Leftists should come up with new words

[Skyhilist]

I've noticed that some of the biggest arguments between various different tendencies are sometimes almost entirely semantical, and frankly often arbitrary (and I know I'm guilty of this myself).

If we want the same thing (like how anarchists and council communists tend to want the same, or at least very similar things), I don't think we should have useless fights about how to characterize them.

Therefore, we should create entirely new words to describe certain things -- terms that are completely meaningless so that there can't be some type of arbitrary semantical argument over them. Like "dictatorship of the proletariat." Council communists use this term, while anarchists reject this term. But yet the tangible reality of what these two groups want can be almost exactly the same. So it's therefore useless and arbitrary to have terms that divide people who really believe pretty much the same things. Instead, why not just make up a random word like "transitionary revolutionism" or something like that to replace DoTP that would cause less division? DoTP is just an example, there are plenty of other examples.

Yeah, I realize this would be really difficult to spread throughout leftism. It's probably impractical -- but it would be nice in theory if we could have terms like this which would help lessen arbitrary divisions, no?

[cliffhanger]

I don't think minor issues of language are why the world isn't socialist yet.

[Skyhilist]

Surely you don't think that divisions based on purely semantical disagreements help its chances though?

[cliffhanger]

Surely you don't think that divisions based on purely semantical disagreements help its chances though?
Most disagreements are not semantic. Also, anarchists and council communists don't fail because they aren't united, but because their line is wrong. They could unite all they want and they would still fail.

[Venas Abiertas]

Language is very important. Few people who have studied sociology, culture, philosophy, or history doubt this. Words have great power. That's why a master speaker like Lenin, Hitler, MLK, or Archbishop Romero can have such a tremendous impact without ever firing a shot or leading an army into battle.

Choice of words matter. Witness what happens when you describe someone as slender instead of skinny, leftist instead of "pinko", or as a "Dago" instead of Italian.

Gramsci describes how the dominant culture ascribes value judgements to certain terms and concepts. When the dominant culture is bourgeoisie capitalism, anything related to socialism, however mild, is going to acquire a negative connotation just through its constant misuse by the mass media and schools.

Certain innocuous terms like "labor union", "evolution", or "progress" have been so demonized that even leftists are sometimes ashamed to use them. It's impossible in the West to have a rational discussion about any socialist country or its leaders, past or present.

So, yeah, I think we should explore new ways to present things to people, if for no other reason than not to immediately trigger a negative reaction in them as soon as we utter the first sentence. Some leftist parties in Latin America already do this. Just because they don't go around inserting Marx, Lenin, and Engels in every sentence doesn't mean that they're not committed to building socialism.

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

I look forward to an anarchist or council communist reading this thread. I somehow doubt they'll take too kindly to essentially being told they are one and the same.

In any case it's irrelevant. Left unity - and I believe this is an attempt at such, by circumnavigating arguments of language and such - is a sham. The current 'left' is so unfit to educate, agitate and lead anything, uniting it would just create a bigger pile of shit that would be even more useless.

In reality, tendencies have always existed, and will always exist, and their existence/non-existence are probably irrelevant to whether the working class takes power or not.

[Zukunftsmusik]

Therefore, we should create entirely new words to describe certain things -- terms that are completely meaningless so that there can't be some type of arbitrary semantical argument over them.

So we should make words with real political content completely devoid of politics?

[blake 3:17]

Yeah, I realize this would be really difficult to spread throughout leftism. It's probably impractical -- but it would be nice in theory if we could have terms like this which would help lessen arbitrary divisions, no?

100% agreed. In theory. And in reflection on past leftism.

It would be a mistake to come up with a new Revolutionary Esperanto -- in fact that's the worst direction to turn in -- but many tired old phrases just become empty cliches with little relevance to the struggle for socialism.

When I joined the socialist movement I was terribly confused by terms like 'praxis' -- like what??? And at a recent demo certain chants coming from French and Spanish speaking countries/places that really made little sense. The spirit was right, but outside the radical Left, nobody knows what they mean. They weren't there to appeal to French or Spanish speakers.

I'd very much recommend the work of Raymond Williams, one of the great socialist thinkers and scholars of English, high and low, of the 20th century. I'd especially recommend Keywords and Culture and Society. Williams started writing C&S, which in many ways is simplified in Keywords on the experience of coming back to Cambridge from serving in the Second War and finding his slightly younger peers who hadn't served were using the same words but with very different meanings.

I was in a break out caucus of labour / union / worker (I'm already getting complicated) activists a couple of years back and I could I idenitfy the word 'labor'/'labour' being used in about 5 different ways. & there's no Labour Party here! People meant unions, union bureaucracy, workers, union members, work... In a 25 minute meeting. What a maze!

[Skyhilist]

It probably is irrelevant like you guys are saying because it's not currently practical. But my point is if somehow someday something like this did become practical and would lessen arbitrary divisions it would at the very least have some small positive impact.

[cliffhanger]

It probably is irrelevant like you guys are saying because it's not currently practical. But my point is if somehow someday something like this did become practical and would lessen arbitrary divisions it would at the very least have some small positive impact.

My solution to the problem would be for people to study anti-revisionist Marxism-Leninism and then adopt it's general use of language as their own. I'm not against simplifying English to destroy revisionism at its root, though, it seems like a double-plus-good idea.

[Danielle Ni Dhighe]

My solution to the problem would be for people to study anti-revisionist Marxism-Leninism and then adopt it's general use of language as their own.
So...the solution is Stalinist lingo? Will there be show trials and gulags for those who don't conform?

[cliffhanger]

Will there be show trials and gulags for those who don't conform?Inshallah!

[Blake's Baby]

Surely it's not the language itself that's the problem, the problem is not talking to each other? Discussion forums - I'm thinking primarily face-to-face meetings, but also to an extent internet forums like RevLeft, LibCom and others where people from different tendencies do communicate with each other - are helpful in trying to tease out what people actually mean, and what the differences are. The seamntic question cuts both ways - we may have different terms for the same thing (linguistic difference covers 'philosophical' similarity - eg Anarchists and Marxists describe the situation of the workers' councils overthrowing the bourgeois state differently) or we may use the same term for different things (linguistic similarity covers 'philosophical' difference - eg different tendencies using the word 'socialism' to mean radically different things, which then confuse the issue of what is actually being discussed).

In talking to each other we can clarify these different conceptions and explanations. That's the most important thing, surely?

[helot]

like how anarchists and council communists tend to want the same, or at least very similar things

Sure, anarchism and council communism are closer than in the sense that all communists want the same thing (i.e. statelessness, classlessness) and sure both tend to support workers' councils but neither anarchism nor council communism is reducable to workers' councils. There's distinct differences between both that are at odds with each other. I'd suggest creating a thread about this so this one doesn't get derailed.



As for the topic at hand, the problem isn't a lack of shared jargon the problem is the reliance on jargon over actually explaining precisely our own positions in every day language. Our own jargon might be useful as a shorthand when discussing things with people of our own tendency who thus are aware precisely of the meaning we place on those words but discussing things with people outside our tendency in this way just results in talking past each other.

[BIXX]

Two things: I am not the same as a council communist. Shit, I probably have different views of anarchism than most other anarchists on this forum. It's not simple word differences, it's actual differences in how we see the struggle and how we believe communism should be achieved. Many of us have different views of what it will even look like.

Second thing: false unity is gross. For example- Why should I work with an ML? Our views are diametrically opposed (I believe authoritarianism can't work and that it would just lead to a reinstatement of capitalism, they believe anarchy will do the same). Also, historically we haven't worked to well together with the authoritarians (like their countless betrayals, which they believe was either us striking first or "securing the revolution"). So no, I don't wanna unify. Same thing for other tendencies.

[Skyhilist]

Surely it's not the language itself that's the problem, the problem is not talking to each other? Discussion forums - I'm thinking primarily face-to-face meetings, but also to an extent internet forums like RevLeft, LibCom and others where people from different tendencies do communicate with each other - are helpful in trying to tease out what people actually mean, and what the differences are. The seamntic question cuts both ways - we may have different terms for the same thing (linguistic difference covers 'philosophical' similarity - eg Anarchists and Marxists describe the situation of the workers' councils overthrowing the bourgeois state differently) or we may use the same term for different things (linguistic similarity covers 'philosophical' difference - eg different tendencies using the word 'socialism' to mean radically different things, which then confuse the issue of what is actually being discussed).

In talking to each other we can clarify these different conceptions and explanations. That's the most important thing, surely?

This at the very least sounds like a more practical solution.

[argeiphontes]

Why should I work with an ML? ... So no, I don't wanna unify. Same thing for other tendencies.

Not at the cost of libertarian socialist ideals. Just for those agreeing with those ideals.