anti-intellectualism

[TheOneWhoKnocks]

So I've experienced a lot of anti-intellectualism in local organizing. Most often, it is expressed in arguments against "education-level specific" discussions -- that discussions involving radical language and theory are alienating and elitist. Now I definitely agree that there is some elitism in academic Marxist circles, which needs to be addressed, but that is altogether different from the discussions on theory had in this. Any ideas on how to handle this?

[BIXX]

I think it is important to have "teach ins" where anyone can go to help them understand certain language. The problem comes in when those who know what certain things mean shame others for not understanding. I think it should be made clear that there is no shame in not understanding. I know that there are lots of things I still don't understand and I often am too embarrassed to ask. If someone accuses you specifically of being elitist, just offer to explain what any of the terminology you used means, as well as offering to explain over again using less "elitist" language.

[Art Vandelay]

Don't use Marxist jargon when talking to people unfamiliar to the vocabulary. As Marxists we need to make our views as accessible as possible.

[TheOneWhoKnocks]

That's not what I am saying. I don't use Marxist terms outside of those circles. The conversations I referred to were simply about power and oppression, and related topics.

[Hermes]

I think (and am probably wrong) that it's elitist to refrain from theory-related discussion, to be honest. People aren't workers because they're 'base' or unintelligent, and to refrain from discussing theory would seem to undermine exactly what you're trying to do (i.e. raise class consciousness, etc).

Again, though I'm probably wrong.

[Let's Get Free]

whats with the insistence on the hyper academic language in leftist circles? dont use boring, dry academic rhetoric that most people dont want to hear. Instead, make the message as simple as possible, write it in single syllable words a foot high on the walls or scribble it on origami paper and fold it seven times, slip it in the menu at a truck stop, ‘capitalism is rubbish, communism is good, you alone have the power of transformation’.

[TheOneWhoKnocks]

whats with the insistence on the hyper academic language in leftist circles? dont use boring, dry academic rhetoric that most people dont want to hear. Instead, make the message as simple as possible, write it in single syllable words a foot high on the walls or scribble it on origami paper and fold it seven times, slip it in the menu at a truck stop, ‘capitalism is rubbish, communism is good, you alone have the power of transformation’.
That might make a person feel good, but it's pretty pointless when it comes to effecting real change through organizing. And to know where and how to do that requires engagement with theory. That doesn't mean using academic language, but it does seem to me that it requires words longer than one syllable..

[Art Vandelay]

I want to clarify that in no way was I saying that workers aren't smart enough to learn theory. Just that when you aren't knowledgeable on the terminology employed in Marxists circles, then it can be difficult and intimidating to understand at first.

[Let's Get Free]

That might make a person feel good, but it's pretty pointless when it comes to effecting real change through organizing. And to know where and how to do that requires engagement with theory. That doesn't mean using academic language, but it does seem to me that it requires words longer than one syllable..

i dont know, for me, all you need to be a socialist- you understand and want socialism- a stateless, classless, wageless commonwealth with common ownership and democratic control of the means of production, you recognize capitalism is a class society that cannot operate in the interest of workers, you reject reformism, nationalization and so on, You oppose racism, sexism and homophobia and you advocate non-authoritarian democratic methods of changing society.

This is all you need to become a socialist in my view. All this talk about theory belongs to a philosophical debating society.

[Hermes]

I want to clarify that in no way was I saying that workers aren't smart enough to learn theory. Just that when you aren't knowledgeable on the terminology employed in Marxists circles, then it can be difficult and intimidating to understand at first.

Ayah, truth, sorry if I implied that was your idea, it was unintentional.

I agree, especially when you're recruiting or just talking to people who may or may not be interested, that it's incredibly beneficial to make things as simple as possible (not because they're unintelligent, but only because expecting everyone to have a background in such is unrealistic). Once they start to get interested though, I think it changes (which you may even agree with, I'm not great at parsing posts, sorry!).

[Art Vandelay]

Ayah, truth, sorry if I implied that was your idea, it was unintentional.

I agree, especially when you're recruiting or just talking to people who may or may not be interested, that it's incredibly beneficial to make things as simple as possible (not because they're unintelligent, but only because expecting everyone to have a background in such is unrealistic). Once they start to get interested though, I think it changes (which you may even agree with, I'm not great at parsing posts, sorry!).

I definitely agree with that. I guess my main point is that when talking to someone new to Marxist theory saying this like: 'The bourgeoisie control the means of production and use their monopoly on private property to expropriate the surplus value of the proletariat.' Things like that, I generally find, are alienating to new comers. Its not that you can't discuss theory, just that you should put it in more common terms.

[Flying Purple People Eater]

I think marxists would be a hell of a lot more understandable if they stopped using french words to describe things to english speakers.

"The proletariat oust the bourgeoisie in a coup d'etat".

OR

"The working employed, like you, overthrow the capitalists and businessmen who make money off of having you move a machine for them all day, in a seizure of power".

[Zanthorus]

The aspect that makes me distrust most of these attempts to get socialists to use language which is ostensibly more easily understood by the 'average worker' (whoever that is), is that most of the time it seems to boil down to reducing arguments to easily digestible slogans and phrases. Thinking in phrases is usually a good way to get people to take up awful political positions - witness Revleft - but not particularly effective in converting anyone to communist politics proper, I shouldn't think.


All this talk about theory belongs to a philosophical debating society.

Sorry, I temporarily forgot that communism was a question of having the best propaganda. How silly of me.

[KurtFF8]

So I've experienced a lot of anti-intellectualism in local organizing. Most often, it is expressed in arguments against "education-level specific" discussions -- that discussions involving radical language and theory are alienating and elitist. Now I definitely agree that there is some elitism in academic Marxist circles, which needs to be addressed, but that is altogether different from the discussions on theory had in this. Any ideas on how to handle this?

I feel that one thing (at least in my experience in Florida and New York) that is strange about the problem you're talking about is a consistent separation between more "academic" Leftists/Marxists and the "activist" Leftists/Marxists. There seems to be a mutual animosity between them both (although there is also of course plenty of cross over). Some of this, I would argue, has to do with the fact that we don't really have major organizations (see: Communist parties) that are able to bridge the gap in a material way to construct more "organic intellectuals" that are more tied in with mass movements. This isn't the fault of intellectuals wanting to remain isolated in the ivory tower, but the "fault" lies with many factors and trends over the past 30 years in the wake of the failure of the New Left and resurgence of the Communist movement in the 60s and 70s.

As for the jargon issue: I've found that the activists actually tend to appeal to jargon more than intellectuals in many cases. It doesn't come from the fact that they are any more educated (which is not always the case) but rather that they are in a sort of sub-culture that has become comfortable with that said jargon. This actually tends to receive the scorn of many intellectuals who paint them as dogmatic more than it makes them seem more intellectual.

At least that has been what it's seemed like in my experience.

[greenjuice]

I find Marxism itself pretty anti-intellectualist, being that it, along with Hegelianism, belongs to what is called "Continentalism" or Continental "philosophy" (as opposed to Classical and Analytic philosohy), which is defined by it's anti-rationality.

But what is discussed in the OP is not anti-intellectualism, but rejection of 'academic elitism'.

[Zanthorus]

I find Marxism itself pretty anti-intellectualist, being that it, along with Hegelianism, belongs to what is called "Continentalism" or Continental "philosophy"

No it doesn't.

[greenjuice]

Marx and Engels propose logical deductions as arguments in favour of their ideas? I don't remember reading rationalistic arguments in their works. If there were such stuff in there, Elster and Roemer wouldn't have to write rationalist explanations and apologies of Marxism.

[KurtFF8]

I find Marxism itself pretty anti-intellectualist, being that it, along with Hegelianism, belongs to what is called "Continentalism" or Continental "philosophy" (as opposed to Classical and Analytic philosohy), which is defined by it's anti-rationality.

If anything, I would imagine most people see Continental Philosophy to be quite "elitist" rather than the other way around (that being anti-intellectual)

[MEGAMANTROTSKY]

i dont know, for me, all you need to be a socialist- you understand and want socialism- a stateless, classless, wageless commonwealth with common ownership and democratic control of the means of production, you recognize capitalism is a class society that cannot operate in the interest of workers, you reject reformism, nationalization and so on, You oppose racism, sexism and homophobia and you advocate non-authoritarian democratic methods of changing society.

This is all you need to become a socialist in my view. All this talk about theory belongs to a philosophical debating society.
And are you suggesting that in coming to these conclusions, you did not make any changes to your way of thinking? Or what this socialist society might look like, and ways on how to bring it about? In coming to political conclusions, you are already inferring the existence of a theoretical mindset. I think you have caught yourself in a contradiction--despite your rejection of theory as "philosophical debating", you cannot help referring to the fact that you yourself utilized it to get here. You cannot have it both ways.

This is not to mention that Marxism does indeed have a philosophical element as well as a practical one. With an attitude like yours, we could fruitlessly wonder why Lenin undertook a study of Hegel following the betrayal of the Second International at all, if all that one needed was "correct" politics.

[The Garbage Disposal Unit]

Probably some degree of "anti-intellectual" impulse comes not out of misunderstanding, or inability to grasp terms (though, certainly, many anticapitalists could learn some things about clarity), but out of a distrust of particular means or styles of conveying knowledge. As long as radicals replicate the pedagogical style of existing schools, where the "teacher" imparts "knowledge" to the "student", people are going to be turned off by it. Rather, a communist pedagogy should be rooted in helping people to tease knowledge out of their own real life experience of capitalism. To some degree, this problem is also at the root of being unable to find the right words - the right words are contingent on too many factors for their to be a single "correct" way of making theory comprehensible to people.

tl;dr Version - less preaching, more conversation.

[greenjuice]

If anything, I would imagine most people see Continental Philosophy to be quite "elitist" rather than the other way around (that being anti-intellectual)
It usualy goes hand in hand, most continenralists consider their "philosophy" as radically above the one "confined" to rationality and logic.

[Decolonize The Left]

Marxism, or leftism in general, can be explained on the back of an envelope to a ten-year old. The problem isn't the theory, it's how it's delivered.

[The Garbage Disposal Unit]

It usualy goes hand in hand, most continentalists consider their "philosophy" as radically above the one "confined" to rationality and logic.

If any philosophical tradition locates itself "above" anything, it's "the one ''confined'' rationality and logic", since it is precisely the confining which necessarily posits an outside point from which serves as both referent and position. Not a particularly useful method of navigation.

[brigadista]

finding this thread victim to the question asked to be honest

[greenjuice]

If any philosophical tradition locates itself "above" anything, it's "the one ''confined'' rationality and logic", since it is precisely the confining which necessarily posits an outside point from which serves as both referent and position.
It's continentalism that sees analytic and classical philosophy as "confined" to rationality and logic, not one strand of either of those philosophies sees themselves as by it's nature above any other, they just try and explain themselves and provide arguments in their favour. I haven't seen any analytic or classical philosopher say anything like "those contintentalists cannot understand what we're talking about, they are confined to their preconceptions" they just equire about their views and try and reason with them. It's the continentalists that being withtout any rational argument get annoyed and go all elitist "you can't understand what I'm talking about until you accept a 'higher level' of 'philosophy'".