A Marxist Leninst Response to Gun Control

[wulfric82]

By Daniel Lee

In a recent editorial piece published by Peoples World, the newspaper of the CPUSA, titled “Guns, profits and Sandy Hook” – the article started by opening with the need for the country to “get serious about regulating guns.” It pontificates further, giving a perfunctory nod to universal health access as “a piece of the puzzle” to preventing the epidemic of gun violence. The editorial then issues a call for a “broad enough coalition to confront and curb those who profit from manufacturing and dealing in these individual weapons of mass destruction”. It places the blame squarely on the gun lobbyists, and the corporations that profit from the sale of guns. The article ends finally in demanding a “Ban [of] assault weapons and high capacity bullet clips”. This article, which could have been written by any bourgeois Democrat or liberal group from Nancy Pelosi to Moveon.org, buys into the reactionary “liberal” approach of treating the symptom without curing the disease. Certainly those profiting off of the sale of weapons through the promotion of violence and racism must be made accountable for their exploitation and oppression of our fellow workers – and let us not forget that the US Government is one of the largest gun runners in the world, fueling instability, murder, and genocide of the proletariat around the globe, a fact PW conveniently leaves out. The article fails to mention that nearly 2,000 civilians were wounded in our War of Imperialism in Afghanistan , Pakistan, and Iraq during the first six months of 2012. About 1,145 civilians were killed in that same time period, according to U.N. totals. James Holmes’, Adam Lanza’s, and other serial killers’ crimes are dwarfed by this monstrosity in comparison, making the US government by far the most psychotic killer, still at large and continuing to slaughter men, women and children by the thousands. These figures don’t even take into account the hundreds of unarmed civilians slaughtered by uniformed bourgeois Police gangs across the country. Where is PW’s outrage to this crime? Where is the demand to confiscate the government’s guns?
As Marxist-Leninists, we must approach the issue of gun control as we do any other issue – under the scientific principles of Marxist-Leninist revolutionary theory and practice. We affirm first and foremost the absolute supremacy of the interests of the working class, and the necessity of revolution for the establishment of a dictatorship of the proletariat to completely overthrow the oppression of the Bourgeois state and its minions. As Marx and Engels famously wrote at the end of the Communist Manifesto, "The Communists disdain to conceal their views and aims. They openly declare that their ends can be attained only by the forcible overthrow of all existing social conditions. Let the ruling classes tremble at a communist revolution. The proletarians have nothing to lose but their chains.”
When we talk about gun ownership then, we must talk about the rights of the workers to bear arms. One way or another, the bourgeois will exert their will through force either directly or indirectly, and usually through the cats-paw of the government and its military and police institutions to repress the working class and protect their own property interests. How then shall the workers protect their interests? As Marx writes,
"The arming of the whole proletariat with rifles, guns, and ammunition should be carried out at once [and] the workers must ... organize themselves into an independent guard, with their own chiefs and general staff. ... [The aim is] that the bourgeois democratic Government not only immediately loses all backing among the workers, but from the commencement finds itself under the supervision and threats of authorities behind whom stands the entire mass of the working class. ...As soon as the new Government is established they will commence to fight the workers. In order that this party (i.e., the democrats) whose betrayal of the workers will begin with the first hour of victory, should be frustrated in its nefarious work, it is necessary to organize and arm the proletariat." - Karl Marx, Address to the Communist League (1850)This quote sounds as if it were written for the times we are facing today! However, Dialectical Materialism teaches us that the issues and struggles of history are cyclical, and though taking new forms, at the heart of the struggle remains the eternal war for class dominance.
Moving forward to Lenin, the great leader of the October Revolution in Russia, we see that he too advocated arming the workers:
“The minimum programme of the Social-Democrats calls for the replacement of the standing army by a universal arming of the people. Most of the official Social-Democrats in Europe and most of our own Menshevik leaders, however, have “forgotten” or put aside the Party’s programme, substituting chauvinism (“defencism”) for internationalism, reformism for revolutionary tactics. Yet now of all times, at the present revolutionary moment, it is most urgent and essential that there be a universal arming of the people. To assert that, while we have a revolutionary army, there is no need to arm the proletariat, or that there would “not be enough” arms to go round, is mere deception and trickery. The thing is to begin organizing a universal militia straight away, so that everyone should learn the use of arms even if there is “not enough” to go round, for it is not at all necessary that the people have enough weapons to arm everybody. The people must learn, one and all, how to use arms, they must belong, one and all, to the militia which is to replace the police and the standing army.
The workers do not want an army standing apart from the people; what they want is that the workers and soldiers should merge into a single militia consisting of all the people.” - A Proletarian Militia by VI Lenin
Comrade Stalin, the fierce defender of the fledgling workers’ Soviet democracy and the Champion against Nazi aggression, said that the “most important countermeasure against counterrevolution is the arming of the workers and peasants.” Finally, from the writings of the revered leader and liberator of the Chinese people, Mao Zedong, we find this important commentary on the role of the Red Army: "The Chinese Red Army is an armed body for carrying out the political tasks of the revolution. Especially at present, the Red Army should certainly not confine itself to fighting; besides fighting to destroy the enemy's military strength, it should shoulder such important tasks as doing propaganda among the masses, organizing the masses, arming them, helping them to establish revolutionary political power and setting up Party organizations."
Certainly, each statement above applies to a particular instance in time at that particular stage of revolution in each writer’s respective countries. However, the principle remains the same. The workers must be made able to protect and defend themselves. In some cases, such as in 1916 Russia, the bourgeois were even willing to finance a workers militia - to protect their own interests – which Lenin said should be paid for by the bourgeoisie, but that the militia must above all protect the workers both from external threats, and from the bourgeois within the gates.
At this point in time, the bourgeois state is not in a state of flux which would necessitate them calling upon the workers to form militias – in fact, such a thing is considered a threat to the Imperialist State’s hegemonic domination. Thus we can expect no checks to be coming in the mail from the rich for the funding of workers’ protection. However, we must still encourage the exercising of such rights still granted to all people by the Bourgeoisie state for the protection of the working class and minorities. We can take a lesson from the Black Panthers, who encouraged black communities to arm and protect themselves instead of relying on the unpredictable and brutal police forces and judicial system for protection. We can encourage the formation of community defense groups which are founded along class lines, upholding and protecting the rights of oppressed minorities. We can encourage and sponsor gun safety training, and work to create the best conditions possible for working class neighborhoods to protect themselves. We can encourage organized labor to stand together in solidarity to help protect the schools and surrounding communities, creating a “thin red line” of our own which acts as a deterrent against crimes from any source. And in the center must be the party, directing, protecting, and organizing the workers defense. Lenin would do no less.

Originally posted at: www . okworkersmonthly.blogspot. com - Oklahoma Workers' Monthly, the #1 news source for the Oklahoma working class, produced by the Communist Party of Oklahoma

[goalkeeper]

I mean, I agree that we should never concede the bourgeois state a monopoly on gun ownership, but this article sounds like a parody.

"under the scientific principles of Marxist-Leninist revolutionary theory and practice"

"Comrade Stalin, the fierce defender of the fledgling workers’ Soviet democracy and the Champion against Nazi aggression"

"revered leader and liberator of the Chinese people, Mao Zedong"

"Lenin, the great leader of the October Revolution in Russia"

Who writes like this? Seriously. It sounds like a parody of the stale Soviet era writings.

[La Guaneña]

Am I reading the Pravda in 1930?

[TheRedAnarchist23]

Sounds like something written by a PCP militant...

[Brosa Luxemburg]

Sounds like something written by a PCP militant...

I'm not from Portugal, but I have a friend who moved to the states from there and he said they are the most fanatical and irrational group of people he had ever met. Would you agree?

[RadioRaheem84]

Despite the pravda style language, can we focus on the issue at hand?

[goalkeeper]

Despite the pravda style language, can we focus on the issue at hand?

I don't think there would be much disagreement with the basic idea behind the article that 'workers having guns in capitalism is good' on a forum for the Revolutionary Left. So there isn't much to discuss.

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

Yep, arming a few workers with assault rifles is gonna be a load of good against a standing, national army how strong? Fuck sake, if it ever came down to a civil war, the deciding issue would be how many working class soldiers defected, not how many pistols/rifles ordinary workers had. They wouldn't stand a chance against an organised army.

Also, you say that anti-gun people treat the symptom without the disease. But I pose this: since when has someone treated a disease without a care for the symptoms? Yes, we need to shine a light on mental health care, but why should that mean we can't deal with the very real issue of gun proliferation at the same time?

[Agathor]

Yep, arming a few workers with assault rifles is gonna be a load of good against a standing, national army how strong? Fuck sake, if it ever came down to a civil war, the deciding issue would be how many working class soldiers defected, not how many pistols/rifles ordinary workers had. They wouldn't stand a chance against an organised army.

Yeah - take Libya. The rebels were supported by most of the population, they were very heavily armed, and they were thrashed until the French turned up. Either revolutionary socialists start campaigning for a right to own tanks and anti-aircraft batteries or they consider a different method.

[DDR]

Yep, arming a few workers with assault rifles is gonna be a load of good against a standing, national army how strong? Fuck sake, if it ever came down to a civil war, the deciding issue would be how many working class soldiers defected, not how many pistols/rifles ordinary workers had. They wouldn't stand a chance against an organised army.

What about Cuba? 11 guys one of them asmathic against a state and they succeded. And China? A popular militia who fought against the Japanese in WWII and a civil war, an they won. And Vietnam? Agrarian country who won the independence of France and shortly after they got invaded by the US and they ultimately won. The list can go forever, I agree it is difficulf, bloody difficult, but not imposible.

[Fourth Internationalist]

Despite the fact a Stalinist wrote this, it's changed my opinion about the issue of gun control. Mental health care and more funding for education should be first before limiting weapons.

[Prof. Oblivion]

What about Cuba? 11 guys one of them asmathic against a state and they succeded. And China? A popular militia who fought against the Japanese in WWII and a civil war, an they won. And Vietnam? Agrarian country who won the independence of France and shortly after they got invaded by the US and they ultimately won. The list can go forever, I agree it is difficulf, bloody difficult, but not imposible.

Are you trying to make a point about the subject of this thread or going off on a tangent? I sure hope the latter.

[DDR]

Are you trying to make a point about the subject of this thread or going off on a tangent? I sure hope the latter.

What's here to discuss? goalkeeper put it cristal clear above, I just wanted to express my opinion on the comment that armed civilians cannot overcome profesional military, so lets relax :thumbup1:

[Ostrinski]

Armed struggle cannot overpower a military with enough bombs and nuclear weapons to destroy the world multiple times over as well as tanks, planes, helicopters, and all sorts of other fun stuff. The best bet is to get large swaths of the armed forces on our side.

[Os Cangaceiros]

The issue about the government having tanks, aircraft etc. is true, but most insurgencies are fought with small arms. A .223 vs a tank is not a fair fight, but the proliferation of hundreds of millions of small arms can sure as hell make civil society completely ungovernable.

[Let's Get Free]

It isn't that there aren't enough guns in the country and people willing to use them. The problem is that the state has possession of so much more lethality and has practice and the willingness to use it (through the armed services).

A citizens' militia which posed a real threat to the government would not be treated kindly. If I were in that militia, I would expect to be dead before breakfast.

[Psy]

Armed struggle cannot overpower a military with enough bombs and nuclear weapons to destroy the world multiple times over as well as tanks, planes, helicopters, and all sorts of other fun stuff. The best bet is to get large swaths of the armed forces on our side.

An army marches on its stomach, meaning wars are won through superior logistics not firepower. Meaning we don't need large swaths of the armed forces we just need large enough worker occupations to prevent military stockpiles from replenishing and a revolutionary army strong enough to keep the bulk of the means of production out of the hands of the army.

In this kind of war then arming the masses is the best strategy due to it being a war of attrition and the extra armed manpower helping in outlasting the enemy till they no longer have the means to continue fighting.

[Paul Pott]

Maybe a little off topic, but why is there a Communist Party of Oklahoma?

No one on this forum will disagree with the basic premise of the article, but the way we can control the discussion among the wider left is like this: is it really in the best interests of the working class to have capital's state, the same state which wages a war on drugs, on opposition to imperialism, on working class militancy, etc. wage a war on guns? Why do we give a fuck about "gun proliferation"? Why create absolute dependence on the cops to defend our communities?

[Flying Purple People Eater]

An army marches on its stomach, meaning wars are won through superior logistics not firepower. Meaning we don't need large swaths of the armed forces we just need large enough worker occupations to prevent military stockpiles from replenishing and a revolutionary army strong enough to keep the bulk of the means of production out of the hands of the army.

In this kind of war then arming the masses is the best strategy due to it being a war of attrition and the extra armed manpower helping in outlasting the enemy till they no longer have the means to continue fighting.

This is the logic of a hundred years ago. Now, most acting governments have nuclear weapons and international partnerships at their disposal. :lol:

[Psy]

This is the logic of a hundred years ago. Now, most acting governments have nuclear weapons and international partnerships at their disposal. :lol:

Nuclear weapons destroys the means of productions and radiation makes it impossible to rebuild it (i.e Chernobyl is still uninhabitable). International partnerships only means other bourgeois nations will try to supply the bourgeois state under attack, yet if these nations are also crippled by strikes they would have the means to do so.

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

What about Cuba? 11 guys one of them asmathic against a state and they succeded. And China? A popular militia who fought against the Japanese in WWII and a civil war, an they won. And Vietnam? Agrarian country who won the independence of France and shortly after they got invaded by the US and they ultimately won. The list can go forever, I agree it is difficulf, bloody difficult, but not imposible.

You are listing examples of effective guerrilla warfare being waged, not popular revolutions.

Besides, I don't think setting ourselves up for civil war is a particularly good tactic. Revolutions can and have happened without a protracted war or civil conflict. In fact, i'd argue that any transition between modes of production will not happen overnight, and will not be a 'war' but a process, involving but not characterised by violence but rather by an attrition in the power of the ruling class.

[Psy]

You are listing examples of effective guerrilla warfare being waged, not popular revolutions.

Besides, I don't think setting ourselves up for civil war is a particularly good tactic. Revolutions can and have happened without a protracted war or civil conflict. In fact, i'd argue that any transition between modes of production will not happen overnight, and will not be a 'war' but a process, involving but not characterised by violence but rather by an attrition in the power of the ruling class.
Every popular revolution has been followed by counter-revolutions by the bourgeoisie. Take Chile in 1973, if the alternative to civil-war is mass graves then we have nothing to lose by a civil-war and the revolutionary army defeating counter-revolutionaries like Pinochet in battle is the only winning scenario.

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

Every popular revolution has been followed by counter-revolutions by the bourgeoisie. Take Chile in 1973, if the alternative to civil-war is mass graves then we have nothing to lose by a civil-war and the revolutionary army defeating counter-revolutionaries like Pinochet in battle is the only winning scenario.

Chile wasn't really a revolution, though, as Allende was an elected bourgeois politician.

But yes, you are right, it will be necessary to organise some sort of army/militia. But this has nothing to do with arming the general populace.

[Ethics Gradient, Traitor For All Ages]

I'm split on this. On one hand everyone owning a pistol or a stripped down rifle isn't going to come close to guaranteeing a victory against a standing army, however the conception of first world armies being these behemoths with unimaginable technological superiority is a myth perpetuated by those armies and primarily the defense companies that provide the technology to them. Don't be so quick to buy into the marketing campaigns coming out of DC, a great deal of that tech only works in theory or in controlled testing environments.

[Psy]

Chile wasn't really a revolution, though, as Allende was an elected bourgeois politician.

A agree but it is not like the CIA would have acted differently if it was.



But yes, you are right, it will be necessary to organise some sort of army/militia. But this has nothing to do with arming the general populace.
Armed in general population makes defence easier and the USSR was able grind down the Wehrmacht by also arming partisans in occupied territories plus the arming the masses in Leingrad allowed Leingrad to hold out as the Red Army in Leningrad by itself lacked manpower and this was simply solved by Red Army officers in Leningrad drafting the masses in Leningrad on the spot, shoving a rifle into hands and sending them to front with bare minimal training (in this cause the masses of Leningrad having previous firearm training would have helped make this tactic more effective).

[TheRedAnarchist23]

I'm not from Portugal, but I have a friend who moved to the states from there and he said they are the most fanatical and irrational group of people he had ever met. Would you agree?

Yes, I would. Your friend is right.

[Geiseric]

Yep, arming a few workers with assault rifles is gonna be a load of good against a standing, national army how strong? Fuck sake, if it ever came down to a civil war, the deciding issue would be how many working class soldiers defected, not how many pistols/rifles ordinary workers had. They wouldn't stand a chance against an organised army.

Also, you say that anti-gun people treat the symptom without the disease. But I pose this: since when has someone treated a disease without a care for the symptoms? Yes, we need to shine a light on mental health care, but why should that mean we can't deal with the very real issue of gun proliferation at the same time?

yeah the red guards were rolled over by the german army, during the actual revolution though the red guards were invaluable, and that organization is what "arming the workers," i'd say has more to do with then the red army which was much more of a conventional fighting force, not quite a bourgeois army though. It had to adopt bourgeois military tactics though, on top of creating its own, but the necessity of an army that big is a glaring hole in the theory of SioC.

[Philosopher Jay]

The NRA Terrorists (NRATs) have helped to kill 1.3 million people in the United States, including thousands of children, over the last 50 years. It is the objective of the fascist NRATS to keep the ownership of guns in private bourgeois hands.

It should be the position of all Marxists and Marxist-Leninists to take guns out of the hands of private citizens. This serves both the immediate and long range interests and the genuine needs of the working-class and the public.

Marxist-Leninists using absurd, twisted pseudo logic who support the NRATs and oppose gun control make themselves into jokes and fools.

The policy of any true workingclass organization should be that no private citizen has a right to own any gun whatsoever. Public control over the manufacture, distribution and use of guns is a fundamental principle of socialism/communism.

The failure to see the differences between Russia in 1913 and the United States in 2013
is a monumental failure of reasoning.

[Psy]

The NRA Terrorists (NRATs) have helped to kill 1.3 million people in the United States, including thousands of children, over the last 50 years. It is the objective of the fascist NRATS to keep the ownership of guns in private bourgeois hands.

It should be the position of all Marxists and Marxist-Leninists to take guns out of the hands of private citizens. This serves both the immediate and long range interests and the genuine needs of the working-class and the public.

Marxist-Leninists using absurd, twisted pseudo logic who support the NRATs and oppose gun control make themselves into jokes and fools.

The policy of any true workingclass organization should be that no private citizen has a right to own any gun whatsoever. Public control over the manufacture, distribution and use of guns is a fundamental principle of socialism/communism.

The failure to see the differences between Russia in 1913 and the United States in 2013
is a monumental failure of reasoning.
What about the Black Panther Party for Self-Defence, they formed militias to defend black communities from police and at first it worked as the police needed the FBI to not get pinned effortlessly by the BPP that used basic US Army infantry tactics to suppress police learned from black Vietnam vets.

[Ethics Gradient, Traitor For All Ages]

The NRA Terrorists (NRATs) have helped to kill 1.3 million people in the United States, including thousands of children, over the last 50 years. It is the objective of the fascist NRATS to keep the ownership of guns in private bourgeois hands.

It should be the position of all Marxists and Marxist-Leninists to take guns out of the hands of private citizens. This serves both the immediate and long range interests and the genuine needs of the working-class and the public.

Marxist-Leninists using absurd, twisted pseudo logic who support the NRATs and oppose gun control make themselves into jokes and fools.

The policy of any true workingclass organization should be that no private citizen has a right to own any gun whatsoever. Public control over the manufacture, distribution and use of guns is a fundamental principle of socialism/communism.

The failure to see the differences between Russia in 1913 and the United States in 2013
is a monumental failure of reasoning.

The US government is not publicly controlled, niether is production or distribution.

[DDR]

The NRA Terrorists (NRATs) have helped to kill 1.3 million people in the United States, including thousands of children, over the last 50 years. It is the objective of the fascist NRATS to keep the ownership of guns in private bourgeois hands.

It should be the position of all Marxists and Marxist-Leninists to take guns out of the hands of private citizens. This serves both the immediate and long range interests and the genuine needs of the working-class and the public.

Marxist-Leninists using absurd, twisted pseudo logic who support the NRATs and oppose gun control make themselves into jokes and fools.

The policy of any true workingclass organization should be that no private citizen has a right to own any gun whatsoever. Public control over the manufacture, distribution and use of guns is a fundamental principle of socialism/communism.

The failure to see the differences between Russia in 1913 and the United States in 2013
is a monumental failure of reasoning.

Then tell me how to make a revolution and defend ourselves from counterrevolution without weapons. I'm all ears.

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

Then tell me how to make a revolution and defend ourselves from counterrevolution without weapons. I'm all ears.

Democracy.

Changing the fundamental social relations in society.

Refusing to work.

The possibilities really are endless, yet you choose to limit them to bloodletting. Why? Because some revolutions in the 21st century that failed were violent??

[RedAtheist]

It is the objective of the fascist NRATS to keep the ownership of guns in private bourgeois hands.

This argument is a guilt by association fallacy. It's no different to arguing that universal healthcare is bad because Nazis supported it. Also 'private' hands aren't necessary 'bourgeois' hands. Opposition to private property doesn't mean not allowing individuals to own things. Gun factories definitely need to be collectively owned but that does not mean the products of such factories cannot be divided amongst people.


Marxist-Leninists using absurd, twisted pseudo logic who support the NRATs and oppose gun control make themselves into jokes and fools.

Opposing gun control does not equal lending general support for any particular political ideology or organisation.


The policy of any true workingclass organization should be that no private citizen has a right to own any gun whatsoever. Public control over the manufacture, distribution and use of guns is a fundamental principle of socialism/communism.

Public control over the manufacture and distribution of all products is a fundamental principle of socialism/communism. That does not mean an individual cannot possess a product. How exactly can we have collective control over the use of products designed for one person (e.g. clothes, food, guns, etc.)? I don't think this is a principle of socialism.

In relation to some of the other issues brought up in this thread.

Guns don't guarantee victory for the revolutionary proletariat, but they certainly help. If the US government did unleash its full military capacity (tanks, fighter planes, etc.) on its own citizens (which is unlikely given the level of public condemnation such as action would receive both from the American public and internationally) it would still be better for the workers to have guns than for them to not have guns. They could, for example, be used to capture tanks. In any case, I think it can be savely said that guns in the hands of the revolutionary proletariat won't hinter the revolutionary cause.

The problem however is that if guns became more freely available right now, there would be far more reactionaries, libertarians and ultra-macho assholes rushing out to buy guns than left-wing revolutionary. For now I think the struggle for socialism needs to be fought on an ideological level with members of the working class. We should save the struggle for gun ownership for when socialists have gained more support from the working class.

I also don't see a problem with better enforcing restrictions against mentally ill people (who's illnesses make them prone to violence) owning guns. Most of the mass shootings which are used to justify gun control are carried out by such people after all, not by the average legal purchaser of guns. One third of Americans own guns, yet one third of Americans aren't out shooting people for no good reason.

[Paul Pott]

I'm pretty sure Philosopher Jay is being sarcastic.

[RisingSun]

I don't think there would be much disagreement with the basic idea behind the article that 'workers having guns in capitalism is good' on a forum for the Revolutionary Left. So there isn't much to discuss.

The vast majority of firearm owners in the United States would be, if anything, counter-revolutionaries.

Face facts though - There won't be a revolution in the USA. At least not anytime soon. However, there will be many gun murders that take place in the time that you're waiting for one. It's sensible to advocate tight gun laws to reduce the homicide rate, which is three times as much as similar industrialised countries.


The NRA Terrorists (NRATs) have helped to kill 1.3 million people in the United States, including thousands of children, over the last 50 years. It is the objective of the fascist NRATS to keep the ownership of guns in private bourgeois hands.

It should be the position of all Marxists and Marxist-Leninists to take guns out of the hands of private citizens. This serves both the immediate and long range interests and the genuine needs of the working-class and the public.

Marxist-Leninists using absurd, twisted pseudo logic who support the NRATs and oppose gun control make themselves into jokes and fools.

The policy of any true workingclass organization should be that no private citizen has a right to own any gun whatsoever. Public control over the manufacture, distribution and use of guns is a fundamental principle of socialism/communism.

The failure to see the differences between Russia in 1913 and the United States in 2013
is a monumental failure of reasoning.

I very much agree.

[DDR]

Democracy.

Changing the fundamental social relations in society.

Refusing to work.

The possibilities really are endless, yet you choose to limit them to bloodletting. Why? Because some revolutions in the 21st century that failed were violent??

And when and where in history has this happened? Where on earth have the ruling class relinquish its power peacefully? Every social change in hystory has been brought by violence, and I'm afraid it will continue like it for a long time.

[Philosopher Jay]

Hi Psy;2562947,

I believe the person who first proposed the armed self-defence line and procured the first weapons for the Black Panther Party turned out to be a police informant. It was a disastrous strategy that just got a lot of courageous people killed and jailed.




What about the Black Panther Party for Self-Defence, they formed militias to defend black communities from police and at first it worked as the police needed the FBI to not get pinned effortlessly by the BPP that used basic US Army infantry tactics to suppress police learned from black Vietnam vets.

[RedSonRising]

Hi Psy;2562947,

I believe the person who first proposed the armed self-defence line and procured the first weapons for the Black Panther Party turned out to be a police informant. It was a disastrous strategy that just got a lot of courageous people killed and jailed.

The fact is that people in their communities were getting beaten and killed by police violence already. Their public showing of arms was public under state law, and having an armed wing in some form is not inherently dangerous. Considering all the right wing militias that shoot Latinos indiscriminately along the border, urban police and vigilante killings against people of color, tea party nuts with guns, etc., any respectable leftist social movement that arises anytime soon wouldn't be stupid to try it. Publicly celebrating and emphasizing the possession of arms is one thing, but given the history of bourgeois violence against popular dissent, I'd feel more comfortable working in an office with an armed guard.

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

And when and where in history has this happened? Where on earth have the ruling class relinquish its power peacefully? Every social change in hystory has been brought by violence, and I'm afraid it will continue like it for a long time.

There is violence and then there is violence.

Violence is inevitable in some form or other - violence at protests, demonstrations and so on. Of course.

But planning for civil war, conflict, guerrilla conflict is altogether different.

[Killer Enigma]

It seems like a lot of bloggers have borrowed heavily from this piece, Three Positions on Gun Control (http://return2source.wordpress.com/2012/12/19/three-positions-on-gun-control/)...

[Philosopher Jay]

Thank you Killer Enigma for the article, "Three Positions on Gun Control." This is an amazing article. I'll ignore the factual errors, for example, the article includes the NRA propaganda that Hitler banned private ownership of guns. In fact, he only banned guns for Jews, and he made it easier for Germans to get guns and ammunition, abolishing the strict gun control laws that had been in place under the previous regime. One only has to Google "Gun Control under the Nazies" to find this out, something the Marxist author of this article, could not be bothered to do. However, the serious mistakes of this article are much more fundamental and intolerable.

Apparently, what Marx wrote from London in 1850 about armed workers in Germany who had been engaged in revolutionary fighting for two years during the Revolutions of 1848 and 1849 should be regarded as the one and only "Marxist" position on gun control.

Apparently, we should not notice that the world of the United States in 2013 is fantastically different from the world of Germany in 1850, but we should assume along with creationists that evolution is false and we always live in the world of 1850 Europe. Further, we should proclaim Marx, not as a scientist who analyzed specific social situations in his own time period, but a prophet, who made pronouncements for once and all time.

Opposition to gun control in all times and places is certainly not the "Marxist" View, but the view of gun fetishists.

The real Marxist view for today should be that the NRA is a terrorist organization that needs to be arrested and destroyed as soon as possible. To do this we need to organize a socialist party dedicated to defending all people against private gun owner/terrorists.

This is a viewpoint that reflects the needs of the working class in the United States in 2013 and not the "Marxist" viewpoint that mistakes the situation in Germany in 1850 for the situation in the United States in 2013.

Those who use out of context quotes from Marx or Lenin or whomever to justify the murder of six and seven year old school children are no friends of the working class or even themselves.

[Fourth Internationalist]

Opposition to gun control in all times and places is certainly not the "Marxist" View, but the view of gun fetishists.

I don't think anyone here holds an absolute opposition to gun control.


The real Marxist view for today should be that the NRA is a terrorist organization that needs to be arrested and destroyed as soon as possible. I think every communist (whether Marxist or not) agrees on this already.


Those who use out of context quotes from Marx or Lenin or whomever to justify the murder of six and seven year old school children are no friends of the working class or even themselves.I don't see anyone justifying the murder of six and seven year-olds, not even the far-right gun fetishists.

[Philosopher Jay]

Hi User Name,

Which socialist or communist party in the United States has identified the NRA as the leading terrorist organization in the United States? Which one has called for its immediate eradication and the jailing of all its leaders for aiding and abetting at least 1/2 million deaths and millions of shootings over the past 50 years?

[TheRedAnarchist23]

I would guess marxist leninists would want you to keep the guns and use them to get the closest communist party into power and form a dictatorship of the party.

[Trap Queen Voxxy]

I basically agree with the article and personally like it's Pravda flavor. Gun control essentially accomplishes nothing considering, you've just legislated new black market commodities into existence thus further filling the pockets of those criminals the state hates so much. It also disarms the working class which no leftist of any stripe should support. I also like how it framed the situation that the American government kills tens of hundreds of people regularly, if not daily, with drones and so on and the American public is concerned about a school shooting that allegedly happened? Really? Get the VP to accost video game producers even? We can't, oh, idk, focus on mental healthcare, early detection of children, adolescents and adults who experience anti-social behavior with potential fatal harm towards themselves or others, education, things that would actually attempt to solve the 'problem' no, of course not.

[Fourth Internationalist]

Hi User Name,

Which socialist or communist party in the United States has identified the NRA as the leading terrorist organization in the United States? Which one has called for its immediate eradication and the jailing of all its leaders for aiding and abetting at least 1/2 million deaths and millions of shootings over the past 50 years?

I'm not very familiar with any communist or socialist parties, and as far as I know, the supposedly socialist/communist parties in the US are quite pathetic and weak.

[goalkeeper]

Hi User Name,

Which socialist or communist party in the United States has identified the NRA as the leading terrorist organization in the United States? Which one has called for its immediate eradication and the jailing of all its leaders for aiding and abetting at least 1/2 million deaths and millions of shootings over the past 50 years?

None hopefully, because thats fucking stupid.

Gun violence is caused by some lobby; luck them up and problem solved :sleep:

I suppose we can solve the problem of American Imperialism by locking up the New American Foundation. While we are at it, lets abolish this capitalism thing by rounding up the Cato institute. Problem solved.

[The Jay]

Armed struggle cannot overpower a military with enough bombs and nuclear weapons to destroy the world multiple times over as well as tanks, planes, helicopters, and all sorts of other fun stuff. The best bet is to get large swaths of the armed forces on our side.

You are clearly correct in that 10,000 ar-15s could not compare to one UAV but here is the thing: taking a military base wouldn't be a good idea. Taking a rail road, supplies depot, factory, ect would be possible. I am not even sure if that would be necessary but it that started happening or even if others started a civil war I would rather have a gun even if I were not involved.

[Philosopher Jay]

If you care to study the issue, you will find that the United States has the most guns per capita and the most gun deaths per capita. (from http://news.yahoo.com/gun-deaths-familiar-american-experience-143015822--abc-news-topstories.html:)


"A study in the Journal of Trauma and Acute Care Surgery found that the gun murder rate in the U.S. is at 19.5 percent, almost 20 times higher than the next 22 richest nations combined.
Among the world's 23 wealthiest countries, 80 percent of all gun deaths are American deaths and 87 percent of all kids killed by guns are American kids."


The relationship between more guns and more gun deaths is both a simple logical and scientifically proven fact. It is also a fact that the NRA's lobbying against gun control has caused the enormous increase in guns per capita in the United States that has led to the epidemic in gun deaths.

Your denial of hard scientific facts is fucking stupid.

Imperialism is a quite different subject with its own socio-economic laws. Confusing the two is fucking stupid.

[Popular Front of Judea]

It's rather humorous to see how well the OPs argument -- shorn of the paeans to Stalin -- maps onto the standard 2nd Amendment maximalist argument. The 2nd Amendment types want a citizens militia to bring down the coming tyrannical government, the OP wants a working class militia to bring down the bourgeois government.

The reality is that the American public is armed. There is little chance of confiscation -- despite all the scare talk emanating from the NRA. The question I think we should be asking is how do we ensure that the working class doesn't hobble itself in self-destructive gun violence. The present fratricidal violence only serves to legitimate the militarization of police forces.

[BIXX]

The real Marxist view for today should be that the NRA is a terrorist organization that needs to be arrested and destroyed as soon as possible. To do this we need to organize a socialist party dedicated to defending all people against private gun owner/terrorists.

Red: I am not a terrorist. I own an M14, a Kel-Tec 9mm, and a HMR17 "Savage" (It's not all that savage, to be honest). I have owned an AK47, a .357 magnum, an SKS, a Colt 1911, etc... I do not use these weapons for intimidation, or the spread of fear, or to even harm living creatures. I practice with them because I want to be able to defend myself, and my family, if need be. I practice cause I do feel they could be handy in a revolution, if for nothing more than to make people feel safe.

Blue: Imagine this scenario- your socialist party is formed, they decide to abolish guns. You send your police force (the only possible way I can see to actually gather the guns) to retrieve the guns from the gun owners. Do the police have guns? If so, it seems hypocritical, and if they succeed, congratulations on your shiny new police state where only the cops and military have guns. If they don't have guns however, how do you expect them to retrieve the guns? Why the fuck would a gun owner listen to you if you had no means of enforcing your gun ban?

Everyone should read the Justfacts article on gun control. I can't post a link to it because of needing 25 posts to add a link in my post. Anyway, it shows pretty well that gun control does not work. In fact, I wrote a paper citing that almost entirely. Plus an article showing gun control to be a tool used by racists, consistently, to impede on the rights of minorities.



I am not a Marxist, but I doubt Marx would be impressed by your idea of what "The real Marxist view for today" is.

[Popular Front of Judea]

@EchoShock: You really should thank @Philosopher Jay for being an obliging foil. Although the NRA is demonstrably a reactionary organization no serious revolutionary will argue for the disarmament of the American people.

So what small steps would you accept to lower the fratricidal gun deaths that we are now experiencing? Is a ban on 30 round magazines and closing the gun show loophole really disarming the proletariat -- or making the defense of your family any less effective?


Red: I am not a terrorist. I own an M14, a Kel-Tec 9mm, and a HMR17 "Savage" (It's not all that savage, to be honest). I have owned an AK47, a .357 magnum, an SKS, a Colt 1911, etc... I do not use these weapons for intimidation, or the spread of fear, or to even harm living creatures. I practice with them because I want to be able to defend myself, and my family, if need be. I practice cause I do feel they could be handy in a revolution, if for nothing more than to make people feel safe.

Blue: Imagine this scenario- your socialist party is formed, they decide to abolish guns. You send your police force (the only possible way I can see to actually gather the guns) to retrieve the guns from the gun owners. Do the police have guns? If so, it seems hypocritical, and if they succeed, congratulations on your shiny new police state where only the cops and military have guns. If they don't have guns however, how do you expect them to retrieve the guns? Why the fuck would a gun owner listen to you if you had no means of enforcing your gun ban?

Everyone should read the Justfacts article on gun control. I can't post a link to it because of needing 25 posts to add a link in my post. Anyway, it shows pretty well that gun control does not work. In fact, I wrote a paper citing that almost entirely. Plus an article showing gun control to be a tool used by racists, consistently, to impede on the rights of minorities.



I am not a Marxist, but I doubt Marx would be impressed by your idea of what "The real Marxist view for today" is.

[BIXX]

@EchoShock: You really should thank @Philosopher Jay for being an obliging foil. Although the NRA is demonstrably a reactionary organization no serious revolutionary will argue for the disarmament of the American people.

So what small steps would you accept to lower the fratricidal gun deaths that we are now experiencing? Is a ban on 30 round magazines and closing the gun show loophole really disarming the proletariat -- or making the defense of your family any less effective?

Red: Haha, yeah, I just get tired of reading that crap.

2nd paragraph: Personally, I feel that a ban on 30 round mags won't help the issue, in fact, I feel it could encourage people to learn how to use the "assault" rifles more accurately and efficiently, to make more use of what small amount of ammo they had. Also, in Oregon, there is no gun show loophole- not sure about other places. If you buy a gun, person to person, you don't need to get a background check, whether or not you're at a gun show.

To answer your question, I do have a solution that (in my mind) would work very well. I think that if a law was enacted that made it so all "assault" weapons had to be carried in a case/bag that was secured with a zipper or belt buckle (or something that made it equally difficult to open up) while it was being carried in public. That way, if anyone sees someone who is not abiding by that rule, they know that they have to get out of the situation. It empowers the would-be victims.
However, as an anarchist, I do think that if/when there is a revolution, there should be no gun control laws, and the safety of the communities would be left to the communities.

[Buttscratcher]

I'm not from Portugal, but I have a friend who moved to the states from there and he said they are the most fanatical and irrational group of people he had ever met. Would you agree?
I don't know many of them, but the impression i have, is that only a small part of them are like that, portuguese people are usually open minded when it comes to politics.

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

[QUOTE=EchoShock;2567870]Red: I am not a terrorist. I own an M14, a Kel-Tec 9mm, and a HMR17 "Savage" (It's not all that savage, to be honest). I have owned an AK47, a .357 magnum, an SKS, a Colt 1911, etc... I do not use these weapons for intimidation, or the spread of fear, or to even harm living creatures. I practice with them because I want to be able to defend myself, and my family, if need be.

Hmm funny that, i've visited some of the most dangerous places around and have managed to avoid getting shot or stabbed (despite having guns and knives pointed in my face/chest) by using that thing, umm, common sense. And talking. Having guns never, ever, diffuses a situation. It's a lame excuse to own a gun bro.


I practice cause I do feel they could be handy in a revolution, if for nothing more than to make people feel safe.

Make who feel safe? I really struggle to see how going into a demo that has guns galore would make anybody feel safe. Would teenagers, children and the elderly really be attracted to that situation? C'mon. Again, this is lame.


Blue: Imagine this scenario- your socialist party is formed, they decide to abolish guns. You send your police force (the only possible way I can see to actually gather the guns) to retrieve the guns from the gun owners. Do the police have guns? If so, it seems hypocritical, and if they succeed, congratulations on your shiny new police state where only the cops and military have guns. If they don't have guns however, how do you expect them to retrieve the guns? Why the fuck would a gun owner listen to you if you had no means of enforcing your gun ban?

If revolution is so popular, then the police won't shoot everyone. Even the East Germans didn't. No government will kill every worker, or a majority of workers, to stay in power because they'll have nobody to exploit in the end.


Everyone should read the Justfacts article on gun control. I can't post a link to it because of needing 25 posts to add a link in my post. Anyway, it shows pretty well that gun control does not work. In fact, I wrote a paper citing that almost entirely. Plus an article showing gun control to be a tool used by racists, consistently, to impede on the rights of minorities.

Sorry this is bullshit. Argue your point all you want, but don't you dare call people racists for opposing gun control when you know that is bullshit.

Seriously, if you wanna go and shoot in teh forest go ahead, but don't call people racists for no good reason. That's not on.

[redblood_blackflag]

The CPUSA is essentially a mouth-piece for the state apparatus and the DNC.
They don't support serious "reform," or change in society, their "solution" is "get the government to fix everything."
You can tell this when they proclaim they want "more/higher/fair/taxation," and state programs, etc.

Something I feel is important to keep in mind, any time someone talks about "gun control," what they are essentially saying is "people need to be regulated, by threat/force, to not make, trade, or possess certain guns, and if they disobey, violence should be initiated against them."
If an individual were to say they want to "ban guns," the real-world result of this would be state agents forcefully confiscating guns from non-violent people; the entire thing is the addition of a threat of violence, or the initiation of violence, against non-violent, non-threatening people.

[redblood_blackflag]

Red: Haha, yeah, I just get tired of reading that crap.

2nd paragraph: Personally, I feel that a ban on 30 round mags won't help the issue, in fact, I feel it could encourage people to learn how to use the "assault" rifles more accurately and efficiently, to make more use of what small amount of ammo they had. Also, in Oregon, there is no gun show loophole- not sure about other places. If you buy a gun, person to person, you don't need to get a background check, whether or not you're at a gun show.

To answer your question, I do have a solution that (in my mind) would work very well. I think that if a law was enacted that made it so all "assault" weapons had to be carried in a case/bag that was secured with a zipper or belt buckle (or something that made it equally difficult to open up) while it was being carried in public. That way, if anyone sees someone who is not abiding by that rule, they know that they have to get out of the situation. It empowers the would-be victims.
However, as an anarchist, I do think that if/when there is a revolution, there should be no gun control laws, and the safety of the communities would be left to the communities.

"Gun control laws" in this sense, of state regulation, are always tyrannical. It is just one person telling another person, who is not inherently threatening anyone, what kind of weapons they can have for self defense.
As an anarchist, I do not support any "gun control laws," period, now, or after "revolution," or whatever.
They are always the same thing: state attempting to control society.
Which group is trying to control 'society' doesnt matter to me, theyre inherently oppressive no matter what they claim their purpose for ruling me/everyone else is.

[redblood_blackflag]

The question I think we should be asking is how do we ensure that the working class doesn't hobble itself in self-destructive gun violence.

I don't see a way to ensure that any more than the state can ensure people won't commit murder.

[redblood_blackflag]

I don't think anyone here holds an absolute opposition to gun control.


If you mean state regulation, yes, I do.

[Popular Front of Judea]

I am having deja vu. Where have I heard this rap before?

Ah ladies and gentlemen here is living proof that "anarcho-capitalists" walk among us. All hail Rothbard!

6 posts so far, 4 of them on the gun control thread. Surprise.


Something I feel is important to keep in mind, any time someone talks about "gun control," what they are essentially saying is "people need to be regulated, by threat/force, to not make, trade, or possess certain guns, and if they disobey, violence should be initiated against them."
If an individual were to say they want to "ban guns," the real-world result of this would be state agents forcefully confiscating guns from non-violent people; the entire thing is the addition of a threat of violence, or the initiation of violence, against non-violent, non-threatening people.

[redblood_blackflag]

I am having deja vu. Where have I heard this rap before?

Ah ladies and gentlemen here is living proof that "anarcho-capitalists" walk among us. All hail Rothbard!

6 posts so far, 4 of them on the gun control thread. Surprise.



Im not sure waht "anarcho capitalist" has to do with anything. That might be your word for me, but I dont consider myself as such.
You didnt actually have anything to say about my post, though.
Do you have anything to say which might be able to prove what I said wrong?
Am I incorrect in some way? If so, could you point it out?

[Ostrinski]

You are clearly correct in that 10,000 ar-15s could not compare to one UAV but here is the thing: taking a military base wouldn't be a good idea. Taking a rail road, supplies depot, factory, ect would be possible. I am not even sure if that would be necessary but it that started happening or even if others started a civil war I would rather have a gun even if I were not involved.I don't think seizure of factories or railroads requires assault rifles.

If a civil war takes shape, then the ideal conditions for a revolutionary movement have been compromised anyway, and not only would the working class need to be armed but they would also need to be organized militarily. But it isn't as if civil wars are a necessarily natural result of a revolutionary movement. On the contrary, I would say civil wars show that the revolution isn't popular and that the revolutionary government is unstable.

[Popular Front of Judea]

Im not sure waht "anarcho capitalist" has to do with anything. That might be your word for me, but I dont consider myself as such.
You didnt actually have anything to say about my post, though.
Do you have anything to say which might be able to prove what I said wrong?
Am I incorrect in some way? If so, could you point it out?
If it walks like an an-cap, and quotes the "non-aggression principle" like an an-cap, it's most likely an an-cap.

Your ideological stance is no skin of off my nose. It may be an issue however to the anarchists on this site. They may not take kindly to someone who comes down solidly on the side of property owners in any dispute. There is also all those awkward "right wing populist" Murray Rothbard quotes that you are going to have to account for.

As for me I'm just going to pop some popcorn and watch the fireworks.