about is not really historical materialism, but some weird marxified form of vulgar psychology.






That's part of the reason petty-bourgeois "communists" can be so dangerous. The other part is that they are often driven by their own motives, careerist or worst, and have the management skills to intervene in class struggle at just the right moment to lead it down the road of good intention. And we all know where that leads.

:shrugs:, stalin's whole central committee was made of workers more or less. What you are talking about is not really petit bourgeois individual "communists" but careerists and party bureaucrats in general. The petit bourgeois happens to generally be better equipped financially and in terms of skills to overtake this organizations, but any one of any class background who ends up taking those positions and becoming professional community organizers/radicals/partyheads/petit bourgeois overseers whatever the fuck is the current flavor of little lenins today, is bound more or less to be like that. We are talking really, however, about mass movements, when the class is in conflict, not small reading council communist circles, which is what I have been alluding to all the time. THis is why I said class matters in the macroscopic, structural level, as opposed to trying to map the destiny of a particular individual and its psychology, especially someone as weird to be part of a council communist circle/wpa/tinyleftsect is a bit silly. Some dude who's daddy owns some stupid bookstore or whatever that happens to read marx in a circle with you is very different from talking about, say, may 1968 and the influence of party bureacrats.

A good comparison is statistics. Statistics are more or less useless when your sample size is tiny, however the useability of it increases as the sample size increases. In physics, we use statistical mechanics to talk about 10^23 atoms, not the trajectory of one atom. Historical materialism is a theory of history, not a theory of individuals.

[Nothing Human Is Alien]

Of course not. Nor the urban bachelor that serves coffee in some metropolis have much to do psychologically with an indian worker rioting in some auto factory. Nor the white kid that grew up in a middle class union home has much to do psychologically with the black kid that has a crack addicted mom and his friends shoot some fuckers to push dope. We can play that stupid game all you want.No one said all workers listen to the same music or drink in the same bar or even speak the same language. But that doesn't matter. What they have in common is their relation to the means of production and society.

When the bosses go on the attack, workers can come together on the same side of the barricades, regardless of any of that.

Who did battle in the auto plants of Michigan? "Polish-Americans" from Detroit, "blacks" from the south and "hillbillies" from Appalachia. Workers all.

Who waged war in the coal fields of West Virginia? White and black miners (as the saying goes, everyone is black after a shift underground).

Look at the reports of Turkish and Kurdish workers together during the recent Tekel strike. The St. Louis commune with white workers who undoubtedly had racist ideas taking up the cause of black workers. The Coal Creek War, with southern white workers freeing black inmates being used to replace them.

Etc., etc., etc.

And therein lies the point.

Workers aren't bound by ideological strings, taste in music, but by what are ultimately common conditions of life and position in society. And although they have differences among themselves, they share this essential commonality, whether or not they are conscious of it at any given time, that will and must emerge in times of open class conflict.

And while they may chill with different groups of friends after work, they all know what it's like to sell their labor power to survive, to be exploited, to be a cog in the bosses machine, etc. And ultimately, their only way out of all of this is through a working class revolution that abolishes capitalism.

The petty-bourgeois communists on the other hand take up their political positions for whatever personal reason (careerism, idealism, guilt, to "serve the people," because they're angry at mommy and daddy, etc.), and can jettison it like their CD collection whenever they tire of it. Not to mention that were an actual proletarian revolution to break out, it's goals would surpass their own of "a more humane society," and in fact encroach on their material interests.

The worker is free to abandon communist politics... but escaping wage-slavery isn't so easy.


:shrugs:, what you are talking about is not really historical materialism, but some weird marxified form of vulgar psychology. :shrugs: I don't even know what you're talking about most of the time because your posts are muddled and meandering, with topics that change throughout, sometimes mid-sentence.

It was Marx who developed "historical materialism," with Engels proclaiming at his grave that it was one of his two great discoveries.

What did these two "discoverers" say and do in practice?

Marx specifically rejected official leadership positions time and time again.
"'Victor Le Lubez … asked if Karl Marx would suggest the name of someone to speak on behalf of the German Workers.’ Marx himself was far too bourgeois to be eligible so he recommended the emigre tailor Johann Georg Eccarius…'" – Karl Marx: A Life. Francis Wheen.

"Citizen Marx has just been mentioned; he has perfectly understood the importance of this first congress, where there should be only working-class delegates; therefor he refused the delegateship he was offered in the General Council." – Geneva Congress of the First International, James Carter.

"Lawrence moved that Marx be President for the ensuing twelve months; Carter seconded that nomination. Marx proposed Odger: he, Marx, thought himself incapacitated because he was a head worker and not a hand worker." – The General Council of the First International: Minutes.
Marx and Engels argued against members of the petty-bourgeoisie leading workers.
"The International Working Men's Association, based upon the principle of the abolition of classes, cannot admit any middle class Sections.'” - Engels, Resolutions of the Hague Congress of the International Working Men's Association


"... the I.W.M.A., according to the General Rules, is to consist exclusively of 'workingmen's societies' .... the General Council was some months ago precluded from recognizing a Slavonian section exclusively composed of students ... the General Council recommends that in future there be admitted no new American section of which two-thirds at least do not consist of wage laborers." - Resolution of the IWMA on the Split in the U.S. Federation

"If people of this kind from other classes join the proletarian movement, the first condition is that they should not bring any remnants of bourgeois, petty-bourgeois, etc., prejudices with them but should whole-heartedly adopt the proletarian point of view. But these gentlemen, as has been proved, are stuffed and crammed with bourgeois and petty-bourgeois ideas. In such a petty-bourgeois country as Germany these ideas certainly have their own justification. But only outside the Social-Democratic Workers’ Party. If these gentlemen form themselves into a Social-Democratic Petty-Bourgeois Party they have a perfect right to do so; one could then negotiate with them, form a bloc according to circumstances, etc. But in a workers’ party they are an adulterating element. If reasons exist for tolerating them there for the moment, it is also a duty only to tolerate them, to allow them no influence in the Party leadership and to remain aware that a break with them is only a matter of time. The time, moreover, seems to have come." - Engels
Some of that "weird marxified form of vulgar psychology" I suppose.


:shrugs:, stalin's whole central committee was made of workers more or less.The Bolshevik's central committee was absolutely dominated by the petty-bourgeoisie. After the civil war the "Lenin Levy" brought a flood of workers into the ranks of the party, but where they? Many of the most militant workers had been killed off in the struggles after the revolution. Those who remained, and made it through "War Communism," were largely conservative, trying to stay alive and support their families. They entered the party for self-preservation (at a rare time in history when being a "communist" actually expanded your opportunities). They were very easily manipulated by the bureaucrats who controlled the reins, brought in to fill the gaps and perfect the state apparatus.


What you are talking about is not really petit bourgeois individual "communists" but careerists and party bureaucrats in general.That's exactly what I'm talking about. People trained by their conditions of life not only to "lead," manage, boss around, etc., but who also expect it as rightfully and naturally theirs.


The petit bourgeois happens to generally be better equipped financially and in terms of skills to overtake this organizations, but any one of any class background who ends up taking those positions and becoming professional community organizers/radicals/partyheads/petit bourgeois overseers whatever the fuck is the current flavor of little lenins today, is bound more or less to be like that. Right. The petty-bourgeoisie socialists and their organizations (which unfortunately suck in some working people). They are training houses for careerists of all stripes. They develop "leadership" skills, propaganda skills, and even the "nuts and bolts" stuff like making posters, newspapers, videos, websites, speeches, etc., that "normal" workers by and large don't have much experience in. That's a part of the danger.


We are talking really, however, about mass movements, when the class is in conflict, not small reading council communist circles, which is what I have been alluding to all the time.And? People were armed in the street of Bolivia chanting "workers to power" before Morales and co. swept in to head things off at the pass. The same kind of activity (and worse) can be found throughout history.

The groups are small now but that doesn't mean they are not dangerous for the simple of fact of their skills, underlying motives and what they can become in times of open conflict.

The role of the petty-bourgeoisie in socialist movements has been demonstrated time and time again through history. Here's a hint: it ain't a good one.


THis is why I said class matters in the macroscopic, structural level, as opposed to trying to map the destiny of a particular individual and its psychology, especially someone as weird to be part of a council communist circle/wpa/tinyleftsect is a bit silly. Some dude who's daddy owns some stupid bookstore or whatever that happens to read marx in a circle with you is very different from talking about, say, may 1968 and the influence of party bureacrats.

A good comparison is statistics. Statistics are more or less useless when your sample size is tiny, however the useability of it increases as the sample size increases. In physics, we use statistical mechanics to talk about 10^23 atoms, not the trajectory of one atom. Historical materialism is a theory of history, not a theory of individuals. Trying to decipher this, all I can come up with is the argument you always make about "class breaking down on the individual level" or whatever. Frankly, it makes no sense.

If there is a working class then there must be working people, and vice versa. And just as the existence of a bag of rice requires the existence of individual grains of rice, the existence of a petty-bourgeois class requires the existence of petty-bourgeois individuals.

Classes make history. But if we are indeed materialists, then we must recognize that class isn't a political position or program. The "working class" doesn't suddenly emerge out of thin air when a group of various and random people get together around the "good idea" of "communism." It objectively exists as a necessary aspect of capitalist society, and has itself the ingrained task to abolish that society in order to liberate itself.

[black magick hustla]

this is my last post cuz' i think both of us are just repeating ourselves and i already said everything i had to say.


No one said all workers listen to the same music or drink in the same bar or even speak the same language. But that doesn't matter. What they have in common is their relation to the means of production and society.
the difference between a union family living in the suburbs and someone living in the ghettos, surrounded by drugs, violence, and unemployment is certainly more than "music" and "drinks". the difference between some 20something pouring coffee and spending his paycheck booze and drugs and tats is certainly different in a deeper level than his tastes to indian factory workers committing suicide, or killing their bosses.

Of course what they have in common is their relation to the economy. I never claimed otherwise, in fact, what I've been claiming is that, in periods of class peace, that is basically the only thing they share. THere is no such thing as "consciousness". Although the very mechanistic definition of class as "relation to means of production" wasn't actually mentioned by marx himself, but is a post-marx invention. class is more than a relation to the means of production, which is a definition that lacks historicity. The concept of class is only useful when it relates to historical agents. Actually, this is one of the reasons why it has been reduced to some weird identity. For example, I have a wage and I don't really have control over anyone, but whether grad students or not are workers is pretty much a meaningless mental excersize. I've seen "radical" grad students going on about how they are workers etc, but who gives a fuck really.It is the same type of sociological speculation as if asking oneself if a soccer player or a porn star is a worker or not.
They might be, they might not be, but they are not really meaningful historical agents in terms of class struggle, in the same way, miners, truckers and autoworkers might be.




When the bosses go on the attack, workers can come together on the same side of the barricades, regardless of any of that.
workers can do many things. sometimes they come on the same side of the barricades, sometimes they slaughter each other in imperialist war.





Who did battle in the auto plants of Michigan? "Polish-Americans" from Detroit, "blacks" from the south and "hillbillies" from Appalachia. Workers all.

Who waged war in the coal fields of West Virginia? White and black miners (as the saying goes, everyone is black after a shift underground).

Look at the reports of Turkish and Kurdish workers together during the recent Tekel strike. The St. Louis commune with white workers who undoubtedly had racist ideas taking up the cause of black workers. The Coal Creek War, with southern white workers freeing black inmates being used to replace them.

Etc., etc., etc.


which were quite noble events.



Workers aren't bound by ideological strings, taste in music, but by what are ultimately common conditions of life and position in society. And although they have differences among themselves, they share this essential commonality, whether or not they are conscious of it at any given time, that will and must emerge in times of open class conflict.



I think here lies the crux of the issue. You confuse "class politics" with "worldview, psychological makeup, etc." in other posts you were trying to browbeat me by arguing how a university student has a different worldview than a single mom working part time in a grocery store, no shit. (which anyway, there's been countless of sociological studies about how the newer layers of students are being utterly proletarianized, there is such thing as student loans and debt, you know). However, workers in general, come actually from many "economic" backgrounds, and many "worldviews". In fact, the most militant workers are generally not the most miserable ones (i.e. public workers, factory workers etc as opposed to utterly defeated casualized workers in the ghettos and in the newer generations), so your attempt at browbeating me by talking about the most miserable sectors of the proletariat was kinda silly. However in times of class conflict, all this very varied people, with different aspirations and worldviews, will be objectively thrown against the economy and the existent itself. But outside periods of social rupture, there is really nothing, beyond their objective position in society, that makes them similar to each other, at all.

This is what I was refering to when reducing class to a mechanistic, identity politic as opposed to a dynamic, historical agent.


[





The petty-bourgeois communists on the other hand take up their political positions for whatever personal reason (careerism, idealism, guilt, to "serve the people," because they're angry at mommy and daddy, etc.), and can jettison it like their CD collection whenever they tire of it. Not to mention that were an actual proletarian revolution to break out, it's goals would surpass their own of "a more humane society," and in fact encroach on their material interests.

Sure. this has little to do with anything I am saying though.




:shrugs: I don't even know what you're talking about most of the time because your posts are muddled and meandering, with topics that change throughout, sometimes mid-sentence.
sorry






Marx specifically rejected official leadership positions time and time again.
"'Victor Le Lubez … asked if Karl Marx would suggest the name of someone to speak on behalf of the German Workers.’ Marx himself was far too bourgeois to be eligible so he recommended the emigre tailor Johann Georg Eccarius…'" – Karl Marx: A Life. Francis Wheen.

"Citizen Marx has just been mentioned; he has perfectly understood the importance of this first congress, where there should be only working-class delegates; therefor he refused the delegateship he was offered in the General Council." – Geneva Congress of the First International, James Carter.

"Lawrence moved that Marx be President for the ensuing twelve months; Carter seconded that nomination. Marx proposed Odger: he, Marx, thought himself incapacitated because he was a head worker and not a hand worker." – The General Council of the First International: Minutes.
Marx and Engels argued against members of the petty-bourgeoisie leading workers.
"The International Working Men's Association, based upon the principle of the abolition of classes, cannot admit any middle class Sections.'” - Engels, Resolutions of the Hague Congress of the International Working Men's Association


"... the I.W.M.A., according to the General Rules, is to consist exclusively of 'workingmen's societies' .... the General Council was some months ago precluded from recognizing a Slavonian section exclusively composed of students ... the General Council recommends that in future there be admitted no new American section of which two-thirds at least do not consist of wage laborers." - Resolution of the IWMA on the Split in the U.S. Federation



yes, i am aware of those quotes. I've probably read them from your posts like a dozen times, no offense.

I don't really have anything against all of this in general. I think it is problematic when a serious, formal and influential "communist" organization is formed mostly of students (although to be fair, 19th century students came from much more privilieged backgrounds than today), although I think a "statistical mayority" of professional thinkers in particular organizations says more about the state of the class in general than the organization itself i.e. in periods of heightened class struggle, probably communist organizations would become more "proletarian". My problem with your arguments doesn't generally amount to this issue, but to your strange workerism, and really mechanistic definition of "what it means to be proletarian".



"If people of this kind from other classes join the proletarian movement, the first condition is that they should not bring any remnants of bourgeois, petty-bourgeois, etc., prejudices with them but should whole-heartedly adopt the proletarian point of view. But these gentlemen, as has been proved, are stuffed and crammed with bourgeois and petty-bourgeois ideas. In such a petty-bourgeois country as Germany these ideas certainly have their own justification. But only outside the Social-Democratic Workers’ Party. If these gentlemen form themselves into a Social-Democratic Petty-Bourgeois Party they have a perfect right to do so; one could then negotiate with them, form a bloc according to circumstances, etc. But in a workers’ party they are an adulterating element. If reasons exist for tolerating them there for the moment, it is also a duty only to tolerate them, to allow them no influence in the Party leadership and to remain aware that a break with them is only a matter of time. The time, moreover, seems to have come." - Engels
Some of that "weird marxified form of vulgar psychology" I suppose.

Nice attempt at browbeating me with strawmen, but the quote about vulgar psychology has nothing to what engels said, but with your strange post about single moms in gas stations.




The Bolshevik's central committee was absolutely dominated by the petty-bourgeoisie. After the civil war the "Lenin Levy" brought a flood of workers into the ranks of the party, but where they? Many of the most militant workers had been killed off in the struggles after the revolution. Those who remained, and made it through "War Communism," were largely conservative, trying to stay alive and support their families. They entered the party for self-preservation (at a rare time in history when being a "communist" actually expanded your opportunities). They were very easily manipulated by the bureaucrats who controlled the reins, brought in to fill the gaps and perfect the state apparatus.

Well there is a difference between Lenin's and stalin's central committee, seeing that stalin's faction exterminated basically the totality of lenin's central committee. Stalin came from a very miserable background, and every general secretary after him came from a "proletarian background". there wasn't really a petit bourgeois conspiracy puppetting stalin or whatever, but what happened is that they became the managers of a state. It wasn't because of "adulterating petit bourgeoisie".




Right. The petty-bourgeoisie socialists and their organizations (which unfortunately suck in some working people). They are training houses for careerists of all stripes. They develop "leadership" skills, propaganda skills, and even the "nuts and bolts" stuff like making posters, newspapers, videos, websites, speeches, etc., that "normal" workers by and large don't have much experience in. That's a part of the danger.

THis is not really about the "petit bourgeois" but about the role of formal, mass organizations.





Trying to decipher this, all I can come up with is the argument you always make about "class breaking down on the individual level" or whatever. Frankly, it makes no sense.

you make it sound as if what I say is impossible to understand, but seems that a lot of people do get what I am saying. Its not that "class breaks down" but that the explanatory power of historical materialism breaks down, that is why people have psychology or other fields to talk about individuals, same as how statistical mechanics explanatory power breaks down at the individual atom. Theories are not meant to explain every figment of reality, they have explanatory powers and boundaries. Physics can't explain sociology, or viceversa. I don't see how this is hard to understand.

[Искра]

Isn't is kind of mixture of self interest and moral/human/ethical assumptions?

I mean...yeah I don't wanna people to be treated like rats, but also I want to have life... which I will not have...

[gorillafuck]

well this thread became a bag of feces pretty quickly

[Rafiq]

i've been bothered lately by some proclamations in the forum that a worker communist can't desert "communism" because its survival depends on it etc., as opposed to petit bourgeois intellectuals etc. it bothers me because i think its a bit dishonest, because it comes from this idea that communist workers become communist because of their state and material conditions. i don't think this is true, at all, actually.

Yet quite evidently, this is true. Perhaps not the communism that had already been reinforced in the 20th century, or the communism we know today, but communism has it's origins as both a movement and ideology that sprang organically from the Worker's movement.

i
n the 1930s there was an american council communist called sam moss who wrote the following very interesting article, http://www.lettersjournal.org/moss.html . he argued that "communism" in the working class was acquired by a particular set of what he called "worker intellectuals", but that the accepted idea that communist militants are like an organic arm of the class is more or less wrong.

Of course, this wasn't the case in the 1930's, as most international communist parties were mere extensions of Soviet Imperialism. As for other parties, there were some that did. However, if we want to talk about parties external from the proletariat, i.e. in the Third world, than yes, Communist militants were very much so an organic arm of the peasantry and rural petty bourgeois class.


i
think its a very interesting idea, because i do also think that nobody, especially in this particular epoch in the west, becomes a communist because of "self interest", or "self preservation".

This is because communism today is not an ideology nor a movement that has sprung out from the proletariat as a whole, i.e. Most of the modern communist parties are opportunists alien from the proletariat and left of capital.

Communism of the 20th century is dead. Communism, as we know it, will eventually drastically re invent itself. On the bright side, we have Marxism, and Marxism doesn't need to re invent itself nor is it possible for it (Which isn't necessarily an ideology) to die. The purpose of Marxism in contrast with the Communist movement is to radically transform it into something much more Scientific. The Communist movement isn't alive.


in fact, in many ways it is quite stupid to be a communist, you will be blacklisted, in some places you will be thrown to jail/prison/tortured, you will have this weird ideological deadweight on your shoulders and you won't be able to function as a normal human being. if one does the math and the statistics, one probably finds out that it is better to not be a communist at all, no matter your socio economic background.

Communism (as you put it) isn't the embodiment of class conscious in the 21st century.



i think this whole, i am a communist because i am a worker, is a bigger part of this weird identity-politics like doctrine that has been adopted by some pro revolutionaries.

The workers who are communists because they are workers have found themselves a form, or in a stage of class conscious. That isn't to say there exists workers who adhere to Communism which is external from their interests as a class.


there is this fake, constructed identity of what means to be a worker that is articulated by some pro-revs, it is also connected to this idea that there is such thing as a "working class consciousness" which is of course more or less reductionist. the only thing that pretty much workers share in times of class peace is pretty much just their relation to the economy.

Class consciousness does indeed exist and it bleeds through capitalist society. Indeed, from Ideological views, to the mere architecture of a house, these are all things connected to the interest of a certain class.


my point is that communists are not the "working class" nor an extension of it, at least in a historical materialist sense.

Not any more they aren't. They used to be, though.


the working class creates its own organs and ways of fighting, and most of the time the people in those organs are not really communists,

"Communism" doesn't just mean carrying a red flag and singing the Internationale. When they aren't what we call "Communists", they have not reached the highest form of class conscious. Take for example Occupy Wallstreet. Communism itself doesn't mean adhering to Communist rhetoric, as, all across the globe we see Communist movements arising, whether they called themselves Anarchists or anything else. Communism itself doesn't exist as a blue print in which we all must adjust society to. Communism isn't a very prescise and exact thing that must fall under a very strict definition. Spartacus was a communist but he didn't call for a "Stateless, classless" society.




except in some specific historic situations, in a very vague sense.



Again, It depends on how you are defining Communism.

[Rafiq]

i think the problem is that hipsters try to acknowledge they are "against morality" and therefore, the only amoral way to be a communist is if they make some dumb myth about self interest. While communism will come through necessity I think, its ultimate legitimacy rests in moral/human/ethical assumptions. men don't deserve to be treated like rats or be cold, hungry, and miserable.

Than why aren't the petty bourgeois classes holding a history of championing Communism, since it isn't about class interest?

There's a difference between "Self Interest" as you put it (Self interest isolated from the collective) and "Class interest" (which is a collective interest that resides within the "self").

Communists didn't arise because people were treated like rats, were cold, hungry or miserable. Communists arose when the interests between Proletarians and their bosses became so antithetical that compromise was no longer possible. It is a product of class struggle. So yes, it doesn't have much to do with Morality or ethical assumptions, but they could be an effect of the ideology, though never can they be a cause.

This is why a lot of the Communists from the 90's today were left of capital devoid of any class consciousness or class character, it was because they, like the rest of society, were so much being drowned via fictitious capital in this almost-Utopian smell of fresh air of what was ahead for the world. The communists, seeing this, then became a movement of morality and focused only on irrelevant postmodern issues. Fictitious capital blinded the masses from seeing the class distinction from one and other.

[Rafiq]

dnz proves my point. does it really matter if he is ultraprole or the haute bourgeosie? he is a fucking nutter, and the millieu is full of them

I don't think Marxism, by any means, is something inherent to a certain class. It can be adjusted to a class interest, as it has several times in the past, but there is an ever growing phenomena among even the upper crust of the Bourgeoisie to adopt Marxian concepts and a fascination with Marx.

I don't see how DNZ is crazy.. I've yet to see one of his posts that could validate this.

[Positivist]

I certainly believe that communism is in the interests of the working class and that communist ideas can be developed through the worker's relation to the Capitalst mode of production, and even that the bulk of communists will necessarily develop their ideas from this relation if revolution is to occur but I also recognize that communist ideas will not necessarily be developed as a result of this relation. This site is evidence enough of this. Not everyone here falls under the category of working class though are communists all the same. These communists such as myself have developed our communist beliefs as part of our development of meaning. I would contest that most of us started out religious (as Marx did) then arrived at the rational conclusion that there isn't a God, then confronted what a world without God meant (no objective meaning/values, no life after death, no 'God's testing us' crutch) and decided to pursue meaning for the purpose of receiving some satisfaction. This then, atleast in my case, lead to valuing human well being above any other thing, and, in time, accepting communism as the most efficient way of improving the human condition. Simply suggesting that people are only communists because they need it does not sufficiently account for the sheer volume of communists outside of the working class, so I offer the explanation I have presented above in it's place.

[Positivist]

Oh yea and Rafiq we got our thread haha. I was about to launch mine too. Oh well atleast it's back at the forefront. Now on a more serious note, one area where we don't contrast whatsoever is that a group's relation to production is the ORIGIN of that group's ideas, and that individual's will reactively develop ideas as a result of their material conditions at first. Our first point of departure however is that I believe that individuals may proactively develop different ideas based on values and reason. On this same token individual's may also be manipulated into holding beliefs that are opposed to their material interests. This was apparently the case in the USA during the great depression and is apparently the case throughout most of the capitalist world.