Is there any actual hope for Parliamentary politics?

[Comrade Thomas]

I was just wondering, as I follow the new religiously I have been following numerous elections and so on across Europe and US. While Seattle and a few other, isolated electoral areas have been successful in either having 1) An open socialist candidate and 2) The implementation of leftist reforms. But overall left-wing parties generally don't do that we'll in Europe ( when I say left, I mean it not capitalism painted red). So should the aim of parties be to raise class consciousness/workers' knowledge of exploitation or maybe a hybrid model?

[tuwix]

I'll answer the question contained in topic's title. No. I don't think there is any hope for parliamentary politics. In the best case, you will have something like Bolivia or Venezuela. Parliament is an elite and it will always reproduce elitist solutions.

[Sea]

It is a failed strategy. We have tried it before, and many of us continue to try it. There has been zero success. We are no closer to revolution today than we were 25 election cycles ago. The condition of the working class grows more dire each day. Wages continue to stagnate. There is no more hope for parliamentarianism than there is for the mode of production that it is tied to.

[exeexe]

Rudolf rocker talks about this in chapter 4:
http://www.spunk.org/library/writers/rocker/sp001495/rocker_as4.html


The lancehead of the labour movement is, therefore, not the political party but the trader union, toughened by daily combat and permeated by Socialist spirit. Only in the realm of economy are the workers able to display their full social strength, for it is their activity as producers which holds together the whole social structure, and guarantees the existence of society at all. In any other field they are fighting on alien soil and wasting their strength in hopeless struggles which bring them not an iota nearer to the goal of their desires. in the field of parliamentary politics the worker is like the giant Antaeus of the Greek legend, whom Hercules was able to strangle after he took his feet off the earth who was his mother. Only as producer and creator of social wealth does he become aware of his strength; in solidaric union with his fellows he creates in the trade union the invincible falanx which can withstand any assault, if it is aflame with the spirit of freedom and animated by the ideal of social justice.

[Brutus]

Rudolf rocker talks about this in chapter 4:
http://www.spunk.org/library/writers/rocker/sp001495/rocker_as4.html

And that's economism. Class struggle is a political struggle- unions only serve the economic demands that arise through the consequences of capitalist exploitation.

[The Idler]

Parliamentarism or parliamentary politics as a form of governance has no hope for socialism.

[Sinister Cultural Marxist]

It is a failed strategy. We have tried it before, and many of us continue to try it. There has been zero success. We are no closer to revolution today than we were 25 election cycles ago. The condition of the working class grows more dire each day. Wages continue to stagnate. There is no more hope for parliamentarianism than there is for the mode of production that it is tied to.

Yes but the same thing can be said for every strategy of Proletarian revolution. 95 years after the Russian revolution, 95 years since the Hungarian revolution, 60 years since the Chinese revolution, 50 years since the Cuban revolution, roughly three or four decades since the revolutions in Sierra Leone, Angola and Mozambique - all of those countries reverted back to Capitalist rule long ago, have totally stagnated, or both.

Moreover, revolutionary movements were always active in every country with reformist parties too. There hasn't been a revolution from Hoxhaists, Maoists or Sparts just as much as there hasn't been a revolution from Eurocommunists.

I'm not praising electoralism, but the fact that it "hasn't worked" is an argument which can be leveled against every Leftist strategy in history, especially if you take a long term view of the historical arc of a revolution.


I was just wondering, as I follow the new religiously I have been following numerous elections and so on across Europe and US. While Seattle and a few other, isolated electoral areas have been successful in either having 1) An open socialist candidate and 2) The implementation of leftist reforms. But overall left-wing parties generally don't do that we'll in Europe ( when I say left, I mean it not capitalism painted red). So should the aim of parties be to raise class consciousness/workers' knowledge of exploitation or maybe a hybrid model?

Generally speaking, reformist politics in the past have led to the watering down of revolutionary parties. Any revolutionary party which risks parliamentary politics should be aware of this history before blindly waltzing into such a strategic model.

Also, I think it's naive to think that the ruling class would just let the proletariat change the basic economic and social system without trying to put in roadblocks varying from constitutional laws to police action to military coups.

[TheSocialistMetalhead]

I'm not against reforms, in fact i support positive reforms. I think we should strive to improve the lives of workers and the poor in any way we can.

However, reformism can never lead to socialism. Reforms have to be formulated in laws and these laws will inevitably be subject to bourgeois attack as soon as the ruling class is inconvenienced by them. The bourgeoisie need but snap their fingers and every reform ever accomplished will be abolished. This can't be done lightly of course, people will rise up if that happens. This is why social democracy is in many cases just smoke and mirrors. These parties have become tools of capitalism as well, they simply represent the more sympathetic of the two faces of capital. Modern social democrats usually only seek to make capitalism acceptable.

People are right to note that a socialist party should never water down their goals and methods to be able to get into parliament. Class consciousness has to be worked on using many different methods. Being active in electoral politics can be one of them but the revolutionary outlook can't be abondened. No revolution = no socialism.

[The Idler]

I was just wondering, as I follow the new religiously I have been following numerous elections and so on across Europe and US. While Seattle and a few other, isolated electoral areas have been successful in either having 1) An open socialist candidate and 2) The implementation of leftist reforms. But overall left-wing parties generally don't do that we'll in Europe ( when I say left, I mean it not capitalism painted red). So should the aim of parties be to raise class consciousness/workers' knowledge of exploitation or maybe a hybrid model?
Kshama Sawant, Seattle's 'socialist' councillor's main election platform was a $15 minimum wage. This isn't an 'open socialist candidate'.

[helot]

And that's economism. Class struggle is a political struggle- unions only serve the economic demands that arise through the consequences of capitalist exploitation.


Rudolf Rocker isn't guilty of economism and neither is anarcho-syndicalists at large. A/Sers don't reject political struggle but instead aim to base their tactics on where the workers are strongest: that is at the point of production, in our capacity as producers.

[Црвена]

No. The government will never be able to bring about equality and freedom because it is run by people who like hierarchy and control. If there is hope, it lies in the unions and in the protest movements that are actually in touch with the people and what they want unlike the government, so the left should be putting its focus here.

[exeexe]

And that's economism. Class struggle is a political struggle- unions only serve the economic demands that arise through the consequences of capitalist exploitation.
Who cares if its economism? Everything is economism. Economy just means managing a house

http://www.thewisdomjournal.com/Blog/meaning-of-the-word-econom/


The word “economy” originated as a combination of Greek words: “oikos” which means “house” and “nemos” meaning “to manage.” The meaning would translate: to manage your house or to manage your affairs.

[Remus Bleys]

Who cares if its economism? Everything is economism. Economy just means managing a house

http://www.thewisdomjournal.com/Blog/meaning-of-the-word-econom/

Okay well setting aside the fact you don't know what economism is, you are playing a bad game here. Firstly words don't mean things because of their etymology, they change meaning, they represent concepts. For instance, the etymological lineage of the word "shout" is "scold." Secondly the economy, is, as engels said, "production and reproduction of real life." And in a certain sense, reproduction of Humans is simply the production of humans.
Economism is a vulgar take on this, focusing solely on the isolated "economic struggle" and ignores the political struggle, which aside from abandoning the dictatorship of the proletariat also means that things like a war are seen as irrelevant to communist activity.

[Loony Le Fist]

So should the aim of parties be to raise class consciousness/workers' knowledge of exploitation or maybe a hybrid model?

I think there should be what you are calling a hybrid model, if I'm understanding you correctly here. I call it a multipronged approach. :laugh:

There is no reason the left cannot walk and chew gum at the same time. We can be both support and participate in revolutionary action while simultaneously engaging in the parliamentary process. I think this approach might even be better because it allows us to get helpful reforms that assist the working class, while applying pressure through revolutionary action (also ensuring that reforms stick) on the path towards fundamental change. Of course the response might be a repression of the left's participation in the parliamentary process. However, revolutionary action is required in either case for true emancipation, so I don't see that as a downside.

[exeexe]

Economism is a vulgar take on this, focusing solely on the isolated "economic struggle" and ignores the political struggle, which aside from abandoning the dictatorship of the proletariat also means that things like a war are seen as irrelevant to communist activity.
Well that doesnt sound too bad at all. But yeah anarchists are against dictatorship included dotp and there are only one war that can be justified and that is class war.
We have a saying:
FRED MELLEM FOLKESLAG - KRIG MELLEM KLASSER

It means something like peace between people, war between classes.

But anyways during and after the revolution, according to syndicalism, the trade unions will take the role of political power. So to say that syndicalism ignores political power is just wrong.

[RedWorker]

But yeah anarchists are against dictatorship included dotp

Then what was Revolutionary Catalonia, if not a dictatorship of the proletariat? The usage of the term "dictatorship" in the term DotP has nothing to do with the usage of the term "dictatorship" elsewhere.

[Brutus]

But anyways during and after the revolution, according to syndicalism, the trade unions will take the role of political power. So to say that syndicalism ignores political power is just wrong.

Then they're not trade unions, which have solely an economic role.

[Remus Bleys]

Dictatorship was used to mean the exclusive control of the state and society by a force that needs no external legitimacy. This is a pretty common definition, and is in line with marx referring to the revolutionary Dictatorship of the Proletariat. Exclusive control of the state and society by the proletariat, and no external force necessary to "legitimize" it.
edit: to be clear, the dictatorship has this control because it was "appointed" to get things done. Therein lies the difference between despotism and dictatorship.

[Rafiq]

Without legitimacy there can be no dictatorship. When the fires of the revolution rage in the hearts of the damned, when the proletariat has torn down the idols of bourgeois mysticism through blood and sweat, there you will find the legitimacy of the proletarian dictatorship. The revolution will never be legitimized by the global capitalist order because the revolution itself is the armageddon of the global capitalist order - it will be legitimized in the eyes of even the most embedded in bourgeois ideology, it is a new universe that which no ideological power can triumph, or categorize into it's own ideological world. Following the Bolshevik revolution and it's failure, the most effective means of de-legitimization was antisemitism - a means of categorizing such an event within bourgeois ideological proximity (that there was an international jewish conspiracy, in which Communism was merely an instrument). And no wonder it held so much sway, liberalism had proved unable to define the October revolution on it's own terms.

When the workers across Russia were mobilized to fight under the red star, they did not do so out of conscious self interest or even force. They did so - they were willing to die for the universality erected by the October revolution. What many forget is that the revolution brought forth a new ideological system unseen before in the history of the workers movement as a sole result of the seizure of power, almost mythological. It is hard to notice - it was not long before it degenerated into the logic of capital, but it was there.

[DigitalBluster]

Is there any actual hope for Parliamentary politics?

It depends on what you mean by "hope." The mistake, in my view, is in believing that participation in the ruling class political system can achieve anything beyond the interests of the ruling class. Where interests overlap, there is certainly "hope" that the lesser evil will prevail, and there's nothing contradictory in recognizing this and taking sides, even while opposing the system.

In my view, speaking to the US electoral college system, running "leftist" candidates is just a feel-good measure. Anything they manage to accomplish will fall within the boundaries set by the two-party system and could have been accomplished from within that system; those accomplishments are not due to the "leftist" nature of the party. The ruling class will allow no fundamental change. To believe otherwise is to believe that the system is democratic and thus representative of working class interests.

[exeexe]

Then what was Revolutionary Catalonia, if not a dictatorship of the proletariat? The usage of the term "dictatorship" in the term DotP has nothing to do with the usage of the term "dictatorship" elsewhere.
It was a dotp because the communist party took power and killed everyone that didnt like the idea of a dictatorship. The communist party were more eager to make war against the inhabitants of Catalonia than to fight the fascists and so the war was lost.

[exeexe]

Then they're not trade unions, which have solely an economic role.
No trade unions dont have solely an economic role. Its easy to prove just watch this picture
http://media.chinaworker.info/2007/08/ana3-300x233.jpg

[Sea]

Yes but the same thing can be said for every strategy of Proletarian revolution. 95 years after the Russian revolution, 95 years since the Hungarian revolution, 60 years since the Chinese revolution, 50 years since the Cuban revolution, roughly three or four decades since the revolutions in Sierra Leone, Angola and Mozambique - all of those countries reverted back to Capitalist rule long ago, have totally stagnated, or both.We haven't yet successfully carried out a worldwide proletarian revolution. We *have* successfully done much mucking around in parliament.
No trade unions dont have solely an economic role. Its easy to prove just watch this picture
http://media.chinaworker.info/2007/08/ana3-300x233.jpgOh, good point! I forgot about their poster-making role!

[RedMaterialist]

Parliamentary politics is one of the few ways for socialists and communists to bring their ideas to the public. By entering election campaigns socialists have the opportunity to force debates with pro-capitalist candidates. These debates can demonstrate socialist ideas about worker exploitation by the appropriation and theft of surplus value, recurrent capitalist crises, etc. The thing is not to win the election, although that would be great, but to educate people.

This was advocated by Marx (but I can't find the cite.)

Rosa Luxembourg showed that a revolution cannot be simply ordered up like a meeting on a calendar, but that it can only be spontaneous. Since we seem to be living in a non-revolutionary period the only real way to advance socialism is through politics.

[exeexe]

Oh, good point! I forgot about their poster-making role!
You missed the point. When you display yourself with weapons its a clear sign that you want to have weapons.

[Sea]

You missed the point. When you display yourself with weapons its a clear sign that you want to have weapons.http://www.ky.aflcio.org/wkvaflcio/index.cfm?action=print&articleid=5615f47b-3c51-4ba9-b30f-5e2e8220b62e

No.

[Sinister Cultural Marxist]

We haven't yet successfully carried out a worldwide proletarian revolution. We *have* successfully done much mucking around in parliament.

I think parliamentary leftists and other leftists alike approve of the idea of a "worldwide proletarian revolution", but there are legitimate questions as to how to move towards that end, including questions regarding the role of parliamentary politics when necessary. Marx and Engels themselves thought parliamentary politics might be useful for the worker's movement, but they clearly preferred a global revolutionary movement to reforms pushed through parliaments. Surely the Russian Revolution did not lead to a worldwide proletarian revolution, though that was a plan. Yet that doesn't mean we reject their tactics out of hand.

I think what is more interesting is a sober analysis of the limits and dangers of parliamentary politics, as opposed to just saying "well Eurocommunists and social democrats tried it, and we didn't have a revolution."

[exeexe]

http://www.ky.aflcio.org/wkvaflcio/index.cfm?action=print&articleid=5615f47b-3c51-4ba9-b30f-5e2e8220b62e

No.
So you are telling me that there exist no single individual on the entire planet who is both a member of a union and who have a gun during the entire history unionism?

[Sea]

So you are telling me that there exist no single individual on the entire planet who is both a member of a union and who have a gun during the entire history unionism?Once again:

No.

I'm telling you (and I am correct in doing so) that bourgeois unions generally take bourgeois liberal stances.

[Thirsty Crow]

Parliamentary politics is one of the few ways for socialists and communists to bring their ideas to the public. By entering election campaigns socialists have the opportunity to force debates with pro-capitalist candidates. These debates can demonstrate socialist ideas about worker exploitation by the appropriation and theft of surplus value, recurrent capitalist crises, etc. The thing is not to win the election, although that would be great, but to educate people. First of all, there's quite a difference between political actions around the election campaign without standing members for election, and a real election campaign. Presumably, it would be possible to engage in this without standing in the election.

The purpose of abstentionism is not some abstract revolutionary purity, but to set the organization on such a course of possible development that some disastrous pitfalls are avoided and that the organization doesn't end up in a completely contradictory position (standing in election when claiming that nothing can be done in that way).

And that old idea about propaganda value of elected members disregards the simple fact that any such propaganda is mediated through the bourgeois media system - which again simply forces the pro-revolutionary organization to conduct propaganda in a direct way (and that doesn't at all need parliamentary participation of any kind).

[Revolver]

I think parliamentary leftists and other leftists alike approve of the idea of a "worldwide proletarian revolution", but there are legitimate questions as to how to move towards that end, including questions regarding the role of parliamentary politics when necessary. Marx and Engels themselves thought parliamentary politics might be useful for the worker's movement, but they clearly preferred a global revolutionary movement to reforms pushed through parliaments. Surely the Russian Revolution did not lead to a worldwide proletarian revolution, though that was a plan. Yet that doesn't mean we reject their tactics out of hand.

I think what is more interesting is a sober analysis of the limits and dangers of parliamentary politics, as opposed to just saying "well Eurocommunists and social democrats tried it, and we didn't have a revolution."

Excellent point. I would just add that the operating conditions were quite different at the time that Marx and Engels were engaged in revolutionary politics and there were at least points where the tactics shifted to use of parliamentary mechanisms as a stop-gap while the underlying social revolution churned on.

I believe that there are clear signs that the ruling class is moving away from the pretext of liberal democracy, particularly in the United States (where I draw most of my examples). There are a few signs of this, but one of the clearest is found in Michigan, where state-appointed "emergency mangers" routed local government opposition to austerity measures. Closely linked to this is the use of municipal bankruptcy (which subjects many of these questions to the jurisdiction of the federal courts), particularly in Detroit where, again, there is no electoral control over the process and in fact private firms that also represent creditor classes were brought in to carry out the orders of the Emergency Manager. A point that only an insider would be aware of should be of particular interest to the Left: the original emergency manager law had to be modified to make it clear that an Emergency Manager had to be an individual and not a corporate entity, as there was a concern that the Whirlpool Corporation (or a "nonprofit" that it had capitalized) would be appointed to oversee Benton Harbor.

I bring up this issue because I think it illustrates a relatively new development in the looming threat of "managed democracy" or "inverted totalitarianism" that Sheldon Wolin and other critics of neoliberalism have been discussing for over a decade now (not to be confused with a critique from a socialist perspective but not necessarily incompatible with a socialist analysis). The reality is that a large segment of the ruling class is not content with parliamentary procedures if they risk even the losses that accompanied the New Deal period. Another segment favors Keynesian intervention, but even their voices are relatively mute in the face of anti-democratic currents in American politics. I think it represents more of a tactical break than anything else.

Anyway, from my perspective there's an underlying shift in the economy fueled by technology that is making actually existing capitalism obsolete as a mechanism of distribution, while there's a countervailing political shift in favor of wealth concentration. In some ways it parallels the overthrow of the feudal order because it circles back to the use of political repression for the purpose of securing a largely hereditary advantage. The tech shift suggests that there may be a much easier path to socialist infrastructure today or in the near future, while the latter suggests a corresponding need for political revolution. In this context, as I see it, the main purpose of using parliamentary tactics is to a) open the door and clear the way for an actual social and political revolution to the extent it is possible now or within the lifetime of people living today and b) minimize the harm of the neoliberal rearguard (including its socially reactionary elements).

[Ismail]

It was a dotp because the communist party took power and killed everyone that didnt like the idea of a dictatorship. The communist party were more eager to make war against the inhabitants of Catalonia than to fight the fascists and so the war was lost.Pretty sure he was talking about the anarchist-controlled areas. The PSUC (like the PCE in the rest of Spain) opposed any talk of establishing a dictatorship of the proletariat during the civil war.

As for the subject of this topic, running for seats in bourgeois legislatures can play a legitimate role in gaining support for a party. The biggest problem is that many parties that take the electoral road become intoxicated with moderate (for avowed leftist parties) success and start to orient their whole activities around winning more seats. This was the fate of the SPD and many other likeminded parties back when social-democrats and communists were synonymous (i.e. before the Third International), they became subordinated to their parliamentary leaderships, which played an important role in their degeneration into counter-revolutionary parties.

In the context of the US, another problem is that you have what are basically tiny parties running campaigns to elect "socialist" congressmen, and some even run for President. I always thought such campaigns were weird and had next to zero agitation value, for the simple reason that the parties in question have little inherent influence among workers. Eugene Debs got millions of votes because the Socialist Party already had a large degree of working-class support. Some guy going around saying "VOTE FOR ME I REALLY REPRESENT YOUR INTERESTS" with nothing to show for it besides his word will justifiably get a negligible amount of votes.


And that old idea about propaganda value of elected members disregards the simple fact that any such propaganda is mediated through the bourgeois media system - which again simply forces the pro-revolutionary organization to conduct propaganda in a direct way (and that doesn't at all need parliamentary participation of any kind).The Bolsheviks in the Duma (whose "oversight" powers were obviously a fair bit more limited than bourgeois legislatures) used the opportunities given to them to force ministers of the regime to be subjected to questioning, and to bring up various subjects for discussion (workers' grievances, corruption, etc.) A reactionary media can try sweeping things under the rug or minimizing their effects, but it can't pretend that such things don't happen.

The main work on this subject is a memoir by one of the Bolshevik deputies titled The Bolsheviks in the Tsarist Duma (http://www.revolutionarydemocracy.org/archive/bad0.htm).

[exeexe]

Once again:

No.

I'm telling you (and I am correct in doing so) that bourgeois unions generally take bourgeois liberal stances.
You mean a union of capitalists? Like an Employers' organization? Well they are not trade unions.

[exeexe]

Pretty sure he was talking about the anarchist-controlled areas. The PSUC (like the PCE in the rest of Spain) opposed any talk of establishing a dictatorship of the proletariat during the civil war.


He said:


Then what was Revolutionary Catalonia, if not a dictatorship of the proletariat?


And since the area was both first controlled by anarchists and then the communist party during the revolution my answer is completely in line with what he asked about

Dictatorship: the revolution can only take one direction for the whole population because its lead by one unit. The revolution lead by only one unit will be so rigid that the aim of the revolution can never be achieved.

Anarchism: The revolution can take many directions since its not lead by one unit. The anarchist revolution is therefore a free revolution that can take shape according to demand.
From each according to his revolutionary abilities, to each according to his revolutionary needs

[Ismail]

The PCE and PSUC line was that there did not exist a revolution (much less a dictatorship of the proletariat) in Catalonia, nor would they fight for one during the Civil War. Consequently, the view of those who held that there was a revolution in Catalonia was that both parties were carrying out a "counter-revolution." Therefore neither side would recognize that Catalonia after the "May Days" of 1937 was revolutionary, nor that the Communists had established a dictatorship of the proletariat.

[Sperm-Doll Setsuna]

You mean a union of capitalists? Like an Employers' organization? Well they are not trade unions.

No, obviously Sea meant a union with bourgeois values, like the majority of recognised official union organisations in the world today. They are participating in management just like the company owners and serve to reproduce and protect the capitalist system.

[Sea]

You mean a union of capitalists? Like an Employers' organization? Well they are not trade unions.Just for my own amusement, can you give me some examples of really proley unions? They must be modern, cause we're talking about parliamentary politics in relation to modern tactics.
No, obviously Sea meant a union with bourgeois values, like the majority of recognised official union organisations in the world today. They are participating in management just like the company owners and serve to reproduce and protect the capitalist system.And they require ongoing exploitation of the working class to even exist.

[exeexe]

+++

[exeexe]

Then they're not trade unions, which have solely an economic role.



With the Nationalists taking Zaragoza almost immediately after the announced coup d’état on 19th July 1936, the surrounding areas in Aragon became strategically important, particularly as the militias of Barcelona were marching into Aragon, after successfully defeating the rebellious generals due to the armed Trade Unions and loyal assault guards.

http://kopitemike.wordpress.com/2011/11/01/belchite/

Ever heard of a trade union that can kill? Well now you have

[exeexe]

Just for my own amusement, can you give me some examples of really proley unions?

What? Proley?

[Prometeo liberado]

I was just wondering, as I follow the new religiously I have been followBarring numerous elections and so on across Europe and US. While Seattle and a few other, isolated electoral areas have been successful in either having 1) An open socialist candidate and 2) The implementation of leftist reforms. But overall left-wing parties generally don't do that we'll in Europe ( when I say left, I mean it not capitalism painted red). So should the aim of parties be to raise class consciousness/workers' knowledge of exploitation or maybe a hybrid model?

Oh my, how we do need some form of entrance exams nowadays. Hybrid models? Is this a form of Roseanne Barr "ism" rearing its ugly head? Oh please make these threads go away. When, oh lord? When?

[Five Year Plan]

Then they're not trade unions, which have solely an economic role.

So political agitation and propagandizing and organizing can't take place in the context of a union's economic struggle for better workplace conditions? This seems a rather arbitrary rule to pluck from thin air.

[Luisrah]

Well, you can have a genuine communist/socialist party that has seats in parliament. This can work as a political thermometer.
In theory if the communists, by a miracle, got 51% of votes, they would form a government. But you can't beat the bourgeoisie at their own game.

In practice, when that communist party starts to get a good amount of seats, that is just a reflection of what is happening in the streets (considering this is a real communist party). This party will never win an election because when it has the strength to do that, the streets are already filled with riots, strikes, etc. and power will be taken by other means.

However, in the beginning I think it could be helpful to show our intentions to many people. Some local elections may be won, and the outcome of those victories can show many people that communists actually work with and for them through their actions.

[Zoroaster]

I don't think so. We need to replace the current system with something more durable, such as a worker's democratic government, which actually cares about it's people.

[Rafiq]

All hegemonic unions today have been absorbed and serve only to reproduce the conditions of exploitation. Labor has been in retreat for quite some while.

[Trap Queen Voxxy]

Nope

[Orange Juche]

It depends on what you mean by "hope." The mistake, in my view, is in believing that participation in the ruling class political system can achieve anything beyond the interests of the ruling class. Where interests overlap, there is certainly "hope" that the lesser evil will prevail, and there's nothing contradictory in recognizing this and taking sides, even while opposing the system.

In my view, speaking to the US electoral college system, running "leftist" candidates is just a feel-good measure. Anything they manage to accomplish will fall within the boundaries set by the two-party system and could have been accomplished from within that system; those accomplishments are not due to the "leftist" nature of the party. The ruling class will allow no fundamental change. To believe otherwise is to believe that the system is democratic and thus representative of working class interests.

It can be useful to vote, I would argue, though. I personally vote third party - because the major parties then have to start leaning in that direction if they "lose votes" in that direction too much. As you said, the ruling class will allow no fundamental change - however, there's meaningful enough changes - like in Seattle with the $15/hr minimum wage - that it is and can be worth voting.

The key lays in - don't confuse minor victories for the end goal, which far too many people do. $15 an hour is nothing compared to the workers controlling the means of production and the society in which they live - however, it's something compared to what's been going on. It is a minor victory, and we shouldn't overlook those as if they are nothing.

Not to mention - parties like Socialist Alternative (which elected Sawant, who was at the forefront of the $15 wage) can be kind of a gateway to newcomers into leftism from liberalism. So there are some benefits, and I think people are too quick to pass over electoral/parliamentary politics because "it supports the system!", which is silly, in my opinion.

[DigitalBluster]

I don't think we disagree much. I vote for candidates to the "left" of the Democrats if the polls show the Democrat likely to win. Otherwise I vote "for" (in quotes) the Democrat to prevent the more precipitous backslide promised by the Republican.

I would reiterate though, the $15/hr minimum wage is not incompatible with ruling-class interests. As you said, it's nothing compared to stripping them of their ownership of productive resources.

Sawant said, correctly, "Workers did this. It was not the result of the generosity of corporations or their Democratic Party representatives in government." (I've started Sawant's Wikiquote page (https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Kshama_Sawant); please help improve it!)

Nevertheless, it wasn't the result of the nature of the Socialist Alternative party, either. Raises to the minimum wage can and do happen within the confines of the two-party system.

[Sperm-Doll Setsuna]

I don't think so. We need to replace the current system with something more durable, such as a worker's democratic government, which actually cares about it's people.

No. No democracy and what is the implication in "caring about its people"? The people depend on the good intentions of this "government" you envision? How is that different from the current situation? We don't want a government to be sympathetic, we don't want its false compassion, we want to dominate it, and dominate the world, and achieve communism.

[Trap Queen Voxxy]

All hegemonic unions today have been absorbed and serve only to reproduce the conditions of exploitation. Labor has been in retreat for quite some time.

Fixed

[Comrade Thomas]

Wow, I didn't expect the responses I would get. Some really interesting (and intelligent) stuff being mentioned.

[renalenin]

However, in the beginning I think it could be helpful to show our intentions to many people. Some local elections may be won, and the outcome of those victories can show many people that communists actually work with and for them through their actions.

Yes by all means communists must try to get some seats in parliament, as this makes for good agitation and it lifts our profile. Lenin himself agreed that it was a good thing. But there can be no compromising with other parties and no class collaboration, even if it means a 'left' government falls. As many comrades have observed the real struggle is elsewhere. Parliament is always under a constitution that safeguards property in the means of production. There is a class war to win.

[RedWorker]

So the people against participation in parliamentary politics focus on that parliamentary politics have never succeeded in bringing socialism or communism.

But have revolutions ever succeeded in bringing communism? Or socialism, for that matter, and not a corrupted state capitalism, which is fundamentally not different from regular capitalism in any way.

The true answer to this issue is to not exclude any pathway. The fact that you take 5 minutes to vote every 4 years does not mean that you cannot perform any other action.

I'm not claiming whether parliamentary politics can bring socialism or communism or not. I'm claiming that there's no point in refusing to take actions which help the left advance the immediate interests of the working class.

The Communist Manifesto quite clearly suggests that communists should support left-of-status quo parties everywhere, parties which advance the interests of workers.

[Zoroaster]

To Takayuki:

Domination? The whole point of socialism and communism is to create a humane society to replace the mishap caused by capitalism, not to become capitalist by dominating people!

And when I say a government that cares about it's people, I mean it. Look to an event during the protests in Greece. When a old woman asked her neighbors to help her find her lost dog, the council decided to help her. Why? They didn't want to control anyone, they wanted to liberate people from their boring days of slaving away at some job. That is the future, a free society where people co-operate with each other and live freely, and control will not solve that problem.

[Per Levy]

Yes by all means communists must try to get some seats in parliament, as this makes for good agitation and it lifts our profile.

please elaborate what kind "propaganda" a party can do from cushy parliament seats? also, who will hear this propaganda? most workers dont give a shit about the parliament, for good reasons i might add. also this tactic is used for over a hundred years now, it hasnt brought any succses in spreading communist propaganda, just ask all the commies in your parliament. oh there arnt any, well then.


Lenin himself agreed that it was a good thing.

a few things, lenin is dead since 90 or so years, since then communists have participated in parliaments and now lets see what has changed, the system or those communists partys? its the latter aint it. also lenins arguments for participation in parliaments has been critizised many many times even during his life time. also lenin liked cats, commies who dont have a cat cant be commies.


There is a class war to win.

yeah but the parliament isnt the place for that war, parliament tactics have proven to be a complete failure and to be a giant waste of time, energy, manpower and money.

[Rafiq]

To Takayuki:

Domination? The whole point of socialism and communism is to create a humane society to replace the mishap caused by capitalism, not to become capitalist by dominating people!

And when I say a government that cares about it's people, I mean it. Look to an event during the protests in Greece. When a old woman asked her neighbors to help her find her lost dog, the council decided to help her. Why? They didn't want to control anyone, they wanted to liberate people from their boring days of slaving away at some job. That is the future, a free society where people co-operate with each other and live freely, and control will not solve that problem.

The point of communism is not to milk the dried, poisoned teet of bourgeois intimate feelings of kindness, the point is not to gently caress the bastard offspring of capitalist relations. "Oh!" You'd say, "let's help out poor uncle Joe whose bakery is under attack!" And so on. Where does it end?

The point of communism is to violently instill a new morality, to unveil the falseness of the capitalist ideological universe, and to repress and dominate the class enemies. It isn't pretty, it isn't sweet and nice as though you're helping an old women across the street. It is the revolutionary locomotive blazing with fire through the streets indiscriminate if grandma is crossing or not.

[Per Levy]

So the people against participation in parliamentary politics focus on that parliamentary politics have never succeeded in bringing socialism or communism.

that isnt the argument though, its more the critique of the notion that soem kind of "propaganda" can be done by being in parliaments, wich is just wrong.


But have revolutions ever succeeded in bringing communism? Or socialism, for that matter, and not a corrupted state capitalism, which is fundamentally not different from regular capitalism in any way.

a revolution is the only way to break the power of the bourgeoisie, sitting in a parliament wont break that power and if it really could the parliament could be swiftly disbanded and be replaced by a dictatorship to keep the order in tact.


The true answer to this issue is to not exclude any pathway. The fact that you take 5 minutes to vote every 4 years does not mean that you cannot perform any other action.

the point is that if you vote you do legitimize the system though.


I'm not claiming whether parliamentary politics can bring socialism or communism or not.

it cant, the parliament is a bourgois institution, and that bourgeois institution can break the power of the ruling class only a revolution can.


The Communist Manifesto quite clearly suggests that communists should support left-of-status quo parties everywhere, parties which advance the interests of workers.

and while the communist manifesto is a good text, its horribly outdated and written for completly different time, heck it was allready outdated at the end of the 19th century.

[Zoroaster]

Oh, I'm sorry that I give a damn about people and I don't see violence as an immediate answer to the problems that we face. If the goal of Marxism and Anarchism is to create a free, happy society, then we should make sure that those who want to live freely don't have chests filled with lead.

[Sabot Cat]

No. No democracy and what is the implication in "caring about its people"? The people depend on the good intentions of this "government" you envision? How is that different from the current situation? We don't want a government to be sympathetic, we don't want its false compassion, we want to dominate it, and dominate the world, and achieve communism.

I favor direct and industrial democracy, but I agree: we do not need a more paternalistic ruling class to take care of us, we need liberation from under the heel of capital.

[Zoroaster]

I didn't mean a nicer bourgeois government , I meant a government democratically ruled for the working class, by the working class.

[Sabot Cat]

I didn't mean a nicer bourgeois government , I meant a government democratically ruled for the working class, by the working class.

Or we could have no government, and the working class can forge a future without rulers.

[Zoroaster]

Since I'm a follower of Communisation Theory, I completely agree with you.

[Rafiq]

Oh, I'm sorry that I give a damn about people and I don't see violence as an immediate answer to the problems that we face. If the goal of Marxism and Anarchism is to create a free, happy society, then we should make sure that those who want to live freely don't have chests filled with lead.

The goal of Marxism was never to "create a new society" to begin with, none the less a "Happy" society. Marxism is the means by which we understand humans categorically as animals and their social (rather than biological, which was essentially what Darwin did) being. The most ardent defender of capitalist relations, an honest member of the bourgeoisie can be a Marxist, he can recognize the world for what it is and simply choose the side of his class.

Happiness is never the goal of any revolutionary. Happiness is to be content, happiness is weakness.

[Five Year Plan]

The goal of Marxism was never to "create a new society" to begin with, none the less a "Happy" society. Marxism is the means by which we understand humans categorically as animals and their social (rather than biological, which was essentially what Darwin did) being.

So when Marx wrote, "The philosophers have only interpreted the world, in various ways; the point is to change it," you think the "change" he is talking about isn't a transformation of society into a new (non-exploitative) type?

[honourable left]

I agree heavily with Rafiq, and would add that the dire truth is that regressing over any the possibility revolution is ultimately futile. The world has become too adverse to them. Both governments and peoples have become so disposed towards neoliberal norms that any revolution, especially socialist, would provoke such a harsh reaction as to be their death note.

Parliamentarianism produces inequality and dominance. But in the present era it is only with interactions with it that any socialist goals can be obtained.

[Rafiq]

So when Marx wrote, "The philosophers have only interpreted the world, in various ways; the point is to change it," you think the "change" he is talking about isn't a transformation of society into a new (non-exploitative) type?

No, the change he is talking about has nothing to do with a 'new society' (Or more specifically, the 'creation' of one). The point is that legitimacy is gained in the process of attempting to change society, for Marx communism is not a state of affairs which is to be established. Communism is the active process by which the proletarian class struggles against the enemy, Communism is the ideology which smashes through the carcass of bourgeois thought. Marx's problem with philosophers is that while they might have 'understood' the nature of things, they did so comfortably within the confines set forth by those in power, set forth by the existing social order. It is not so much that they failed in their action, it is that they failed to challenge the existing order in the first place. Marx does not say we ought to consciously change society into something we find appealing or desirable. The very nature of our desires, the very nature of our appeals is shaped by our ideological presumptions, the same ones set forth by the existing order. It is no wonder bourgeois ideologues who 'want communism' do so for reasons only logical in the parameters of bourgeois ideology. Marx means in the process of fighting, in the process of struggle society changes. This is the difference, and it is crucial.

When those - dare I say utopians, those bourgeois ideologues who speak of 'creating a better, more humane society', they see the Communist movement in all its stormy revolutionary outbursts as nothing short of a tool to realize their utopian fantasies. While on the contrary, the struggle itself, the fight against those in power is a universe of its own for any radical. Understanding Communism as derived from premises now in existence, we logically understand that any talk of a new society is merely an ideological component of the struggle for the conquest of the state. Rather than the revolution being a tool to create a new society, the very notion of creating a new society is a tool of the revolution. The truth is that finding these utilitarian models to maximize efficiency, even dare I say to organize production consciously in a different way is a relatively trivial thing. This is not the goal, the changes brought forth from re-organization of relations to production are a result of changes in power.

[Five Year Plan]

No, the change he is talking about has nothing to do with a 'new society' (Or more specifically, the 'creation' of one). The point is that legitimacy is gained in the process of attempting to change society, for Marx communism is not a state of affairs which is to be established. Communism is the active process by which the proletarian class struggles against the enemy, Communism is the ideology which smashes through the carcass of bourgeois thought.

So in other words Marxism as a body of thought is drawn from the real movement of workers to create a new society, and is in turn used to support that effort.

Precisely my point.

For the onlookers, watch out when a poster takes two lengthy paragraphs to try to make a simple point: more often than not it's a sign that there's a lot of obfuscation and dodging going on.

[Rafiq]

So in other words Marxism as a body of thought is drawn from the real movement of workers to create a new society, and is in turn used to support that effort.


No, that's Communism as an ideology. Workers do not fight because they have created an idea of a new society which they seek to at all costs pursue. This new society (or the notion of it) is derived from the struggle of workers to pursue their real, immediate material interests, starting from petty trade union struggles to the struggle for the conquest of the state (The Communist movement). The role of Marxism is a disciplined, scientific understanding of our social being, as well as to add a radical dimension to trade union consciousness that goes beyond simple material interests. The merger of Marxism and the worker's movement is the politicization of this movement, the discipline and adoption of a coherent and consistent ideological universe. Marxism, above all things is how we understand. And the Communism, the Communism from Muntzer, the Communism of revolutionary France, the Communism of the Bolsheviks is more like a possession of the mind and soul, Communism is the persistent irrational outbursts of the revolutionary spirit. We think of religious fundamentalists being "possessed" by their beliefs, as though an otherworldly set of ideas consume them. Nothing is more true for communism.

Perhaps my post needs to be a bit fucking longer, actually. No, it's not a simple point, it's not something that can be summed up in a few sentences. And your interpretation is complete proof of that.

[Five Year Plan]

Workers do not fight because they have created an idea of a new society which they seek to at all costs pursue.

Communist workers don't struggle to create a communist society? That's news to me.


This new society (or the notion of it) is derived from the struggle of workers to pursue their real, immediate material interests, starting from petty trade union struggles to the struggle for the conquest of the state (The Communist movement).

Yes, the notion of a new society emerges from the movement. Marx's ideas about the destruction of capitalism were inspired by the real movement of workers opposing capitalism, whose actions pointed toward the creation of a new society.


The role of Marxism is a disciplined, scientific understanding of our social being, as well as to add a radical dimension to trade union consciousness that goes beyond simple material interests. The merger of Marxism and the worker's movement is the politicization of this movement, the discipline and adoption of a coherent and consistent ideological universe. Marxism, above all things is how we understand. And the Communism, the Communism from Muntzer, the Communism of revolutionary France, the Communism of the Bolsheviks is more like a possession of the mind and soul, Communism is the persistent irrational outbursts of the revolutionary spirit. We think of religious fundamentalists being "possessed" by their beliefs, as though an otherworldly set of ideas consume them. Nothing is more true for communism.

There's nothing here that in any way contradicts my point, and Marx's point, about the pursuit of scientific knowledge being inseparable from the actual movement, and therefore being directed toward clarifying issues for and advancing that movement. The movement for a new kind of society.

[Rafiq]

Communist workers don't struggle to create a communist society? That's news to me.


I would imagine a great many things inherent to Marxism are news to you, seeing the sheer poverty of your understanding of it.

But no, there is no room for intellectual laziness here. They don't struggle to create a new society, they struggle because their immediate interests are opposed to that of their class enemy. Communist workers wish to impose a wholly new ideological universe upon the enemy, it is a class war inristic to capitalist relations. Rhetoric about creating a new society is nothing more than an ideological expression of this very real, and grounded struggle for power (NOT for a utopia, and you can call it whatever the fuck you want, in the end what you among other users speak of is nothing short of utopia).

But even then, the rhetoric we have seen from actually existing communist movements, from the Paris Commune to the Bolsheviks, is nowhere near the infantile, delusional nonsense that users here like to tout. It is as though Communism is just another internet fetish, some kind of style or preference (I mean like at Reddit communism if you don't believe me). Again, all of this stems from your lack of understanding of so many things. Philistinism is so prevalent today among the Left especially, everything which is not simplistic is dismissed and distasted. The situation here is anything but simplistic.

[Five Year Plan]

But no, there is no room for intellectual laziness here. They don't struggle to create a new society, they struggle because their immediate interests are opposed to that of their class enemy.

Watch out, Rafiq. Your second-international social democracy is showing. Workers in general struggle because their immediate interests are opposed to those of their class enemy. Communist workers understand the link between those immediate struggles and the larger project to establish a society free from exploitation. As a result, they don't just struggle for day-to-day reforms. They couch the push reforms into their struggle for a new type of society. It is for this reason that it makes perfect sense to say that (some, revolutionary) workers are struggling for a society free from exploitation. Not all of them do, obviously. The goal of communist workers is to enlist the non-communist ones into the struggle, the real movement that Marx wrote about, which is going on right now.


Communist workers wish to impose a wholly new ideological universe upon the enemy, it is a class war inristic to capitalist relations. Rhetoric about creating a new society is nothing more than an ideological expression of this very real, and grounded struggle for power (NOT for a utopia, and you can call it whatever the fuck you want, in the end what you among other users speak of is nothing short of utopia).

What you call "rhetoric about creating a new society" is nothing more than than expression of a scientific understanding of the capital-labor relationship that is responsible for creating all immediate struggles for reforms. It seems you have a fear of people talking about revolution and socialism and a new society. I wonder if this has anything to do with your petty-bourgeois fear that workers, upon hearing such arguments and learning from them in struggle, might actually create that society. I'll leave that for others to decide.


But even then, the rhetoric we have seen from actually existing communist movements, from the Paris Commune to the Bolsheviks, is nowhere near the infantile, delusional nonsense that users here like to tout. It is as though Communism is just another internet fetish, some kind of style or preference (I mean like at Reddit communism if you don't believe me). Again, all of this stems from your lack of understanding of so many things. Philistinism is so prevalent today among the Left especially, everything which is not simplistic is dismissed and distasted. The situation here is anything but simplistic.

You speak in the most tired of cliches then pose as sophisticated. Life must be frustrating when people call you out on your bullshit.

[Brotto Rühle]

Yo, Rafiq. You're full of shit. Marx talks about a "new society" and "communist society" in some fairly important works. I mean, shit son, just read critique of the gotha programme. Marx talking about communist SOCIETY.. Ohhh noooooo.

"The emancipation of the oppressed class thus implies necessarily the creation of a new society." K. Marx, PoP.

[Comrade #138672]

Yeah, a new society is not necessarily empty rhetoric or utopian thinking.

But it is true that workers initially struggle for their immediate interests. It is only under the influence of communist workers and a revolutionary Vanguard that the struggle for immediate gains transforms into the struggle for communism, i.e., a new society.

[Rafiq]

Watch out, Rafiq. Your second-international social democracy is showing. Workers in general struggle because their immediate interests are opposed to those of their class enemy. Communist workers understand the link between those immediate struggles and the larger project to establish a society free from exploitation. As a result, they don't just struggle for day-to-day reforms. They couch the push reforms into their struggle for a new type of society. It is for this reason that it makes perfect sense to say that (some, revolutionary) workers are struggling for a society free from exploitation. Not all of them do, obviously. The goal of communist workers is to enlist the non-communist ones into the struggle, the real movement that Marx wrote about, which is going on right now.

Communism is nothing more than the more coherent, disciplined and specialized means by which workers fight for their immediate interests. When I speak of immediate interests, I do not mean higher wages, reforms, or a better quality of life. I speak of immediate interests as in their immediate conditions as proletarians, their immediate desire to conquer the state and destroy the class enemy. Their immediate interests, as opposed to some eternal 'idea of a new society' that is exclusive only to the internet, their immediate interests within the class struggle. THIS is what I mean. Their immediate interests are grounded in the existing society, the existing reality, which is in itself its own destruction. Your Communism and the Communism you speak of is wholly abstract, wholly petty bourgeois. As I said before, like the stoics of Rome who spoke of 'freedom 'and 'liberty' while utterly despising the wretched and filthy masses, their abstract notions of 'freedom' only served to reproduce a greater oppression. And thus, your abstract conception of Communism has nothing to do with the creation of a new society, it is nothing more than the means by which you attempt to legitimize the existing order. You fear a Communism with a modern context, because you are a petty bourgeois ideologue.

Workers do not struggle for a new society, they struggle for power. And all talk of a new society is not the manifestation of their 'reformist' prerogatives, but their struggle for power. Communism is an ideology among many ideologies, but what distinguishes it is what it really means, not what it claims to mean.




What you call "rhetoric about creating a new society" is nothing more than than expression of a scientific understanding of the capital-labor relationship that is responsible for creating all immediate struggles for reforms. It seems you have a fear of people talking about revolution and socialism and a new society. I wonder if this has anything to do with your petty-bourgeois fear that workers, upon hearing such arguments and learning from them in struggle, might actually create that society. I'll leave that for others to decide.


And now you're running wild with your misconceived presumptions, how the fuck do I argue with someone arguing with a straw man? Rhetoric about creating a new society is not the result of any scientific understanding alone, you cannot be outside ideology and the merger of the worker's movement with Marxism (BECAUSE THEY ARE NOT inherently one and the same) entails a scientific recognition of existing conditions as well as the irrational (irrational by present standards of reason), hell bent and eternal struggle for Communism. It is the unity of Marxist discipline with the Communist spirit. Do you forget that the Communist movement existed long before Marx?

But that's not even what I'm talking about. I'm talking about:


But even then, the rhetoric we have seen from actually existing communist movements, from the Paris Commune to the Bolsheviks, is nowhere near the infantile, delusional nonsense that users here like to tout. It is as though Communism is just another internet fetish, some kind of style or preference (I mean like at Reddit communism if you don't believe me).


Don't you dare claim that these petty bourgeois students and their utopian pipedreams is anything resemblent of 'workers talking about socialism and revolution'. I'm not going to stand for some Trotskyist shitbird come and tell me I 'fear revolution'. Fuck you, you petty bourgeois swine. You don't know anything about my psyche, you don't know anything about my Marxism or Marxism in general because it is beyond the constrains of your petty bourgeois, abstract understanding of the existing order.

What cack! He speaks of me 'fearing' revolution. Truly, the real cowards who fear revolution are those who wish to obfuscate socialism as some kind of abstract utopia which is to be established, truly only those who fear a proletarian dictatorship and the stormy alterations of revolution are the ones who wish to divorce Communism from existing conditions, whose Communism exists from past struggles, whose Communism they know damned well will never reach the land of the living. Only those who speak of socialism as some kind of preference, rather than a real movement are those that fear the fires of the revolution. You fear, above all things a New Communism that poses a real threat to the existing order.



Yo, Rafiq. You're full of shit. Marx talks about a "new society" and "communist society" in some fairly important works. I mean, shit son, just read critique of the gotha programme. Marx talking about communist SOCIETY.. Ohhh noooooo.

"The emancipation of the oppressed class thus implies necessarily the creation of a new society." K. Marx, PoP.


First of all shut the fuck up, I'm not your bro, I'm not your friend, this isn't a fucking casual conversation, speak clearly or get the fuck out you degenerate piece of shit.

No one denys Marx talks of a new society (GOD you all just don't get it, do you? Hint - A doesn't always equal A in different contexts!), the proletarian dictatorship and the conquest of power, of course that entails the creation of a new society! But for Marx, the point is that it is the struggle for emancipation, for power that is the real struggle, that is the struggle with a modern context. Worker's don't fight directly for this new society that have no idea will look like, they fight for power and the nature of hteir fight is derived from premises now in existence. Like I said, I was talking about this anyway:


But even then, the rhetoric we have seen from actually existing communist movements, from the Paris Commune to the Bolsheviks, is nowhere near the infantile, delusional nonsense that users here like to tout. It is as though Communism is just another internet fetish, some kind of style or preference (I mean like at Reddit communism if you don't believe me).


Don't you dare associate Marx with such nonsense, as though Marx would have been on reddit talking with all the students about how cool communism is going to be. Shut the fuck up and get out Rae, you've been discredited once, do yourself a favor and don't do it again.

[Brotto Rühle]

First of all shut the fuck up, I'm not your bro, I'm not your friend, this isn't a fucking casual conversation, speak clearly or get the fuck out you degenerate piece of shit. You wot m8? I swear on me mum m8.


No one denys Marx talks of a new society (GOD you all just don't get it, do you? Hint - A doesn't always equal A in different contexts!), the proletarian dictatorship and the conquest of power, of course that entails the creation of a new society! But for Marx, the point is that it is the struggle for emancipation, for power that is the real struggle, that is the struggle with a modern context. Worker's don't fight directly for this new society that have no idea will look like, they fight for power and the nature of hteir fight is derived from premises now in existence. Your prose is awful. You did deny that anything had to do with a new society. You do this every time you're challenged.

How do you figure that the struggle is for POWERRRRRRRRRRRR? As opposed to a new society? Workers are too stupid to want a new society. All about power dawg. Once they get power it don't matter no more. Communism is a magical society that appears once the prolea realize "Hey this power thing is lame".


Like I said, I was talking about this anyway:



Don't you dare associate Marx with such nonsense, as though Marx would have been on reddit talking with all the students about how cool communism is going to be. Shut the fuck up and get out Rae, you've been discredited once, do yourself a favor and don't do it again.What the fuck are you even talking about?

Discredited? U mad that Althusser is shit bro. C'mon son, come at me.

[Five Year Plan]

Communism is nothing more than the more coherent, disciplined and specialized means by which workers fight for their immediate interests. When I speak of immediate interests, I do not mean higher wages, reforms, or a better quality of life. I speak of immediate interests as in their immediate conditions as proletarians, their immediate desire to conquer the state and destroy the class enemy.

You're getting so caught up in your empty rhetoric that you're confusing two separate things: workers fighting for their *immediate* interests, which can, and normally will, be realized within the context of capitalism (that's why we call them immediate: they are immediately realizable); and, on the other hand, a "desire to conquer the state," which is of course always in the objective interests of the proletariat, but isn't necessarily immediately realizable and therefore an "immediate interest." Unless, by immediate, you're meaning something other than how anybody else uses the term when talking about these issues.


Their immediate interests, as opposed to some eternal 'idea of a new society' that is exclusive only to the internet, their immediate interests within the class struggle. THIS is what I mean. Their immediate interests are grounded in the existing society, the existing reality, which is in itself its own destruction.Who is speaking of an "eternal idea of a new society"? We're talking about the Marxian vision of communism, which didn't exist until Marx wrote about it in response to the real movement of workers struggling against capitalism in the 19th century. Unless you think humankind developed from Marx's pen two hundred years ago, which would actually be consistent with all the other crazy ideas you spew on this forum, visions originating in the 19th century aren't "eternal."

But let's say for the sake of argument that overthrowing the bourgeois state is immediately realizable because we're in a revolutionary situation, and it therefore makes sense to speak of proletarian revolution as an "immediate interest" and "immediate demand." What does this say about your aversion to "visions of a new society"? How will workers be overthrowing the state? With their minds wiped blank, and no idea circulating about what kind of society they hope to establish to guide their immediate action of overthrowing the state? Won't the visions they have, the plans in their heads, constitute "visions of a new society?" And aren't those visions integral to the movement? And can't those visions be spoken about in abstraction, as a society free from class exploitation and institutionalized coercion emerging from control over the means of production?

In other words, all your bullshit objections to "visions of a new society" rests on this highly economistic and anti-humanist notion of workers being pawns of structural forces over which you assign living, breathing hmans no role in creating, shaping, or transforming. The only "agents" in your own vision of revolution (yes, ironically, you do have a vision, too, albeit a ridiculous one) are "interests," and that's it. In bouts of spontaneism, workers magically channel these interests in revolutionary acts, unaware of the place those interests are leading them.

All of this is highly ironic, since your milieu on this forum love to accuse Trotskyists and the transitional method specifically of "economism."


You fear a Communism with a modern context, because you are a petty bourgeois ideologue.What the fuck is this supposed to mean? You are either a troll or seriously delusional.

[MEGAMANTROTSKY]

Rhetoric about creating a new society is nothing more than an ideological expression of this very real, and grounded struggle for power (NOT for a utopia, and you can call it whatever the fuck you want, in the end what you among other users speak of is nothing short of utopia).
You're doing exactly what Nietzsche did when he attacked the Enlightenment thinkers--unmask the power relations behind their claims to objective truth and reduce it as such. This allows you to lazily dismiss any idea out of hand so you won't have to actually read up on what you're bashing, and you seem to do this quite often. The struggle for socialism requires a vision for a new world that will and must be entirely different than the old one. So what is your problem with utopian thought? I'm willing to bet that your knowledge of the subject goes no further than Engels' paper, "The development of socialism from utopia to science".

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

Happiness is never the goal of any revolutionary. Happiness is to be content, happiness is weakness.

This is pseudo-revolutionary bullshit. It is unabashed masculinism masquerading as 'bravery' or 'determination' or whatever characteristic one believes a 'professional revolutionary' must have.

If the goal of any new society is not happiness, itself a function of the form of society, of generalised living standards [themselves derivatives of various other factors such as participation in society, various freedoms, liberties and rights etc.], then it's pretty bogus and not really worthy of consideration IMO. At least I don't really want to follow an ideology that so easily discards the idea of 'happiness' as some sort of potential end goal.

[Thirsty Crow]

This is pseudo-revolutionary bullshit. It is unabashed masculinism masquerading as 'bravery' or 'determination' or whatever characteristic one believes a 'professional revolutionary' must have.

Not necessarily, I think. It might be just a restatement of that old belief that folks wouldn't struggle for a new kind of society if they're relatively content. Therefore proles must be miserable and destitute.

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

Not necessarily, I think. It might be just a restatement of that old belief that folks wouldn't struggle for a new kind of society if they're relatively content. Therefore proles must be miserable and destitute.

It's even more dangerous in that context, because it becomes embedded in the psyche that happiness, contentment etc. are not conducive to 'our' political goals. I think that's a pretty dangerous route to go down, given the complicated nature of a notion like 'happiness'.

[Rafiq]

I'm not going to waste time having a semantics argument with you, the dichotomy I was making was immediate, real interests vs. abstract utopia. If you do not believe that a proletarian dictatorship is capable of being a real, immediate interest, then you are not a Communist anyway. The proletarian dictatorship will not be realized overnight, the revolution will not happen in a day. Revolutionary consciousness, whether Trotskyist cults agitate them or not, will develop through the coarse of real struggles with the ruling class. Only in the process of this struggle does the proletariat speak of a 'new society', just as the romantic bourgeoisie spoke of a new society of civic virtue, and so on. Of coarse this does not mean revolutionary consciousness develops spontaneously, but the merger of Marxism and the proletarian movement, as Marx knew very well, can only arise with the spontaneous development of trade-union consciousness. We can never truly have a real, objective "vision" of this new society because such a society can only arise after the seizure of power, i.e. in circumstances and conditions that simply are not present, the revolution is not about to happen, revolutionary consciousness is not nearly built upon, no one can speculate about what this new society would ever possibly look like today and any talk of one is just nonsense.

Honestly, you didn't even know what I was talking about anyway (that is, your internet communism). You keep ignoring the most important segments of my post, and it's as though I have to rehash the same shit, only to have you most likely ignore it again. Five Year Plan, I'm sorry but you really shouldn't be arguing with me if you can't even grasp my own arguments. Why can't you just admit you were wrong and move on? Why do you so tirelessly look for these semantic openings to new straw man arguments? I'm sure it would make you feel really good if I truly was arguing for gradual reforms, if my alleged "social democratic politics" were showing, but they don't even exist, you were wrong, now move on.



Who is speaking of an "eternal idea of a new society"? We're talking about the Marxian vision of communism, which didn't exist until Marx wrote about it in response to the real movement of workers struggling against capitalism in the 19th century. Unless you think humankind developed from Marx's pen two hundred years ago, which would actually be consistent with all the other crazy ideas you spew on this forum, visions originating in the 19th century aren't "eternal."

Communism as a movement as well as the Communist idea existed before Marx, I know you don't know much about either of those things but it's important to know before you even further de-legitimize yourself. And I'm not just talking about Utopianism, there was a real Communist movement of which Marx did not create or found. But you're right, any speculation Marx had made about this 'new society' derived from the conditions of 19th century capitalism, and more importantly the conditions of the revolutionary proletariat movement of which he did not himself create. Marx was analyzing the revolutionary movement (which he was A PART OF) and from such a movement was he able to speculate upon what a proletarian dictatorship would look like. I mean for fuck's sake, the Paris Commune had very little to do with Marx. The difference of course today is that there does not exist such a movement, the embryo of any new society cannot be found anywhere, it is thus absurd to speak of being a Communist because "you want a better society". Of course for a delusional Trotskyist, I am sure there are plenty of irrelevant and worthless organizations which you consider a real vehicle of the class struggle, small sects you consider the locomotive of the revolution. I'm sure such feelings make you feel safe and comfortable, as deep down you probably know they're false. A real Communist movement, on the other hand, and the prospect of revolution in the 21st century could only ever terrify you.


But let's say for the sake of argument that overthrowing the bourgeois state is immediately realizable because we're in a revolutionary situation, and it therefore makes sense to speak of proletarian revolution as an "immediate interest" and "immediate demand." What does this say about your aversion to "visions of a new society"? How will workers be overthrowing the state? With their minds wiped blank, and no idea circulating about what kind of society they hope to establish to guide their immediate action of overthrowing the state? Won't the visions they have, the plans in their heads, constitute "visions of a new society?" And aren't those visions integral to the movement? And can't those visions be spoken about in abstraction, as a society free from class exploitation and institutionalized coercion emerging from control over the means of production?


Five Year Plan, when I say you don't understand my argument, I'm not calling you stupid, and i'm not insulting you. I'm saying you genuinely don't understand. Why? My point is not that workers will never have an idea of a new society in their heads. My point is that workers do not struggle (primarily) to realize this idea, I said workers do not struggle because they want a new society, they struggle not for your abstract utopia, but as a result of existing conditions. And I know you believe otherwise, because you're a Trotskyist, probably in some small Trotskyist sect thinking that your ideas (which have no context today) are going to somehow immediately be adopted by the proletariat. You struggle, on one hand, to realize your clever and brilliant ideas, the proletariat on the other hand struggles to achieve its ends. The revolution does not occur, as though the revolutionary proletariat were some obscene UFO cult, the idea of Communism cannot be some imposition on this sea of infinite ideas, rather the idea of Communism can only derive (or I should say, have context) from the real movement of the conscious proletariat. Marxism does not come in order to plant the idea of Communism in the heads of the workers (such an idea already follows in the process of their struggle), Marxism is a means of coherent, consistent revolutionary discipline, a means of understanding their present conditions in totality, it is the barrier against the spontaneous development of reactionary ideas (like nationalism) and the political sophistication of the revolutionary movement. On its own the proletarian movement can spiral into something entirely different in the blink of an eye if it does not have solid direction. Five Year Plan, show me a single argument that you have made that was not a straw-man. You're arguing with a ghost of your own creation.


In other words, all your bullshit objections to "visions of a new society" rests on this highly economistic and anti-humanist notion of workers being pawns of structural forces over which you assign living, breathing hmans no role in creating, shaping, or transforming. The only "agents" in your own vision of revolution (yes, ironically, you do have a vision, too, albeit a ridiculous one) are "interests," and that's it. In bouts of spontaneism, workers magically channel these interests in revolutionary acts, unaware of the place those interests are leading them.

All of this is highly ironic, since your milieu on this forum love to accuse Trotskyists and the transitional method specifically of "economism."


Don't you see that before I even read this little snip from your post, I already knew you were going to accuse me of spontaneism and economism? If you're that predictable, maybe you should re-approach your thought process as a whole, maybe you should think about my level of understanding of your arguments compared to your level of understanding of mine. You're only capable of straw-man, Five Year Plan, you take segments of my post you have absolutely no idea of, and you then accuse me of nonesense, and based on that false presumption you run wild with it, whether you accusing me of "economism" or whether you are saying my "Second international politics are showing". This is the second time you were completely, wholly and dead wrong, Five Year Plan if I was actually in your position, in all honestly, I would admit to my faults. Just come forward and admit you were wrong, admit you were unable to understand what I was talking about. There's nothing wrong with not knowing, but there's something wrong with thinking you do when you don't.

(Sorry but 'workers being pawns of structural forces' made me laugh, what does that even mean? That doesn't mean anything, you literally not only have no idea of what I'm talking about, you also have no idea of what structuralists or economic determinists are talking about either. Do you know what structural forces are?). Revolutionary consciousness does not arise spontaneously, but trade-union consciousness does. The skeleton of proletarian struggle, which is most usually present (and was only almost recently present, since the collapse of the Left), must be present in order for those specialized proletarians of revolutionary consciousness (or even, as Lenin had said, the bourgeois intelligentsia), to instill in the movement a political character, a revolutionary political character. Real direction. But this isn't the same as some fetishist, some kid who likes Communism as 'preference' or someone who claims to "be a Communist because the society sounds feasible". Workers do not struggle for such a society, they struggle to achieve their own ends. Evidently, your understanding of what a society will look like after capitalism (an abstract fantasy) does not coincide with their interests as a class. You completely ignore Marx and Engel's understanding of Utopinianism, Five Year Plan. You might cosmetically agree with them, you might change your wording and so on, but they spoke exactly about the kinds of people, like yourself and your ridiculous positions.


What the fuck is this supposed to mean? You are either a troll or seriously delusional.

This might be the 100th time I've delved into this, you're a petty bourgeois ideologue in that your Communism is nothing short of an 'intellectual' utopian fetish, it is derived from not the land of the living but previous movements which no longer exist, previous contexts which are not present. In recognizing that your Communism has no place in the world, you take advantage of this and Communism becomes not a manifestation of proletarian interests, but a color, a costume that veils your petty bourgeois character. You claim to oppose the existing order not from the existing conditions of politics and even social relations, but from previous conditions. It's almost like how the American Tea Party uses slogans and rhetoric from late 18th century American politics, though that's not the best example (for a lot of problematic reasons).

[Rafiq]

You're doing exactly what Nietzsche did when he attacked the Enlightenment thinkers--unmask the power relations behind their claims to objective truth and reduce it as such.

Not necessarily Nietzsche, this is an understanding of ideology. Do you think it is possible to be outside of ideology? The answer is no, and for that reason we must recognize ideology does not always coincide with objective reality, it thus yes, veils a real class interest, class relations which are the only meaningful power-relations existent. It's so cute how all the Trotskyists flock to here like pigeons.



If the goal of any new society is not happiness, itself a function of the form of society, of generalised living standards [themselves derivatives of various other factors such as participation in society, various freedoms, liberties and rights etc.], then it's pretty bogus and not really worthy of consideration IMO. At least I don't really want to follow an ideology that so easily discards the idea of 'happiness' as some sort of potential end goal.


Not necessarily, I think. It might be just a restatement of that old belief that folks wouldn't struggle for a new kind of society if they're relatively content. Therefore proles must be miserable and destitute.


It's even more dangerous in that context, because it becomes embedded in the psyche that happiness, contentment etc. are not conducive to 'our' political goals. I think that's a pretty dangerous route to go down, given the complicated nature of a notion like 'happiness'.

You're both very wrong. Happiness is a personal matter and can never be politicized. When I speak of happiness, I speak of happiness in terms of happiness being a life goal, which for any revolutionary it should not and can not. A revolutionary struggles for the revolution indiscriminate of his own happiness. Name me a revolutionary who was ever truly happy. To politicize or prioritize your happiness is to be content, but that does not mean our goal is to create conditions of "misery" for the proletariat. The point is that our revolutionary politics must go beyond the direct and animalistic feelings of misery/happiness. Do you think high living standards lead to happiness? They don't, life in the end is quite a pile of shit, the point is that we wish to create the conditions and space where such petty concepts can be dwindled upon in the first place. But no, as an end goal, happiness has nothing to do with the revolution, it is possible to be 'happy' within the miserable conditions of capitalism, there are plenty of happy spiritualists, we can trick and manipulate our minds into being 'happy'. I go as far as saying that even without alleviating the social ills of the proletariat, it is possible to have a 'happy society', a 'content' society. We must not be concerned with our own happiness as far as the struggle for emancipation goes, and yes even if it means our political goals do not coincide with our own happiness. A happy proletariat can still be an exploited proletariat, a happiness and oppression are not necessarily opposed. To derive happiness from existing circumstances which are oppressive, which is wholly possible indiscriminate of class, is the personal legitimization of such circumstances. A slave, not caring for the prospect of emancipation can happily go on serving his master so long as he recognizes his existing condition as a given. Conversely, a population of miserable and wretched people never equates to revolutionary consciousness. A great majority of those living in ghettos are miserable, are not 'happy' and yet are not the least bit inclined for insurrection. The point is that such dichotomy has no place in our struggle, the struggle for communism goes beyond our present standards of not only reason, but humanity while knowing full well of our imperfection, of our constrains and limits, we can only know the wholeness and perfection of any revolutionary struggle, we can only strive for Communism and the revolution.

And look how Vlad, like some kind of pompous liberal technocrat speaks of "dangerous". Good, a revolution is a very dangerous thing, Communism is an incredibly dangerous thing. If you fear danger, than you should re-approach your identification with Communism in the first place.

[Rafiq]

I mean I cannot even begin to dwell upon how cult-like, how ridiculous and how obscene talk of creating a 'happy society' is. We are not here to find salvation, we are not here to struggle amidst a sea of bloodshed and hardship by deceiving anyone into thinking they're going to have 72 virgins waiting for them in the end. We struggle to the very, bitter end, unapologetically for power.

Oh, but notice everyone how Five Year Plan can only address my posts out of context. The next post he makes will ignore all the crucial aspects of my argument, he'll respond to a mere segment out of context and claim "So you're saying...". No, that's not what I'm saying, of course though if he addressed the entire post, he wouldn't be able to make the arguments he does... Perhaps he wouldn't be able to make any arguments at all.

[MEGAMANTROTSKY]

Not necessarily Nietzsche, this is an understanding of ideology. Do you think it is possible to be outside of ideology? The answer is no, and for that reason we must recognize ideology does not always coincide with objective reality, it thus yes, veils a real class interest, class relations which are the only meaningful power-relations existent. It's so cute how all the Trotskyists flock to here like pigeons.
The belittling of principles to the "will to power" is in fact entirely Nietzsche, but thank you for admitting to reductionism. You also failed to answer my question: Why are you against utopian thought? You practically write novels of grab-bag metaphors and other such stupidities in your usual responses, yet you can't answer a very simple question?

[Five Year Plan]

Rafiq, a conversation requires that one's interlocutor be willing to answer questions. You dodged mine, so I will repeat them: How will workers be overthrowing the state? With their minds wiped blank, and no idea circulating about what kind of society they hope to establish to guide their immediate action of overthrowing the state? Won't the visions they have, the plans in their heads, constitute "visions of a new society?" And aren't those visions integral to the movement? And can't those visions be spoken about in abstraction, as a society free from class exploitation and institutionalized coercion emerging from control over the means of production?

You can ramble on and on about how I don't understand what you're saying, but if you don't answer these questions, there's really not much remaining for either of us to say.

[Five Year Plan]

The belittling of principles to the "will to power" is in fact entirely Nietzsche, but thank you for admitting to reductionism. You also failed to answer my question: Why are you against utopian thought? You practically write novels of grab-bag metaphors and other such stupidities in your usual responses, yet you can't answer a very simple question?

Clearly, Megaman, if you don't attribute ideology to some amorphous trans-historical will to power, you must think that you can exist outside of ideology! Profound!

[Rafiq]

QUOTE=Five Year Plan;2766273]Rafiq, a conversation requires that one's interlocutor be willing to answer questions. You dodged mine, so I will repeat them: How will workers be overthrowing the state? With their minds wiped blank, and no idea circulating about what kind of society they hope to establish to guide their immediate action of overthrowing the state? Won't the visions they have, the plans in their heads, constitute "visions of a new society?" And aren't those visions integral to the movement? And can't those visions be spoken about in abstraction, as a society free from class exploitation and institutionalized coercion emerging from control over the means of production?

You can ramble on and on about how I don't understand what you're saying, but if you don't answer these questions, there's really not much remaining for either of us to say.[/QUOTE]

Such a quetion derives only from your straw man argument. I claimed, specifically that


Why? My point is not that workers will never have an idea of a new society in their heads. My point is that workers do not struggle (primarily) to realize this idea, I said workers do not struggle because they want a new society, they struggle not for your abstract utopia, but as a result of existing conditions.



The difference of course today is that there does not exist such a movement, the embryo of any new society cannot be found anywhere, it is thus absurd to speak of being a Communist because "you want a better society".

So my point is that yes if a proletarian revolution was imminent, then some idea of what comes after of coarse is logical. That is a given. My point is that the proletariat does not struggle because they want to realize some idea of a new society, the idea of a new society comes as a result of their struggle against the class enemy. They struggle to realize their interests. For example if someone like you were to talk of a new society, it is Utopianism, there is absolutely no context for one. I shouldn't have to say that though, because it was all in my post. Maybe if you actually read the entire post, instead of dismissing it as rambling, you'd understand that. What's your next move? You're going to accuse me of spontaneism, even though anyone who read my post wouldn't. I can't believe how predictable you are. Address my points Five, don't just reply to this little segment, address my post, everything is in there. And no, such a society cannot be thought of in abstraction because the advanced revolutionary proletarian movement in itself is the embryo of such a society, there is no abstraction there - when the prospect of proletarian dictatorship is feasible, there can be no abstraction. But is this what Marx did? In the Communist manifesto, what were his ten planks? They were what to do once the proletariat took power, as a Communist revolution seemed very feasible, very imminent. Were they some kind of picture of a new society? No, they were immediate goals.

So if a proletarian dictatorship is imminent, if a revolution is imminent, we would not loll upon some 'new society' but would establish something like the ten planks, Embedded in revolutionary consciousness is the new society itself. The point is not that we impose this idea upon society, the point is that the bourgeois dictatorship is the real imposition, we know precisely what to abolish, we fight against what exists now. Saint Just said every king was a usurper, THIS is the logic we abide by, we do not 'impose' this fantasy on reality, rather we claim reality for our own, we change reality. In struggling with the bourgeoisie, the proletariat already knows what it wants. Before the bolshevik revolution the proletariat had been mobilised en masse by a strong party and were embedded with revolutionary consciousness, within their existing conditions they knew what was to be done, whole segments of the industiral proletariat, virtually all of them were ready to spill their blood in the acquisition of power. That's different from some kid on reddit, or Five Year Plan talking about creating a new happy society, that's different form someone professing their "Marxism" because they want a new, better society. As I said before:


Marxism does not come in order to plant the idea of Communism in the heads of the workers (such an idea already follows in the process of their struggle), Marxism is a means of coherent, consistent revolutionary discipline, a means of understanding their present conditions in totality, it is the barrier against the spontaneous development of reactionary ideas (like nationalism) and the political sophistication of the revolutionary movement. On its own the proletarian movement can spiral into something entirely different in the blink of an eye if it does not have solid direction

Of course you're only going to take a lot of my post out of context, of coarse you won't address any of this in a meaningful way. You'll quote a snip, say "So you're saying..." and run wild with your nonsense. Go ahead, you're so predictable at this point it's a given.

[Rafiq]

Why are you against utopian thought? You practically write novels of grab-bag metaphors and other such stupidities in your usual responses, yet you can't answer a very simple question?

Because I shouldn't have to fucking tell you why I oppose utopian thought! Because It's a given, I'm a Marxist, I oppose it not only for the same reason that any other Marxist does, I oppose utopianism because it is worthless, I oppose utopianism because it only exists to abstractly simulate a society based on the presumptions of the existing order and hegemonic ideology, and claim to be something new. Utopianism reproduces the existing order, solely because it is a form of bourgeois ideological masturbation, like a movie, like a piece of bourgeois literature. Utopianism of course is inherently anti-scientific and wholly idealist, wholly ridiculous, it's childish. Why should I even have to say any of this?

WHY DO YOU OPPOSE RELIGION? WHY DO YOU OPPOSE UFO CULTS? what the FUCK is the difference as far as the quality of the question goes?


Clearly, Megaman, if you don't attribute ideology to some amorphous trans-historical will to power, you must think that you can exist outside of ideology! Profound!


You speak sarcastically, but who are you to speak sarcastically? You don't even know what I'm talking about! When have I claimed that the proletariat's will to power was "trans-historical"? When did I claim I even adhered to Nietzche's understanding of the will to power/ Nietzche in many respects could be understood in incredibly reactionary terms, this is not what I am getting at. The desire for power is a very real thing, the whole of class struggle is the struggle for power. What other means can classes realize their interests if not for the acquisition of power? Social development aside, if there is no class based will to power why did the bourgeoisie find it necessary to take control of the state? This is ALL the more relevant for the proletariat, who cannot create the social foundations of a new society within capitalism! Whose only means of pursuing their interests is political struggle and the conquest of the state! No one claims this is necessarily trans-historical. YOU CANNOT be outside of ideology, I do not claim to be, but we can understand the NATURE of ideology.

[Five Year Plan]

So my point is that yes if a proletarian revolution was imminent, then some idea of what comes after of coarse is logical. That is a given. My point is that the proletariat does not struggle because they want to realize some idea of a new society, the idea of a new society comes as a result of their struggle against the class enemy. They struggle to realize their interests. For example if someone like you were to talk of a new society, it is Utopianism, there is absolutely no context for one. I shouldn't have to say that though, because it was all in my post. Maybe if you actually read the entire post, instead of dismissing it as rambling, you'd understand that. What's your next move? You're going to accuse me of spontaneism, even though anyone who read my post wouldn't. I can't believe how predictable you are. Address my points Five, don't just reply to this little segment, address my post, everything is in there. And no, such a society cannot be thought of in abstraction because the advanced revolutionary proletarian movement in itself is the embryo of such a society, there is no abstraction there - when the prospect of proletarian dictatorship is feasible, there can be no abstraction. But is this what Marx did? In the Communist manifesto, what were his ten planks? They were what to do once the proletariat took power, as a Communist revolution seemed very feasible, very imminent. Were they some kind of picture of a new society? No, they were immediate goals.

If you can't think of a socialist society in abstraction, then how do you try to persuade other workers to fight for socialism? I'm guessing the art of persuasion isn't part of your vision for fighting for sparking a socialist revolution at all. Then you act mystified why anybody would accuse you of spontaneism. What you're talking about here has nothing to do with Marxism, since Marx spent the better part of his life trying to explain capitalism to, argue with, and persuade the working class that it shouldn't just fight for reforms, but to incorporate those reforms into a larger struggle against capitalism as a system.


So if a proletarian dictatorship is imminent, if a revolution is imminent, we would not loll upon some 'new society' but would establish something like the ten planks, Embedded in revolutionary consciousness is the new society itself.So workers won't have a vision of a new society, but "the new society itself" is "embedded in revolutionary consciousness"? Who possesses this "revolutionary consciousness" that contains "the new society itself"? Obviously not workers, in your vision, since you refuse to concede that socialist workers struggling for socialist revolution have a vision for a new society.


Saint Just said every king was a usurper, THIS is the logic we abide by, we do not 'impose' this fantasy on reality, rather we claim reality for our own, we change reality.But apparently we don't change reality by first envisioning what that changed reality for which we are struggling looks like.


In struggling with the bourgeoisie, the proletariat already knows what it wants.As I said, pure spontaneism. No need to persuade the non-revolutionary workers to overthrow the state: they already know they want to overthrow the state. I guess everybody on revleft can just go home and watch $25,000 Pyramid. We'll let you with your bad poetry and all-round trollery take care of things on behalf of the workers, since what workers want is an obvious given. That's the goal with your deranged vision, isn't it?

[Five Year Plan]

You speak sarcastically, but who are you to speak sarcastically?

I am the Lizard King. I can do anything. (I specialize in troll removal: for this month 25% off the sticker price.) Now begone, before somebody drops a house on you, too!

[Rafiq]

If you can't think of a socialist society in abstraction, then how do you try to persuade other workers to fight for socialism?

Socialism is a movement, an ideology we do not "persuade" workers to join in on trying to realize your stupid fantasies, all Marxists including Marx himself recognize that workers do not struggle to realize our intellectual brilliance, rather we give them the necessary direction in the realization of their class interests. Just because revolutionary consciousness does not develop spontaneously DOES NOT MEAN it must be 'imposed' on the proletariat like some silly religion. The presuppostion of the class struggle itself (WHICH IS NOT the result of the will of Marxists) is where the Marxists have a place in the struggle, the class struggle MUST EXIST in whatever pathetic, petty form, in order for revolutionary consciousness to arise. This however has nothing to do with convincing workers that your abstract society is better than capitalism. Workers, struggling recognize as a given that there is something wrong with our society, it is the struggle for state power that is in the end the ONLY solution for them.


So workers won't have a vision of a new society, but "the new society itself" is "embedded in revolutionary consciousness"? Who possesses this "revolutionary consciousness" that contains "the new society itself"? Obviously not workers, in your vision, since you refuse to concede that socialist workers struggling for socialist revolution have a vision for a new society.


We are speaking of the revolutionary movement that would have to have already existed for this 'new society' to be spoken of. The revolutionary movement does not exist because they 'want a new society' in the first place, Five Year Plan. Of course if we presume your false presumptions are correct, then your argument holds ground.


As I said, pure spontaneism. No need to persuade the non-revolutionary workers to overthrow the state: they already know they want to overthrow the state.


I said
In struggling with the bourgeoisie, the proletariat already knows what it wants

If the proletariat struggles against the bourgeoisie, which is something that had occurred before Marx, they already know what they want, or should I say, what they DON'T want. The goals of the revolution occur in the process of struggle itself. THIS IS NOT spontaneism because the bourgeois intelligentsia, or the specialized intelligentsia among the proletariat must... WHAT THE FUCK? Wait, I already said all of this! I literally fucking said this!


Marxism does not come in order to plant the idea of Communism in the heads of the workers (such an idea already follows in the process of their struggle), Marxism is a means of coherent, consistent revolutionary discipline, a means of understanding their present conditions in totality, it is the barrier against the spontaneous development of reactionary ideas (like nationalism) and the political sophistication of the revolutionary movement. On its own the proletarian movement can spiral into something entirely different in the blink of an eye if it does not have solid direction.



Only in the process of this struggle does the proletariat speak of a 'new society', just as the romantic bourgeoisie spoke of a new society of civic virtue, and so on. Of coarse this does not mean revolutionary consciousness develops spontaneously, but the merger of Marxism and the proletarian movement, as Marx knew very well, can only arise with the spontaneous development of trade-union consciousness



Revolutionary consciousness does not arise spontaneously, but trade-union consciousness does. The skeleton of proletarian struggle, which is most usually present (and was only almost recently present, since the collapse of the Left), must be present in order for those specialized proletarians of revolutionary consciousness (or even, as Lenin had said, the bourgeois intelligentsia), to instill in the movement a political character, a revolutionary political character. Real direction. But this isn't the same as some fetishist, some kid who likes Communism as 'preference' or someone who claims to "be a Communist because the society sounds feasible"


This is something Lenin understood well when he spoke of the spontaneous development of trade-union consciousness! The point however is that REVOLUTIONARY consciousness is not utopianism, rather it is radical-political sophistication, it is the embryo of the proletarian dictatorship to follow the revolution.

Five Year Plan accuses me of spontaneism, as though he can ignore my previous post, as though it never happened. He wants to bury it in this obscure shitfest of a thread, he would not DARE directly reply to these little snips, and why? Because he cannot, he can only accuse me of 'poetry' and 'mysticism'. He simply cannot confront my posts for what they are, he must fit them within his own silly Trotskyist paradigm. http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.php?p=2766256&postcount=82

Of course to you there is no such thing as a real struggle or real movement. To you, it's like a single-issue campaign to realize your abstract fantasies. Marx spoke DIRECTLY about this, about this kind of mentality.

Oh, and does anyone think I'm wrong about Five Year Plan, still?


Of course you're only going to take a lot of my post out of context, of coarse you won't address any of this in a meaningful way. You'll quote a snip, say "So you're saying..." and run wild with your nonsense. Go ahead, you're so predictable at this point it's a given.



Oh, but notice everyone how Five Year Plan can only address my posts out of context. The next post he makes will ignore all the crucial aspects of my argument, he'll respond to a mere segment out of context and claim "So you're saying...". No, that's not what I'm saying, of course though if he addressed the entire post, he wouldn't be able to make the arguments he does... Perhaps he wouldn't be able to make any arguments at all.



I shouldn't have to say that though, because it was all in my post. Maybe if you actually read the entire post, instead of dismissing it as rambling, you'd understand that. What's your next move? You're going to accuse me of spontaneism, even though anyone who read my post wouldn't. I can't believe how predictable you are. Address my points Five, don't just reply to this little segment, address my post,

[Rafiq]

Five Year Plan's "socialism" is wholly and completely divorced from the proletarian movement historically. He is nothing short of a petty bourgeois ideologue and a Utopian, he presumes his understanding of socialism is correct, and then attacks me as though is presumptions are a breath of fresh air.

[Five Year Plan]

Socialism is a movement, an ideology we do not "persuade" workers to join in on trying to realize your stupid fantasies, all Marxists including Marx himself recognize that workers do not struggle to realize our intellectual brilliance, rather we give them the necessary direction in the realization of their class interests.

And how do we (revolutionaries) give them (the non-revolutionary workers) the necessary direction? I say that it is by presenting arguments about how their antagonism to capital points to the need to create a new society by overthrowing capitalism and its state. How do you "give them the necessary direction" without engaging their ideas, their perceptions, their visions?


Just because revolutionary consciousness does not develop spontaneously DOES NOT MEAN it must be 'imposed' on the proletariat like some silly religion.Presenting arguments to workers while joining them in struggles that will hopefully lead them to accept those arguments through experience is not "imposing" anything on workers. It is accepting that workers will need to be treated and respected like thinking people, who accept and reject ideas (or as you call them "visions") by constantly testing them against experience.



The presuppostion of the class struggle itself (WHICH IS NOT the result of the will of Marxists) is where the Marxists have a place in the struggle, the class struggle MUST EXIST in whatever pathetic, petty form, in order for revolutionary consciousness to arise. This however has nothing to do with convincing workers that your abstract society is better than capitalism. Workers, struggling recognize as a given that there is something wrong with our society, it is the struggle for state power that is in the end the ONLY solution for them.Nobody is saying that workers need to be persuaded to engage in struggle. They do, however, needed to be persuaded to carry that struggle through to smashing capitalism and its state. The society we are discussing isn't abstract in the sense of being arbitrary, utopian, or unrelated to the present movement of workers. It is abstract because only general characteristics of it can be understood, as the concrete specifics that haven't been fleshed out in practice need to be "abstracted" out precisely because we don't want the vision to be imposed arbitrarily from Rafiq's fevered imagination. This "new society" is the society whose preconditions are developing, and in fact are past due, in the womb of the present society. So stop accusing me of "imposing" things out of the blue from my imagination.


We are speaking of the revolutionary movement that would have to have already existed for this 'new society' to be spoken of. The revolutionary movement does not exist because they 'want a new society' in the first place, Five Year Plan. Of course if we presume your false presumptions are correct, then your argument holds ground.A movement becomes revolutionary because people involved in them have decided to carry out a revolution. In the process of making that decision, they entertain their options, they deliberate, and are ultimately persuaded that one particular vision of how they want reality to be is more appealing than the others. Guess what that means? They struggle for the new society, the society that exists after a qualitative break in power relations, because they have a vision of that society and think it's better than the alternative visions.

But please: caricature this as saying I'm dreaming up my own vision of a utopian society that I then want to boss workers into.

[Rafiq]

And how do we (revolutionaries) give them (the non-revolutionary workers) the necessary direction? I say that it is by presenting arguments about how their antagonism to capital points to the need to create a new society by overthrowing capitalism and its state. How do you "give them the necessary direction" without engaging their ideas, their perceptions, their visions?

Direction comes from coherent revolutionary discipline, a consistent ideological universe and the adoption of theoretical, political sophistication into the mass movement. That's quite different from advertising your remedy to capitalism, a 'new society' which is, whatever you like to write it off as, wholly alien and without context. Revolutionary fervor is not synonomous with the lust for a 'new society', one could easily recognize that such utopian abstractions are nothing short of the ideological manifestation of presumptions of the EXISTING order and ruling ideology, which say nothing about a potential new society, but everything about our existing society. You seem to think that workers struggle and mobilize in the first place because they buy into such nonsense, while the truth is infinitely more complicated. The idea of a new society, is derived from the struggle itself. The struggle which presently does not exist (your assertion that there is an actual revolutionary movement in the U.S. is evidence of your delusions).


A movement becomes revolutionary because people involved in them have decided to carry out a revolution. In the process of making that decision, they entertain their options, they deliberate, and are ultimately persuaded that one particular vision of how they want reality to be is more appealing than the others. Guess what that means? They struggle for the new society, the society that exists after a qualitative break in power relations, because they have a vision of that society and think it's better than the alternative visions.


No, a movement becomes revolutionary when the struggle itself reaches a certain climax -not simply because people 'decide' anything, that begs the question - what prompts them to decide? It's very simple. The belief in another society, and another social order does not come out of its rationality or feasability. Rather it is derived from the egalitarian spirit itself, proletarian ideology, it is derived from the conditions of the movement itself. It is not telling of what really this new society would look like, but the ideological nature of the revolutionary movement (Not in the sense of 'is it fascist, is it liberal', but the fundamental nature of the struggle and the ideas that sustain this struggle). Petty bourgeois intellectuals see the stormy alterations of the revolutionary movement and the struggle as an ugly means to a pretty ends. Rather, the movement itself is the real ends in that the logical conclusion of the seizure of power is an act inherent to the struggle itself, not inherent to those speculating or sympathizing with it. This was Trotsky's greatest crime - he was a sympathizer, and apologist.

[Five Year Plan]

Direction comes from coherent revolutionary discipline, a consistent ideological universe and the adoption of theoretical, political sophistication into the mass movement.

This says absolutely nothing. You've just provided synonyms for "the necessary direction" non-revolutionary workers are to receive. You don't explain how they are to receive it, which was the question I asked. So far you're batting a perfect score in dodging every single one of my questions while spouting bizarre and non-sensical rhetorical flourishes.


No, a movement becomes revolutionary when the struggle itself reaches a certain climax -not simply because people 'decide' anything, that begs the question - what prompts them to decide? It's very simple. The belief in another society, and another social order does not come out of its rationality or feasability. Rather it is derived from the egalitarian spirit itself,I always thought that workers would become revolutionary when other, revolutionary workers presented compelling arguments, arguments that lined up with real-life experience workers have as they are involved in the movement. But here you've convinced me otherwise. Thanks, Rafiq! Now I know that "the egalitarian spirit" is responsible for convincing them.

Please enlighten me: how do I get baptized in this egalitarian spirit? Is an ordained minister necessary to administer the baptism? I want to know because I want to advance the struggle. Thanks for redirecting me away from the path of abstract idealism and utopianism!

[Rafiq]

My post is there, anyone can read it, it's fine if you take things out of context and pretend to formulate an actual argument to the point of the whole post, but you're wrong.

You claim 'this sais absolutely nothing' but overlook


Revolutionary fervor is not synonomous with the lust for a 'new society', one could easily recognize that such utopian abstractions are nothing short of the ideological manifestation of presumptions of the EXISTING order and ruling ideology, which say nothing about a potential new society, but everything about our existing society. You seem to think that workers struggle and mobilize in the first place because they buy into such nonsense, while the truth is infinitely more complicated. The idea of a new society, is derived from the struggle itself. The struggle which presently does not exist (your assertion that there is an actual revolutionary movement in the U.S. is evidence of your delusions).


You just don't get it. The point wasn't that 'egilitarian spirit' was a means of convincing anyone, the point was that there is no need for such convincing. Long before Marx the egilitarian spirit was inherent to the proletarian movement. It is not a matter of convincing, but providing direction. It's not a matter of compelling arguments. You don't understand the notion of collective action, you don't understand how humans behave really. It's not a matter of convincing individuals, real movements, despite being composed of individuals are capable of forming a character of their own. Hell this is the story of humanity: As individuals we are worthless, our power comes from that we are social animals.

You think the phrase 'egilitarian spirit' sounds funny, and your run wild with your nonsense and accuse me of not elaborating or making a sufficient argument. Maybe if you read the rest of the sentence


it is derived from the conditions of the movement itself. It is not telling of what really this new society would look like, but the ideological nature of the revolutionary movement (Not in the sense of 'is it fascist, is it liberal', but the fundamental nature of the struggle and the ideas that sustain this struggle)

Such an argument couldn't be made.

I think you might be trolling, but if anyone's interested in this discussion, they can form their own conclusions as to whether Five Year Plan is being honest in his arguments.

[Five Year Plan]

My post is there, anyone can read it, it's fine if you take things out of context and pretend to formulate an actual argument to the point of the whole post, but you're wrong.

You claim 'this sais absolutely nothing' but overlook



You just don't get it.

You think the phrase 'egilitarian spirit' sounds funny, and your run wild with your nonsense and accuse me of not elaborating or making a sufficient argument. Maybe if you read the rest of the sentence



Such an argument couldn't be made.

I think you might be trolling, but if anyone's interested in this discussion, they can form their own conclusions as to whether Five Year Plan is being honest in his arguments.

You still don't explain how non-revolutionary workers become revolutionary. How does it happen?

[Rafiq]

Do you actually think class based movements arise because they are 'convinced' by brilliant thinkers? Because they 'buy into' our brilliant arguments? Are you a child?

[Five Year Plan]

Do you actually think class based movements arise because they are 'convinced' by brilliant thinkers? Because they 'buy into' our brilliant arguments? Are you a child?

I am a fair person, and I am open to alternative models of how non-revolutionary workers become revolutionary. The problem here is that you've been asked twice to provide an alternative explanation, but haven't done so. I wonder why.

[Rafiq]

You still don't explain how non-revolutionary workers become revolutionary. How does it happen?

Marxists, intellectuals, whatever, provide the necessarily theoretical and political discipline making them aware of their present conditions. Thus the intensification of the class struggle breeds the revolutionary movement. Again that's different from 'compelling' them to buy into our notion of a new society, rather it is making them aware of the illegitimacy of the ruling class and it's political rule. I can't put it in any other way, but workers are generally attracted to the ideas of those of revolutionary consciousness, it is not really a matter of 'convincing' , pamphlets by Marx weren't advertised, they logically gained popularity among the already radicalised proletariat. As Communists we must recognize that truly Communism is a manifestation of their interests, again we provide direction, we do not 'compel' them. The struggle derives from existing conditions, not potential conditions.

Honest question, are you trolling?

[Rafiq]

It is not simply one or the other, either they are implanted with ideas or develop them spontaneously - rather over the coarse of their real struggles to realize their interests, the nature of their struggle can become confused, degenerate and so on - which is why revolutionary consciousness must necessarily be adopted externally from those fully aware of existing conditions.

If you're generally curious, then I recommend looking into the development of radical politics and the proletarian movements of the 19th century, how they developed as radical offspring of the bourgeois revolutionary fervor, in realization that their interests were not being fulfilled by the bourgeoisie.

[Five Year Plan]

Marxists, intellectuals, whatever, provide the necessarily theoretical and political discipline making them aware of their present conditions.

So Marxist intellectuals present arguments about how workers should understand their experiences, and how they might go about changing those experiences in the most effective way? Gee, this sounds an awful lot like "brilliant thinkers" convincing people. Are you a child?


Thus the intensification of the class struggle breeds the revolutionary movement. Again that's different from 'compelling' them to buy into our notion of a new society, rather it is making them aware of the illegitimacy of the ruling class and it's political rule.Who said anything about "compelling" workers to do anything? Making arguments is nowhere near the same as compulsion. In fact, where compulsion is possible, arguments become unnecessary.



I can't put it in any other way, but workers are generally attracted to the ideas of those of revolutionary consciousness, it is not really a matter of 'convincing' , pamphlets by Marx weren't advertised, they logically gained popularity among the already radicalised proletariat. As Communists we must recognize that truly Communism is a manifestation of their interests, again we provide direction, we do not 'compel' them. The struggle derives from existing conditions, not potential conditions.If workers are "generally attracted to the ideas of those of revolutionary consciousness," then isn't it incumbent upon "those of revolutionary consciousness" to put forward their ideas as forthrightly as possible, including their understanding of what a revolution would entail and the kind of society a revolution would help to create?

You spend multiple posts deriding the idea that revolutionaries should engage non-revolutionary workers' ideas and "visions," then, when pressed upon an alternative model of how to make non-revolutionary workers revolutionary, you basically just spit out a tortured restatement of that very model. Then you ask whether I am trolling? That's rich.

[Rafiq]

You can't 'make' non-revolutionary workers revolutionary, it is not so much pure reason we are talking about, or what you are claiming to say. It is your very ideological foundations that would prompt you to say such a thing, 'How do we make non-revolutionary workers revolutionary'. It's like a senator in the U.S. being politically correct about his racism, or saying he 'opposes big government'. It is not so much the problem of what you claim to say, but why you say it in the manner you do. your infantile understanding of the development of revolutionary consciousness makes this very difficult for you to understand, I know.

No, I cannot provide a simplistic, straightforward answer to that question because it is really a false question, and the situation itself is not simple, You ask such a question while assuming your presumptions about the revolution are correct in the first place, and they are not. And when I attack them, like a broken record you repeat the same nonsense and make it as though I am incapable of answering the question without giving a "tortured restatement".

Brilliant thinkers do not create the movement, or 'compel' (Yes, you did use that word) workers to 'be revolutionary', they provide the necessary direction by which workers become revolutionary as a logical result of the pursuit of their own ends. That is a lot different from brilliant thinkers convincing people of trying to struggle for what they believe is a nice sounding society.

You are casually and ignorantly equating the struggle against the existing order with the struggle for a utopia, and that therin is the problem. The conquest of power in which the proletariat is able to realize their interests will logically create conditions for a new order, however it is the former that which the struggle exists for, the later is simply an effect. It is very difficult for you to understand, and you'll respond to this predictably with "YOU'RE DODGING THE QUESTION". The very nature of your question is ridiculous. I am curious, are you actually trolling? Only a troll could be capable of spouting such nonsense, it's like you're ignoring the entirety of my posts, skimming over them and finding snippets which are completely out of context that you think you could provide an argument with. You're taking my clothing from me and creating from them a straw-man, either not aware, or ignorant of the fact that I'm standing right here, a real person of which such clothing is meaningless without. The whole of my post is that person, and those snippets are the straw.

[Rafiq]

My posts are here, everyone can read them thoughtfully and form there own conclusions. There is nothing you have posted that I haven't thoroughly addressed previously. And it's not so far off the bat that you're trolling (albeit, in a sophisticated manner) once people have a grasp of the discussion.

But go ahead, re-hash the same nonsense, maybe the 10th time your argument will mean something.

[Five Year Plan]

You can't 'make' non-revolutionary workers revolutionary, it is not so much pure reason we are talking about, or what you are claiming to say.

This would be a compelling point if I hadn't said, just two posts ago: "I always thought that workers would become revolutionary when other, revolutionary workers presented compelling arguments, arguments that lined up with real-life experience workers have as they are involved in the movement."

So, no, nobody here is advocating "making" or "compelling" workers to do anything. And nobody is advocating the use of "pure reason" divorced from struggle. You are have erected a completely false dichotomy where either a revolutionary rubbishes any talk of arguments and subjectivity and deliberation, or else somebody falls victim to pure reason. Both options have no relationship to the revolutionary, Marxist understanding of how subjectivity changes: by individuals apprehending their world through an ideological prism, measuring up those ideological preconceptions to their actual experiences, and then potentially choosing as a result of their experience to adjust their understandings and views of the world accordingly.


It is your very ideological foundations that would prompt you to say such a thing, 'How do we make non-revolutionary workers revolutionary'. It's like a senator in the U.S. being politically correct about his racism, or saying he 'opposes big government'. It is not so much the problem of what you claim to say, but why you say it in the manner you do. your infantile understanding of the development of revolutionary consciousness makes this very difficult for you to understand, I know.Faulting me for framing my question as "how do you we make non-revolutionary workers revolutionary" is also funny, since the way I prefer framing the issue is the way that I did in my previous post: "how do workers become revolutionary?" The "authoritative" element actually comes from your initial attempt to address the issue, where you donned your faux macho revolutionary cap and proclaimed, chest puffed out, that "Marxists, intellectuals, whatever, provide the necessarily theoretical and political discipline making them aware of their present conditions."

See what you did there? You talked of Marxist intellectuals "disciplining" and "making the workers aware of things," then when I respond to this framework by replicating it, you fault me for adopting it. Epic trolling, that.


No, I cannot provide a simplistic, straightforward answer to that question because it is really a false question, and the situation itself is not simple, You ask such a question while assuming your presumptions about the revolution are correct in the first place, and they are not. And when I attack them, like a broken record you repeat the same nonsense and make it as though I am incapable of answering the question without giving a "tortured restatement".So you answer the question, then when I point out that your answer is just a bullshit, poorly worded restatement of the answer I originally gave, you back-peddle and claim that you can't answer the question. More fantastic trolling.


Brilliant thinkers do not create the movement, or 'compel' (Yes, you did use that word) workers to 'be revolutionary', they provide the necessary direction by which workers become revolutionary as a logical result of the pursuit of their own ends. That is a lot different from brilliant thinkers convincing people of trying to struggle for what they believe is a nice sounding society.I talked about workers presenting compelling arguments, not compelling workers. Do you understand the difference between compelling as an adjective and as a verb? I'm sure we can set up some rudimentary English tutoring if you aren't sure.

And yes, I agree that revolutionaries "provide the necessary direction by which workers become revolutionary." They do this by providing models of leadership in their activism, while simultaneously explaining to workers the rationale behind that behavior, specifically the need to overthrow capitalism and how the working class can begin to organize to achieve that task. You refuse to elaborate on what you mean by "provide necessary direction," because you know that if you do, you'll end up in the uncomfortable position of admitting that "visions of a new society" very much do play a role, not the *only* role, in how non-revolutionary workers become revolutionary.


You are casually and ignorantly equating the struggle against the existing order with the struggle for a utopia, and that therin is the problem.No, I'm not.


The conquest of power in which the proletariat is able to realize their interests will logically create conditions for a new order, however it is the former that which the struggle exists for, the later is simply an effect.And how does the conquest of power by workers occur? As a result of workers becoming revolutionary and seizing state power. And how does that occur? Oops. We're back to you trying to duck that most nettlesome of questions, so you can avoid talking about those "visions of a new society" again.


It is very difficult for you to understand, and you'll respond to this predictably with "YOU'RE DODGING THE QUESTION".Why would I need to accuse you of dodging the question any longer? You openly admit it in your own posts, claiming that your dodges are reasonable because I am supposedly asking "false questions."

It turns out that all the second-grade poetry and macho posturing you litter the board with is just a house of cards, Rafiq. It, and you, stand exposed. How does it feel?

[Rafiq]

So, no, nobody here is advocating "making" or "compelling" workers to do anything. And nobody is advocating the use of "pure reason"

Five Year Plan, you don't know what I'm talking about when I speak of "pure reason". I speak of pure reason not in the context of convincing or attracting workers, but this discussion, this argument itself. Your ideological foundations bleed through your words, and for that reason I cannot approach them for what you claim them to be. That is the problem.


Faulting me for framing my question as "how do you we make non-revolutionary workers revolutionary" is also funny, since the way I prefer framing the issue is the way that I did in my previous post: "how do workers become revolutionary?" The "authoritative" element actually comes from your initial attempt to address the issue, where you donned your faux macho revolutionary cap and proclaimed, chest puffed out, that "Marxists, intellectuals, whatever, provide the necessarily theoretical and political discipline making them aware of their present conditions."

See what you did there? You talked of Marxist intellectuals "disciplining" and "making the workers aware of things," then when I respond to this framework by replicating it, you fault me for adopting it. Epic trolling, that.


The problem is not the act of engaging workers and leading them to the abolishment of their present conditions, rather the problem is what exactly you're engaging them with. That was the point from start. As I had said countless times before, the problem are your false presumptions which you dismiss as a breath of fresh air. There is an astronomical difference between introducing the concept of abolishing their present conditions, fighting against the state - and telling them about your elaborate new society and what this 'new society' will entail. Marx said something along the lines of the embyro of communism is within present conditions for a reason. Because I do not answer your venus-fly trap of a question with simplicity, you then further accuse me of 'dodging the question':


So you answer the question, then when I point out that your answer is just a bullshit, poorly worded restatement of the answer I originally gave, you back-peddle and claim that you can't answer the question. More fantastic trolling.


Any idiot can recognize I've answered the question, I've answered the question countless times, I just haven't answered it the way you wanted me to. You're arguing like a child and honestly, I say this in the most comradely manner I can: Grow up. You're not winning this argument, you're making a fool of yourself and anyone whose had a mere glance at any one of my posts and the way you've replied to them recognizes this.


And yes, I agree that revolutionaries "provide the necessary direction by which workers become revolutionary." They do this by providing models of leadership in their activism, while simultaneously explaining to workers the rationale behind that behavior, specifically the need to overthrow capitalism and how the working class can begin to organize to achieve that task. You refuse to elaborate on what you mean by "provide necessary direction," because you know that if you do, you'll end up in the uncomfortable position of admitting that "visions of a new society" very much do play a role, not the *only* role, in how non-revolutionary workers become revolutionary.

And how does the conquest of power by workers occur? As a result of workers becoming revolutionary and seizing state power. And how does that occur? Oops. We're back to you trying to duck that most nettlesome of questions, so you can avoid talking about those "visions of a new society" again.


Necessary direction comes from the necessity of political action in consistency with Communist ideological doctrine forged in the fires of the struggle itself. It is up to the task of those of revolutionary consciousness to preserve, defend and uphold the Communist nature of the struggling proletariat, in order to further reintroduce it to them. What that means, essentially, is not 'pointing them in the direction of our new society' as you would have it, but pointing them to hte direction of the abolishment of their present conditions. While you predictably want to equate them, they are not the same. The latter is a direct act with context, the former is nothing short of the result of such a thing. The proletariat first and foremost wishes to achieve state power and abolish themselves - the rest, the 'new society' and all the immediate things that would entail (housing, work, and so on) would necessarily have to be addressed when the revolution is imminent or when the revolutionary struggle has reached a mature stage. However at no point in the struggle do we convince workers to buy into our little utopian fantasies. And what you fail to understand is that the blips of utopia within the Communist movement were ideological manifestations of the existing struggle, not any real hypothesis of what a post capitalist society would look like. Just as the stoics of Rome had their ideal societies which really embedded their actually existing class interests.

So what this essentially means is that, to give an example, the establishment of a real political program that would allow the proletariat to combat the enemy in the most effective means possible. You keep presuming that the end goal itself is this 'new society' and for that reason you keep accusing me of 'dodging the question'. That isn't how adults argue, Five Year Plan. Would workers have to be approached and given a 'vision of a new society'? They might be, who knows, but the point is that is not why they struggle in the first place. That was the basis of my initial argument and you simply lack the ability to address it for what it is without obfuscating it with some nonsense, and then running wild. Even more pathetic is how you profess your 'victory' over me because I refuse to argue within the parameters set forth by your ridiculous infantile presumptions.

I would never approach a white nationalist while abiding by the presumption "do you want white genocide?". How could anyone argue with this, if not giving a detailed explanation as to why such a concept is bunk in the first place. He may accuse you of dodging the question, but that's only because it's a false question in the first place.


And of course this is perfectly comparable, when you ask me if workers are going to need a "vision of a new society", I could only say maybe, I have to give a detailed explanation as to why - while they might have an idea of a new society in their heads this is a) Not reflective of what this society would actually look like and wholly ideological and most importantly b) they are not struggling as a class to realize this new society, rather they struggle for the conquest of state power by which such a new society would be a logical result. THE PREMISE OF THE ARGUMENT IS WHY THEY STRUGGLE, AND WHAT THEY ARE STRUGGLING FOR. IT IS NOT WHAT THEIR PRESUMPTIONS ABOUT A POST-CAPITALIST SOCIETY ARE. I know this is very hard for you to understand, often times with non-Marxists it is difficult, but bear with me Five Year Plan.

A logical result of the conquest of state power is going to be global civil war, madness and barbarism in the suppression of the counter revolution. Do workers struggle for terror? Do workers fight for the deaths of millions? No! We might engage with them and discuss the scale of the implications of the seizure of power, but that is not why they are fighting. You fail to understand this simple point, or you don't, and you're just a troll. I don't even expect you're going to read this entire post, but it's here for everyone else.

However your conception of socialism and this 'new society' is wholly divorced from any proletarian movement, it is the result of your own obscure intellectual machinations. You can go ahead and call this accusation 'poetry' and 'macho bullshit', but I think it is inarguable that deep down you know damned well I am right. Don't you see how ferociously you argue now, as compared to me? Do you honestly think you're actually having a go at me? At the moment, I am teaching you, Five Year Plan. I know you're trying to troll as hard as you can, but give it a rest and grow up.


It turns out that all the second-grade poetry and macho posturing you litter the board with is just a house of cards, Rafiq. It, and you, stand exposed. How does it feel?

There have been several times where upon being wrong, I have conceded defeat. I am capable of humility, I am capable of admitting I am wrong. I am wholly and solely dedicated to Marxism first and foremost, not myself, not my reputation - and if I see that a grain of what I say is wrong, or discredited, I will abandon it immediately. Indeed there have been more than a few times in which I had admitted I was wrong.

But Five Year Plan, you're either trolling or seriously delusional if you actually think this is one of those times. Not only have I not been discredited here, not only has my 'poetry' and 'macho posturing' not been reduced to a 'house of cards', I have proven my point to everyone that you yourself are incapable of coherent and reasoned discussion. I have been polite, I have been wholly reasonable, and like a cornered rat you are thrown into a frenzy. You are only capable of recycling the same nonsense over and over again - what argument have you used was original? That you haven't used before in this discussion? Why post if it's the same discredited nonsense? Do you honestly believe that if you repeat such nonsense a second, third, fourth, or fifth time, it is any less wrong? I compliment you wholly by accusing you of trolling, becuase if you are not trolling that indeed would be a sad thing. If you here are actually believe the arguments you are making are in any way of any substance, if you actually believe that you are in anyway discrediting me or 'proving me wrong', or 'winning this argument' I can only feel bad for you.

It is unbelievable that you would think that because I do not abide by your false presumptions, I somehow am "dodging your questions".

What makes you different from this?:

Well I have a question, and you can't dodge it: Do you believe in limited government? Economic freedom? Don't you dare bring your nonsensical poetry into this, or your obscurities, I want a straightforward, simple answer. Elaborating and explaining your real positions only means you're dodging the question.


I mean, if you want to think that you've cornered me, or that you've "exposed" me, that you're some David whose defeated Goliath, then you can feel free to. If it soothes the pain of having a poor understanding of Marxism and a poor understanding of life in general, then by all means, continue to believe that. You're just, you know, wrong.

[Rafiq]

I think the most coherent, reasoned argument he has made so far is this:


No, I'm not.


At least he's honest about being unable to argue like an adult.

Anyway, Five Year Plan isn't going to read the whole thing. He's going to skim through and cherry pick what he thinks he can argue with. Of coarse it will be out of context and complete nonsense: Isn't it telling that I'm two steps ahead of him here? How can someone be so predictable? I literally know exactly what he's going to reply with because I have the whole premise of his disagreement completely understood. Five Year Plan has throughout many threads attempted to attack me, and in every single one he's been proven a damned fool. He is going to defend his little jab at me to the end, full aware that he was mistaken, because he's a child.

Even more funny though: A child-Trotskyist actually believes that he will be my undoing. I actually laugh at this prospect, after everything, my theoretical composition is shattered to pieces by Five Year Plan, a child. He thinks he's the first person to tout such nonsense. To everyone reading this, there will be plenty of Five Year Plan's that will come and go with their nonsense. And eventually, they will grow old only to abandon their meek and baseless ideas. I am here to stay.

[Five Year Plan]

You can try to cloud the debate with seven paragraphs of poorly written dreck, Rafiq. But when it comes down to it, you have no model for how workers become revolutionary apart from the tried and true method of engaging workers in the course of struggle with the message of revolution, smashing capitalism, and creating a new society. The problem is that you won't take this model to its logical conclusion and concede that it necessarily involves visions of a new society, although admittedly somewhat general visions (not "elaborate" ones, as you claim), because then you'd actually have to admit your initial claim was wrong.

You can twist and turn and try to hide this fact by hurling ridiculous accusations and childish insults, but for anybody who reads our exchange, it's easy to see.

And I have no problem with the fact that you're here to stay. I look forward to revealing your bullshit for what it is in thread after thread.

[Sea]

What? Proley?Proley, you know, shiggy wiggy, it's groovy and stuff.

[Rafiq]

And I have no problem with the fact that you're here to stay. I look forward to revealing your bullshit for what it is in thread after thread.

Oh, just as you have in this thread? Do you honestly think a couple of sentences declaring that I am wrong (Because you said so) counts as "revealing my bullshit"? Literally there is nothing that you have said that I didn't already address.

Also, in times when revolution was imminent, can you refer to some historical examples where intellectuals leading the revolution seduced workers with elaborate visions of a new society? Saying that workers would have somewhat of an idea of what a post revolution society would look like, isn't a fucking concession. The argument was whether workers are fighting or fight for the purpose of realizing this abstract utopia of yours (among other internet "Communists")


while they might have an idea of a new society in their heads this is a) Not reflective of what this society would actually look like and wholly ideological and most importantly b) they are not struggling as a class to realize this new society, rather they struggle for the conquest of state power by which such a new society would be a logical result. THE PREMISE OF THE ARGUMENT IS WHY THEY STRUGGLE, AND WHAT THEY ARE STRUGGLING FOR. IT IS NOT WHAT THEIR PRESUMPTIONS ABOUT A POST-CAPITALIST SOCIETY ARE. I know this is very hard for you to understand, often times with non-Marxists it is difficult, but bear with me Five Year Plan.

Five Year Plan calls this a "concession", he makes it as though I am running in retreat with my tail caught between my legs. My initial point stands adamantly as wholly and unarguably correct.

Five Year Plan is incapable of engaging in any magnitude of reasonable discussion because he dismisses the entirety of my post as "poorly written dreck". If "poorly written dreck" can wholly de-legitimize and discredit him in the way that it did, I wonder what he thinks of the quality of his own posts are to begin with.

[Rafiq]

I think it's quite obvious that Five Year Plan is fully aware of his own dishonesty here, there is literally no argument.

My point


The goal of Marxism was never to "create a new society"


His:

So when Marx wrote, "The philosophers have only interpreted the world, in various ways; the point is to change it," you think the "change" he is talking about isn't a transformation of society into a new (non-exploitative) type?


Not only is Five Year Plan wholly convinced that the proletarian class struggles against the class enemy (as though they are exempt from the nature of class itself) to realize an abstract utopia, he proclaims that the goal of Marxism is to realize a "new society". For Five Year Plan, Marxism is not a means of understanding, Marxism is not a scientific understanding of human social relationships and history, among many other things, it is some kind of "plan", some kind of "tool" to create a new society. To speak of "goals" as far as Marxism, a paradigm of science is the most childish thing I could think of as far as this discussion goes. Five Year Plan is wholly ignorant of the fact that Marxism and the worker's movement are not one and the same.

Five Year Plan actually believes that Marxism = Worker's movement. He does not realize that historically it took effort to see to the merger of Marxism and the proletarian movement (which had existed before Marxism). He is not only wrong about his assertions regarding revolutionary consciousness and the nature of Communist ideology - he is wrong about Marxism itself. Because he isn't a Marxist, he's a liberal who thinks that the facade of Communism, as though it is some extensive magnitude of liberalism (evidently his blatant and completely philistine "rationalism" and inability to understand the psychological, ideological dimensions behind things) is more appealing. He is by no means a radical, he's an apologist for radicalism, much like his idol Trotsky.

[Five Year Plan]

Also, in times when revolution was imminent, can you refer to some historical examples where intellectuals leading the revolution seduced workers with elaborate visions of a new society?

Where did I say "intellectuals," as a sociological category distinct from the vanguard of the working class, will lead any revolution? I guess you think workers aren't capable of envisioning new societies. That says a lot about your opinion of workers.


Saying that workers would have somewhat of an idea of what a post revolution society would look like, isn't a fucking concession. The argument was whether workers are fighting or fight for the purpose of realizing this abstract utopia of yours (among other internet "Communists")Workers fighting for a revolution, who have an understanding of what that post-revolutionary society entails, aren't fighting for a revolution because they desire to attain their vision of a post-revolutionary society? No, according to you, they have the (general, not utopian) vision in their head, but their struggle for revolution has absolutely nothing to do with the vision they have, with what they are thinking. Then you wonder why anybody would accuse you of removing the subjective factor, individual agency, from politics, and treating the working class like a collection of robots. Fascinating bit of tap dancing you're engaged in.

What you are saying amounts to the absurd proposition that a revolutionary worker who talks about revolution, who impresses upon his coworkers the need to overthrow capitalism, who organizes co-workers in his workplace while describing the end goal to his coworkers as a society where everybody's needs are provided for as a result of the elimination of profit as a motive for production, is not engaging in political struggle for the purpose of establishing that society.

I guess you're used to being around people on this forum who find such a claim so absurd that they won't bother to respond and systematically dismantle how ridiculous your ideas are, because they think your absurdities speak for themselves. Now things are changing. The above, to-the-point, succinct picking apart of your bullshit is exactly what you can expect in whatever thread you spew your nonsense in. Hold yourself in readiness.

[Rafiq]

Where did I say "intellectuals," as a sociological category distinct from the vanguard of the working class, will lead any revolution? I guess you think workers aren't capable of envisioning new societies. That says a lot about your opinion of workers.

First you accuse me of spontaneism, and now you claim that workers can develop revolutionary consciousness (Which rests on the false presumption that revolutionary consciousness = visions about a new society) on their own. That begs the question as to why you are dodging the point: Can you name me an example?


Workers fighting for a revolution, who have an understanding of what that post-revolutionary society entails, aren't fighting for a revolution because they desire to attain their vision of a post-revolutionary society? No, according to you, they have the (general, not utopian) vision in their head, but their struggle for revolution has absolutely nothing to do with the vision they have,


Such a vision, if any, is a result of their struggles: how can they have previously struggled as revolutionaries, as conscious proletarians if they only started to have this idea at the climax of the revolutionary struggle? The Ten Planks were not a Utopian vision, they were immediate tasks the proletariat would work towards in the event of a proletarian dictatorship. That's different for an elaborate utopia. And this begs the question: Why would they formulate this in the first place? Wouldn't such a formulation have to have occurred BEFORE revolutionary struggle? Evidently, historically speaking it does not. Almost as though you are a religious with your detailed descriptions of heaven, and how your followers will be rewarded for their service with paradise. It's sleazy, dishonest, and in this regard petty bourgeois. They are the distinctive features of a cult.


Now things are changing. The above, to-the-point, succinct picking apart of your bullshit is exactly what you can expect in whatever thread you spew your nonsense in. Hold yourself in readiness.

You've dodged, ignored and dismissed all of the crucial points, such as within the context of this discussion: who the fuck are YOU to talk about a post-revolutionary society in conditions in which proletarian consciousness is not the least bit developed, in which there is no Communist movement? Unless you are delusional to believe that your Trotskyist sects are a vehicle for revolution...

Five Year Plan thinks cherry picking phrases and words that are out of context and formulating a straw man is "to-the-point, succinct picking apart of your bullshit". He then pledges to do so in threads to come. While we could only assume this is trolling, I welcome him to. If this thread is anything close to an example of how it will play out, then I can expect many more victories for Marxism to come. But can we call this a victory? He is not even a worthy opponent as far as discussion goes, he is a mosquito you, upon noticing effortlessly swat, crush, and proceed to go about your business. There's been far more experienced, knowledgeable and theoretically adept Marxists who have had a go at me, and failed. Do you really think of yourself as some kind of internet savior whose going to come and defeat big bad me because everyone else is, apparently too afraid to? Go ahead, try and have a go at me again, this isn't even about me. I'm worthless, I'm nothing, I'll die eventually and no one will remember me. This is about the legacy of Marxism and what that entails, and you can argue your way through a hundred me's: Marxism will stand strong.

[Ocean Seal]

Amidst the stream of no NO or basically any clever one liner saying the same thing, I would like to add that its not a good thing to make generalizations, make of that what you will. There is never a mandate to do anything in socialism nor is there a mandate to avoid anything at all costs. Everything falls within strategy.

[Five Year Plan]

First you accuse me of spontaneism, and now you claim that workers can develop revolutionary consciousness (Which rests on the false presumption that revolutionary consciousness = visions about a new society) on their own. That begs the question as to why you are dodging the point: Can you name me an example?

Well, I refuse to answer questions that are about scenarios that I not only haven't talked about, but would disagree with. When you ask me for examples involving intellectuals leading revolutions, and I never said anything about intellectuals leading revolutions, I am not going to answer your question. Instead, I am going to point out how you appear not to be reading my posts at all, and are just inventing strawmen to attack.

Now you are asking for examples of where workers arrive at revolutionary consciousness "on their own." I'm not sure what you are even asking here. Workers develop revolutionary consciousness in a variety of ways, but all these ways entail weighing ideas, either their own ideas or the ideas of others, against their social experiences. So social-revolutionary consciousness always develops in a decidedly social context, around other people, not in solitary confinement. If that is what you mean by "on their own," then no worker develops such consciousness on their own.

Many workers become revolutionary, and decide that the state needs to be overthrown, without having any exposure to high-minded theoretical ideas about what the state is, what capitalism is, and so on. So if that's what you're asking an example of, then look no further than the posts in the Introduction subforum of this forum to see where workers do develop revolutionary consciousness "on their own" (or independent of intellectual guidance by others).


Such a vision, if any, is a result of their struggles: how can they have previously struggled as revolutionaries, as conscious proletarians if they only started to have this idea at the climax of the revolutionary struggle?You're arguing that workers are incapable of developing a revolutionary consciousness in non-revolutionary periods. I disagree, and as an example, I can point you to many of the posters on this forum who want socialism, who fight for the vision they have of a socialist society, even though they do not live in, or are currently struggling in, a social-revolutionary situation.


The Ten Planks were not a Utopian vision, they were immediate tasks the proletariat would work towards in the event of a proletarian dictatorship. That's different for an elaborate utopia.Except the vision of "a society where everybody's needs are met and production is democratically planned" is not an "elaborate" much less a "utopian" vision. It is the vision that revolutionary socialists have, and it is what they struggle to achieve. It is the vision that, once attained, drives their daily political work, even if that work is presently just about reforms.

But I am pleased to see that you are now trying to "sleazily" adjust your claim from "workers do not struggle for a vision of a new society" to "workers do not struggle for a utopian vision of a new society."

As your claims are systematically debunked, you push the goal posts further and further back.


You've dodged, ignored and dismissed all of the crucial points, such as within the context of this discussion: who the fuck are YOU to talk about a post-revolutionary society in conditions in which proletarian consciousness is not the least bit developed, in which there is no Communist movement? Unless you are delusional to believe that your Trotskyist sects are a vehicle for revolution... Who was Marx to talk about his (general, non-Utopian) vision of a post-revolutionary society? Who is any of us. We're people on a political forum debating political ideas and visions of a new society. If you don't like it, don't let the door hit you on the way out. And take your pathetic attempts at poetry with you.

[MEGAMANTROTSKY]

There's a post that I made a while back that seems to encapsulate all of Rafiq's philosophical flaws and outrageous behavior. For those interested, the thread in question can be perused here, at the end of the third page: http://www.revleft.com/vb/karl-marx-sexist-t176264/index3.html

Rafiq,

I apologize for the delay in my post. I have been dealing with some rather excessive busy work. Since your recent post is mostly ad hominem and projection (again), I’m going to ignore it entirely. This is the post I intended to write before I read your verbal temper tantrum.

Initially, I was planning to respond to you point for point, concentrating on the history of Germany during the 1930s. But I realized that this would be inadequate. After all, we are not dealing with mere interpretative differences in history, but opposing conceptions of the Marxist method itself. Something you said recently gave the best clue of this:

“They [the bourgeoisie] may not know they are sustaining the class relations that sustain their dictatorship, but none the less they are.”

This is simply a “truism”, and a rather useless one at that. It is only the start of an explanation of the German crisis, not the end of one. So what does this quote really tell us? Certainly not a unique point of departure that sheds any light on the Nazi holocaust or Marxism’s explanatory power; instead we only get the “skeleton” of a real Marxist analysis in your posts, stripped of all its entrails and organs. What you have written is nothing but an endless (and somewhat fatalistic) stream on “structures and forms” in class society that only appears to have explanatory power with terms and dramatic flair—but ultimately it is rather vague because you make no effort to analyze German capitalist society as it actually existed in the early twentieth century.

The error you have made is quite elementary—that is, for a structuralist. You conflate base and superstructure in such a way that the latter ends up being nothing more than the rationalization of the former. The traditional Marxist conception of this relationship is actually about dependence, not importance. The role of ideology and culture, while tied to economy and structure in the final instance, is relatively autonomous from them, and can take on a life of its own, especially in a deep historical crisis like Germany’s in the thirties. That ideology is a “secondary characteristic” in capitalist society does not make it less important. This is what I was trying to express by taking “human agency” into account, as it allows us to examine people themselves and their “false consciousness” concretely instead of throwing it out and sticking only to class structure.

But you seem to disagree. If it is true that “men make their own history, but they do not do it as they please”, then you are guilty of only concentrating on the qualifying clause. After all, you make no mention of culture, mass psychology, or anything specific about the human actors of Germany in your assessment, be it bourgeois or proletarian. In the context of what you wrote, how can you even begin to speak of “unconscious motives” when you never paid any attention to how the consciousness of the German masses was determined by their actual social being, be it “false” or “true”? While you do acknowledge that it’s not all about “economics”, reductionism doesn’t always refer to economics. You simply replace the word “economics” with “form”. Then, when you sense danger to your position, you attempt to adopt an orthodox posture and insult your critics, claiming that we’re idealists and fools with either “narrow understanding” or “bourgeois-rationalism” (whatever that means). This is indicative of intellectual dishonesty, at the very least.

In conclusion, I believe that what you have had to say about the Nazi holocaust so far has been next to worthless. Your philosophical method is just too woefully inadequate for the task. You mechanically reduce everything to the economic and structural forms of capitalism, all while adhering to a determinist model of history— ironically claiming that your critics are the ones with a closed mind. Your Marxism is an eviscerated one, lacking its head and heart.

[Rafiq]

Now you are asking for examples of where workers arrive at revolutionary consciousness "on their own." I'm not sure what you are even asking here. Workers develop revolutionary consciousness in a variety of ways, but all these ways entail weighing ideas, either their own ideas or the ideas of others, against their social experiences. So social-revolutionary consciousness always develops in a decidedly social context, around other people, not in solitary confinement. If that is what you mean by "on their own," then no worker develops such consciousness on their own.

No, Five Year Plan, once again you either deliberately attempt to dodge the question, or formulate false premises of discussion to begin with. I asked you

Also, in times when revolution was imminent, can you refer to some historical examples where intellectuals leading the revolution seduced workers with elaborate visions of a new society?


Fine then, exchange "intellectuals" with workers of higher consciousness or whatever the fuck you want, the question still stands. Why are you unable to answer it? Are you 'dodging' the question, just has you had accused me? You are at every turn now contradicting yourself: First I am arguing for "spontaneism" and now you're saying workers develop revolutionary consciousness on their own. This is precisely what is called spontaneism and yes Marxists as intellectuals are truly not one and the same with the proletariat: Lenin was not a proletarian, Kautsky was no proletarian, Marx was no proletarian... All the giants of Marxism were not proletarians, they were of the intelligentsia.


You're arguing that workers are incapable of developing a revolutionary consciousness in non-revolutionary periods. I disagree, and as an example, I can point you to many of the posters on this forum who want socialism, who fight for the vision they have of a socialist society, even though they do not live in, or are currently struggling in, a social-revolutionary situation.


Which one is it, Five Year Plan? Will a revolutionary vanguard (A term Lenin never used) or workers themselves lead the revolution? And in which cases was the Communist movement not led by the revolutionary intelligentsia? I would be very curious if you could name me one historical circumstance, just one, Five Year Plan. You cannot. No one is saying that members of the revolutionary intelligentsia are incapable of having been or are proletarians: We know Stalin for a time was a factory worker (Actually I could be mistaken here). Let us assume you are correct that posters here are of revolutionary consciousness: What exactly distinguishes them from revolutionary intellectuals? Besides the fact that they may share work environments from other workers? What exactly is the difference here? Is convincing workers of buying into your utopia different, if you're a worker too? Are the vocal chords of proletarians so distinctly structured as well as their ability to hear, so that they possess a form of communication that the revolutionary intelligentsia is incapable of? No wonder the October revolution failed! Lenin was completely bunk because he wasn't a proletarian!

So what do we learn from this? You're trying to evade the question and change the discussion. The points you have brought forth are irrelevant and do nothing to change the point of the questions, they can be intellectuals or they can be intellectuals who are also wage earning workers, ti does not matter. When we speak of the proletariat, we do not speak of individual proletarian, we speak of the proletariat as a collective force, as a class with a common social relationship to production. When we say 'the proletariat' does something, or possess ideas, we do not speak of posters on internet forums, we speak of a whole distinguishable and identifiable mass social phenomena. Again, you're dodging the point, though even then you are crushed all the same under the weight of whole truth: Truth is worthless if it is not part of a whole, and your truths do not fit a systemic whole: instead they are inconsistent, incoherent and contradict each other at every turn. We can only assume then that your partake in this discussion is not about the defense of Marxism, it is not about the defense of revolutionary ideas: It is about you desperately trying to win. And you won't.


Except the vision of "a society where everybody's needs are met and production is democratically planned" is not an "elaborate" much less a "utopian" vision. It is the vision that revolutionary socialists have, and it is what they struggle to achieve. It is the vision that, once attained, drives their daily political work, even if that work is presently just about reforms.

But I am pleased to see that you are now trying to "sleazily" adjust your claim from "workers do not struggle for a vision of a new society" to "workers do not struggle for a utopian vision of a new society."


Okay, so now you claim that this vision is no longer elaborate. You seem to be missing the point of my argument, you keep straying from the coarse of the discussion and opening up new ones (which really only further discredit you, by the way). My official position is this, and has always been this: Workers do not struggle because they want a new society (that doesn't mean they don't want one, or that a new society is not a logical result), none the less a Utopian one. And the Utopian one I speak of is your conception of what a post-captialist society would look like, among almost all other internet Communists. That is what I mean. That is what I have said if you were actually reading my posts wholly and honestly to begin with. But as a Trotskyist, you are incapable of this.

What you fail to understand is that workers struggle in order to realize their interests in accord with their present and existing conditions, my point has always been "The struggle derives from existing conditions, not potential conditions". And while workers may have an idea of what a new society looks like, any talk of a new society (not in the sense that a new society is possible, but what this society will look like, and so on) is nothing short of ideological. My point, my point has always been that while we can say that we want a society in which things will be like X, this sais nothing about any potential new society, it sais everything about the ideological nature of the revolutionary proletariat within existing conditions, within their present struggle against the class enemy. The bourgeois ideologues, from humanism up to the enlightenment had spoken of 'new societies': This didn't really amount to much as far as the reality of the new societies went.

The utopians and petty bourgeois ideologues such as your self fail to realize that... Wait, I already said this (interestingly enough you ignored it)
Petty bourgeois intellectuals see the stormy alterations of the revolutionary movement and the struggle as an ugly means to a pretty ends. Rather, the movement itself is the real ends in that the logical conclusion of the seizure of power is an act inherent to the struggle itself, not inherent to those speculating or sympathizing with it.

The whole point is that any vision of a new society, such as the ten planks, derived from the revolutionary struggle itself, proletarians did not struggle against the state in order to realize the ten planks, rather, the Ten Planks were formulated in order to have an idea of what to do in the event of a proletarian dictatorship. Because we are in a non-revolutionary situation, unlike Marx, unlike the Bolsheviks: Who are you to come up with the political prerogatives of a proletarian dictatorship (A post revolutionary society) when the premises, the embryo of such a dictatorship, the revolutionary proletarian movement does not exist? How can you understand the nature of a post revolutionary society when you cannot know the nature of a revolutionary movement in the 21st century?

I wish ckaihatsu could make a diagram of your trolling technique, which has been the only consistent thing you have brought to the discussion. I make a very long post detailing and addressing all of your points, shattering them and de-legitimizing you - you respond to a fraction of them which are distinctively out of context, and then repeat the same arguments. And on, and on the cycle goes. B

Now, I will use the following example of Five Year Plan's infantile understanding of the argument:


Who was Marx to talk about his (general, non-Utopian) vision of a post-revolutionary society?

Stop right there. What are you talking about? Do you have any idea what I was saying? How can you claim to address me when you have absolutely no idea of what I was talking about? Marx, along with anyone else during his time could have formulated a vision - because the revolutionary proletariat had built itself after decades of struggle, because the Communist movement had already existed and was derived from those existing premises, because proletarian consciousness was advanced and a proletarian dictatorship was a very probable thing. That is what gives Marx legitimacy when he spoke of the Ten Planks, or even speculated (as he did in the German Ideology) about the conditions of a post revolutionary society (which really only served to expose the nature of our EXISTING society).

But who the fuck are you? Who are those 'reddit Communists' who talk of their feasible Communist society that they want workers to fight for? Who exactly are you, to be able to logically deduce what a post-revolutionary society would entail if we are not even close to a revolutionary situation, or at least a situation in which the proletariat has established a political program? Who are you, Five Year Plan? You're a troll, or you're delusional, or you don't know what you're talking about. Want to know why you don't know what you're talking about?

Does anyone remember when I claimed that Five Year Plan's method is to make a false accusation based on false presumptions about my post, and then run wild with it?


Well take a look at this:


Who is any of us. We're people on a political forum debating political ideas and visions of a new society. If you don't like it, don't let the door hit you on the way out. And take your pathetic attempts at poetry with you.

Ah, alas, the excrement of excrement, the offspring of already an initial lie. He makes these ridiculous presumption, and then spouts this kind of nonsense that you see above. Five Year Plan I say this kindly, I say this as a caring stranger: you're making an ass out of yourself. I mean it's hilarious, look at this shit! Look at how he's forming these wild conclusions, look at how he's trying to school me! Go back and take a fucking look at what I said first, if you don't feel you can respond to it adequately then shut the fuck up and don't respond at all!

And he keeps talking of my "pathetic attempts at poetry". When have I used poetry in this thread? Do you even know what poetry is? I have in the past expressed many valid points through the use of poetry - but you want to know who was the greatest offender of the use of poetry? You want to know whose unconstrained use of poetry would irritate you the most? Marx himself, Marx who used poetry several times in order to get his point across. And besides, such poetry is completely self conscious, such poetry is like Marx's: in that it is almost sarcastic. You, among others who have attacked me for using it don't understand. And you can't, because your Communist ideological universe is either non-existent or incomplete.

But of coarse you won't respond to that. Of coarse you won't acknowledge the sword that has pierced you. Of coarse you'll take more phrases and words completely out of context and form a new argument, and then run wild with your false accusations and ridiculous presumptions. Of coarse you'll ignore this too, even though it's in larger font. Which is okay, because I don't give a shit about you. This is for everyone else. Anyone whose been paying the slightest amount of attention to this argument cannot but bear the fowl smell of your dishonesty, you're not fooling anyone when you're trying to change the parameters of the discussion. There is nothing you have said, that I did not previously address. When my post is exceptionally long, you make a sentence or two giving it a jab, I reply, and on it goes. I'm being honest, if you're trolling just stop, you've had your fun, we get it.

And if you're not trolling, well, since we all know you have no qualms with being the dishonest worm you are, why don't you just falsely confess you were trolling, in order to not embarrass yourself by making it as though the nonsense you've spewed is what you actually believe.

[Rafiq]

I promise everyone here he won't even reply to a third of this. He's going to do the same thing that he has continually done. He's going to reply to phrases out of context and formulate a new straw man. I can already predict the arguments he will try to level against me.

But go on, claim you won't respond to them because they're "poorly written" and too "poetic". The pompous liberal you are, sitting on your bourgeois-rationalist throne looking down upon me?

[Rafiq]

Five Year Plan thinks that somehow, he derives legitimacy from the fact that my posts are often ill-received on this website. As though that means anything.

To him, it means he can dismiss my posts as worthless, as nothing. Is he a child? Does the essence of my post rely on how popular I am on this website, or what my social status is here? He hasn't been here long enough to realize that I'm not just some gremlin who everyone overlooks and dismisses: There is, or at least was a sizable number of users who generally concurred with me.

[Five Year Plan]

Fine then, exchange "intellectuals" with workers of higher consciousness or whatever the fuck you want, the question still stands. Why are you unable to answer it? Are you 'dodging' the question, just has you had accused me? You are at every turn now contradicting yourself: First I am arguing for "spontaneism" and now you're saying workers develop revolutionary consciousness on their own. This is precisely what is called spontaneism and yes Marxists as intellectuals are truly not one and the same with the proletariat: Lenin was not a proletarian, Kautsky was no proletarian, Marx was no proletarian... All the giants of Marxism were not proletarians, they were of the intelligentsia.

You are confusing spotaneism with certain, individual workers being able to arrive at revolutionary conclusions without being guided intellectually and theoretically by people who already possess revolutionary consciousness.

Spontaneism is the thesis that workers will automatically arrive at revolutionary consciousness as the organic extension of their experiences as workers. It is "spontaneous" because, according to the model, revolutionary conclusions are the only ones a worker can arrive at. I hope you are bright enough to understand how it is possible for workers to arrive at revolutionary consciousness based on their own experience, without that making their arrival "automatic" or seamless, as if bourgeois propaganda were not trying to intervene at every step of the way.

So, no, there is no contradiction in anything I've written. There's just a failure on your part to understand basic distinctions.


Which one is it, Five Year Plan? Will a revolutionary vanguard (A term Lenin never used) or workers themselves lead the revolution?Oh, so a revolutionary vanguard can never consists of workers? Practically every statement you make here reeks of anti-worker prejudices, about how they can't constitute a vanguard or arrive at their own visions of a new society.


And in which cases was the Communist movement not led by the revolutionary intelligentsia? I would be very curious if you could name me one historical circumstance, just one, Five Year Plan. You cannot.Two posts ago you were asking me to name a revolutionary movement that was led by intellectuals, as if you thought such a thing never existed. Now you are claiming that the Communist movement has never not been led by a revolutionary intellgentsia. Somebody here seems confused and blind to his own contradictions, and that person happens not to be me.


No one is saying that members of the revolutionary intelligentsia are incapable of having been or are proletarians: We know Stalin for a time was a factory worker (Actually I could be mistaken here). Let us assume you are correct that posters here are of revolutionary consciousness: What exactly distinguishes them from revolutionary intellectuals? Besides the fact that they may share work environments from other workers? What exactly is the difference here? Is convincing workers of buying into your utopia different, if you're a worker too? Are the vocal chords of proletarians so distinctly structured as well as their ability to hear, so that they possess a form of communication that the revolutionary intelligentsia is incapable of? No wonder the October revolution failed! Lenin was completely bunk because he wasn't a proletarian!You're getting awfully desperate to try to shift the discussion onto an entirely new topic. The debate we were having was whether workers making a revolution can do so without first having a vision of that new society for which they then choose to fight. You claimed that they could, and I disagreed.

Now you want to have a sociological and historical discussion about the class nature of revolutionary movements and their leadership. All I have stated on that front is that I have never made any claims about intellectuals leading revolutions. All I have done is disagree with your implication that workers require the leadership of intellectuals because they can't engage in the task of theorizing themselves. So this debate is your fixation, not mine. As it turns out, I think intellectuals, in the narrow sense of a sociological stratum, can be involved in positions of authority within a revolutionary party, but I would distinguish this from the question of which class exercises leadership in a movement.


So what do we learn from this? You're trying to evade the question and change the discussion.The discussion we have been having is about whether a revolutionary worker struggles for the vision of a new society that he has. You then insist on asking me questions about the leadership roles of intellectuals vs. workers, while pretending that I am trying to change the discussion. Whether a revolution is led by workers, or intellectuals, or aliens, or the bourgeoisie, the people who make them will make them according to a vision that they have in advance. It might not be (and almost certainly won't be) a detailed vision; it will be a rough blueprint, since construction is a process where details are filled in through act of engaging in the movement itself. But there will be a vision. Just as a sculptor starts off with rough cuts, then fills in the details as he proceeds in his project.

So nice try, Rafiq, but your diversionary tactics won't work.


Okay, so now you claim that this vision is no longer elaborate.Where did I ever say that the vision of a new society that revolutionaries have is "elaborate"? In point of fact, I have stated multiple times just the opposite. You once again are debating voices in your head. Let me know when you actually want to try debating me.

[Rafiq]

No, Five Year Plan, once again you either deliberately attempt to dodge the question, or formulate false premises of discussion to begin with. I asked you

Also, in times when revolution was imminent, can you refer to some historical examples where intellectuals leading the revolution seduced workers with elaborate visions of a new society?


Fine then, exchange "intellectuals" with workers of higher consciousness or whatever the fuck you want, the question still stands. Why are you unable to answer it? Are you 'dodging' the question, just has you had accused me? You are at every turn now contradicting yourself: First I am arguing for "spontaneism" and now you're saying workers develop revolutionary consciousness on their own. This is precisely what is called spontaneism and yes Marxists as intellectuals are truly not one and the same with the proletariat: Lenin was not a proletarian, Kautsky was no proletarian, Marx was no proletarian... All the giants of Marxism were not proletarians, they were of the intelligentsia.



Which one is it, Five Year Plan? Will a revolutionary vanguard (A term Lenin never used) or workers themselves lead the revolution? And in which cases was the Communist movement not led by the revolutionary intelligentsia? I would be very curious if you could name me one historical circumstance, just one, Five Year Plan. You cannot. No one is saying that members of the revolutionary intelligentsia are incapable of having been or are proletarians: We know Stalin for a time was a factory worker (Actually I could be mistaken here). Let us assume you are correct that posters here are of revolutionary consciousness: What exactly distinguishes them from revolutionary intellectuals? Besides the fact that they may share work environments from other workers? What exactly is the difference here? Is convincing workers of buying into your utopia different, if you're a worker too? Are the vocal chords of proletarians so distinctly structured as well as their ability to hear, so that they possess a form of communication that the revolutionary intelligentsia is incapable of? No wonder the October revolution failed! Lenin was completely bunk because he wasn't a proletarian!

So what do we learn from this? You're trying to evade the question and change the discussion. The points you have brought forth are irrelevant and do nothing to change the point of the questions, they can be intellectuals or they can be intellectuals who are also wage earning workers, ti does not matter. When we speak of the proletariat, we do not speak of individual proletarian, we speak of the proletariat as a collective force, as a class with a common social relationship to production. When we say 'the proletariat' does something, or possess ideas, we do not speak of posters on internet forums, we speak of a whole distinguishable and identifiable mass social phenomena. Again, you're dodging the point, though even then you are crushed all the same under the weight of whole truth: Truth is worthless if it is not part of a whole, and your truths do not fit a systemic whole: instead they are inconsistent, incoherent and contradict each other at every turn. We can only assume then that your partake in this discussion is not about the defense of Marxism, it is not about the defense of revolutionary ideas: It is about you desperately trying to win. And you won't.



Okay, so now you claim that this vision is no longer elaborate. You seem to be missing the point of my argument, you keep straying from the coarse of the discussion and opening up new ones (which really only further discredit you, by the way). My official position is this, and has always been this: Workers do not struggle because they want a new society (that doesn't mean they don't want one, or that a new society is not a logical result), none the less a Utopian one. And the Utopian one I speak of is your conception of what a post-captialist society would look like, among almost all other internet Communists. That is what I mean. That is what I have said if you were actually reading my posts wholly and honestly to begin with. But as a Trotskyist, you are incapable of this.

What you fail to understand is that workers struggle in order to realize their interests in accord with their present and existing conditions, my point has always been "The struggle derives from existing conditions, not potential conditions". And while workers may have an idea of what a new society looks like, any talk of a new society (not in the sense that a new society is possible, but what this society will look like, and so on) is nothing short of ideological. My point, my point has always been that while we can say that we want a society in which things will be like X, this sais nothing about any potential new society, it sais everything about the ideological nature of the revolutionary proletariat within existing conditions, within their present struggle against the class enemy. The bourgeois ideologues, from humanism up to the enlightenment had spoken of 'new societies': This didn't really amount to much as far as the reality of the new societies went.

The utopians and petty bourgeois ideologues such as your self fail to realize that... Wait, I already said this (interestingly enough you ignored it)

The whole point is that any vision of a new society, such as the ten planks, derived from the revolutionary struggle itself, proletarians did not struggle against the state in order to realize the ten planks, rather, the Ten Planks were formulated in order to have an idea of what to do in the event of a proletarian dictatorship. Because we are in a non-revolutionary situation, unlike Marx, unlike the Bolsheviks: Who are you to come up with the political prerogatives of a proletarian dictatorship (A post revolutionary society) when the premises, the embryo of such a dictatorship, the revolutionary proletarian movement does not exist? How can you understand the nature of a post revolutionary society when you cannot know the nature of a revolutionary movement in the 21st century?

I wish ckaihatsu could make a diagram of your trolling technique, which has been the only consistent thing you have brought to the discussion. I make a very long post detailing and addressing all of your points, shattering them and de-legitimizing you - you respond to a fraction of them which are distinctively out of context, and then repeat the same arguments. And on, and on the cycle goes. B

Now, I will use the following example of Five Year Plan's infantile understanding of the argument:



Stop right there. What are you talking about? Do you have any idea what I was saying? How can you claim to address me when you have absolutely no idea of what I was talking about? Marx, along with anyone else during his time could have formulated a vision - because the revolutionary proletariat had built itself after decades of struggle, because the Communist movement had already existed and was derived from those existing premises, because proletarian consciousness was advanced and a proletarian dictatorship was a very probable thing. That is what gives Marx legitimacy when he spoke of the Ten Planks, or even speculated (as he did in the German Ideology) about the conditions of a post revolutionary society (which really only served to expose the nature of our EXISTING society).

But who the fuck are you? Who are those 'reddit Communists' who talk of their feasible Communist society that they want workers to fight for? Who exactly are you, to be able to logically deduce what a post-revolutionary society would entail if we are not even close to a revolutionary situation, or at least a situation in which the proletariat has established a political program? Who are you, Five Year Plan? You're a troll, or you're delusional, or you don't know what you're talking about. Want to know why you don't know what you're talking about?

Does anyone remember when I claimed that Five Year Plan's method is to make a false accusation based on false presumptions about my post, and then run wild with it?


Well take a look at this:



Ah, alas, the excrement of excrement, the offspring of already an initial lie. He makes these ridiculous presumption, and then spouts this kind of nonsense that you see above. Five Year Plan I say this kindly, I say this as a caring stranger: you're making an ass out of yourself. I mean it's hilarious, look at this shit! Look at how he's forming these wild conclusions, look at how he's trying to school me! Go back and take a fucking look at what I said first, if you don't feel you can respond to it adequately then shut the fuck up and don't respond at all!

And he keeps talking of my "pathetic attempts at poetry". When have I used poetry in this thread? Do you even know what poetry is? I have in the past expressed many valid points through the use of poetry - but you want to know who was the greatest offender of the use of poetry? You want to know whose unconstrained use of poetry would irritate you the most? Marx himself, Marx who used poetry several times in order to get his point across. And besides, such poetry is completely self conscious, such poetry is like Marx's: in that it is almost sarcastic. You, among others who have attacked me for using it don't understand. And you can't, because your Communist ideological universe is either non-existent or incomplete.

But of coarse you won't respond to that. Of coarse you won't acknowledge the sword that has pierced you. Of coarse you'll take more phrases and words completely out of context and form a new argument, and then run wild with your false accusations and ridiculous presumptions. Of coarse you'll ignore this too, even though it's in larger font. Which is okay, because I don't give a shit about you. This is for everyone else. Anyone whose been paying the slightest amount of attention to this argument cannot but bear the fowl smell of your dishonesty, you're not fooling anyone when you're trying to change the parameters of the discussion. There is nothing you have said, that I did not previously address. When my post is exceptionally long, you make a sentence or two giving it a jab, I reply, and on it goes. I'm being honest, if you're trolling just stop, you've had your fun, we get it.

And if you're not trolling, well, since we all know you have no qualms with being the dishonest worm you are, why don't you just falsely confess you were trolling, in order to not embarrass yourself by making it as though the nonsense you've spewed is what you actually believe.



Two posts ago you were asking me to name a revolutionary movement that was led by intellectuals, as if you thought such a thing never existed. Now you are claiming that the Communist movement has never not been led by a revolutionary intellgentsia. Somebody here seems confused and blind to his own contradictions, and that person happens not to be me.


Two posts ago...

Also, in times when revolution was imminent, can you refer to some historical examples where intellectuals leading the revolution seduced workers with elaborate visions of a new society? Saying that workers would have somewhat of an idea of what a post revolution society would look like, isn't a fucking concession. The argument was whether workers are fighting or fight for the purpose of realizing this abstract utopia of yours (among other internet "Communists")


Yes, Before I demanded you name an example in which intellectuals led the revolution, I totally didn't ask for an example about intellectuals advertising what communism will look like and seducing workers about a new society. You can think that if it makes you feel better, but no one believes it..

[Rafiq]

The conclusions that you have arrive at, evidently you could not have arrived at without taking things out of context. I wonder what that sais about your intellectual honesty as a whole. Honest question did you read the whole thing?


Where did I ever say that the vision of a new society that revolutionaries have is "elaborate"? In point of fact, I have stated multiple times just the opposite. You once again are debating voices in your head. Let me know when you actually want to try debating me.


Look at the segment he replied to, look how he carefully ignored the rest
Okay, so now you claim that this vision is no longer elaborate. You seem to be missing the point of my argument, you keep straying from the coarse of the discussion and opening up new ones

I explicitly made it clear that it's irrelivent, it doesn't matter whether you agree if it's "elaborate" or not, it is Utopian none the less. Just because you refuse to talk about the 72 virgins, but continue to insist the religious fundamentalists struggle in order to go to paradise doesn't make it less utopian (interestingly enough, the religious don't fight for this: Rather there are deeply complicated social dimensions to something like islamism - this is very ironic).

[Five Year Plan]

The conclusions that you have arrive at, evidently you could not have arrived at without taking things out of context. I wonder what that sais about your intellectual honesty as a whole. Honest question did you read the whole thing?

Which statements of yours have I taken out of context in a way that misrepresents their meaning?

As for your previous post, I just made the observation that in one post you asked me for examples of where intellectuals did lead workers, then in the next asked for examples of where they didn't. I found it odd and inconsistent, at least in terms of framing. Are you suggesting that this inconsistency didn't exist?

[Rafiq]

Which statement of yours have I taken out of context in a way that misrepresents their meaning?

Actually, literally (and I'm not just saying this) all of them. If you want an example, look to the post above you.

[Thirsty Crow]

Actually, literally (and I'm not just saying this) all of them. If you want an example, look to the post above you.
But then there is no context to speak of if literally all of the statements were taken out of...well, yeah, context.

[Five Year Plan]

Actually, literally (and I'm not just saying this) all of them. If you want an example, look to the post above you.

If you don't specifically explain how my representations of what you said differ from what you were intending to convey, I don't see how your latest posts stand as anything other than empty, unsubstantiated accusations and sour grapes.

[Rafiq]

I hope you are bright enough to understand how it is possible for workers to arrive at revolutionary consciousness based on their own experience, without that making their arrival "automatic" or seamless, as if bourgeois propaganda were not trying to intervene at every step of the way.


Also this itself is nothing short of ridiculous, cult-like: Communist ideology derives from premises now in existence, not some kind of specialized fashion workers evade the bombardments of the illuminati or reptilians subliminal messages (And yes, that is very comparable to your understanding of "bourgeois propaganda". Propaganda is intentional, ideology is not propaganda). Surprise, Surprise that a Trotskyist would tout such drivel.

But to address the point at hand, absolutely no proponents of spontaneism, which tend to be 'libertarian socialists' or left communists of the dutch tradition, claim that the transition to revolutionary consciousness is seamless or automatic. That itself is a straw-man argument. They claim that revolutionary consciousness is developed much in the way you describe, but rather on a mass scale - one worker to another. That is pure spontaneism and a distinguishable or special proletarian who develops the views he does divorced from the collective, mass ideology of his class is therefore a member of the intelligentsia. The argument stands, and it does not make a difference, AS I SAID BEFORE. Why do I have to repeat myself?

[Rafiq]

If you don't specifically explain how my representations of what you said differ from what you were intending to convey, I don't see how your latest posts stand as anything other than empty, unsubstantiated accusations and sour grapes.

I have explained in all of the previous posts of this thread, literally the great bulk of my posts was explaining how your representations and false presumptions about my posts were entirely wrong. Are you honestly trolling? Like what the FUCK do you think I've been doing for the past million posts if not precisely that? And now you're curious about it? Now you're interested? Because all of your arguments are the same recycled nonsense, you can go back and look yourself. Click the previous page and look. The argument is over. The debate is over. You have discredited yourself in a way more elaborate and efficient then I could eve dream to.

[Rafiq]

But then there is no context to speak of if literally all of the statements were taken out of...well, yeah, context.

There is a real context, the context of my posts. If I have a great chunk of text which is necessary in order to understand every part of it, and someone takes a phrase that is meaningless without the rest - that is taking it out of context.

If I am replying to him, in that he was taking my previous post out of context, I am creating a new context from which he takes phrases out of. He's not replying to my posts wholly, it's not as though he's actually replying to my arguments. He's taking phrases, words from whole truths and reducing them to something entirely different.

[Five Year Plan]

Also this itself is nothing short of ridiculous, cult-like: Communist ideology derives from premises now in existence, not some kind of specialized fashion workers evade the bombardments of the illuminati or reptilians subliminal messages (And yes, that is very comparable to your understanding of "bourgeois propaganda". Propaganda is intentional, ideology is not propaganda). Surprise, Surprise that a Trotskyist would tout such drivel.

In this little attempt at diverting the discussion, you are right to note that ideology is analytically distinct from propaganda. They exist at two different levels of analysis. Some propaganda advances a bourgeois ideology. Some of it advances a revolutionary socialist ideology. So no, it is not ridiculous for me to talk about how bourgeois propaganda is backed by a multi-billion dollar apparatus that attempts to get workers to interpret their experiences in ways that are friendly to capitalism, in ways that would disrupt any spontaneous or automatic translation of workers' immediate experiences into a high-level understanding of revolutionary socialist tasks.


But to address the point at hand, absolutely no proponents of spontaneism, which tend to be 'libertarian socialists' or left communists of the dutch tradition, claim that the transition to revolutionary consciousness is seamless or automatic. That itself is a straw-man argument. They claim that revolutionary consciousness is developed much in the way you describe, but rather on a mass scale - one worker to another. That is pure spontaneism and a distinguishable or special proletarian who develops the views he does divorced from the collective, mass ideology of his class is therefore a member of the intelligentsia. The argument stands, and it does not make a difference, AS I SAID BEFORE. Why do I have to repeat myself?I see what you did there. You claim libertarian socialists are spontaneists, but that they don't think that revolutionary consciousness is seamless or automatic. Therefore you are operating with a different definition of spontaneism than I am. I explained what my definition was, and it's really the only definition of the term that I see used on the revolutionary left. I'm not saying your definition is wrong: it's just not mine. I hope that explains why I corrected you when you claimed I was contradicting myself. I wasn't. You thought I was because you were attributing your definition of the word to me, and it's a definition I obviously don't share.

[Thirsty Crow]

There is a real context, the context of my posts. If I have a great chunk of text which is necessary in order to understand every part of it, and someone takes a phrase that is meaningless without the rest - that is taking it out of context. Quite possibly so, but then you can't claim that literally everything you wrote was taken out of context. It's specific phrases and/or sentences, or even whole paragraphs.

The question is which ones.

[MEGAMANTROTSKY]

There is a real context, the context of my posts. If I have a great chunk of text which is necessary in order to understand every part of it, and someone takes a phrase that is meaningless without the rest - that is taking it out of context.

If I am replying to him, in that he was taking my previous post out of context, I am creating a new context from which he takes phrases out of. He's not replying to my posts wholly, it's not as though he's actually replying to my arguments. He's taking phrases, words from whole truths and reducing them to something entirely different.
He can't respond wholly to your posts, as there are many chunks of them that are either personal attacks or polemical bluster that wouldn't even fit into the century it came from. You didn't "wholly" respond to him either, as the post history plainly shows. Why should you expect a standard that neither of you have, or should have (in your case, at least) met?

The rest of your post is nonsense. Anybody reading the exchange can see who has been constantly changing the subject or "reacting entirely different."

[Rafiq]

Are you suggesting that this inconsistency didn't exist?

No. I am asserting it didn't exist. I don't care if you find it 'odd', you cannot go about claiming I contradicted myself when you know damn well this is not the case. But yes, I find it incredibly distasteful that some think intellectuals who distinctively in this case have an idea of a feasible society, should recruit workers and have them fight in order for them to realize the society. It's the same sad story of the modern Left, and it doesn't work because it has no real social application.

Intellectuals like Marx and Lenin, on the other hand, the revolutionary intelligentsia, Marxists do not hold such ridiculous reservations. A does not equal A in different contexts. That is the failure of liberal rationalism. You don't even understand basic logic, however, you fail to understand that Lenin can be an Intellectual and so can a Left-Utopian, they are distinguished in their intellectual character, what they are.

So what is this inconsistency you speak of?

[Five Year Plan]

I have explained in all of the previous posts of this thread, literally the great bulk of my posts was explaining how your representations and false presumptions about my posts were entirely wrong. Are you honestly trolling? Like what the FUCK do you think I've been doing for the past million posts if not precisely that? And now you're curious about it? Now you're interested? Because all of your arguments are the same recycled nonsense, you can go back and look yourself. Click the previous page and look. The argument is over. The debate is over. You have discredited yourself in a way more elaborate and efficient then I could eve dream to.

Now, when asked where I misrepresented what you were saying, you're not providing any specific examples and are just claiming you have already provided the examples. That's not going to work either, Rafiq.

[Rafiq]

I see what you did there. You claim libertarian socialists are spontaneists, but that they don't think that revolutionary consciousness is seamless or automatic. Therefore you are operating with a different definition of spontaneism than I am. I explained what my definition was, and it's really the only definition of the term that I see used on the revolutionary left. I'm not saying your definition is wrong: it's just not mine. I hope that explains why I corrected you when you claimed I was contradicting myself. I wasn't. You thought I was because you were attributing your definition of the word to me, and it's a definition I obviously don't share.

This is nothing but dishonest: As far as revolutionary discourse goes, as far as how the usage of the term has historically been used in talking of those economistic spontaneists, there is a real coherent definition that you know damn well of. No spontaneist argues for "seamless, automatic" consciousness. They all recognize it can take time to develop, and different stages. The point however is that it is not "imposed" externally. I don't care about your personal definition, that is meaningless and irrelevant to the discussion at hand.

[Rafiq]

The question is which ones.

Quite obviously the ones he quoted.

[Rafiq]

He can't respond wholly to your posts, as there are many chunks of them that are either personal attacks or polemical bluster that wouldn't even fit into the century it came from. You didn't "wholly" respond to him either, as the post history plainly shows. Why should you expect a standard that neither of you have, or should have (in your case, at least) met?


I'm not asking that he respond to my entire post, indeed I did not respond to his entire post: BUT I ACTUALLY ADDRESSED THE ARGUMENT HE WAS MAKING and if I did not quote something specifically, that does not mean I ignored it. What exactly did I ignore? What crucial points did he make that I intentionally ignored? literally I can provide a billion examples. If he makes a presumption that is wrong and the rest of his argument is nothing short of a result of that false presumption, I have to first attack the presumption and then the rest is blatantly, and obviously wrong.

[Rafiq]

Now, when asked where I misrepresented what you were saying, you're not providing any specific examples and are just claiming you have already provided the examples. That's not going to work either, Rafiq.

They're in the thread, Five Year Plan.

You said


If you don't specifically explain how my representations of what you said differ from what you were intending to convey

What have my posts been if not exactly this? What, you want me to essentially, just re-write them all? Is everything written in the 6th page now void? Does it have to be imported to the 7th in order to hold legitimacy? Why don't I just copy and paste them, for fuck's sake? There's not point in either.

[Five Year Plan]

Also, in times when revolution was imminent, can you refer to some historical examples where intellectuals leading the revolution seduced workers with elaborate visions of a new society?


And in which cases was the Communist movement not led by the revolutionary intelligentsia? I would be very curious if you could name me one historical circumstance, just one, Five Year Plan. You cannot.

As I said, you asked in the first post whether I can name an example of where revolutionary workers were led by intellectuals and their visions. In the second post, you ask me if I could name examples of where workers were not led by an intelligentsia/intellectuals.

Nope, no inconsistency here. :)

[Rafiq]

In this little attempt at diverting the discussion, you are right to note that ideology is analytically distinct from propaganda. They exist at two different levels of analysis. Some propaganda advances a bourgeois ideology. Some of it advances a revolutionary socialist ideology. So no, it is not ridiculous for me to talk about how bourgeois propaganda is backed by a multi-billion dollar apparatus that attempts to get workers to interpret their experiences in ways that are friendly to capitalism, in ways that would disrupt any spontaneous or automatic translation of workers' immediate experiences into a high-level understanding of revolutionary socialist tasks.


Yes propaganda exists, but very quickly and easily it is pure ideology. Just look at the vocabulary that is used by the Koch brothers funded Cato institute. No longer is it propaganda, it is a breath of fresh air, it is ideology. The point is that propaganda can never stand as the sole deterrence of the development of proletarian consciousness: circumstances of power-relations are crucial here: The defeat of labor and the betrayal of unions in the 1990's was the sole problem, the advance and specialization of the bourgeois state itself. Of course propaganda can reproduce and deter consciousness in small ways: This, however, is the smallest of problems.

[Rafiq]

And now we're on the 8th page. Do we need to import everything form the previous one, or should we just rehash the same arguments and pretend they are new?

[Thirsty Crow]

If I might interject, it seems to me that Rafiq is arguing against the idea that all communists have to do is draw up a nice plan and a nice description of life in a new society and serve it to the workers as fried pigeons of science for them to gobble up (I'm paraphrasing here, too lazy to look up the exact quote).
Rather, the idea would be that the actual course of social and political struggle enables the viable and realistic plan, "the vision".

I don't think this is controversial. It's basically a restatement of one part of the criticism leveled against utopian socialism.

On the other hand, Five Year Plan seems to find the idea problematic insofar as they think the "abstract" (in other words - negative) vision of a new kind of life is a vital part in communists' interaction with workers (i.e. propaganda), during actual struggles or not.

I don't think these two positions are mutually exclusive at all; it's a complicated problem of how communists exactly interact with other workers (and of course - under which conditions and so on). But you managed to make a cluster fuck out of it mostly with misguided inflammatory proclamations.

To illuminate the problem at hand, I'd offer some concrete interaction experience from my side. Both come from people engaged in (then) current struggles.

On one hand, a person will tell something to the effect of "now this detailed political reasoning is all fine and dandy; but here we're concerned with stuff immediately material and important to us", but on the other hand and almost at the same time you'll hear something like "but what concrete measures beneficial to us workers would we achieve through getting rid of capitalists, how would we organize society and not fail like people in the fSU".

[MEGAMANTROTSKY]

I'm not asking that he respond to my entire post, indeed I did not respond to his entire post: BUT I ACTUALLY ADDRESSED THE ARGUMENT HE WAS MAKING and if I did not quote something specifically, that does not mean I ignored it.
But you do. In a very recent post, for instance, you claim that Five Year Plans' definition of spontaneism is traditionally used in a manner different than his, and claim that his definition is entirely a priori and personal. But you never bothered to explain why your definition is more correct than his. You forget that you're not trying to just convince your opponent, but your audience. Sometimes the onlookers require that a bone be thrown to it.

What exactly did I ignore? What crucial points did he make that I intentionally ignored? literally I can provide a billion examples.
Then do it, already. You were asked to provide specific places where this happened, and you have yet to do so. I can hazard a guess as to why: You can't.

If he makes a presumption that is wrong and the rest of his argument is nothing short of a result of that false presumption, I have to first attack the presumption and then the rest is blatantly, and obviously wrong.
Again, since he consistently defined his terms and the structure of his argument, as opposed to you, who constantly throw personal attacks like birdseed and try to overwhelm your opponent with verbosity instead of clarity, this assertion is utterly fantastic.

[Rafiq]

As I said, you asked in the first post whether I can name an example of where revolutionary workers were led by intellectuals and their visions. In the second post, you ask me if I could name examples of where workers were not led by an intelligentsia/intellectuals.

Nope, no inconsistency here. :)

I don't know if English is your native language but clearly from this:


Also, in times when revolution was imminent, can you refer to some historical examples where intellectuals leading the revolution seduced workers with elaborate visions of a new society?


We can tell that intellectuals leading the revolution is rather a given, they are distinguished here as intellectuals seducing workers with elaborate visions of a new society. Why would I put in the later part if that wasn't what was important? Why wouldn't I just say "Give me an example of intellectuals leading the revolution". No organic form of proletarian consciousness would be similar to such utopianism, this is why I used the word intellectual. That does not however mean much as far as the argument you're trying to make goes.

Now the obvious truth is that you misinterpreted it, which is fine. You can admit that, because quite obviously you did. It's not even up for debate, you clearly fucking misinterpreted it. The more you defend yourself here, the more of an ass you look like.

And now for the phrase that contradicts the former?


And in which cases was the Communist movement not led by the revolutionary intelligentsia? I would be very curious if you could name me one historical circumstance, just one, Five Year Plan. You cannot.


Notice the terminology, revolutionary intelligentsia. The revolutionary intelligentsia does not, like petty bourgeois intellectuals, try and seduce workers with elaborate ideas about a new society. So clearly, you don't even have a right to be mistaken because I didn't even use the same words. Not only were they not of different contexts, this is further demonstrated by the fact that they weren't the same words.

[Thirsty Crow]

The revolutionary intelligentsia does not, like petty bourgeois intellectuals, try and seduce workers with elaborate ideas about a new society.
But no one is doing this - utopian seduction, today.

Or are there some folks? If so, which? All I could think of are Hahnel and Albert but it would be simply grotesque to claim they're trying to propagandize.

[Five Year Plan]

Yes propaganda exists, but very quickly and easily it is pure ideology. Just look at the vocabulary that is used by the Koch brothers funded Cato institute. No longer is it propaganda, it is a breath of fresh air, it is ideology.

By propaganda, I mean political arguments that attempt to persuade a person to adopt a specific ideology or worldview. That is why I distinguish ideology from propaganda, but acknowledge that propaganda is a vehicle for people to advocate ideologies.

With you? Well, propaganda, at some unspecific point, apparently vaporizes into pure air that is then breathed. Yeah, that clarifies matters about as well as the rest of your contributions to the forum. So poetic! If only Marx had this caustic wit.

[Five Year Plan]

We can tell that intellectuals leading the revolution is rather a given, they are distinguished here as intellectuals seducing workers with elaborate visions of a new society. Why would I put in the later part if that wasn't what was important? Why wouldn't I just say "Give me an example of intellectuals leading the revolution". No organic form of proletarian consciousness would be similar to such utopianism, this is why I used the word intellectual. That does not however mean much as far as the argument you're trying to make goes.

Now the obvious truth is that you misinterpreted it, which is fine. You can admit that, because quite obviously you did. It's not even up for debate, you clearly fucking misinterpreted it. The more you defend yourself here, the more of an ass you look like.

And now for the phrase that contradicts the former?


Notice the terminology, revolutionary intelligentsia. The revolutionary intelligentsia does not, like petty bourgeois intellectuals, try and seduce workers with elaborate ideas about a new society. So clearly, you don't even have a right to be mistaken because I didn't even use the same words. Not only were they not of different contexts, this is further demonstrated by the fact that they weren't the same words.

I understand the point you are making, and the distinction. My point was that they way you phrased the questions in back-to-back posts made it appear as though you were at cross purposes and contradicting yourself, especially to people who are not already on board with your initial assumptions.

[Rafiq]

But you do. In a very recent post, for instance, you claim that Five Year Plans' definition of spontaneism is traditionally used in a manner different than his, and claim that his definition is entirely a priori and personal. But you never bothered to explain why your definition is more correct than his. You forget that you're not trying to just convince your opponent, but your audience. Sometimes the onlookers require that a bone be thrown to it.

Spontaneism was a word that was traditionally leveled against economistic 'radicals', among them I believe were Council Communists. So from their positions we can form a coherent understanding of 'spontaneism' as we do not hold that Lenin's argument was a straw-man. The argument against spontaneism was not about the amount of time it took for them to develop consciousness, rather, that they do not require direction from those theoretically skilled, politically adept intellectuals.

But that doesn't have anything to do with your initial argument, that I won't respond or address his actual argument. He was making a defense of why he contradicted himself, and I shot such defense down as illegitimate. That's not the same as taking things out of context and formulating a straw-man argument, that's not the same as blatantly and intentionally misinterpreting your opponents arguments, because they fit within your constrained presumptions about Marxism and so on.


Then do it, already. You were asked to provide specific places where this happened, and you have yet to do so. I can hazard a guess as to why: You can't.


You can do this just as easily as I can. Honestly I will admit this is nothing short of my own laziness here. Because of all the posts I made were essentially just that, explanations of specific places where that happened, I just don't find the need to re-quote them and bring them back. I made them and posted them for a reason, I didn't put an expiration date on them.

Here's just a few

http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.php?p=2766646&postcount=107
http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.php?p=2766899&postcount=111
http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.php?p=2766900&postcount=112
http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.php?p=2766905&postcount=114
http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.php?p=2766905&postcount=114

I'm confident enough that you all know what I'm talking about. If you don't, it's probably because you're being dishonest.

[Rafiq]

With you? Well, propaganda, at some unspecific point, apparently vaporizes into pure air that is then breathed.

it is a fresh of breath air because they create ideological presumptions which are then no longer question: Just look at the dichotomy between "big" and "small" government. Is that propaganda, or ideology? It may have originated as propaganda, but proponents then recycle it not because they are dishonest or trying to fool anyone, but because such dichotomy is no longer questioned. That is ideology. Without ideology, propaganda is worthless.

[Five Year Plan]

But no one is doing this - utopian seduction, today.

Or are there some folks? If so, which? All I could think of are Hahnel and Albert but it would be simply grotesque to claim they're trying to propagandize.

Now you understand the box Rafiq is having a coronary trying to argue himself out of. He claimed that workers' struggles cannot, on principle, be driven by their visions for a new society. When pressed to defend this absurd claim, he tries to modify it by claiming he is talking only about "utopian" and "elaborate" visions. Then, when his dishonest revision is pointed out to him, he screams about how I am misrepresenting what he is saying, but then refuses to show where.

[Rafiq]

I understand the point you are making, and the distinction. My point was that they way you phrased the questions in back-to-back posts made it appear as though you were at cross purposes and contradicting yourself, especially to people who are not already on board with your initial assumptions.

It made it seem that way to you, who was not carefully reading the posts to begin with. If you were more careful and mindful, you wouldn't have made such an accusation. This is your problem, don't try to group everyone else in with you here.

[Five Year Plan]

it is a fresh of breath air because they create ideological presumptions which are then no longer questioned

At the point an idea is taken for granted, would it makes sense to wax poetic about it being a "breath of fresh air?" After all, don't people generally take notice of breaths of fresh air due to the fact that the air is "fresh," new, and noticeable? I assign this poem a failing grade.

[Rafiq]

But no one is doing this - utopian seduction, today.

Or are there some folks? If so, which? All I could think of are Hahnel and Albert but it would be simply grotesque to claim they're trying to propagandize.

Well, even if no one actively goes out and seduces workers like this - the point I was trying to make is that the manner in which utopians think workers will adopt their ideas is just that: they think that if they convince workers well enough of the feasibility of their happy society, if they get workers to buy into it a revolution logically follows. And this is a problem usually reserved for 'Communists' (#:hammersickle::hammersickle::trotski::trotski::h ammersickle::hammersickle:) on the internet, most especially this site.

[Rafiq]

At the point an idea is taken for granted, would it makes sense to wax poetic about it being a "breath of fresh air?" After all, don't people generally take notice of breaths of fresh air due to the fact that the air is "fresh," new, and noticeable? I assign this poem a failing grade.

So now you want to argue about my 'poetry'? Do you know what poetry is? That isn't poetry, it's a single simile.

Breath of fresh air in that it is natural, it is a given, and so on. Breaths of fresh air are a very common thing - if such presumptions are "new", as they are, then yes it is comparable to a breath of fresh air. They take it in, however, as natural without thinking twice about it, rather than breathing in poison or something that would otherwise be hostile or vicious.

I fail to see what this has to do with anything.

[Five Year Plan]

So now you want to argue about my 'poetry'? Do you know what poetry is? That isn't poetry, it's a single simile.

I know. I gave the entire poem a failing grade on the basis of the terrible metaphor (not simile).

[Thirsty Crow]

Spontaneism was a word that was traditionally leveled against economistic 'radicals', among them I believe were Council Communists. So from their positions we can form a coherent understanding of 'spontaneism' as we do not hold that Lenin's argument was a straw-man.So let me see if I got this straight.

You seem to think that Lenin's attack against what is known as "economism" at the turn of the century in Russia, and the criticism of the international left communist opposition is connected to the one thing these two have in common: spontaneism.

This is a generous interpretation since you say


economistic 'radicals', among them I believe were Council Communists...which would indicate you believe the latter were a part of the overall problem of economism.

This would be so absurd so as to not merit any time whatsoever. So I'm gonna go ahead and assume the former.

The faith you place in one man is extraordinary here, a man known for "bending the stick too far". That's the first thing. The lesson: go to primary texts and see for yourself. This should be a really uncontroversial thing.

Secondly, spontaneism is a nebulous concept most of the time, and as far as I can see you're framing it in terms of the lack of organized political struggle by communists. That's quite fine and is enough.

The trouble is:

1) Lenin didn't live long enough to witness and write about councilism with its basically ambivalent attitude towards such organization and action by communists; maybe "ambivalent" is not really accurate, but in some cases the idea of communists "intervening" in workers' struggles, propaganda and so on was not rejected; the text to consult here is Pannekoek's on party and class from the 30s I think

That's why you can't be thinking of councilism when you say the German/Dutch council communists. The only people Lenin criticized who can fall under that category are

2) the historical German/Dutch left, primarily in KAPD. But your problem here is that attributing spontaneism is simply stupid and inaccurate. For instance, Gorter concluded in his 1920 Open Letter:


No, Comrade, this period is just beginning in Western Europe. There is no firm kernel anywhere as yet.


What we need here is such a kernel, hard as steel, clear as glass. And this is where we should begin herewith to build up a big organisation. In this respect we are here in the stage you were in 1903, or even before, in the Iskra period. Comrade, conditions here are far riper than we are, but that is no reason why we should let ourselves be carried away, to begin without a kernel!
(the "period" referred to is the period of propaganda by communists)

Now I would absolutely love to see an argument that itself would see this advocacy of the communist kernel as a kernel of spontaneism.

Anyway, primary sources. That might be the lesson of the day.

Now considering the fact that FYP place themselves in the Trotskyist tradition, I find it very, very unlikely that your accusation of spontaneism makes any sense whatsoever. Either that or they're one hell of a weird Trot.
If this is what you claimed; I can't be sure now that this thread was turned into a complete mess.

: they think that if they convince workers well enough of the feasibility of their happy society, if they get workers to buy into it a revolution logically follows. I highlighted the part I think is relevant. And yeah, it's obviously a problematic point. Not only problematic, much more.

But still you would sometimes face up to a situation like that I described, when people genuinely ask you questions like that. Obviously, the point is that social revolution doesn't logically or necessarily follow from presenting reasonable arguments that workers do indeed find reasonable and convincing.

But let's be clear on this. The conclusion, that it doesn't follow "logically" doesn't and cannot address the viability and effect of such arguments; in other words you can't conclude at the same time that everywhere and at any time such arguments are bollocks.

[Rafiq]

Well logically any attack on spontaneism would be an attack on economism: In that agency and will have nothing to do with the development of revolutionary consciousness and such a thing occurs logically as a result of the social condition of the proletarian class without any external guidance.

But yes, you're right, perhaps I was mistaken regarding Council Communists or the dutch Left. I had inferred so, because I believed them to be of an aversion to what they call a "vanguard" (or did they? I am not sure, but I am quite sure that those among the "Left-Wing Communism" camp, well, those sympathetic to them have - I have had little to no interaction with Left Communists of the dutch tradition outside of their sympathizers on this website). Isn't this a common idea among anarchists too? Well perhaps I was wrong in who prescisely Lenin among others were targeting, in attacks on spontaneism, that does not however change the point: Spontaneism does not entail the seamless or abrupt transition to revolutionary consciousness.

While as an offical position, I very much doubt that Five Year Plan adheres to Spontaneism. In another thread, he would most likely argue against it. My point is that he would go as far as to defend and make himself a proponent of such concepts (without admitting it, of coarse) for the sole purpose of winning the argument in which he personally, not his ideas, are primarily a part of. He clearly contradicted himself just for the sake of disagreeing with me. That was my point. No one is arguing Trotskyists believe in spontaneity.

[Thirsty Crow]

Well logically any attack on spontaneism would be an attack on economism: In that agency and will have nothing to do with the development of revolutionary consciousness and such a thing occurs logically as a result of the social condition of the proletarian class without any external guidance. It would not if you took Lenin's own view of economism constituting a reformist trend seriously.

But yes, you're right, perhaps I was mistaken regarding Council Communists or the dutch Left.


I had inferred so, because I believed them to be of an aversion to what they call a "vanguard" (or did they? I am not sure, but I am quite sure that those among the "ultra-Left" camp, well, those sympathetic to them have - I have had little to no interaction with Left Communists outside of their sympathizers on this website

The famous formulation of Gorter's, part of that quote, is for a kernel hard as steel and clear as glass - a kernel of the revolutionary communists political organization. Think about it; a kernel, a vanguard, or in modern left comm parlance, a nucleus. Yeah, same goddamn thing.


Isn't this a common idea among anarchists too?Some anarchists basically advocate communists political organization on almost the same organizational lines (eschewing federalism, for instance). I think the recently founded LCI (libertarian communists initiative) might be a good example, though I might have mentioned eschewing federalism a bit too early. From their statement of intent:


11. The Libertarian Communist Initiative is a medium term, pre-party formation which means to establish a pole of attraction for political regroupment which is capable of moving beyond both anarchism and Leninism. The Initiative intends to grow into a Libertarian Communist Party that can build on existing struggles and campaigns in order to pursue a clear programme for advanced struggle across all sections of the class and across an assemblage of terrains.

12. We use ‘Party’ here in the broad sense deployed by Malatesta, and do not feel this form compromises our libertarian content. We have never sought to build a mass organisation or union, and continue to reject substitutionist modes of organisation which prioritise the interests of the organisation or member over the interests of the class at large. The proletariat is the motor of social change and does not require being anything but itself, acting in solidarity against all forces which harass and undermine its interests.


Spontaneism does not entail the seamless or abrupt transition to revolutionary consciousness.
That is true.

In the 30s and within councilism this idea reached the height of importance and clarification. But it was always postulated that the crucial conditions of the development of revolutionary consciousness were actual workers' struggle (implying an uneven development), and by means of a criticism of the "party form" the conclusion was obvious, that political organizations are at least a hindrance, if not reactionary (as I said there's some noticeable ambivalence about what constitutes a party and so on)


My point is that he would go as far as to defend and make himself a proponent of such concepts (without admitting it, of coarse) for the sole purpose of winning the argument in which he personally, not his ideas, are primarily a part of.That's an entirely personal argument.
Did they go as far in this thread though? I think that's a question worth answering, and also this:


He clearly contradicted himself just for the sake of disagreeing with me.