What would happen to the Bourgeoisie after a revolution?

[Red Star Rising]

I hate think that Socialism requires people to be forced from their homes and have their possessions taken away. At least, not those who aren't ludicrously rich. I just want to know what would happen to small business owners and the upper-middle class who aren't inordinately wealthy but are by no means proletarian?

[Comrade #138672]

They will be given the chance to support the revolution.

[DOOM]

expropriation by the society (as in socialisation of the mop), no mercy. The petty-bourgeois are as "capitalist" as their bigger brother.

[Red Star Rising]

expropriation by the society (as in socialisation of the mop), no mercy. The petty-bourgeois are as "capitalist" as their bigger brother.

And after this? what happens to them? Their property is taken and they conveniently cease to exist?

[DOOM]

And after this? what happens to them? Their property is taken and they conveniently cease to exist?

They're defined by their relations to the means of productions. Thus they cease to exist once there is no private ownership.

[Creative Destruction]

do you mean after the revolution starts or after the revolution has completed its task? after the revolution there'd be no bourgeoisie, just like there'd be no proletariat. the class system would have been destroyed.

my wife and i had a length discussion about this very topic the other night, though. i liked her idea. if they have mansions, convert them into apartments and let them stay in one of the apartments. if they have multiple houses, let them choose which apartment they want to occupy. but they're not going to be treated any more "fairly" (in the bourgeois sense) than anyone else... otherwise there wouldn't be a revolution.

most petty capitalist's social positions would stay the same or probably improve. many are just as poor, sometimes poorer, than proletarians. they're just going to have to deal with the fact that society has come to a collective decision to get rid of private property and give it up (that is, liquidating their businesses, etc.) if they violently resist, then it'll be treated in kind. if they relent and follow the revolutionary decision, then i can't see any harm coming to them.

[Red Star Rising]

They will be given the chance to support the revolution.

Of course, but what if they refuse?

[Creative Destruction]

And after this? what happens to them? Their property is taken and they conveniently cease to exist?

i'd venture that housing is socialized. i don't think this necessarily means we have to force people out of their houses or where they're living right now (unless it's just an egregious waste of space; a 4 bedroom house for a married couple, for example, which is ridiculous even today.) they won't be able to pass it along to their kids after they die, though. the house reverts back to society as a whole to be used on a basis for need.

[Creative Destruction]

Of course, but what if they refuse?

i'm still trying to get a handle on what you're referring to here. their businesses, their houses, what?

[Red Star Rising]

do you mean after the revolution starts or after the revolution has completed its task? after the revolution there'd be no bourgeoisie, just like there'd be no proletariat. the class system would have been destroyed.
I mean as soon as the revolutionary dictatorship begins i.e after cpitalism is overthrown locally.


my wife and i had a length discussion about this very topic the other night, though. i liked her idea. if they have mansions, convert them into apartments and let them stay in one of the apartments. if they have multiple houses, let them choose which apartment they want to occupy. but they're not going to be treated any more "fairly" (in the bourgeois sense) than anyone else... otherwise there wouldn't be a revolution.
I like that idea too. Of course, if somebody else calls dibs on an apartment in a mansion before the previous owner the previous owners demand is not prioritised I presume.

[QueerVanguard]

Death, I would hope

[Comrade #138672]

Of course, but what if they refuse?Then they are reactionaries and will be treated as such. So, they better know what is good for them.

[Red Star Rising]

Death, I would hope
I hope you aren't serious.

[Red Star Rising]

Then they are reactionaries and will be treated as such.
Uh-huh. And how is that?

[Comrade #138672]

Uh-huh. And how is that?It depends entirely on the situation and the degree of resistance. Anyway, outright counter-revolutionaries will be dealt with mercilessly, since the revolution cannot survive if it allows its enemies, which are still powerful, to undermine it.

[Creative Destruction]

I hope you aren't serious.

QV is an idiot and can be safely ignored.

[Mass Grave Aesthetics]

I think their fate after and during the revolution is entirely up to them.

[RedWorker]

It depends entirely on the situation and the degree of resistance. Anyway, outright counter-revolutionaries will be dealt with mercilessly, since the revolution cannot survive if it allows its enemies, which are still powerful, to undermine it.

So what is a counter-revolutionary? You start with this and end up murdering leftists.

I don't think the proletarian state needs excesses. Obviously it will defend itself against counter-revolution, but this does not mean curtailing freedom of speech, for instance.

[Comrade #138672]

So what is a counter-revolutionary? You start with this and end up murdering leftists.I am sure we can all agree that fascists are counter-revolutionaries, for example. Of course, "murdering leftists" would not be something I would advocate. In fact, that thought is very disturbing to me.


I don't think the proletarian state needs excesses. Obviously it will defend itself against counter-revolution, but this does not mean curtailing freedom of speech, for instance.So, freedom of speech even for counter-revolutionaries, like fascists? That seems like a perfect way for a revolution to commit suicide. Sure, freedom of speech is important for the proletariat, but we do not want the counter-revolutionaries to use it against the revolution. Then all would be for nothing.

[RedWorker]

So, freedom of speech even for counter-revolutionaries, like fascists? That seems like a perfect way for a revolution to commit suicide. Sure, freedom of speech is important for the proletariat, but we do not want the counter-revolutionaries to use it against the revolution. Then all would be for nothing.

So wait, the proletariat has seized control overpowering the bourgeois state's violence and runs a state, yet it is threatened by words, which ultimately are only particular expressions of ideas? The point is, WHO decides who's a "fascist" and who's not? We've seen all kinds of left-wing uprisings become corrupted and start using the excuse of "eliminating counter-revolutionaries" to suppress leftists.

Oh, but the fascists! Yeah, because the revolutionary dictatorship of the proletariat is going to feel highly threatened by four neo nazis who do the armrise salute and can't draw a swastika properly. Not. They want to spread their racist and chauvinistic crap? Let them, and let everyone see what fools they are. The restriction of these ideas is only going to create more people who will follow them.

As you can see, you can now make a point that I'm "indirectly supporting fascists", while I can also make a point that you are indirectly supporting fascists (by indirectly creating more of them, no matter with what intentions). This is the exact same that applies in what I said previously. The most powerful faction, at any time, can decide that anyone is "indirectly supporting counter-revolution" and suppress them. The point is that ANYONE can be said to be supporting counter-revolution from some point of view.

Freedom of speech for everyone. The restriction of freedom of speech will only create more counter-revolutionaries, and threaten the principles and structures behind the revolution. You can censor specific expressions, but you can't eliminate an idea. The restriction, in any way, of freedom of speech, is a bourgeois idea, belonging to bourgeois society, and which always has a bourgeois expression.

[Comrade #138672]

So wait, the proletariat has seized control overpowering the bourgeois state's violence and runs a state, yet it is threatened by words, which ultimately are only particular expressions of ideas?You should not underestimate the power of agitation and propaganda. You should not let counter-revolutionaries organize in any way.


The point is, WHO decides who's a "fascist" and who's not? We've seen all kinds of left-wing uprisings become corrupted and start using the excuse of "eliminating counter-revolutionaries" to suppress leftists.Who decides that capitalism needs to be overthrown in the first place? Obviously the suppression of freedom of speech can be abused, but that does not mean that we should not restrict counter-revolutionary propaganda.


Oh, but the fascists! Yeah, because the revolutionary dictatorship of the proletariat is going to feel highly threatened by four neo nazis who do the armrise salute and can't draw a swastika properly. Not.There are already much more of them. You should not underestimate them.


They want to spread their racist and chauvinistic crap? Let them, and let everyone see what fools they are. The restriction of these ideas is only going to create more people who will follow them.How is letting the counter-revolutionary propaganda flow freely going to stop them from growing?


As you can see, you can now make a point that I'm "indirectly supporting fascists", while I can also make a point that you are indirectly supporting fascists (by indirectly creating more of them, no matter with what intentions).Well, I am not going to do that.


This is the exact same that applies in what I said previously. The most powerful faction, at any time, can decide that anyone is "indirectly supporting counter-revolution" and suppress them. The point is that ANYONE can be said to be supporting counter-revolution from some point of view.With that kind of thinking, how could you be supporting a revolution at all? After all, who decides that it is a revolution in the first place?


Freedom of speech for everyone. The restriction of freedom of speech will only create more counter-revolutionaries, and threaten the principles and structures behind the revolution. You can censor specific expressions, but you can't eliminate an idea. The restriction, in any way, of freedom of speech, is a bourgeois idea, belonging to bourgeois society, and which always has a bourgeois expression.To me it seems somewhat idealist.

[RedWorker]

You should not underestimate the power of agitation and propaganda. You should not let counter-revolutionaries organize in any way.

Okay. So who's a counter-revolutionary or not? Where do we draw the line? Is the PCE suppressing the revolutionaries in 1930s Spain, under the lie that they were hampering the anti-fascist effort okay? Is the suppression of Kronstandt okay? WHO decides if the people at Kronstandt were counter-revolutionaries or not? They can be construed of as of being counter-revolutionaries and being revolutionaries, depending on who you are. Counter-revolutionaries can hide behind revolutionary rhetoric, and revolutionaries can be construed of as being indirectly counter-revolutionaries all the time. We've seen countless examples of this throughout history, and every time the suspension of basic freedoms for any group, individual or idea has been considered, the expression has been either gross inefficiency, gross barbarianism, or both. The VERY notion that it is okay at all to suppress such basic freedoms HAS been the greatest harm, the greatest threat to all revolutions of all ages.

Freedom only for the supporters of the government, only for the members of one party – however numerous they may be – is no freedom at all. Freedom is always and exclusively freedom for the one who thinks differently. Not because of any fanatical concept of “justice” but because all that is instructive, wholesome and purifying in political freedom depends on this essential characteristic, and its effectiveness vanishes when “freedom” becomes a special privilege. (Rosa Luxemburg)



Who decides that capitalism needs to be overthrown in the first place? Obviously the suppression of freedom of speech can be abused, but that does not mean that we should not restrict counter-revolutionary propaganda.

This makes no sense. I do the revolution because I want to do the revolution. I don't trust any clique to decide who is a counter-revolutionary because I don't agree with that principle, and even if I did, I don't trust them in correctly deciding who is a 'counter-revolutionary' or not (in fact, I believe that by the very principle being considered here, by the very structures that would enable it, it is impossible for it to be done 'correctly', no matter who's in charge). Simple.


How is letting the counter-revolutionary propaganda flow freely going to stop them from growing?

By not attracting people to a banned idea, by not attracting people to become counter-revolutionaries in order to achieve freedom of speech.

[Creative Destruction]

You should not underestimate the power of agitation and propaganda. You should not let counter-revolutionaries organize in any way.

This assumes that the people are stupid and that they're going to let their gains go to waste because some useless fascists printed a newspaper. Sorry, this is elitist, paternalistic crap; the idea that people have to be protected from certain things said.

[Slavic]

This assumes that the people are stupid and that they're going to let their gains go to waste because some useless fascists printed a newspaper. Sorry, this is elitist, paternalistic crap; the idea that people have to be protected from certain things said.


Are we just going to ignore the successful agitation and propaganda that fascists promoted in the 20th century?

Also, why would you even tolerate a fascist newspaper? Speech can be used as a weapon, and such a weapon should used by socialists against their enemies.

[G4b3n]

QV is an idiot and can be safely ignored.

Well, historically, it has been a popular position.

[Brandon's Impotent Rage]

I think the basic fear here is that after the revolution we're going to start herding the bourgeois into death camps or something.

....Yeah, that would be rather stupid. Seriously, what actual good would that do? Other than the basic distaste for mass murder (I don't trust a person who doesn't shiver at the idea), what would be the point? The bourgeois class would no longer exist. Other than by force of arms (which would amount to counter-revolution), the best they could do is just whine about having to actually share their stuff and getting their hands dirty.

[Red Star Rising]

I think the basic fear here is that after the revolution we're going to start herding the bourgeois into death camps or something.

....Yeah, that would be rather stupid. Seriously, what actual good would that do? Other than the basic distaste for mass murder (I don't trust a person who doesn't shiver at the idea), what would be the point? The bourgeois class would no longer exist. Other than by force of arms (which would amount to counter-revolution), the best they could do is just whine about having to actually share their stuff and getting their hands dirty.

#I'm more worried about the people who live in nice houses but they aren't big or grand enough to support multiple families? What would happen here?

[Red Star Rising]

And Comrade #138672, I'm sure that Fascist post revolution will be given about as much credibility as TheQueerVanguard got here. And I don't notice this thread being brought to its knees by unpopular ideas.

[RedKobra]

They're defined by their relations to the means of productions. Thus they cease to exist once there is no private ownership.

is the right answer. Its pretty simple really. Everyone becomes a communist, since all other classes (as defined by their relation to the means of production) will cease to exist. The answer is the same to the question 'what happens to the proletariat after the revolution?'

[The Intransigent Faction]

Are we just going to ignore the successful agitation and propaganda that fascists promoted in the 20th century?

Not at all, but that agitation took place under very different socioeconomic circumstances than would exist after a successful socialist revolution. Propaganda is not a magical incantation and its resonance in the Weimar republic is no indication of how a post-revolutionary society would react to it.

[synthesis]

#I'm more worried about the people who live in nice houses but they aren't big or grand enough to support multiple families? What would happen here?

I think as long as everyone else is already sufficiently housed, this doesn't particularly matter.

But I also think that these questions will seem less pertinent to you as you spend more time here. Revolutions often lead to civil wars which often lead to extreme cases of displacement, for example, in which case the issue becomes completely different in nature.

It's really impossible to say, in large part because people here don't get to define how the revolution plays out. (I will say that people who are overly concerned about things such as this tend to generally not be cut out for revolutionary politics.)


Freedom of speech for everyone. The restriction of freedom of speech will only create more counter-revolutionaries, and threaten the principles and structures behind the revolution. You can censor specific expressions, but you can't eliminate an idea. The restriction, in any way, of freedom of speech, is a bourgeois idea, belonging to bourgeois society, and which always has a bourgeois expression.

Freedom of speech itself is, like, the ultimate bourgeois idea, historically speaking. I also happen to believe that it's a good humanist goal that can only be fully realized in the absence of class society, but I still don't think there's any real harm in a communist equivalent to the de-Nazification that took place in Germany after WWII.

[cyu]

What I believe should happen and what I believe would happen aren't necessarily the same thing. In societies where capital punishments are the norm, then there would more likely be executions after the revolution. In societies where life imprisonment is the norm, then there would more likely be life imprisonment after the revolution. In societies where torture is the norm, the there would more likely be torture during the revolution.

Just as victims of child abuse come to learn only one way to deal with interpersonal conflict, so too do the people in a society learn from example - and their reflexive reaction would be to deal with their oppressors in the same way their oppressors dealt with them.

[motion denied]

They would be regrouped as a curling team. They'd compete against the Proletarian Curling All Stars for privileges such as share in the total social product and access to Olympic swimming pools.

[Zukunftsmusik]

They would be regrouped as a curling team.

And I can hardly think of worse punishment

[Gepetto]

Revleft: when it's not dominated by supporters of socialism in one armored division, it's dominated by bleeding hearts that want to give bourgeoisie freedom (as if infringement on their very right to exist as a class wasn't what they want).

[Lev Ulyanov]

My view on this is that just because you suppress fascist, bourgeois and religious media, or fascists, bourgeoisie or religious people themselves, doesn't mean that their views are simply going to die out. It is better to let them come to the surface, and be eliminated in due course by the activity of the dialectic, than to force them into submission - which is merely hiding the problem, and not resolving it. Look what happened with nationalism in Yugoslavia.

[Redistribute the Rep]

Okay. So who's a counter-revolutionary or not? Where do we draw the line? Is the PCE suppressing the revolutionaries in 1930s Spain, under the lie that they were hampering the anti-fascist effort okay? Is the suppression of Kronstandt okay? WHO decides if the people at Kronstandt were counter-revolutionaries or not? They can be construed of as of being counter-revolutionaries and being revolutionaries, depending on who you are. Counter-revolutionaries can hide behind revolutionary rhetoric, and revolutionaries can be construed of as being indirectly counter-revolutionaries all the time. We've seen countless examples of this throughout history, and every time the suspension of basic freedoms for any group, individual or idea has been considered, the expression has been either gross inefficiency, gross barbarianism, or both. The VERY notion that it is okay at all to suppress such basic freedoms HAS been the greatest harm, the greatest threat to all revolutions of all ages.

Freedom only for the supporters of the government, only for the members of one party – however numerous they may be – is no freedom at all. Freedom is always and exclusively freedom for the one who thinks differently. Not because of any fanatical concept of “justice” but because all that is instructive, wholesome and purifying in political freedom depends on this essential characteristic, and its effectiveness vanishes when “freedom” becomes a special privilege. (Rosa Luxemburg


This makes no sense. I do the revolution because I want to do the revolution. I don't trust any clique to decide who is a counter-revolutionary because I don't agree with that principle, and even if I did, I don't trust them in correctly deciding who is a 'counter-revolutionary' or not (in fact, I believe that by the very principle being considered here, by the very structures that would enable it, it is impossible for it to be done 'correctly', no matter who's in charge). Simple.

Well, this same type of argument is used by anti communists all the time. They say that because communist movements have resulted in authoritarian states in the past, communism should be abandoned altogether, not unlike your assertion that attempts to thwart reactionaries should be avoided because it wasn't applied "correctly" in the past. I'm not very convinced that "by the very structures that would enable it, it is impossible for it to be done correctly." What are the "structures" you're speaking of? Ones created from revolutionary power? The same ones that will be needed to establish a proletarian dictatorship? Elaborate.

But again, this is something the reactionaries use as an argument against communism, that the "very structures that enable it" prevent it from being done correctly. Also, one can certainly think of times where dealing with the counterrevolutionaries proved useful or would have been useful, Jacob zhitomirsky comes to mind, and the nazi party for that matter. If it wasn't applied correctly in the past, then apply it correctly this time. If the equivalent of the spanish PCE tries to pop up again, we repress them because we know if we don't, then it's going to be the other way around. nobody here is advocating indiscriminate repression of all things anybody deems reactionary; this is a weak strawman.


By not attracting people to a banned idea, by not attracting people to become counter-revolutionaries in order to achieve freedom of speech.

You are aware of how the Nazis came to power in Germany, right? It should be fairly obvious how keeping fascists from organizing would keep them from gaining influence or political traction as a movement. People aren't going to become reactionary in order to achieve freedom of speech because people simply don't support freedom of speech as an abstract concept for the fuck of it. people support it only as it is used as an expression of their class interest. Here's some lenin


“Freedom of the press” is another of the principal slogans of “pure democracy”. And here, too, the workers know — and socialists everywhere have admitted it millions of times — that this freedom is a deception while the best printing presses and the biggest stocks of paper are appropriated by the capitalists and while capitalist rule over the press remains, a rule that is manifested throughout the world all the more strikingly, sharply, and cynically, the more democracy and the republican system are developed, as in America for example. “The first thing to do to win real equality and genuine democracy for the working people, for the workers and peasants, is to deprive capital of the possibility of hiring writers, buying up publishing houses, and hiring newspapers. And to do that the capitalists and exploiters have to be overthrown and their resistance suppressed.


It is better to let them come to the surface, and be eliminated in due course by the activity of the dialectic, than to force them into submission - which is merely hiding the problem, and not resolving it.


As the german Communist party said in reaction to the Nazi rise to power, "after nazis, us." Yea lets let that happen again. Perhaps "the activity of the dialectic" will get rid of the fascists eventually, but are we really just going to wait it out as millions are killed and socialism is brutally repressed. John Maynard Keynes said (in response to a much different situation, to the people who said that the free market would eventually fix itself in the long run) "in the long run... we'll all be dead." Let's not let some blind abstraction of dialectics keep us from taking necessary actions. The revolution is not some dream that we can just sit and wait for because it will one day materialize due to the glorious "dialectic" with no action needed. The struggle is today. The workers won't wait until the fascists have had their turn with freedom of speech.

[Sabot Cat]

I'd imagine that they'd just become workers and participate in society like everyone else and/or get all grumpy about the revolution and complain about how 'everything was better in my day, under capitalism' while drinking a shot of whiskey. Society would regard these opinions as quaint relics from a darker time, much like how we'd treat someone who ardently supports slavery or some such.

[Sabot Cat]

Also, I believe that the press, in general, is a realization of human freedom, and that free press is the ever vigilant eye of the people's spirit, the embodiment of the people's trust in itself. To fight freedom of the press, one must maintain the thesis of the permanent immaturity of the human race. And if the immaturity of the human race is the mystical ground for opposing freedom of the press, then certainly censorship is a most reasonable means of hindering the human race from coming of age.

[Mad Frankie]

Also, I believe that the press, in general, is a realization of human freedom, and that free press is the ever vigilant eye of the people's spirit, the embodiment of the people's trust in itself. To fight freedom of the press, one must maintain the thesis of the permanent immaturity of the human race. And if the immaturity of the human race is the mystical ground for opposing freedom of the press, then certainly censorship is a most reasonable means of hindering the human race from coming of age.

Yours is an Idealist and a Humanist view. Communism is a movement waging the class struggle for the working class, free press is supported in the context of a capitalist society to resist censorship and repression and help disseminate revolutionary propaganda. You're the one turning it into something mystical, a god of sorts. The reason free press shouldn't be some sort of sacred principle in a revolutionary society is not a belief in 'the permanent immaturity of the human race.' It is simply that there is no rational reason for such a principle; on the contrary, allowing the enemy to spread their propaganda is ludicrous.

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

Socialists believe in the abolition of private property, capital and money wealth and wages.

Ergo you can probably figure out that what would 'happen' to those with private property and capital during a socialist revolution is that they would have this expropriated from them.

As for asking what else would 'happen' to them, I hope we aren't going down this faux-hardman act of talking about killing people for no particular reason. Obviously if there is a war raised by counter-revolutionaries then socialists must defend themselves, but it is nonsense to advocate judicial or extra-judicial slaughter just because of someone's position in a previous [class] society.

[Sabot Cat]

Yours is an Idealist and a Humanist view. Communism is a movement waging the class struggle for the working class, free press is supported in the context of a capitalist society to resist censorship and repression and help disseminate revolutionary propaganda. You're the one turning it into something mystical, a god of sorts. The reason free press shouldn't be some sort of sacred principle in a revolutionary society is not a belief in 'the permanent immaturity of the human race.' It is simply that there is no rational reason for such a principle; on the contrary, allowing the enemy to spread their propaganda is ludicrous.

But who is banning this material from who? The proletariat must rule itself as a whole, and there will be no parliamentary deputies or state hierarchy to dictate what we can or cannot read other than ourselves.

Also, would you say my view is contrary to Marxism, then?

[RedWorker]

But again, this is something the reactionaries use as an argument against communism

Nazis constantly use your argument against freedom of speech - "safeguard the revolution" (yes fascists talk about their 'revolution'), "don't let the enemy speak".


nobody here is advocating indiscriminate repression of all things anybody deems reactionary; this is a weak strawman.

So said the Bolsheviks.


You are aware of how the Nazis came to power in Germany, right?

You are aware of how the Bolsheviks created a single-party bourgeois dictatorship, right?


People aren't going to become reactionary in order to achieve freedom of speech because people simply don't support freedom of speech as an abstract concept for the fuck of it.

Many would become liberals and right-wingers.


but are we really just going to wait it out as millions are killed and socialism is brutally repressed.

So, wait. We have the revolutionary dictatorship of the proletariat yet Nazis are somehow killing millions and 'brutally' repressing socialism.


The workers won't wait until the fascists have had their turn with freedom of speech.

Really? And what workers are these? Why would workers be attracted to the idea of restricting their own freedom of speech? (Restriction of freedom of speech is always restriction for all. "Restriction of freedom of speech for one class" is nonsense.)


Yours is an Idealist and a Humanist view. Communism is a movement waging the class struggle for the working class, free press is supported in the context of a capitalist society to resist censorship and repression and help disseminate revolutionary propaganda. You're the one turning it into something mystical, a god of sorts. The reason free press shouldn't be some sort of sacred principle in a revolutionary society is not a belief in 'the permanent immaturity of the human race.' It is simply that there is no rational reason for such a principle; on the contrary, allowing the enemy to spread their propaganda is ludicrous.

There's nothing idealist in that. He's simply explaining his own opinion, as you are.

[Mad Frankie]

But who is banning this material from who? The proletariat must rule itself as a whole, and there will be no parliamentary deputies or state hierarchy to dictate what we can or cannot read other than ourselves.

Also, would you say my view is contrary to Marxism, then?

Yes, I think your view is contrary to Marxism, I think it is an Enlightenment view rooted in anthropological optimism. Marxism is scientific socialism. Communists should support or oppose something on the basis of whether it will harm or help the revolution.

The Party would suppress all reaction and their propaganda. Just as proletarian leadership is necessary before the revolution (that is to say, people who devote their whole life to the revolutionary struggle, professional revolutionists who, as Nechaev put it, sacrifice everything, including their own name, and put themselves on permanent disposal to the Party), in order to make it happen, it has to exist after the revolution in order to defend and secure the victory of the working class.

[Sabot Cat]

Yes, I think your view is contrary to Marxism, I think it i an Enlightenment view rooted in anthropological optimism. Marxism is scientific socialism. Communists should support or oppose something on the basis of whether it will harm or help the revolution.

It's interesting that you think my view is contrary to Marxism, as my post on freedom of the press consisted entirely of Marx quotes. See here (http://socialistreview.org.uk/376/marx-freedom-press).


The Party would suppress all reaction and their propaganda. Just as proletarian leadership is necessary before the revolution (that is to say, people who devote their whole life to the revolutionary struggle, professional revolutionists who, as Nechaev put it, sacrifice everything, including their own name, and put themselves on permanent disposal to the Party), in order to make it happen, it has to exist after the revolution in order to defend and secure the victory of the working class.

We can defend and secure our own victory without a bunch of Apparatchiks telling us what to do. I see the need for proletarian organization, but not a group that is vested with the power to create an asymmetry of information with the working class at large. As Marx put it in the context of censorship, "But if we all remain children in swaddling-clothes, who is to swaddle us? If we all lie in a cradle, who is to cradle us? If we are all in jail, who is to be the jail warden?"

The proletariat must rule itself.

[Mad Frankie]

As first, Marx wasn't even a communist at the time of the Rheinishe Zeitung. As second, it was published in an absolutist state where one is trying to win as much as possible in order to make it possible to spread revolutionary propaganda as much as possible and weaken the regime. Even in the Neu Rheinishe Zeitung bourgeois liberal views were promoted (such as the unification of Germany) because they were viewed as progressive in a state as reactionary as Prussia.

The Paris Manuscripts (written after the Rheinishe Zeitung was banned) are an example of this Humanist, Enlightenment Marx that will later be superseded by the Mature Marx, the founder of scientific socialism.

[Sabot Cat]

As first, Marx wasn't even a communist at the time of the Rheinishe Zeitung. As second, it was published in an absolutist state where one is trying to win as much as possible in order to make it possible to spread revolutionary propaganda as much as possible and weaken the regime. Even in the Neu Rheinishe Zeitung bourgeois liberal views were promoted (such as the unification of Germany) because they were viewed as progressive in a state as reactionary as Prussia.

The Paris Manuscripts (written after the Rheinishe Zeitung was banned) are an example of this Humanist, Enlightenment Marx that will later be superseded by the Mature Marx, the founder of scientific socialism.

If you can find me texts where he repudiates his repeated superlatively stated defense of it, I'd like to see them.

But the question remains: who is to censor what from whom, if the proletariat in its entirety are their own rulers? The self-rule of the proletariat as a whole is something that 'Mature Marx' affirmed, and while you you maintain that there is a contradiction between 'Enlightenment Marx' and 'Mature Marx', there's a far more grave structural contradiction you need to account for that exists between the workers ruling themselves and a hierarchy wherein censorship is enforceable.

[RedWorker]

.

The establishment of censorship threatens the very principles and structures behind the revolution. It also makes it possible for one socialist faction to censor others (don't even try to pretend that this won't happen in practice), as it has always historically happened, and therefore threatens the very dictatorship of the proletariat itself.


Marxism is scientific socialism. Communists should support or oppose something on the basis of whether it will harm or help the revolution.

This is dumb, and neither scientific socialism nor Marxism support this principle per se (it's a personal opinion). If a terrorist attack murdering hundreds of innocents would help raise awareness about communism, should it be done?


As first, Marx wasn't even a communist at the time of the Rheinishe Zeitung

Ah, and here the (pseudo-) radical materialist makes excuses as to why Marx said one thing or the other, instead of refuting the principle behind the argument. Pray tell, even if Marx was fervently in favor of freedom of speech his whole life, does this mean that revolutionaries can't be against freedom of speech? The correct response is that Marxism is not Marx, and Marx's personal opinions are not an unquestionable gospel.

But of course, Marx was highly in favor of freedom of speech.

[Mad Frankie]

The establishment of censorship threatens the very principles and structures behind the revolution. It also makes it possible for one socialist faction to censor others (don't even try to pretend that this won't happen in practice), as it has always historically happened, and therefore threatens the very dictatorship of the proletariat itself.



This is dumb, and neither scientific socialism nor Marxism support this principle per se (it's a personal opinion). If a terrorist attack murdering hundreds of innocents would help raise awareness about communism, should it be done?



Ah, and here the (pseudo-) radical materialist makes excuses as to why Marx said one thing or the other, instead of refuting the principle behind the argument. Pray tell, even if Marx was fervently in favor of freedom of speech his whole life, does this mean that revolutionaries can't be against freedom of speech? The correct response is that Marxism is not Marx, and Marx's personal opinions are not an unquestionable gospel.

But of course, Marx was highly in favor of freedom of speech.

It was just an historical note, I doubt anybody supports or opposes something on the principle of whether Marx was personally in favour of it or against it. The point is, why would communists support something as a sacred principle? Now you made a practical defence of the freedom of speech, explaining that it would harm the dictatorship of the proletariat; that is a valid position with which I disagree. It presupposes factionalism. You avoided the question of censoring bourgeois propaganda and suppressing counterrevolutionary agitation.

As for 'terrorism', it is a bourgeois category. The example is completely abstract. Attacks can of course be counterproductive (bombing of Axel Springer for example) and revolutionary tactics ought to be debated in that spirit, of what effect it will have on the revolutionary struggle.

@Sabot Cat - What can I say, I support the vanguard party as the leadership of the proletariat and I believe that people who made the revolution happen and had the most immediate experience of struggle, of bourgeois prisons and tactics and methods and whatnot, ought to, in a democratic way (so as to prevent bureaucratisation and bonapartism), decide how to deal with threats to the Revolution. There is no blueprint for a postrevolutionary society. It will structurally be completely different from the bourgeois one.

[RedWorker]

The point is, why would communists support something as a sacred principle?

They shouldn't. Sacred principles presupposes dogma, and lack of reasoning. There is nobody arguing for sacred principles here.


It presupposes factionalism.

Which will happen.


You avoided the question of censoring bourgeois propaganda and suppressing counterrevolutionary agitation.

There is always someone who decides what is bourgeois propaganda and what's not, and something can always be construed of as bourgeois propaganda, as "strategically" or "indirectly" aiding the counter-revolution. You can rationally think it out all you want, but it simply won't be that way in practice. For instance, once Stalin took control, he started censoring 'counter-revolutionary agitation'. That there was no DOTP under him is beyond the point. Furthermore, Stalin was simply taking advantage of the whole authoritarian machine built by the Bolsheviks - which then turned against them. First the liberals are banned (which I also would not agree with, whether it threatens the DOTP or not), the next moment the people asking for an actual DOTP after the pre-Stalin degeneration are repressed over 'counter-revolutionary actions', the next Stalin does his thing.


As for 'terrorism', it is a bourgeois category.

It's not. It refers to a very clear type of direct action, as distinguished from the kind of action Marxists advocate.


The example is completely abstract.

The point is, if something is aiding the revolution, should it be done even if it breaks certain principles? Say, a communist group can choose to murder 50 people and then they will become infamous and therefore communism will become more known. This will result in more people being communists and the revolution being more likely. Under your rule, this would be a good action.


What can I say, I support the vanguard party as the leadership of the proletariat

The proletariat ARE the leaders, and in any case they choose their leadership, not a bunch of enlightened politicians who claim to know better than the 'dumb' masses.


and I believe that people who made the revolution happen

So, this enlightened party decides without the participation of the proletariat?


There is no blueprint for a postrevolutionary society. It will structurally be completely different from the bourgeois one.

Obviously not when there is, for instance, censorship, which is a distinct characteristic of bourgeois society and cannot exist in communism.

Anyway, we all known what historically happened every single time basic freedoms had to be suspended anywhere, by anyone, for any reason.