Mao on free speech and tolerance

[Yet_Another_Boring_Marxist]

The following is a transcript of one of Mao's conversations with his niece Wang Hai-Jung (December 21, 1970.) It deals with HOW revolutionaries should expose and isolate reactionaries -- and how they should deal with criticism from hostile forces. It touches directly on the question of whether to criminalize reactionary speech.

Hai-jung: Class struggle is very acute in our school. I hear that reactionary slogans have been found, some written in English on the blackboard of our English Department.

Chairman: What reactionary slogans have been written?

Hai-jung: I know only one. It is, 'Chiang wan sui.'

Chairman: How does it read in English?

Hai-jung: 'Long live Chiang.'

[i.e. a slogan, written in english, upholding Chiang Kai-Shek the leader of Nationalist Kuimintang Party that was overthrown by the communist revolution in 1949.]

Chairman: What else has been written?

Hai-jung: I don't know any others. I know only that one.

Chairman: Well, let this person write more and post them outdoors for all people to see. Does he kill people?

Hai-jung: I don't know if he kills people or not. If we find out who he is, we should dismiss him from school and send him away for labour reform.

Chairman: Well, so long as he doesn't kill people, we should not dismiss him, nor should we send him away for labour reform. Let him stay in school and continue to study. You people should hold a meeting and ask him to explain in what way Chiang Kai-shek is good and what good things he has done. On our part, you may tell why Chiang Kai-shek is not good.

Chairman: How many people are there in your school?

Hai-jung: About 3,000, including faculty and staff members.

Chairman: Among the 3,000 let us say there are seven or eight counter-revolutionaries.

Hai-jung: Even one would be bad. How could we tolerate seven or eight?

Chairman: You shouldn't be all stirred up by one slogan.

Hai-jung: Why should there be seven or eight counter-revolutionaries?

Chairman: When there are many, you can set up opposition. There can be teachers in opposition. Only they should not kill.

Hai-jung: Our school has realized the class line. Among the new students 70 per cent are workers and sons and daughters of poor and lower-middle farmers. Others are sons and daughters of cadres and heroic officers and men.

Chairman: How many sons and daughters of cadres are there in your class?

Hai-jung: In addition to myself, there are two, while others are the sons and daughters of workers and poor and lower-middle farmers. They do well. I learn much from them.

Chairman: Are they on good terms with you? Do they like you?

Hai-jung: I think our relationship is good. I find it easy to associate with them and they find the same with me.

Chairman: That's good.

Hai-jung: But there is the son of a cadre who doesn't do well. In class he doesn't listen attentively to the teacher's lecture and after class, he doesn't do homework. He likes to read fiction. Sometimes he dozes off in the dormitory and sometimes he doesn't attend the Saturday afternoon meeting. On Sunday he doesn't return to school on time. Sometimes on Sunday when our class and section hold a meeting, he doesn't show up. All of us have a bad impression of him.

Chairman: Do your teachers allow the students to take a nap or read fiction in class? We should let the students read fiction and take a nap in class, and we should look after their health. Teachers should lecture less and make the students read more. I believe the student you referred to will be very capable in the future since he had the courage to be absent from the Saturday meeting and not to return to school on time on Sunday. When you return to school, you may tell him that it is too early to return to school even at eight or nine in the evening, he may delay it until eleven or twelve. Whose fault is it that you should hold a meeting Sunday night?

Hai-jung: When I studied at the normal School, we usually had no meeting Sunday night. We were allowed to do whatever we liked that night. One day several cadres of the branch headquarters of the League (I was then a committee member of the branch headquarters) agreed to lead an organized life on Sunday night but many other League members did not favour the idea. Some of them even said to the political counsellor that Sunday was a free day and if any meeting was called at night, it would be inconvenient for us to go home. The political counsellor eventually bowed to their opinion and told us to change the date for the meeting.

Chairman: This political counsellor did the right thing.

Hai-jung: But now our school spends the whole Sunday night holding meetings -- class meetings, branch headquarters committee meetings or meetings of study groups for party lessons. According to my calculation, from the beginning of the current semester to date, there has not been one Sunday or Sunday night without any meetings.

Chairman: When you return to school, you should take the lead to rebel. Don't return to school on Sunday and don't attend any meetings on that day.

Hai-jung: But I won't dare. This is the school system. All students are required to return to school on time. If I don't people will say that I violate the school system.

Chairman: Don't care about the system. Just don't return to school. Just say you want to violate the school system.

Hai-jung: I cannot do that. If I do, I will be criticized.

Chairman: I don't think you will be very capable in the future. You are afraid of being accused of violating the school system, of criticism, of a bad record, of being expelled from school, of failing to get party membership. Why should you be afraid of so many things? The worst that can come to you is expulsion from school. The school should allow the students to rebel. Rebel when you return to school.

Hai-jung: People will say that as the Chairman's relative, I fail to follow his instructions and play a leading role in upsetting the school system. They will accuse me of arrogance and self-content, and of lack of organization and discipline.

Chairman: Look at you! You are afraid of being criticized for arrogance and self-content, and for lack of organization and discipline. Why should you be afraid? You can say that just because you are Chairman Mao's relative, you should follow his instructions to rebel. I think the student you mentioned will be more capable than you for he dared to violate the school system. I think you people are too metaphysical.

I thought this would be interesting to start a conversation on free speech.

So, should there be freedom of speech in a socialist society/DOTP? I say that there should be no freedom of speech but there ought to be freedom of expression and criticism. The reason why I make this distinction is because I believe that reactionary speech, that is speech that is rooted in feudal and colonial ideology such as racism, homophobia, and sexism, is oppressive in of it's self and serves to reinforce social structures that do more net harm the allowing such speech (which in reality has no positive benefit). Other speech that are directly reactionary should be prohibitted. However I have no problem with allowing people who are Anti-Communist to have the right to criticism our socio-economic system, these criticism keep us honest after all! Nor should the dominate tendency suppress other tendencies, after all, "let a thousand flowers bloom and let a hundred schools of thought contend". So in short yes, I do believe there ought to be some form of free speech, just that I don't hold a bourgeois notion of free speech being indepedant of class nor do I believe that it is a moral absolute, and that if there was a socialist society without perfect freespech I would not reject it on that basis, I just think it is over all a positive aspect of a civilization. Pardon me for not elaborating on my position I am just a bit tired and I need to get back to my work soon.

[Yet_Another_Boring_Marxist]

Another article on political repression and excution:


Mao spoke on the question of political executions in this essay "Ten Major Relationships." It was written in 1956, as there was great controversy over revelations about the Stalin era. The whole essay articulates Mao's major departure from the methods and policies of the Soviet experience.

IMao mentioned that the Chinese Communist adopting their policy against political executions "in Yenan." That is a reference to the Yenan period from 1936 through 1945. This was when the Chinese Communist Party received reports on the Great Purges from comrades exiled in the USSR, and secretly resolved amongst themselves never to adopt of similar methods of political execution.

by Mao Zedong

We must keep up the policy which we started in Yenan: "No executions and few arrests". There are some whom we do not execute, not because they have done nothing to deserve death, but because killing them would bring no advantage, whereas sparing their lives would. What harm is there in not executing people? Those amenable to labour reform should go and do labour reform, so that rubbish can be transformed in something useful.

Besides, people's heads are not like leeks. When you cut them off, they will not grow again. If you cut off a head wrongly, there is no way of rectifying the mistake even if you want to.

If government departments were to adopt a policy of no executions in their work of suppressing counter-revolutionaries, this still would not prevent us from taking counter-revolution seriously. Moreover it would ensure that we would not make mistakes, or if we did they could be corrected. This would calm many people.

If we do not execute people, we must feed them. So we should give all counter-revolutionaries way out of their impasse. This will be helpful to the people's cause and to our image abroad.

The suppression of counter-revolution still requires a long period of hard work. None of us may relax our efforts.

[kasama-rl]

I think there is multiple value of those essays:

1) It lays out a subtle and far-sighted approach to the question of punishment (for opponents).

2) It reveals that it is wrong to view Maoism as some kind of "subset" of Stalinism -- when, in fact, Maoism has always incorporated both rupture and critique of the Soviet experience.

3) It reveals one way (one example) that Maoism is not simply (or mainly) a kind of "agrarian socialism for peasant countries" -- but a distinctive synthesis of communism with general application in all kinds of countries.

[Os Cangaceiros]

What a bunch of crap. (http://books.google.com/books?id=J5QbQpQTegwC&pg=PA548&lpg=PA548&dq=yu+luoke&source=bl&ots=qoDHq1Vxn7&sig=8j2q3QtRRssaWkvL0qwlHFUyLEg&hl=en&sa=X&ei=i04tUbGaL6bliwLSjYGgBA&ved=0CDMQ6AEwAQ#v=onepage&q=yu%20luoke&f=false)

[TheGodlessUtopian]

What a bunch of crap. (http://books.google.com/books?id=J5QbQpQTegwC&pg=PA548&lpg=PA548&dq=yu+luoke&source=bl&ots=qoDHq1Vxn7&sig=8j2q3QtRRssaWkvL0qwlHFUyLEg&hl=en&sa=X&ei=i04tUbGaL6bliwLSjYGgBA&ved=0CDMQ6AEwAQ#v=onepage&q=yu%20luoke&f=false)

Care to elaborate?

[Os Cangaceiros]

Yeah. A 27 year old dude wrote a criticism of the way the political system was being run under Mao during the Cultural Revolution, and for his troubles he was executed. So much for freedom of criticism. So much for "people's heads are not like leeks", LOL, love that folksy wisdom.

All this horseshit about "rebelling" is just that, horseshit. The most insurgent forces and those with the most substantial criticisms during the Cultural Revolution were crushed. I guess "rebellion" is fine, as long it's shaming bureaucrats and praying that the "Great Helmsman" gets your country on the right track.

[kasama-rl]

"Yeah. A 27 year old dude wrote a criticism of the way the political system was being run under Mao during the Cultural Revolution, and for his troubles he was executed. So much for freedom of criticism. So much for "people's heads are not like leeks", LOL, love that folksy wisdom.

All this horseshit about "rebelling" is just that, horseshit. The most insurgent forces and those with the most substantial criticisms during the Cultural Revolution were crushed. I guess "rebellion" is fine, as long it's shaming bureaucrats and praying that the "Great Helmsman" gets your country on the right track."

In fact, there were very few executions for political differences, and Mao in particular opposed the practice. And his point that "heads are not leeks" is an important ethical point: it says human beings are not just inert material, they are irreplacable. And if errors are made, it is important to correct them. But if your error involves killing people, Mao is saying, it is hard to correct that. You don't think this is an important point? You don't think this is a particularly important point for a major communist leader to be making after the history of the 1930s?

I think it is both correct and very necessary.

To be clear -- there were quite a few executions of landlords and KMT reactionaries immediately after the revolution, but these actions were often part of the vast mass movement of land reform, and were hardly centrally ordered. But the point is that Mao's line and argument in this was to minimize this, and focus on the transformation (not elimination) of former opponents.

In the great proletarian cultural revolution (GPCR -- which broke out 17 years after the initial revolutionary victory), there was the largest wave of rebellion and debate in world history. No leader of a government in history ever issued a call like Mao's "Bombard the headquarters" -- and the revolutionary quality of that is revealed by the response among the people. It is truly a unique event -- in nature, context, goals and form.

Put another way, there have been mass movements of many kinds in history -- movements for change, for revolution and for liberation. But the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution was the first time in history that tens of millions of people debated and struggled over how to move toward communism -- classless society, radical egalitarianism, rule by the people, defeat of those enforcing class relations under the guise of socialism.

Above Os Cangaceiros makes an anecdotal point I don't understand. In the midst of this massive, ten year struggle of millions, Os claims that some unnamed "27 year old dude" was excecuted for "criticism of the way the political system was run." What is anyone to make of such a claim, or such a method?

But let me help Os by raising some questions:

1) Who is this person you are raising as an example? What was his criticism and political action? When was he executed? Where is this documented?

2) Why is this single anecdote proof of the larger nature of these events? (If a nun is raped in the Spanish revolution, is the whole movement defined by such an aweful act?) So explain to us (methodologically) why you think mentioning an anonymous undocumented killing is something relevant to this discussion?

3) The core of the whole cultural revolution was " criticism of the way the political system was being run" -- it was a break, an actual revolution, and it was (ironically and shockingly) led by Mao himself (who was not simply or direclty "running" the society).

4) There is a fact question to raise: There was not some single "political system" during the Cultural Revolution... this was a revolution which (in many ways that can be explored and documented) was precisely about changing the dominent political party and system -- and there was not a unitary "system" through that period, everything was contested.

5) In the course of the cultural revolution, the revolutionary forces were ultimately defeated -- and with the rise of Deng in the 1970s a rather vicious capitalism came to power (in the name of "modernization" but resting on armed force). This could not succeed before the Great Helmsman was dead (september 1976) The process that led to this defeat was complex, and protracted (and we can explore that too).

But lets explore reality (and our perhaps-different analysis of reality) rather than inventing vague and unclear anecdotes, or just saying "horseshit" based on rather familiar (and false) summations denouncing this remarkable revolutionary process and its leaders.

Got facts about the subject at hand -- Mao's policy on educations, the encouragement of opposition and rebellion during the GPCR -- then lets hear them. lets engage on that basis.

[MarxArchist]

Lenin to Stalin, "hey, lets set up the CHEKA, brutalize a bunch of innocent people and then use 'socialism' to do capitalism's job"....Stalin to Mao..."hey, check out what we did in Russia, it works so well....help us spread this revisionist (warped) interpretation of Marx all across the globe and we'll call it anti-revisionism". And so goes the story of the perversion of Marxism.

[kasama-rl]

"Stalin to Mao..."hey, check out what we did in Russia, it works so well....help us spread this revisionist (warped) interpretation of Marx all across the globe and we'll call it anti-revisionism". And so goes the story of the perversion of Marxism."

The point of these two essays is that they are examples of the break between Stalin's methods and Maos. Perhaps you missed that.

Mao wrote that when his party learned (in their base area of Yenan) about the intense bloodletting within the Soviet Party, they passed a resolution to never adopt those methods in their own party struggles. And (over the next decades) that resolution held: Mao described 10 major two line struggles in the history of the Chinese Communist Party, in none of those struggles were the defeated leaders of various lines put on trial and executed. Nor were they accused of being spies etc.

The method of the Chinese communists were, quite simply, different from the Soviet party -- and were rooted in a larger critique of that Soviet experience.

Mao said "After 1935 we no longer obeyed them" (meaning the Sovet party). It is not incidental that 1935 is the year that Mao was elected leader of the Chinese party -- i.e. he came to power as the current among chinese communists that was not going to simply adopt (whateverism) the dictates of the Comintern, its representatives in china, and the Soviet party who directed both.

In other words, your argument is exactly wrong -- and these essays are two examples (among many) of why it is wrong.

[MarxArchist]

The point of these two essays is that they are examples of the break between Stalin's methods and Maos. Perhaps you missed that.

Mao wrote that when his party learned (in their base area of Yenan) about the intense bloodletting within the Soviet Party, they passed a resolution to never adopt those methods in their own party struggles. And (over the next decades) that resolution held: Mao described 10 major two line struggles in the history of the Chinese Communist Party, in none of those struggles were the defeated leaders of various lines put on trial and executed. Nor were they accused of being spies etc.

The method of the Chinese communists were, quite simply, different from the Soviet party -- and were rooted in a larger critique of that Soviet experience.

Mao said "After 1935 we no longer obeyed them" (meaning the Sovet party). It is not incidental that 1935 is the year that Mao was elected leader of the Chinese party -- i.e. he came to power as the current among chinese communists that was not going to simply adopt (whateverism) the dictates of the Comintern, its representatives in china, and the Soviet party who directed both.

In other words, your argument is exactly wrong -- and these essays are two examples (among many) of why it is wrong.
The cultural revolution was not indiscriminate. Got it.

[Let's Get Free]

There was an 18 year old high school student named Yang Xiguang who was imprisoned for ten years for writing an essay proclaiming that the major conflict in China was not between Mao’s supporters and enemies, nor between China’s proletariat and the former wealthy, but rather between a “red capitalist class”

[sixdollarchampagne]

When Mao was running mainland China, there was certainly punishment of rank and file Chinese who dared criticize the Chinese Communist Party during the famous "Hundred Flowers" campaign. Those critics were imprisoned in the 1950's and only released in the 1970's, for the "crime" of criticizing the Maoist one-party regime.

And, on the internet, there are readily-available accounts of Mao's rule that assert that vast numbers of people perished in mainland China during several Maoist "anti-rightist" campaigns (one of which soon followed the "Hundred Flowers" campaign).

It is easy for Stalinists to make posthumous assertions about Stalin, Mao & Co., to the effect that things were not so bad under their rule. Some years back, I read a (probably apocryphal) story about how Stalin had objected to the construction of his own cult of personality. I think it's a Stalinist maxim that "paper will take anything that is written on it," which is proven by the make-believe stories about Mao in the original posts.

What history shows is that Stalinist rule is a really, really bad deal for the toiling masses. And no amount of apocryphal, after-the-fact fairy tales is gonna change that. I agree completely with Os C's evaluation, made in an earlier post in this thread.

[Zostrianos]

2) Why is this single anecdote proof of the larger nature of these events? (If a nun is raped in the Spanish revolution, is the whole movement defined by such an aweful act?) So explain to us (methodologically) why you think mentioning an anonymous undocumented killing is something relevant to this discussion?
3) The core of the whole cultural revolution was " criticism of the way the political system was being run" -- it was a break, an actual revolution, and it was (ironically and shockingly) led by Mao himself (who was not simply or direclty "running" the society).


Millions of people were persecuted, tortured, raped, or driven to suicide during the Cultural Revolution (many even cannibalized (http://books.google.ca/books?id=ppYRb4mHEEYC&pg=PA423&dq=cultural+revolution+cannibalism&hl=en&sa=X&ei=qIAtUavFGaaS0QGq-YDQBg&ved=0CEoQ6AEwBA#v=onepage&q=cannibalism&f=false)by Red Guards), and Chinese society was thrown into chaos and terror. Given the central nature of terror and oppression that lay behind the Cultural Revolution, I think the entire movement can be defined by its abominations.

As for Mao, he could have put a stop to all that chaos if he wanted to (after all, he started it and encouraged it), but he just let it continue. Mao said and wrote a lot of nice things, but they meant nothing in practice when you see what he actually did. The 100 Flowers movement is a perfect example of Maoist deceit: give your subjects freedom of speech for a little while, and when they start criticizing you, destroy them.

[Os Cangaceiros]

In the great proletarian cultural revolution (GPCR -- which broke out 17 years after the initial revolutionary victory), there was the largest wave of rebellion and debate in world history. No leader of a government in history ever issued a call like Mao's "Bombard the headquarters" -- and the revolutionary quality of that is revealed by the response among the people. It is truly a unique event -- in nature, context, goals and form.

The Cultural Revolution was a bunch of poo-poo. Who cares how many participants it had...you do know that the ruling class all over the earth gets millions of people to comply with their little song and dance on a day-to-day basis, right? If I were Mao I'd try to get rid of the bureaucrats, too, and anyone else who disagreed with my idea of pumping out 40 million tons of steel in a few years, almost half of which was eventually unusable (in a "planned economy" in which the plans were constantly changing, much like Stalin's USSR, actually). With statistics like that post-Great Leap Foward, I probably wouldn't even show my face, but I guess Mao had less shame.


Put another way, there have been mass movements of many kinds in history -- movements for change, for revolution and for liberation. But the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution was the first time in history that tens of millions of people debated and struggled over how to move toward communism -- classless society, radical egalitarianism, rule by the people, defeat of those enforcing class relations under the guise of socialism.

It didn't accomplish anything. And contrary to popular belief, the major economic initiatives including capital investment, pricing, resource allocation etc. were centrally controlled by Mao and Mao's "entourage". Central "planning" with limited imput from outside a narrow circle of individuals, a cult of personality, peasants drafted into heavy industry & making utterly worthless machine tools while agriculture rotted, forced labor, persecuting bureaucrats...man, it truly does baffle the mind how people associate Maoism with Stalinism! Mao was also responsible for purging the bureaucracy level that was responsible for information gathering, making planning basically impossible and utterly chaotic. But hey, at least there were people out in the streets to cut people's hair if their haircuts resembled Mao's. :lol:


Above Os Cangaceiros makes an anecdotal point I don't understand. In the midst of this massive, ten year struggle of millions, Os claims that some unnamed "27 year old dude" was excecuted for "criticism of the way the political system was run." What is anyone to make of such a claim, or such a method?

I'm not gonna spoon feed you information, bud. You can click on the link I posted if you so desire. I think the point I made is pretty obvious to anyone with a brain, honestly...the point is that any society which kills someone for what they wrote regarding matters of state policy is not a society in which criticism is tolerated. I'm sorry, but you just can't square that circle.


1) Who is this person you are raising as an example? What was his criticism and political action? When was he executed? Where is this documented?

Use your fingers to click the link I posted.


2) Why is this single anecdote proof of the larger nature of these events? (If a nun is raped in the Spanish revolution, is the whole movement defined by such an aweful act?) So explain to us (methodologically) why you think mentioning an anonymous undocumented killing is something relevant to this discussion?

It's no secret that not towing Mao's party line had serious consequences...hell, it even had serious consequences if you did tow Mao's party line, in many cases. Countless people had their lives ruined during this great explosion of proletarian consciousness. If you want another "anecdotal" piece of evidence, how about the Chinese anarchist Ba Jin, who was persecuted during the Cultural Revolution and watched his wife die after she was denied medical care by the Red Guards. But hey, more people were dragooned into forced (slave) labor in the fields and pig iron factories than were executed, so it's all good right?


Let us begin with some crude realism. "Mao's thought" was not taken seriously in China because of it's intrinsic insight or value. It was taken seriously because people had no choice. Moreover, Mao's thought in China was never subject to the searching analysis, explication and elaboration that it received at the hands of Western observers - no one dared to do so. In the late 1960's and 70's, it was up to a very small number of ultra-loyal popularisers such as Zhang Chunqiao and Yao Wenyuan to briefly elaborate on Mao's fragmentary pronouncements and aphorisms. And these were people who were not known for intellectual depth or thoughtfulness among Chinese intellectuals; they had long made their living as censors who denounced writers on the orders of Party bosses (strange champions of equality and democracy, these). As for the others, any use of "Mao's thought" in writing conformed so tightly to the original that it was boiled down to a few easily memorisable aphorisms.


3) The core of the whole cultural revolution was " criticism of the way the political system was being run" -- it was a break, an actual revolution, and it was (ironically and shockingly) led by Mao himself (who was not simply or direclty "running" the society).

Thank god Mao found it in his heart to clean up the festering pit of bureaucracy and economic failure of epic proportions that he himself played a large role in creating.


But lets explore reality (and our perhaps-different analysis of reality) rather than inventing vague and unclear anecdotes, or just saying "horseshit" based on rather familiar (and false) summations denouncing this remarkable revolutionary process and its leaders.

What is "vague and unclear" about what I posted? It's a fact. A person existed by the name of Yu Louke. He gained prominance through writing against heriditary punishment (something everyone should be against) and for this (and other writings) he was executed. Feel free to call it bourgeois propaganda or whatever you want, or maybe he was writing fascist counter-revolutionary propaganda against Mao and the Red Guard's glorious re-structuring efforts.

[kasama-rl]

This helps clarify some of the issues.


"
When Mao was running mainland China, there was certainly punishment of rank and file Chinese who dared criticize the Chinese Communist Party during the famous "Hundred Flowers" campaign. Those critics were imprisoned in the 1950's and only released in the 1970's, for the "crime" of criticizing the Maoist one-party regime.

"And, on the internet, there are readily-available accounts of Mao's rule that assert that vast numbers of people perished in mainland China during several Maoist "anti-rightist" campaigns (one of which soon followed the "Hundred Flowers" campaign). "

This started as a discussion of executions for political differences and class. And again: If people want to argue that Mao applied Stalin's 1930s methods, they are free to provide evidence. In fact, they can't. Because he opposed them.

But now the discussion shifts to whether there was political struggle (and consequences for anti-socialist activity). That, obviously, is a different matter.

China in 1949 had ten million feudal landlords. It had KMT armies that literally numbered millions. It had vast networks of warlords. It had U.S. armies in Korea -- and CIA covert operations that crossed its borders from every direction (with a special concentration on Tibet).

And so, the victory of the revolution involved an ongoing struggle with those reactionary forces. And yes (obviously) there was repression (by the masses themselves, and also by their new state) when reactionary forces organized to sabotage (or to organize for a return to feudalism or foreign domination).

A lot has been made about the "hundred flowers movement" (where vrious leftists rather crudely repeat the standard anticommunist narratives of that movement). But lets establish some basics: In 1956 there was a huge explosion of anti-revolutionary activity in Russia and eastern europe. At the height of the Communist Party, the krushchev forces unleashed a general encouragement of rightists of all kinds. And in Eastern europe the rather incomplete and troubled new system broke apart -- with a number of mass revolts breaking out (including in Berlin 1953 and then Hungary).

Mao (again) was involved in actively trying to sum up these things and chart a revolutionary path that incorporated those summations.

His approach in china was first to "take the lid off" -- so that there was an encouragement of diverse debate in the "hundred flowers movement." This encouragement of great debates would return again and again -- and each time it would be more and more unleashed (and often outside party control), culminating in the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution. The Maoists within the party (not the whole party) were deeply commited to this "hundred flowers" approach and the energetic encouragment of broad debates among the people. (And again, the two essays that start this thread are just two examples of this repeated encouragement).

At the same time, in the hundred flowers movement, something very troubling happened. there was a sudden explosion of extreme reactionary activity -- as millions of reactionaries (looking at Hungary, and the shocks coming out of Russia) sensed that there might be a historic occasion to overthrow socialism. Energetic and rather shockingly open agitation for the old system broke out -- and there was a sense that events were building to reactionary uprisings (again, similar to the troubled and contradictory events in Eastern europe).

It was not wrong, in that situation, to reverse course and -- in a focused way -- draw a line that forbade active reactionary organization. (And I won't go into detail about the U.S. aggressive moves of the mid-fifties -- their anticommunist frenzies that forshadowed a real danger of war or intervention if China broke into mass disturbances).

So yes, there was a dictatorhsip of the proletariat in China -- feudal forces were broken up, their political organizaitons suppressed (as the Klan would be in the U.S.), and forces openly allied with the U.S. (or supporting reactionary colonialist policies) were also targeted politically. Most of this "targetting" was political (i.e. took the form of debates, mobilizing ordinary people to engage and repudiate the reactionary politics). And, in some cases, individuals were sentenced to prison for their reactionary politics.

But (after defending this) I want to point out that Mao is (in essays like the ones above) openly criticizing the idea that people should be arrested or jailed simply for expressing very backward views. In other words, I'm making a distinction between the policy advocated by Mao (here and elsewhere) and the policies being carried out by the chinese state. You can see in the responses to his views that (often) his approach seems shocking (to people he is holding discussions with), and apparently in opposition to the general policy being carried out at the street level.

There is a lot to say about this: including the fact that Mao and Maoism were sharply contested (and even opposed) within the chinese party -- and that (particularly around the Eighth Party Congress of the late 50s) Mao was often in a distinct minority.

Of course, it is classic anticommunist dogma to assume that "anything that happens in Russia is Stalin's will" and "anything that happened in china was done by Mao" and so on... it is part of their totalitarian theory, and part of their portrayal of socialist countries as some kind of rigid one-man dictatorship.

But again, Mao's views were often minority views -- and he was (more and more) arguing that the police and state security forces should NOT be the main way of dealing with dissent (and even reactionaries) -- and that more effort should be made to conduct and lead "great debates" where the people themselves would grapple with ideas (and with reactionaries) and not simply rely on (or passively observe) the actions of security forces.

And on another level, there is a real anecdotal method here -- mentioning one person who (for reasons not explored) went to prison for ten years (this i na country of 800 million people, and a complex patchwork quilt of different policiacl areas and political lines). But let's just say the obvious: In the soviet union there is a well documented policy of large scale imprisonment (in the millions), while in china the policy was very different. And you can't explore this differnce in approach by repeating various anticommunist claims that this preson or that person got a political sentence. (Obviously, reactionaries went to prison for reactionary political activity -- including figures like Liu shaochi, or elements that called for the overthrow of the existing socialist system etc.)

So when sixdollarchampaigne writes that "What history shows is that Stalinist rule is a really, really bad deal for the toiling masses" -- the basic issue here is a kneejerk assumption that China (in its socialist period) was simply a version of "Stalinism" and so any verdict on the Stalin era Soviet Union must apply to this other major socialist country (which had a very different history and very different approach to these very questions.)

The point made by Althusser is at issue here: That Mao's work and Maoism is (in fact) the most important single summation and critique of Stalin era policies (not their simple extension).

[ind_com]

Millions of people were persecuted, tortured, raped, or driven to suicide during the Cultural Revolution (many even cannibalized (http://books.google.ca/books?id=ppYRb4mHEEYC&pg=PA423&dq=cultural+revolution+cannibalism&hl=en&sa=X&ei=qIAtUavFGaaS0QGq-YDQBg&ved=0CEoQ6AEwBA#v=onepage&q=cannibalism&f=false)by Red Guards), and Chinese society was thrown into chaos and terror. Given the central nature of terror and oppression that lay behind the Cultural Revolution, I think the entire movement can be defined by its abominations.

As for Mao, he could have put a stop to all that chaos if he wanted to (after all, he started it and encouraged it), but he just let it continue. Mao said and wrote a lot of nice things, but they meant nothing in practice when you see what he actually did. The 100 Flowers movement is a perfect example of Maoist deceit: give your subjects freedom of speech for a little while, and when they start criticizing you, destroy them.


I'm sure that this post will receive many thanks, because it sounds so awfully communist.

[kasama-rl]

Let me give you an example of how false and unproven anticommunist claims get repeated, even by sincere people on a list dedicated to revolutionary politics:


Poimandres writes:


"Millions of people were persecuted, tortured, raped, or driven to suicide during the Cultural Revolution (many even cannibalized by Red Guards), and Chinese society was thrown into chaos and terror. Given the central nature of terror and oppression that lay behind the Cultural Revolution, I think the entire movement can be defined by its abominations."

Ok, so there it is. That is what you are taught in high school, or standard college history.

So let's just ask here: I will make a list of challenges, and i bet you cant defend any of it factually.

Who eats who?

Example: You write "many even cannibalized by Red Guards." Ok.... what is your source?

There was one (only one as far as I know) claim of cannibalization (in an obscure district along china's southern border). it was never proven as far as I know. But even if one Jeffrey Dahmer was (somehow) active or uncovered in the turmoil of a genuine revolution (of tens of millions of people) what possible relevance is that? If there is one incident of a nut eating human beings in China during the Cultural Revolution... how exactly does that become "many even cannibalized by Red Guards" (in which the villians here suddenly the revolutionary mass organizations (!) of Chinese youth).

You can't prove your claim because it isn't true. There was not cannibalism in the GPCR (though there was, for example in the Russian civil war and in the Leningrad siege... and it was treated as a capital offense by the communist forces.)

And let me make a larger point of worldview: What kind of person believes and promotes this kind of lie (that people end up eating each other in a revolution)?! Isn't this the outlook of the rightwing catholic novel "Lord of the Flies"?

In fact, I'm sure most people reading this are aware that the real issue of "cannibalism" involved here is the human-eating capitalist system -- where people are consumed as a raw material. The Cultural Revolution was fighting to prevent the return of capitalism -- the creation of today's gruesome sweatshop capitalism in China. Who are the human eaters? the capitalists. And who was against it? The communists (and the broad revolutionary mass organizations of millions of people).

This casual repeating of baseless, invented, unproven, and false anticommunist lies is itself shameful.

And if you are sincere: either produce evidence to back your claims, or admit that you were fooled by anticommunist nonsense.

* * * * * * * *

Charges of rape?

Or lets take another example: Poimandres implies (actually claims pretty openly) that rape was a characteristic of the GPCR. OK.... what is your source?

Now Poimandres may not know anything about the Maoist approach to rape... but let me fill in some details: The most basic (and well known) rules of the Chinese revolution was Mao's Eight Points of Attention (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three_Rules_of_Discipline_and_Eight_Points_for_Att ention). These were the most basic policies of the peoples liberation army (going back to the first liberated zones of the 1930s). They were simple, clear, memorized, explained... and enforced.

Number 7 of those rules is generally translated as "(7) Don't take liberties with women." This was (at the very core of PLA policy) a strict forbidding of rape. Communists accused of rape faced public criticism in front of the masses of people, and then the most serious punishment. This was true in 1935, and it remained a central policy through the whole revolutionary process. (They were formally reissued in 1947 (http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/mao/selected-works/volume-4/mswv4_23.htm) on the eve of victory -- precisely to reinforce that there were very basic social values of this revolution that were not to be compromised.)

This is a well known and well documented policy of the Maoist revolution (tied, obviously, to its remarkable role in the liberation of hundreds of millions of women).

So if someone want to (suddenly!) claim that the GPCR (the most conscious expression of this revolution) was marked by rape... ok... document it? How many rapes? Claimed by whom? Conducted by whom? What was the approach of the Maoists to this alleged-and-nonexistent mass rape? and so on.

Now, there were powerful reactionary currents within the Cultural Revolution -- i.e. it was a real conflict with different sides, with opposing headquarters, with radically different goals. All kinds of things happened (as they always happen in society). but if you want to claim that this revolution was characterized by rape (or that it caused some rise of rape, or that the rape was carried out by the Maoists etc.) then you have to prove it. And you can't, cuz it is false.

Maoists stood for the libeartion of women. The GPCR was actually a time of great flowering of women's liberation in China (and if you want to investigate further, read about the "Criticize Lin, Criticize Confucius" movement of 1974, which had quite a pathbreaking element of promoting female leadership and denouncing "traditional" male supremacy.

If ractionary college professors want to make false and invented claims about communist revolution -- it may be hard to interrupt them every time. But here on revleft (when their attentive students repeat these lies) we can challenge them... and show the faleshood of these claims.

Now... on other claims....

One thing i have observed, is that some people claim to want "the people" to carry out their agency, and then (when they look at actual revolutions where millions of people actually acted) they are horrified by what the people did.

Look: in the great peasant uprisings of China there were sometimes acts that we can't uphold. Sometimes landlords were killed in grisly ways. Sometimes the wives or daughters of landlords were mistreated. But the point is twofold: (1) In genuine mass movements many complex and contradictory things happen, and (2) the COMMUNISTS had very clear policies on these adverse currents (particularly rapes).

Again the GPCR was an extremely turmultous event... where tens of millions of people organized different mass organizations and entered into political conflict. In the Shanghai events there were reportedly over 350 different mass organizations involved in the great seizure of power from the capitalist roaders in the party. (350 different organizations, with different views and social based! Imagine trying to hold all that together and sort it out!)

So obviously all kinds of things happened. Some of the red guards persecuted people, and were criticized for their actions. Sometimes errors were made (i.e. violence applied between differeing popular organizations). If you follow the history of this (and the debates among the revolutionaries) you can see Mao's very consistent and energetic attempt to prevent such things (with pointed calls to "unite the many, oppose the few." or to oppose the resort to armed actions within the movement -- including when the students of China's main university broke into warring factions that attacked each other with spears and even trenches etc.)

So, if someone is shocked to discover that in a revolution there is violence, that sometimes reactionaries (and even bystanders) are roughed up (and sometimes in extreme and wrong ways).... all I can say is "What do you think revolutino looks like?"

What do you think slave revolts in the U.S. south were like? do you know that Nat Turner killed the children of slaveowners too? And when some things happen that we (as communists) think is mistaken -- that doesn't mean we suddenly act like these excesses *characterize* the larger movmeent, or are a grounds for denouncing the revolution.

As Mao said (as a general point of orientation that is applicable here):


"A revolution is not a dinner party, or writing an essay, or painting a picture, or doing embroidery; it cannot be so refined, so leisurely and gentle, so temperate, kind, courteous, restrained and magnanimous. A revolution is an insurrection, an act of violence by which one class overthrows another."

[Zostrianos]

Example: You write "many even cannibalized by Red Guards." Ok.... what is your source?

I put a source in my post. Here's another:
http://books.google.ca/books?id=QyiDClqjwSUC&pg=PA96&dq=cultural+revolution+cannibalism&hl=en&sa=X&ei=9o8tUabWCKq60QGH34DQDA&ved=0CGMQ6AEwCA#v=onepage&q=cultural%20revolution%20cannibalism&f=false

In the Chinese county of Wuxuan, the Cultural Revolution of 1968 was associated with interfactional cannibalism, for "to chop up, cook, and masticate was a ... complete way of offending bodily integrity, depriving the enemy of humanity...




Or lets take another example: Poimandres implies (actually claims) that rape was a characteristic of the GPCR. OK.... what is your source?


http://books.google.ca/books?id=Ju3N4VeiQ28C&pg=PA229&dq=cultural+revolution+rape&hl=en&sa=X&ei=VI4tUaf6G5C70AGs7YGACg&ved=0CDEQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=cultural%20revolution%20rape&f=false

Opportunistic rape of young girls by their superiors was apparently quite common, and so too aggravated rape of politically suspect or marginal elements by the shock troops of the revolution.

See also:
http://books.google.ca/books?id=ZyviPLYE61sC&pg=PA162&dq=cultural+revolution+china+rape&hl=en&sa=X&ei=Oo8tUbOaO-an0AGr94CoCw&ved=0CDEQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=cultural%20revolution%20china%20rape&f=false

There was also a documentary I saw a few years back which stated that often Red Guards encouraged young kids to violently rebel against their parents, simply as a way of destroying the traditional concept of family. They recounted an episode where Red Guards beat a father, and then they had his young son (10 or 11 I think) assault him and heap insults on him. As far as I know, the father never did anything to harm his son, but now the "revolutionaries" brainwashed his kid to attack his father who raised him and took care of him since he was a baby.

[kasama-rl]

This is helpful, and I think it will help others clarify this.

My response: You think these are sources? You think these are convincing explorations of a vast historic movement? Or that these claims document general trends in history's largest and most protracted revolutionary movement? [Blinks in some astonishment]

Your "source" confirms that you are referring to one (claimed but undocumented) case of cannibalism in one county in china (as I said in my post) -- where a bizarre and anomalous act is alleged. But that was not what you wrote about... you falsely inflated that single claim wildly and wrote ""many even cannibalized by Red Guards." Really? How many is "many"? Does your source make claims of anyting like this? No, it doesn't because it didn't happen.

Is it your right to take some obscure and bizarre incident of mental illness in one county, and turn it into a false and blanket claim of "many" cases of human eating during a revolutionary movement? Doesn't this offend a basic respect for facts and truth.

On the rape: Your own "source" talks of rape by superiors (which happens in class society and is a target of the communist revolution). But I imagine it is clear that you haven't documented anyting, but merely repeated (rather typical) anti-revolutionary claims -- that any incidents of rape at the time of a mass movement are (somehow) the fault of that movement and its leaders (even if they are lifelong and militant opponents of rape!)

How is any of this different from the New York Post ranting about "rapes in Occupy Wall Street"? There were a few incidents of rape at OWS (as there is generally in society)... but these were examples of people IN OWS being raped (not a case of OWS being a movement characterized by, or allowing, rape).

* * * * * * * *

I am particularly struck by the following phrase (expressing a new accusation): "...often Red Guards encouraged young kids to violently rebel against their parents..."

Well no shit.

Do you have any sense of what the traditional Chinese family is like? Can you imagine a revolution in china without intense rebellion against fathers? (Here is the fascinating story of Mao's own rebellion against his father (http://kasamaproject.org/feminism-sexuality/3241-73from-patriarchy-to-peoples-war-mao-039-s-rebellious-childhood).)

Do you think SDS in the 60s didn't "encourage young kids to violently rebel against their parents"? You think many of us in that movement didn't have fights with our father? Or a million kids didn't have it out with conservative parents? Do you think it wasn't a good thing -- for us as individuals and for society -- that such things broke into open generational conflict? And, part of the point, don't you think that this played a huge role in challenging adults, and in many cases moving them to degress of support?

You think a revolution in the U.S. won't involve massive youth rebellion against parents and school authorities (including cases of excess)?

To be blunt: what do you think real revolutionary change and turmoil looks like?

But don't take this wrong: I appreciate you attempting to show sources and explanations. I think it is helpful and clarifying.

[MarxArchist]

I'm sure that this post will receive many thanks, because it sounds so awfully communist.


The goal is to clear up our history before we go repeating it. This goes for both attempting socialism in undeveloped regions and using indiscriminately violent methods of facilitating expropriation/fighting counterrevolution. Leaving aside Stalin's/Mao's (and even Lenin's) rather brutal process of both expropriation and stopping 'counterrevolutionaries' (quotations because that title didn't necessarily make a person a supporter of capitalism) economically, materially, there was no basis for 'socialism' (after it was clear revolutions in advanced capitalist nations weren't taking place -Russia).

China on the other hand had even more suspect conditions for 'socialism' because at least in Russia there was the feeling workers were ready to facilitate expropriation in advanced capitalist nations and would support Russia's efforts- Russia may have been the spark that ignited global revolution some theorized. The idea to go from a socially and economically backwards nation into communism under 'the dictatorship of the proletariat' (with workers not ready to run society) came from post 1925 Russia and that's where we split from Marxism proper. In Russia war communism wasn't socialism the subsequent NEP wasn't socialism and the Great Leap Forward in China wasn't socialism. Some of the Bolsheviks have stated they thought they could just jump right into communism which shows either ignorance of or high disregard for historical materialism. I don't think Lenin thought this, don't think he warped Marx entirely, especially not in 1917 but as time passed they were left with maintaining power while somehow building an economy. Those are the material conditions for straight up authoritarianism. No way around it. Forced labor, executions, food shortages, add in the social backwardness left over from the prior economic base and we have recipe for disaster. so in that sense we've been shown what NOT to do. What to not attempt and that is 'socialist' revolution in non advanced capitalist nations.

Things are different now though. China and Russia have advanced, India is advancing, South America is advancing- Europe and the USA have been ripe for decades....ripe. Ripe for revolution. Like picking fruit off a tree. If it were only that easy. I still think revolutions in the western bloc are paramount. Without that happening first I don't see communism ever coming to fruition.

[Zostrianos]

to be blunt: what do you think real revolutionary change and turmoil looks like?

Portugal's revolution (though it later led nowhere) in the 1970's was accomplished without violence. As for the Cultural Revolution, a few things must be stated:

- Mao had had absolute power over the country since the 50's: the only real revolution took place in 1949. The Cultural Revolution was a useless experiment, brought by Mao's paranoia of capitalist infiltrators.

- While a revolution will necessarily require force and violence, there's a difference between revolutionary force and the type of savagery that marked the revolution. Attacking people indiscriminately (often simply because they were writers, artists, poets, etc), killing them, publicly humiliating them, destroying historical sites, burning books, and propping up Mao's cult of personality among other things are not "revolutionary change", at least not in a positive sense

[kasama-rl]

I will generally not respond in detail point by point... I feel like most of the core issues have come out in a good way.

Just a few factual points:

"Portugal's revolution (though it later led nowhere) in the 1970's was accomplished without violence."

Uh no. It wasn't accomplished at all. It was a brief episode and (as you pointed out) it led nowhere. No revolution.

"Mao had had absolute power over the country since the 50's:"

This is crude U.S. totalitarian theory. Actually Mao was sharply challenged throughout the 1950s, and was knocked down hard at the 8th Party congress. The only way someone can make a statement like this is to (a) believe in theories of "absolute power" in a country of 500 million people, and (b) not know much about the actual complex struggle over power that took place (in the o****ry and in the party).

"The Cultural Revolution was a useless experiment, brought by Mao's paranoia of capitalist infiltrators."

Well, if you look at what Deng Xiaoping carried out after 1976, it seems evident that there was a powerful and determined current of "capitalist roaders" (who in fact restored capitalism when they achieved power). This is not a case of "paranoia" -- Mao had fought these capitalist forces for twenty years -- there was a strong pull to stop the chinese revolution at antifeudalism and anticolonialism (but to carry out capitalist modernization)... and this struggle dominated Chinese politics in the fifties, sixties and seventies. Again, the only way someone can claim that it is "paranoid" to think there were capitalist roaders is to ignore the actual history of the country (and the reversal of the revolution after 1976)/

Finally on your claims of indiscriminate persecution:

Every revolution in history produces "grievance literature" of the people who were targets of the revoltuion. The french revolution produced two centuries of such literature (the Vatican just declared a dead priest from the French revolution "blessed"). The Cuban revolution produces legions of bitter exiled gusanos. The Russian revolution left every capital in western Europe populated with antisemitic White Russians who crried about their mistreatment (and dethronement).

This is the nature of any real revolution.

The Chinese cultural revolution was a revolution that went deep into every institution and corner of society. People were themselves unleashed to excavate and judge. The decisions and actions were often not approved -- but were carried out by ordinary people on their own authority, exercising their own judgement and agency. This is a remarkable thing, and a complex thing (in the act).

If you don't like it, if you think politics needs to be restrained, refined, controled, .... well perhaps you should explore adopting some other politics, and leave revolution to the revolutionaries (and the people).

[sixdollarchampagne]

... Do you think SDS in the 60s didn't "encourage young kids to violently rebel against their parents"? ...

I was a member of SDS at my alma mater during the sixties, as an undergraduate. SDS never encouraged anyone to go home and assault his or her parents. That's simply a damned slander.

Ely wrote the following:
In 1956 there was a huge explosion of anti-revolutionary activity in Russia and eastern europe. At the height of the Communist Party, the krushchev forces unleashed a general encouragement of rightists of all kinds. And in Eastern europe the rather incomplete and troubled new system broke apart -- with a number of mass revolts breaking out (including in Berlin 1953 and then Hungary).

The quote shows that Maoists, like Stalin and his heirs, are opposed to plebeian revolts, like those that took place in the DDR in 1953, which was a proletarian uprising in opposition to bureaucratic rule. We know this is the Maoist position, because Mao himself criticized the 1956 Hungarian workers' revolt against bureaucratic Stalinist rule. That revolt led to the setting up of workers' councils, to run things. That is the opposite of "anti-revolutionary activity" [to quote Ely).

According to wikipedia:
The Uprising of 1953 in East Germany started with a strike by East Berlin construction workers on 16 June. It turned into a widespread uprising against the German Democratic Republic government the next day. In spite of the intervention of Soviet troops, the wave of strikes and protests was not easily brought under control. Even after 17 June, there were demonstrations in more than 500 towns and villages.

So the 1953 uprising in the DDR began as a strike by workers, turned into an uprising against bureaucratic rule, spread to hundreds of towns and villages in the DDR and "was not easily brought under control." Sounds like a workers' revolt to me, and that's what Stalinists refer to as "anti-revolutionary activity," and that's why Stalinists are on the wrong side, as advocates of harsh, undemocratic rule over workers.

[Zostrianos]

If you don't like it, if you think politics needs to be restrained, refined, controled, .... well perhaps you should explore adopting some other politics, and leave revolution to the revolutionaries (and the people).

We'll have to agree to disagree then

[kasama-rl]

I was a member of SDS at my alma mater during the sixties, as an undergraduate. To the best of my knowledge, SDS never encouraged anyone to go home and assault his or her parents. That's simply a damned slander.

I too was around SDS in several cities, and in several post-SDS youth organizing projects. I'm not going to argue the point beyond this: Of course we urged kids to stand up to reactionary parents....as we should! it was a huge part of the times, and was necessary to the break with the ugly 1950s and the mentality of the WW2 generation.

But more the point: I'm sure you will agree that there were all kinds of conflict between kids and parents (positive conflict, precious conflict, productive conflict!).it was integral to the revolutionary movement -- because so often the divisions among people ran along generational lines.

Of course no one in SDS put out leaflets saying "go home and beat up your parents" -- buit of course neither did the Red Guards (and no one claims that)... but there were acute conflicts. What do you think happened when I told my father I was dropping out of college to become a communist organizer (!) among coal miner? You think that was a quiet event -- without anger and threat of violence?

You think we didn't have lots of cases of kids getting beat up by parents for their radical activities (or turned into the cops or whatever)... justifying and necessitating real struggle to break with their parental authority?

There would not have been a radical movement without kids confronting their parents, and challenging them, and where possible winning them over. And anyone active then knows it (and experienced it).

And it will be true in any revoution. Revolutions are always heavily youth movements -- rooted among teenagers of the oppressed, and often challenging the inertia or fear among their parents (or the raw conservatism of patriarchy and parental authority.)

[kasama-rl]

We'll have to agree to disagree then

Agreed!

[kasama-rl]

Again: since we are talking about Maoism, Mao Zedong's own reflections on his conflict with his father and its value for developing a revolutionary spirit. Here for those unfamiliar with it are some quotes from Mao's discussion of conflict in the family (and its relationship to class struggle):


"There were two 'parties' in the family. One was my father, the Ruling Power. The Opposition was made up of myself, my mother, my brother, and sometimes even the laborer. In the 'united front' of the Opposition, however, there was a difference of opinion. My mother advocated a policy of indirect attack. She criticized any overt display of emotion and attempts at open rebellion against the Ruling Power. She said it was not the Chinese way.

"But when I was thirteen I discovered a powerful argument of my own for debating with my father on his own ground, by quoting the Classics. My father's favorite accusations against me were of unfilial conduct and laziness. I quoted, in exchange, passages from the Classics saying that the elder must be kind and affectionate. Against his charge that I was lazy I used the rebuttal that older people should do more work than younger, that my father was over three times as old as myself, and therefore should do more work. And I declared that when I was his age I would be much more energetic."

The full story is here (http://kasamaproject.org/feminism-sexuality/3241-73from-patriarchy-to-peoples-war-mao-039-s-rebellious-childhood).