Castro Not So Bad Afterall

[T.A.Frawley]

I watched the documentary Fidel today and I don't know if it was just the way the presented him, but it left my son and I with the impression he is the Dictator he's been made out to be. Is this true? It at least made is seem like Cubans love him. I was also surprised to find out the roll Cuba played in defeating apartheid in South Africa.

[tuwix]

Stalin was loved too, despite his massive killings... Furthermore, he's loved by some Russians until today. A love for someone isn't any indicator about dictators. Propaganda can make miracles. And it has done.

[Antiochus]

Well Castro isn't a "brutal" dictator. Nevertheless he is one. As far as him being loved, maybe.

[Bala Perdida]

Most dictators are images of national freedom. Much like George Washington in the US. Or Bolivar in South America. Just like George Washington, a lot of them are terrible. But nationalism and anti-imp-ism go a long way.

[Brandon's Impotent Rage]

As far as repressive governments go, Cuba is actually pretty far down on the latter. It's true that politically Cubans don't have any real freedom, and criticizing the government is a pretty bad idea. But with that said, Cubans today have ALOT of social freedom, and they've been trying to make up for the awful repression of LGBT peoples that happened in the revolutionary era.

[mushroompizza]

:laugh::laugh::laugh: I actually kinda laughed at this. This would be like saying "Hmmm I saw a documentary today that said Hitler isn't that bad, I guess some Germans liked him after all!" Its just silly, just stop watching Michael Moore and realize Castro is a Marxist Leninist ass. He hogs all the nations resources himself, his palace is one of the few places with newly paved roads and new power lines.

[Trap Queen Voxxy]

Stalin was loved too, despite his massive killings... Furthermore, he's loved by some Russians until today. A love for someone isn't any indicator about dictators. Propaganda can make miracles. And it has done.

Alright so the whole "mass killings," thing is Anglo-American imperialist horeshit. They were more like prolonged, worker/supervisory negligence induced fatalities. With the very few exceptions of like purges and such. This is bare bones true. Why you choose to use this specific language and verbiage that have legitimized anti-Communist/anti-labor efforts I don't really know, maybe it's by accident? Name me one giant leap from the first time we walked upright till now that wasn't also met by mass plague, famine and horror? I don't think you could. If anything, in all actuality, said great leaps in the USSR could be seen as an extension of the Tsar's campaign of modernization across the Empire.

Anyway, objectively Fidel has been an incredibly progressive force and icon for South American labor and anti-colonialism/imperialism.

[Sinister Intents]

:laugh::laugh::laugh: I actually kinda laughed at this. This would be like saying "Hmmm I saw a documentary today that said Hitler isn't that bad, I guess some Germans liked him after all!" Its just silly, just stop watching Michael Moore and realize Castro is a Marxist Leninist ass. He hogs all the nations resources himself, his palace is one of the few places with newly paved roads and new power lines.

So Castro is like a pampered haute-bourgeois, is that what you're saying? I think not, he may live lavishly compared to other Cubans, but he's certainly a much better force, and as Voxxy pointed out above...^^^

[Lily Briscoe]

"A much better force"... Revleft anarchists are even worse at being anarchists than American anarchists generally, and that's saying something.

[Trap Queen Voxxy]

"A much better force"... Revleft anarchists are even worse at being anarchists than American anarchists generally, and that's saying something.

What a brilliant and completely relevant post, thank you for sharing friend.

[Sinister Intents]

"A much better force"... Revleft anarchists are even worse at being anarchists than American anarchists generally, and that's saying something.

Firstly, I'm no longer an anarchist. Secondly, I like Cuba and Castro and Che despite their flaws :P That DOESN'T mean that I support Marxism-Leninist dictaroships or Che's homophobia, and the horrors that occurred in the Cuban regime. I just simply have an admiration of them

[BIXX]

Firstly, I'm no longer an anarchist. Secondly, I like Cuba and Castro and Che despite their flaws :P That DOESN'T mean that I support Marxism-Leninist dictaroships or Che's homophobia, and the horrors that occurred in the Cuban regime. I just simply have an admiration of them
To be fair I don't think you have a very good understanding of the things you say, extending back to when you were an anarchist.

I'd be really interested in hearing about what the influences of your changes were.

[G4b3n]

Most dictators are images of national freedom. Much like George Washington in the US. Or Bolivar in South America. Just like George Washington, a lot of them are terrible. But nationalism and anti-imp-ism go a long way.

How is leading a historically progressive revolution and winning victories against feudalism terrible?

[Sinister Intents]

To be fair I don't think you have a very good understanding of the things you say, extending back to when you were an anarchist.

I'd be really interested in hearing about what the influences of your changes were.

*sighs* I try though, I've always had issues with comprehension and social situations, but whatever. Plus that'd be for a different topic, so we don't delineate from the subject at hand.

I simply just love Cuba, the place is so beautiful to see in pictures, and it is nostalgia for me to like Che and Fidel, it goes back to when I was just pretty much a liberal

[Bala Perdida]

How is leading a historically progressive revolution and winning victories against feudalism terrible?
Because they established a state based on racism, patriarchy, slavery and exploitation. Such a 'progressive' revolution that wasn't supported by much of the Native Americans or the black slave class, whose genocide continued after the establishing of the USA.

[Trap Queen Voxxy]

Because they established a state based on racism, patriarchy, slavery and exploitation. Such a 'progressive' revolution that wasn't supported by much of the Native Americans or the black slave class, whose genocide continued after the establishing of the USA.

What in the Sam fuck are you talking about? Objectively the Castro and Co leadership has made Cuba one of the most advanced and progressive countries in South America. I mean, like, no it's not a utopia however it's been pretty progressive. Former homophobic legislation has been replaced with those favoring the homosexual community along with trans related issues which make even America look fucked up. I hear you can get sexual reassignment fo free down there. I mean, yeah, you can make a lot criticisms but something's are just objectively true regardless of whatever flavor ice cream happens to be your favorite. Y u as a Socialist want to arbitrarily shit on this is a mystery to me.

[Bala Perdida]

What? No. I wasn't talking about Cuba, I thought the country in question was the US at this point. I don't remember Castro booting out feudalists. Also I wouldn't exactly call myself a socialist on par with most explicit currents, although I am still sympathetic and influenced by it.

[Sea]

Castro is a Marxist Leninist ass.How many of Lenin's books have you read? Don't judge before you become familiar with the material. I'm sorry if it sounds condescending, but that's the same mistake that most people make about anarchism and communism in general. Don't fall for it twice, read and decide for yourself!


He hogs all the nations resources himself, his palace is one of the few places with newly paved roads and new power lines.I'm not a big fan of Castro myself, but this smells like hyperbole.

[G4b3n]

Because they established a state based on racism, patriarchy, slavery and exploitation. Such a 'progressive' revolution that wasn't supported by much of the Native Americans or the black slave class, whose genocide continued after the establishing of the USA.

It was a bourgeois revolution. Of course the working classes and oppressed peoples did not benefit. But if you want to look at the progressive nature of material conditions as opposed to saying "fuck history, I hate everyone who wasn't a proletarian revolutionary" it might do you some good.

[BIXX]

It was a bourgeois revolution. Of course the working classes and oppressed peoples did not benefit. But if you want to look at the progressive nature of material conditions as opposed to saying "fuck history, I hate everyone who wasn't a proletarian revolutionary" it might do you some good.

Ugh. I'm tired of this shit.

The transition to capitalism was particularly violent to anyone who was queer, a woman, non-white, etc... So when we are saying it wasn't progressive that's our basis. So yeah I guess fuck history as history is the story of the growth of leviathan, glorifying the defeats of its enemies (those people who lead a real existence rather than one ground down into a powder).

History is a story of leviathan, not of resistance. We need resistance.

[motion denied]

Castro being compared to Hitler.

Lmao this site has become a place for confused Cold Warriors

[Vogel]

Because they established a state based on racism, patriarchy, slavery and exploitation. Such a 'progressive' revolution that wasn't supported by much of the Native Americans or the black slave class, whose genocide continued after the establishing of the USA.


In their defense, George Washington and Thomas Jefferson struggled with the moral question of slavery. Especially towards the end. Remember its been around for hundreds years before them. Back in the 1800's, at the hight of the Civil War, Abe Lincoln thought black people were lesser than whites, though he didn't like slavery. But he saw the light and made the emancipation proclamation. Then he pushed for the 13th amendment.

The founding fathers like Washington, Jefforson, Madison, weren't evil people. Some of those southerners though. They were moral people doing what they could to advance society. Remember they made the first Republic to exist in centuries. Remember: states were abolishing property requirements as early as 1791 with Vermont.

I think anti-founding father people should take a listen to Daniel DeLeon, who passionately defended them. I haven't yet, but I will.

[Rafiq]

Because they established a state based on racism, patriarchy, slavery and exploitation. Such a 'progressive' revolution that wasn't supported by much of the Native Americans or the black slave class, whose genocide continued after the establishing of the USA.



The transition to capitalism was particularly violent to anyone who was queer, a woman, non-white, etc... So when we are saying it wasn't progressive that's our basis. So yeah I guess fuck history as history is the story of the growth of leviathan, glorifying the defeats of its enemies (those people who lead a real existence rather than one ground down into a powder).


It is simple, and I ask this to you both: Was pre-capitalist society somehow predisposed to having ethical qualms with the enslavement of Negroes, the killing of native Americans and so on? Specifically with regard to the United States - was the American revolution somehow the establishment of this? Is that what distinguished it from British rule in the Americas? According to Fuerte and Placenta, the dichotomy was apparently precisely on those lines. The fact of the matter is that they both ignorantly disregard the fact that only through the pre-supposition of not only capitalism, but bourgeois civic society could these things be articulated as injustices, only with the destruction of old bonds of life did the possibility arise that we could even THINK of a society free from these particular problems. To Hegel, history is the thresher where the dreams and hopes of people are thrown into, lost to the abyss of time. The point, however is this: That which each historic epoch, this wiping of the slate clean offers a chance at redemption, and new particular possibilities for emancipation UNSHACKLED by the failures of the past. And we are here now, and in approximation to our present struggle - Fuerte and Placenta take it upon themselves to somehow create a dichotomy between the American revolution and the political order which proceeded it. This has nothing to do with some kind of genuine empathy with the native Americans or the black slaves (In fact, many of the founding fathers were against slavery - as Marx himself recalled - but were unable to because of the power of the slave-owning class in the South), but with an attempt to further solidify the degenerate character of the "Left", the orientalist, reactionary fetishistic Left which tells us so disgustingly, so hypocritically that European civilization as a whole is to blame for our present condition, of which we could not even fathom being problematic without European civilization. This has coincided with the reactionary character of post-modernism taking the form of PRE-modernism, whether of philistine orientalism or the dark enlightenment. Capital demands we throw away the legacy of the enlightenment, and even the Left cannot help but conform itself to this temptation.

Apparently to Placenta and Feurte, an opposition to - "racism, patriarchy, slavery and exploitation" is somehow a timeless characteristic of humanity, that didn't need to be wrought out by the particular class interests (the proletariat) of a particular historic epoch (i.e. capitalism). Then they will foolishly attempt to point to me societies which were able to do without this - from the Native Americans to some fringe hunter-gatherer society in the amazon. While these features were absent in these societies, these societies were not predisposed to the retention of their absence in any meaningful sense. What are some stupid abstractions, in the mind of a fetishized oriental, to a better means of survival? It is not JUST about perceiving history as linear, of "historical progress" being a painful but necessary reality - No! It is about upholding the legacy EVEN of these particular struggles, upholding the legacy of the bourgeois revolutions from the English Civil war to the French revolution, from the break with mysticism in Ancient Greece to the introduction of universality by Christianity. It is not "simply" that history is linear, it is that THIS history was linear in approximation to the NOW, in other words, that all of these things, which we cannot change, have led to where we are today - and to denounce them is to denounce our particular chance at emancipation TODAY.

I mean, how sickening this logic is... "Oh! The rise of capitalism led to exploitation, how could it be supported?" - the point is what did capitalism REPLACE? What was the rise of capitalism IN SPITE of, against and so forth? And why is this being opposed - this is not even something we should be fucking talking about, it is something Communists almost two hundred years ago already did... It is petite-bourgeois, reactionary socialism. There IS objective process of history, but this could only be articulated in approximation to the conditions of the now. But you know what? I challenge you and your logic with something very simple: The emancipation of the blacks after the civil war was followed by widespread institutional racism, oppression, raw exploitation and miserable poverty by the black people. It then follows that the emancipation of the black slaves was something we ought to denounce and oppose, because it led to Jim crow and all the horrors of American civil racism. If you don't have time to respond to the rest, then respond to this at least. How is this NOT your logic?

[BIXX]

Rafiq, I would engage in a discussion with you but you don't understand my argument so badly that I don't think its probably worth it.

[BIXX]

If you condense your post into words that actually make sense then I'll take the time.

[Rafiq]

You claim that the transition to capitalism is something worth opposing, and the point is that the culmination of this transition has opened up the possibility of emancipation from it. because capitalism did not transition from "freedom" but from feudal relations of life. To denounce this legacy is, therefore, to denounce the possibility of freedom today.

[Bala Perdida]

I don't respect the American revolution because it perpetuated slavery, therefore I support slavery. That seems awfully problematic don't ya think?

If there was resistance to 'revolutionary genocide and slavery' it is in my place to uphold that over capitalist globalization. This is equal to uphold other autonomous resistance over communist globalization. I'm not a Marxist. Neither is PC. I don't get why you respond to us with a Marxist defense of the American revolution and expect us to see our flaws through it. In that paradigm it doesn't look like we can expect anything good out of communist globalization.

[Rusty Shackleford]

Yo, transitioning to capitalism from feudalism is pretty on point. Yeah, it's kinda rough when communists do it because the expectations are beyond high, but when communists do it, the working class gets a pretty good bit out of it.

that being said, the transition between modes of production isnt some binary situation, capitalism grows up within feudalism until it is able to take the place of feudalism, usually by force. There's also those unique moments when capitalists cant enforce their will on feudalism and communists take the lead and work to both move beyond feudalism and capitalism at the same time.

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

Castro being compared to Hitler.

Lmao this site has become a place for confused Cold Warriors

I told you man

I told you about Shachtmanites!


Yo, transitioning to capitalism from feudalism is pretty on point.

Which just raises the question: why do you think there was feudalism in Cuba? Cuba, under Batista, had an economy that was based on generalised wage-labour used to produce commodities. Of course, the Cuban economy included several backward features, and in fact depended on them - semi-free labour for example. But this does not mean it was feudal - this is the case throughout the periphery of the imperialist system. As communists we should understand how capitalism not only incorporates backward features originating in the eras before capitalism, but depends on them. This perspective of fighting for "pure" capitalism, then socialism, has never worked - and often it has led to the bloody defeat of workers.

[Rafiq]

I don't respect the American revolution because it perpetuated slavery, therefore I support slavery.

Did you even look at my post? Was the American revolution DISTINGUISHED by the necessity to perpetuate slavery? In other words, even though it did perpetuate slavery, is this what distinguished it from British rule? As I already said, the founding fathers were largely opposed to slavery but could do nothing about it in that it threatened the unity of the states. Largely because their opposition was grounded in class interests, of which the unity of the states was more important in fulfilling. But anyway, that wasn't my point. My point was that the emancipation proclamation and the abolition of slavery led to the perpetuation of the oppression and exploitation of blacks. I therefore asked a simple question: Would you have opposed the ABOLITION of slavery, because of what followed afterwards?


If there was resistance to 'revolutionary genocide and slavery' it is in my place to uphold that over capitalist globalization. This is equal to uphold other autonomous resistance over communist globalization.


Whether my claims are Marxist or not, the fact that they are Marxist isn't a qualification for dismissing them. As far this so-called resistance, I am glad you so honorably take it upon yourself to uphold "that over capitalist globalization", to fulfill your own orientalist fantasies, considering that such resistance is 100%, without question and without debate futile. It is not one of those circumstances where there is a small chance that they might succeed is there - it is one of those circumstances where their doom is absolutely guaranteed. And it is good that you make yourself known as a complete reactionary, prattling of "capitalist" and "communist" globalization. Your qualifications for supporting "autonomous resistance" are what exactly, that they fulfill a very specific set of ethical, emotional and ideological requirements exclusive to our capitalist epoch, without which you wouldn't give a shit about them? Our struggle doesn't stem from some kind of trans-historical idea, but from specific class antagonisms inherent to a specific historic epoch. It then follows that supporting autonomous resistance is nothing short of an ideological perversion rather than a genuine expression of solidarity. But even if we do want to pretend to empathize with such societies on purely "humane" grounds (and what a COINCIDENCE that animal liberation and supporting these indigenous peoples go hand in hand - as endangered human species we ought to protect. In the eyes of Fuerte, little separates these humans from animals...), what are your qualifications for support?

What if these societies are violently patriarchal, what if they engage in female genital mutiliation, what if they are embedded in various backward practices - ritualistic rape and so on, what if they themselves engage in slavery... Where then goes your support for "autonomous resistance"? More and more qualifications need to be met - they have to be like the blue people from Avatar, egalitarian and one with nature, which reduces them to a size so small that they aren't even worth talking about. Under your own qualifications for support, the very fact that you would have these qualifications means that you yourself are engaging in "cultural imperialism" or "cultural globalization"), infringing upon the autonomous rights of these communities (considering YOU insist we articulate them as monolithic herds of animals). If this isn't the case and you unconditionally support "autonomous resistance" against globalization - then tell us why it is slavery, rape and hell under precarious conditions of survival is more morally excusable than slavery, rape and hell under conditions of better survival that actually open up the space for the abolition of slavery, rape and hell.

So this is the ultimate perverse paradox of your support for "autonomous resistance" - this resistance is either not autonomous at all, but completely reactionary within our global totality, or it is simply not better than the trauma of globalization. Furthermore, one element you fail to understand is how mere EXPOSURE to other totalities has led to the destruction of egalitarianism. Take the innuit people's, or the native Americans. Following European exposure, there was nothing inherent in these societies which made it predisposed to defending its otherwise natural egalitarianism.

[Rafiq]

I
Which just raises the question: why do you think there was feudalism in Cuba? Cuba, under Batista, had an economy that was based on generalised wage-labour used to produce commodities. Of course, the Cuban economy included several backward features, and in fact depended on them - semi-free labour for example. But this does not mean it was feudal - this is the case throughout the periphery of the imperialist system. As communists we should understand how capitalism not only incorporates backward features originating in the eras before capitalism, but depends on them. This perspective of fighting for "pure" capitalism, then socialism, has never worked - and often it has led to the bloody defeat of workers.

The difference of course is that the overthrow of Batista did not stem from the efforts of an organized working class, but from romantic bourgeois revolutionaries destroying the political organs of what had been hindering capitalist development in Cuba, and as you said, giving way to the retention of backward aspects of production. The point is that this doesn't have to be feudal as such, it just has to impede capitalist development - which is what it did. Once castro and co were faced with the reality that the native bourgeoisie weren't with them, they took it upon themselves to assume their role and destroy the remnants of backwardness in Cuba.

[Antiochus]

I simply just love Cuba, the place is so beautiful to see in pictures, and it is nostalgia for me to like Che and Fidel, it goes back to when I was just pretty much a liberal

So join a fucking postcard club :lol:

The notion that there is something "defensible" about Fidel is such a joke. I mean really, what is defensible? That he toppled a dictator? Why not Amin then? Oh because Amin isn't some loquacious romantic fighting in the Sierra Maestra.


Because they established a state based on racism, patriarchy, slavery and exploitation. Such a 'progressive' revolution that wasn't supported by much of the Native Americans or the black slave class, whose genocide continued after the establishing of the USA.

Oh please just shut up. Its like arguing the Russian Revolution was terrible because most of the Bolsheviks were homophobes. Like seriously, look at the historical context instead of interpolating modern analysis into the situation. There are certainly things that can be criticized about the American Revolution (or French) but the notion that they weren't progressive is totally erroneous. Progressive means progress, do you deny there was any substantial social and economic progress in these revolutions? The fact that Washington and Jefferson were not palatable to this modern age shouldn't stop you from branding them progressive anymore than Napoleon.

[Rusty Shackleford]

I never said anything about cuba directly, but from what i know, cuba had an urban bourgeoisie while the countryside was more like post enclosure feudalism where land lords would virtually strangle farmers with debt

[BIXX]

You claim that the transition to capitalism is something worth opposing, and the point is that the culmination of this transition has opened up the possibility of emancipation from it. because capitalism did not transition from "freedom" but from feudal relations of life. To denounce this legacy is, therefore, to denounce the possibility of freedom today.

I don't think the transition to capitalism is worth opposing seeing as its over and done with. However it is regrettable. This does not mean that I support feudalism, either. Or the slave societies before that. The fact is that history is just a big chain of fucked up changes in human interaction.

The reason I find the whole thing regrettable is how the absolute destruction of groups that opposed civilized existence was such an integral part of capitalism (not to say pre-civ or anti-civ groups were perfect, we all know they had some fucked social issues- but by and large civilization has taken away more than it has given). For example, we have the witch hunts, the destruction of Native Americans, the destruction of civilized individuals who abandon civilization, attacks on nature, etc... That is what I oppose, and I imagine it is the same shit I'd end up fighting against in a communist revolution (not to mention my other reasons for opposing communism).

I don't think capitalism has opened up the possibility of emancipating ourselves from civilization. That is bullshit. Its just a more intricate phase of civilization. Marxists see civilization as progressing to a less intricate phase from a more intricate one (seen in such statements as "capitalism has simplified class struggle to two classes" (paraphrasing, can't remember exact quote). But that is not true- every change in civilization is adding social structures, recuperating resistance, etc... So that civilization can constantly evolve and change to add to the forces it uses to limit us and take away from our ability to resist it. And this will include the communist revolution.


Would you have opposed the ABOLITION of slavery, because of what followed afterwards?

I don't think the change from feudalism to capitalism can very accurately be compared to slavery abolition. More just a different form of slavery. Which is to say- the new slavery still sucks, but there are ways in which it is better. One of the things that does suck though is that it lends itself to a more "flexible" society. One that justifies itself easier.

In terms of capitalist slavery it just made capitalism more efficient when slavery was abolished, but it still allowed more free movement within the social structures that were forced upon slaves, hence I think the two can't be compared.


I'm not gonna respond to the rest in detail but I just wanna point out how rafiq has managed to convince himself that supporting indigenous resistance is akin to calling indigenous people animals. Meaning, he thinks supporting indigenous struggle is racist. I suppose a bourgeois person who supports proletarian struggle is classist? Hmm... Engels much? Or men who support feminist struggle, they must be sexist? Straights who support queer struggle? What terrible logic.

You are deliberately misrepresenting the arguments made here, rafiq. Please engage with us honestly.

[Rafiq]

I don't think the transition to capitalism is worth opposing seeing as its over and done with. However it is regrettable. This does not mean that I support feudalism, either. Or the slave societies before that. The fact is that history is just a big chain of fucked up changes in human interaction.

The problem, of course, is that the qualifications you establish for claiming history is a big chain of fuck ups is entirely nonsensical, and at the very best, it rests upon a false dichotomy. Allow me to elaborate - during the civil war in England, and during Thomas Muntzer's rebellion, would it be logical to have simply sided with the respective bourgeois ruling classes, being that they were of the more "progressive" role? What you are doing is responding to a straw man - a vulgarisation of Marxism which actually posits that history is a real "force", metaphysically at least, that leads us closer to liberation. You simply pervert this logic and while granting that history is a real force, claim that it amounts to the "conformation" of the human soul to "leviathan", or whatever you want. But this was neither Marx's nor Hegel's point.

The point of recognizing and upholding something like the transition from capitalism to feudalism has nothing to do with fetishizing "progress" even, but recognizing that this historic transition has important implications for where we position ourselves, and where are coordinates are today. That is to say - even if we were kicked out of paradise - what does it MEAN to demand to go back to paradise? The implications of this, within a given social totality, fails to address the fundamental problem of WHY we were capable of being kicked out of paradise, and therefore also fails to constitute itself as a real demand for the return to it, but something else - a reactionary pathology. The point has nothing to do with ignornace of hte fact that grave injustices and horrors came about from these developments, but that only by pre-supposing those very same developments, can these things be recognized as grave injustices. In other words, you're taking too much for granted. Even orientalism and fetihisizng the noble savage - this was IMPOSSIBLE before the enlightenment era and the beginning of Cartesian subjectivity. Before then, it was literally impossible to "question", so to speak, your own self and society. All of this you gravely take for granted.

If we ignore all of this, we end up playing with stupid moral abstractions. What moral authority does running around in the forest have over a better means of survival, and so forth? We are playing the devil's advocate here - anyone can make up their own moral qualifications based on their own peculiar preferences for what "they" like and it isn't superior. You are, so to speak, epistemologically no better than someone who claims that they "oppose the genocide of the white race" in Europe. Not to say that a Communist should equate the two ethically, but that as far as VALIDITY or substance goes, there is absoltuely no difference.

So where then does the paradigm of support, condemnation lie? Within our present relationships to production and the PRESENTLY existing social antagonisms. Not some kind of trans-historic grand truth but the ability to conceive history in such a way as it has culminated into our present condition. You claim that the transition to capitalism was regrettable, but when push came to shove - how would you, back then, have been able to express this dissatisfaction? Through the wicca? But the wicca themselves didn't care much about any of that - as a matter of fact, you're literally just projecting onto them your own perversions. So how could you have opposed capitalism, without upholding feudalism (or as as Communist)? That is the paradox.


Marxists see civilization as progressing to a less intricate phase from a more intricate one


No, actually, that's a gross vulgarization too. Marxists do not recognize this dichotomy of intricacies because it is a worthless abstraction that fails to establish itself through any scientific methodology. The fact of the matter is that it is an expression of incredible social complexity, historically speaking, to conceive this very "fact" - it is only because of the complexity and intricacy of our relationships to each other and to nature that you have been able to fetishize "pre-civilization" as such. But you really aren't fetishizing pre-civilization, you're fetishizing things inherent to our own society that conform to aspects of pre-civilized existence. It is a typical case of orientalism. How hypocritical of you. "Marxists" recognize Communism has the first historic expression of social consciousness, wrought out of capitalism's various contradictions, from the only class historically capable of abolishing itself affirmatively - the proletariat. The victory of the proletariat is precisely a victory FROM the proletariat - we can conceive class because we are not bound by ideologically reinforcing it, from the social existence of the class which seeks to destroy class society. So to speak, to return to a "less intricate" society would be an impossibility, because the predispositions to a "less intricate society" don't exist within capitalism.

Which leads us to another point, which is simple - how were "pre-civilized" entities incapable of resisting civilization, why were they ultimately subdued to it and what is different about now that allows us to go back on this? Now the fact of the matter is that it would take immense social "intricacies" to prevent civilization from rising again. To even talk about that, however, is an absurdity. I mean, do you really believe what you're saying? It's nonsense. The fact of the matter is that yes civilization has become exponentially intricate, opposition to aspects of our civilization today in any meaningful sense cannot take the form of anti-civilization rhetoric. I mean, you reserve the "right" to make things up, but so do all the worst kinds of reactionaries and fascists. You talk of nature, but this is confused - what IS nature, how are we outside of it and so on.


In terms of capitalist slavery it just made capitalism more efficient when slavery was abolished, but it still allowed more free movement within the social structures that were forced upon slaves, hence I think the two can't be compared.


But according to you, the transition from serfdom to wage labor and from manoralism to generalized commodity production apparently did not also do this? Capitalism necessitates precisely the absence of fixed bondage and the free flow of labor. I mean, let's cut the bullshit Placenta - you know damned well that your logic leads you to this precise conclusion - that the abolition fo slavery should have been opposed - but you refuse to admit it because the political connotations in a society where racism is widespread and rampant would place you exactly on the side of the reactionaries. Tell me, for all that is terrible about the conditions of wage labor - do you actually think that as a condition, this was worse than serfdom or even the conditions of the small peasant? It appears that you're grossly underestimating how barbaric, how fucked up feudalism was by our standards today - even by the standards of the ruling class in the 19th century. But if you don't like the example of the American civil war, which for sure is an anomaly (the southern planter class was unique historically), then let's use the same example regarding the abolition of slavery in the British and French empires respectively. What say you then?

And they are completely comparable. They denote specific social changes societally, historic changes mind you, wherein a dichotomy was created between old and new. According to you, the abolition of slavery was worthwhile supporting because it in effect led to racism. You can then say that "The Jim Crow and institutional racism was merely the halting of the project of negro slavery" - but this is true for any historic change. If the ideas of Equality, Fraternity and Liberty were taken to their logical extension, we'd get at the very least Robespierre, and at the very best Gracchus Babeuf. Actually, Communism is exactly an elaboration of bourgeois ideology of the enlightenment and of civic democracy. So it is a completely valid comparison.


I suppose a bourgeois person who supports proletarian struggle is classist?


For all the claims of not addressing you honesty, you either have to be rather dim or completely dishonest to come to this conclusion. The point isn't that the racism derives from the fact that you are supporting something which you yourself are not identified with, or a part of, but that the racism comes from the fact that you are conforming people living in an entirely different social epoch to your perverse fantasies, fantasies which are unique to capitalism. But the story of the bourgeois individual (from the titanic to whatever else you want) fetishizing the "poor" and their simplicity, in order so that they rejuvenate themselves as bourgeois, is very much an act of class prejudice. There is no synchronicity between your support for indigenous resistance and the reasons you like to provide us for that support, and the actual resistance. While a white person can express solidarity and partake in anti-racism, they do so not because of some kind of fake-empathy, but from recognizing that racism IS their business, whether they're bourgeois liberals taking their logic to the ultimate conclusion or Communists upholding the class struggle, against dividing the working class and so on. The anti-racist struggle is a language universally understood by blacks and whites, but the same can't be said for the alleged 'indigenous resistance' to globalization, a myth which I already addressed previously, which you so conveniently ignored.

You are fetishizing the precise historic oppression, ignorance and backwardness of people's. So this would be akin to a member of the bourgeoisie expressing solidarity with proletarians demanding that they stay proletarians. Of course an absurdity - but the MINUTE indigenous people's even come into contact with forces of modernization, they lose all of their previous authenticity and their struggle is either in vain, or it transforms into something else entirely. Your support for "indigenous" resistance is EXACTLY like treating them like endangered animal species - you don't want them to lose their unique authenticity, just as you don't want the cool looking animals, marvels of nature, to lose their existence in the rain Forrest and so on. My point was that animal-rights garbage coincided precisely with this orientalism, but the same can't be said for anti-racism. The logical result of anti-racism was never liberation for the chickens, this would be an ethical monstrosity.

[Sinister Intents]

So join a fucking postcard club :lol:

The notion that there is something "defensible" about Fidel is such a joke. I mean really, what is defensible? That he toppled a dictator? Why not Amin then? Oh because Amin isn't some loquacious romantic fighting in the Sierra Maestra.


Certainly there is something defensible of Cuba being one of the most progressive state-capitalist nations in Latin America and the Carribean. Yeah they toppled a dictator, and set up their own and all of the people in Cuba are ensured that they won't starve and they have one of the best health care systems in the world. Cuba isn't communist by any means, and also I may not have the historical knowledge you have, who is Amin? Or am I misinterpreting you somehow?

[Bala Perdida]

Did you even look at my post? Was the American revolution DISTINGUISHED by the necessity to perpetuate slavery? In other words, even though it did perpetuate slavery, is this what distinguished it from British rule? As I already said, the founding fathers were largely opposed to slavery but could do nothing about it in that it threatened the unity of the states. Largely because their opposition was grounded in class interests, of which the unity of the states was more important in fulfilling. But anyway, that wasn't my point. My point was that the emancipation proclamation and the abolition of slavery led to the perpetuation of the oppression and exploitation of blacks. I therefore asked a simple question: Would you have opposed the ABOLITION of slavery, because of what followed afterwards?



Whether my claims are Marxist or not, the fact that they are Marxist isn't a qualification for dismissing them. As far this so-called resistance, I am glad you so honorably take it upon yourself to uphold "that over capitalist globalization", to fulfill your own orientalist fantasies, considering that such resistance is 100%, without question and without debate futile. It is not one of those circumstances where there is a small chance that they might succeed is there - it is one of those circumstances where their doom is absolutely guaranteed. And it is good that you make yourself known as a complete reactionary, prattling of "capitalist" and "communist" globalization. Your qualifications for supporting "autonomous resistance" are what exactly, that they fulfill a very specific set of ethical, emotional and ideological requirements exclusive to our capitalist epoch, without which you wouldn't give a shit about them? Our struggle doesn't stem from some kind of trans-historical idea, but from specific class antagonisms inherent to a specific historic epoch. It then follows that supporting autonomous resistance is nothing short of an ideological perversion rather than a genuine expression of solidarity. But even if we do want to pretend to empathize with such societies on purely "humane" grounds (and what a COINCIDENCE that animal liberation and supporting these indigenous peoples go hand in hand - as endangered human species we ought to protect. In the eyes of Fuerte, little separates these humans from animals...), what are your qualifications for support?

What if these societies are violently patriarchal, what if they engage in female genital mutiliation, what if they are embedded in various backward practices - ritualistic rape and so on, what if they themselves engage in slavery... Where then goes your support for "autonomous resistance"? More and more qualifications need to be met - they have to be like the blue people from Avatar, egalitarian and one with nature, which reduces them to a size so small that they aren't even worth talking about. Under your own qualifications for support, the very fact that you would have these qualifications means that you yourself are engaging in "cultural imperialism" or "cultural globalization"), infringing upon the autonomous rights of these communities (considering YOU insist we articulate them as monolithic herds of animals). If this isn't the case and you unconditionally support "autonomous resistance" against globalization - then tell us why it is slavery, rape and hell under precarious conditions of survival is more morally excusable than slavery, rape and hell under conditions of better survival that actually open up the space for the abolition of slavery, rape and hell.

So this is the ultimate perverse paradox of your support for "autonomous resistance" - this resistance is either not autonomous at all, but completely reactionary within our global totality, or it is simply not better than the trauma of globalization. Furthermore, one element you fail to understand is how mere EXPOSURE to other totalities has led to the destruction of egalitarianism. Take the innuit people's, or the native Americans. Following European exposure, there was nothing inherent in these societies which made it predisposed to defending its otherwise natural egalitarianism.
I guess I wasn't clear. I don't oppose the abolition of slavery, I oppose the existence and upbringing of the USA. Just like I do every other state. I don't care if it's a necessary evolution to achieve communism, if that's the case then I'm pretty sure I'll be killed in the process and be labeled nothing but another reactionary idealist by those under your thought. As for autonomous resistance, that was mostly a filler adjective to describe resistance against genocide. Which you seem to think means I hold some racist point of view that these 'endangered little creatures' need to be protected. That, along with me justifying any of the atrocities in their cultures. Well no. I don't think that should be preserved, nor do I think it's the masters responsibility to protect them. I'm just saying, seeing that I'm doomed to die in the same evolutionary massacre, that I'd rather support them fighting back than support their genocide seeing that I'm next in line. But fuck it, you know I'm not gonna change my mind I know know you're gonna keep calling me a counterrevolutionary. The question here wasn't even about the necessity of the existence of the USA, it's whether what Washington and his gang helped to create could constitue an atrocity.

[Bala Perdida]

Oh please just shut up. Its like arguing the Russian Revolution was terrible because most of the Bolsheviks were homophobes. Like seriously, look at the historical context instead of interpolating modern analysis into the situation. There are certainly things that can be criticized about the American Revolution (or French) but the notion that they weren't progressive is totally erroneous. Progressive means progress, do you deny there was any substantial social and economic progress in these revolutions? The fact that Washington and Jefferson were not palatable to this modern age shouldn't stop you from branding them progressive anymore than Napoleon.

I don't support the outcome of the Russian revolution either. Also wether or not it was progressive isn't a concern of mine.

[Sinister Intents]

I guess I wasn't clear. I don't oppose the abolition of slavery, I oppose the existence and upbringing of the USA. Just like I do every other state. I don't care if it's a necessary evolution to achieve communism, if that's the case then I'm pretty sure I'll be killed in the process and be labeled nothing but another reactionary idealist by those under your thought. As for autonomous resistance, that was mostly a filler adjective to describe resistance against being genocide.

Considering the Russian experience, if a dictatorship of proletarian transition is going to happen, then the anarchists may not necessarily be sent off to the gulag for forced labor or shot. The persecution of anarchists and other reactionary, utopian, or petit-bourgeois ideologues may not happen like it did in Russia. There would also be completely different circumstances because this isn't Russia, 1917. Different parts of the world will have different transitions towards statelessness and classlessness. Yeah, you might be suppressed, but so will other groups of people to defend against counterrevolution. We can't predict anything, but I hope the anarchists aren't persecuted with other groups like the Mensheviks as well as other groups that opposed Bolshevik rule.

[Antiochus]

Idi Amin was perhaps the biggest scumbag to rule in the African continent (Uganda) since King Leopold. He killed 300,000 based on "ethnic" lines and dismantled the country. He lived in exile in S.Arabia with a nice pension till 2003. The movie "The last king of Scotland" is actually pretty good.

[Rafiq]

I guess I wasn't clear. I don't oppose the abolition of slavery, I oppose the existence and upbringing of the USA. Just like I do every other state. I don't care if it's a necessary evolution to achieve communism,

But the connotations for opposing the creation of the USA have infinitely more significance than whether one respects what is "necessary for the evolution to Communism". By the time the US had been formed, slavery, genocide were all definitive of the Americas. So the connotations of opposing the formation of the USA (which by the way is not, was never, and never will be a nation-state) amount to NOTHING MORE than having desired the prolonging of British rule.

[Rusty Shackleford]

Plus who knows, maybe the UK would not have enacted anti slavery laws in the early to mid 1800s

[DonQuixote]

When stood next to Stalin, Mao, Ho Chi Min, and mostly certainly the worthless Kennedy etc Castro certainly does look appealing, and his writings on the nature of capitalism in the Third World are a useful resource to anyone who is becoming acquainted with the topic. However, Castro's regime has performed acts of outright barbarity, it has imprisoned people for speaking against it, punished dissidence with a heavy and unflinching hand, supported other groups which align more closely with terrorism than socialism and restricted any kind of free expression. So, Castro is better than the majority of 'communist' leaders, and the social progress Cuba has made under him remains remarkable. I suppose the question I would ask is, watching the young man who fought so valiantly in the revolution, and opposed the brutality and needless economic, as well as physical, violence in capitalism from the very beginning, how did he end up the way he did? I believe history will absolve him, whether we choose to do so is another matter entirely.

[Culicarius]

My knowledge of the Cuban Revolution is not incredibly vast. I've read some things written by both Castro and Che. When it comes to Castro I think he meant to fight and establish something better for Cuba in his days as a Guerrilla fighter. Looking back though, it seems Castro transitioned from being a revolutionary to stepping into the role of bourgeois. Currently, doesn't he live in a mansion and enjoy a lot of luxury? Young Castro may have been a revolutionary but I think at some point he got consumed and that part of his ideology became a talking point and not something he decided to actively fight for.

Or maybe it was always his intention to establish himself in a position of comfort and not fight for the working class worldwide. *shrug* I don't know if Fidel ever took up arms again but at least Che supported revolutions before his assassination. I'd be curious to know what sort of man Che would be if he were alive today.

[BIXX]

The problem, of course, is that the qualifications you establish for claiming history is a big chain of fuck ups is entirely nonsensical, and at the very best, it rests upon a false dichotomy. Allow me to elaborate - during the civil war in England, and during Thomas Muntzer's rebellion, would it be logical to have simply sided with the respective bourgeois ruling classes, being that they were of the more "progressive" role? What you are doing is responding to a straw man - a vulgarisation of Marxism which actually posits that history is a real "force", metaphysically at least, that leads us closer to liberation. You simply pervert this logic and while granting that history is a real force, claim that it amounts to the "conformation" of the human soul to "leviathan", or whatever you want. But this was neither Marx's nor Hegel's point.

The point of recognizing and upholding something like the transition from capitalism to feudalism has nothing to do with fetishizing "progress" even, but recognizing that this historic transition has important implications for where we position ourselves, and where are coordinates are today. That is to say - even if we were kicked out of paradise - what does it MEAN to demand to go back to paradise? The implications of this, within a given social totality, fails to address the fundamental problem of WHY we were capable of being kicked out of paradise, and therefore also fails to constitute itself as a real demand for the return to it, but something else - a reactionary pathology. The point has nothing to do with ignornace of hte fact that grave injustices and horrors came about from these developments, but that only by pre-supposing those very same developments, can these things be recognized as grave injustices. In other words, you're taking too much for granted. Even orientalism and fetihisizng the noble savage - this was IMPOSSIBLE before the enlightenment era and the beginning of Cartesian subjectivity. Before then, it was literally impossible to "question", so to speak, your own self and society. All of this you gravely take for granted.

If we ignore all of this, we end up playing with stupid moral abstractions. What moral authority does running around in the forest have over a better means of survival, and so forth? We are playing the devil's advocate here - anyone can make up their own moral qualifications based on their own peculiar preferences for what "they" like and it isn't superior. You are, so to speak, epistemologically no better than someone who claims that they "oppose the genocide of the white race" in Europe. Not to say that a Communist should equate the two ethically, but that as far as VALIDITY or substance goes, there is absoltuely no difference.

So where then does the paradigm of support, condemnation lie? Within our present relationships to production and the PRESENTLY existing social antagonisms. Not some kind of trans-historic grand truth but the ability to conceive history in such a way as it has culminated into our present condition. You claim that the transition to capitalism was regrettable, but when push came to shove - how would you, back then, have been able to express this dissatisfaction? Through the wicca? But the wicca themselves didn't care much about any of that - as a matter of fact, you're literally just projecting onto them your own perversions. So how could you have opposed capitalism, without upholding feudalism (or as as Communist)? That is the paradox.



No, actually, that's a gross vulgarization too. Marxists do not recognize this dichotomy of intricacies because it is a worthless abstraction that fails to establish itself through any scientific methodology. The fact of the matter is that it is an expression of incredible social complexity, historically speaking, to conceive this very "fact" - it is only because of the complexity and intricacy of our relationships to each other and to nature that you have been able to fetishize "pre-civilization" as such. But you really aren't fetishizing pre-civilization, you're fetishizing things inherent to our own society that conform to aspects of pre-civilized existence. It is a typical case of orientalism. How hypocritical of you. "Marxists" recognize Communism has the first historic expression of social consciousness, wrought out of capitalism's various contradictions, from the only class historically capable of abolishing itself affirmatively - the proletariat. The victory of the proletariat is precisely a victory FROM the proletariat - we can conceive class because we are not bound by ideologically reinforcing it, from the social existence of the class which seeks to destroy class society. So to speak, to return to a "less intricate" society would be an impossibility, because the predispositions to a "less intricate society" don't exist within capitalism.

Which leads us to another point, which is simple - how were "pre-civilized" entities incapable of resisting civilization, why were they ultimately subdued to it and what is different about now that allows us to go back on this? Now the fact of the matter is that it would take immense social "intricacies" to prevent civilization from rising again. To even talk about that, however, is an absurdity. I mean, do you really believe what you're saying? It's nonsense. The fact of the matter is that yes civilization has become exponentially intricate, opposition to aspects of our civilization today in any meaningful sense cannot take the form of anti-civilization rhetoric. I mean, you reserve the "right" to make things up, but so do all the worst kinds of reactionaries and fascists. You talk of nature, but this is confused - what IS nature, how are we outside of it and so on.



But according to you, the transition from serfdom to wage labor and from manoralism to generalized commodity production apparently did not also do this? Capitalism necessitates precisely the absence of fixed bondage and the free flow of labor. I mean, let's cut the bullshit Placenta - you know damned well that your logic leads you to this precise conclusion - that the abolition fo slavery should have been opposed - but you refuse to admit it because the political connotations in a society where racism is widespread and rampant would place you exactly on the side of the reactionaries. Tell me, for all that is terrible about the conditions of wage labor - do you actually think that as a condition, this was worse than serfdom or even the conditions of the small peasant? It appears that you're grossly underestimating how barbaric, how fucked up feudalism was by our standards today - even by the standards of the ruling class in the 19th century. But if you don't like the example of the American civil war, which for sure is an anomaly (the southern planter class was unique historically), then let's use the same example regarding the abolition of slavery in the British and French empires respectively. What say you then?

And they are completely comparable. They denote specific social changes societally, historic changes mind you, wherein a dichotomy was created between old and new. According to you, the abolition of slavery was worthwhile supporting because it in effect led to racism. You can then say that "The Jim Crow and institutional racism was merely the halting of the project of negro slavery" - but this is true for any historic change. If the ideas of Equality, Fraternity and Liberty were taken to their logical extension, we'd get at the very least Robespierre, and at the very best Gracchus Babeuf. Actually, Communism is exactly an elaboration of bourgeois ideology of the enlightenment and of civic democracy. So it is a completely valid comparison.



For all the claims of not addressing you honesty, you either have to be rather dim or completely dishonest to come to this conclusion. The point isn't that the racism derives from the fact that you are supporting something which you yourself are not identified with, or a part of, but that the racism comes from the fact that you are conforming people living in an entirely different social epoch to your perverse fantasies, fantasies which are unique to capitalism. But the story of the bourgeois individual (from the titanic to whatever else you want) fetishizing the "poor" and their simplicity, in order so that they rejuvenate themselves as bourgeois, is very much an act of class prejudice. There is no synchronicity between your support for indigenous resistance and the reasons you like to provide us for that support, and the actual resistance. While a white person can express solidarity and partake in anti-racism, they do so not because of some kind of fake-empathy, but from recognizing that racism IS their business, whether they're bourgeois liberals taking their logic to the ultimate conclusion or Communists upholding the class struggle, against dividing the working class and so on. The anti-racist struggle is a language universally understood by blacks and whites, but the same can't be said for the alleged 'indigenous resistance' to globalization, a myth which I already addressed previously, which you so conveniently ignored.

You are fetishizing the precise historic oppression, ignorance and backwardness of people's. So this would be akin to a member of the bourgeoisie expressing solidarity with proletarians demanding that they stay proletarians. Of course an absurdity - but the MINUTE indigenous people's even come into contact with forces of modernization, they lose all of their previous authenticity and their struggle is either in vain, or it transforms into something else entirely. Your support for "indigenous" resistance is EXACTLY like treating them like endangered animal species - you don't want them to lose their unique authenticity, just as you don't want the cool looking animals, marvels of nature, to lose their existence in the rain Forrest and so on. My point was that animal-rights garbage coincided precisely with this orientalism, but the same can't be said for anti-racism. The logical result of anti-racism was never liberation for the chickens, this would be an ethical monstrosity.

I can respond to a lot of your argument by stating that I actually agree- I do not demand a "return to paradise" or some pre-civ time. I do say that we ought to still resist it. But in essence what you say is why I'm not a primitivist.

You say "But you really aren't fetishizing pre-civilization, you're fetishizing things inherent to our own society that conform to aspects of pre-civilized existence"- I ask you to demonstrate what.

"How were "pre-civilized" entities incapable of resisting civilization, why were they ultimately subdued to it and what is different about now that allows us to go back on this?"

Again. I don't believe in 'going back', but apart from certain things I dislike about "Against His-Story, against Leviathan!" He explains perfectly why communities were unable to resist civilization.

I should rephrase my point about progress as well. The point is that I don't think that the transition from feudalism to capitalism puts us any closer to freedom that feudalism did. Meaning, I see no reason that isn't incredibly weak why say serfs couldn't abolish themselves. I mean, you say that overly used line about how the proles are the only ones that can abolish themselves or whatever, but I've not once ever seen someone give a good reason as to why.

"Even orientalism and fetihisizng the noble savage - this was IMPOSSIBLE before the enlightenment era and the beginning of Cartesian subjectivity."- here is where you completely miss the point of what I'm saying. I'm not even sure where to begin but no guess it would be that I want freedom for my life, asap. So I look around at possible examples and o see some pretty nice shit in some pre-civ existence. However by no means was pre-civ perfect. But I think the argument could easily be made that the general social structure was healthier in a lot of cultures. That's what I want for myself, my loved ones, and even for some of the individuals on this board.

"If we ignore all of this, we end up playing with stupid moral abstractions. What moral authority does running around in the forest have over a better means of survival, and so forth?"- I don't think morality should come into it at all. It isn't that its better morally, but from where I stand- my life and my friends lives would be much better with civilized social structures abolished.

"You claim that the transition to capitalism was regrettable, but when push came to shove - how would you, back then, have been able to express this dissatisfaction? Through the wicca? But the wicca themselves didn't care much about any of that - as a matter of fact, you're literally just projecting onto them your own perversions. So how could you have opposed capitalism, without upholding feudalism (or as as Communist)? That is the paradox."- for one there are numerous examples of witches and queers and what have you resisting that very transition. Furthermore its fairly clear how civ negatively impacted queer existence.

How could I oppose the transition to capitalism without upholding feudalism? Well, for one, there were many nature societies that did just that. I would imagine my methods might look different than theirs, but my general intent would be the same.

"You talk of nature, but this is confused - what IS nature, how are we outside of it and so on."- I think this is good right here. The way I look at nature has to do with social structures. Basically I think its safe to say that the social structures witnessable before civilization appeared are "natural" ones. Not to say that I think they are perfect, but I think there are some definite good points to them that I would definitely take over what we've got now.

That's all I noticed that seemed to need to be responded to in this post, if I missed anything that seems really blaring I'll do my best to get to it.

[BIXX]

Considering the Russian experience, if a dictatorship of proletarian transition is going to happen, then the anarchists may not necessarily be sent off to the gulag for forced labor or shot. The persecution of anarchists and other reactionary, utopian, or petit-bourgeois ideologues may not happen like it did in Russia. There would also be completely different circumstances because this isn't Russia, 1917. Different parts of the world will have different transitions towards statelessness and classlessness. Yeah, you might be suppressed, but so will other groups of people to defend against counterrevolution. We can't predict anything, but I hope the anarchists aren't persecuted with other groups like the Mensheviks as well as other groups that opposed Bolshevik rule.
Lol

Historically speaking anarchists cannot trust statists and vice versa.

[Comrade Jacob]

Fidel never implemented a cult of personality, the people formed it out of their love for the revolution.

[G4b3n]

Fidel never implemented a cult of personality, the people formed it out of their love for the revolution.

I have never seen you saying anything that wasn't pure Stalinist apologia. Why is that exactly? You do realize that contemporary leftism has broken with those failures of ideology and embraced theories that have not yet proven themselves to be complete shit?

[BIXX]

I have never seen you saying anything that wasn't pure Stalinist apologia. Why is that exactly? You do realize that contemporary leftism has broken with those failures of ideology and embraced theories that have not yet proven themselves to be complete shit?
Why are there Marxists on this site then?

insurrectos know what im talking about

[Rafiq]

Meaning, I see no reason that isn't incredibly weak why say serfs couldn't abolish themselves. I mean, you say that overly used line about how the proles are the only ones that can abolish themselves or whatever, but I've not once ever seen someone give a good reason as to why.


There were several movements against serfdom, but every single one was under the backdrop of the acceleration of antagonisms through the rise of capitalist relations to production. Before this, there were plenty of irrational uprisings BY serfs, but in no way was there a clear "vision" of a society without serfdom in these cases. There were no affirmative social characteristics. Likewise, you make the same mistake when you claim that: for one there are numerous examples of witches and queers and what have you resisting that very transition. Furthermore its fairly clear how civ negatively impacted queer existence

They weren't resisting the transition, they simply might have been, consequentially, in the way of the transition. That did not mean as actual, lived forces they were capable of disallowing this transition from happening. Likewise, it was entirely proximal. It takes a Placenta Cream in 2015 to go back and claim "yes, they were resisting the transition to capitalism with a better society in their hearts". This isn't true - you're projecting what you perceive to be a chance at emancipation today, in 2015 onto events which had nothing to do with it.

To add, the conclusions drawn from this isn't that, as I said - Thomas Muntzer's rebellion, or even the social transformations in China were all in vain. Should the peasants, enthusiastically rising up, should have been told to "keep quiet" and wait for conditions to be in their favor once they become wage laborers? No. The point of any real revolutionary is that even if failure is inevitable, the chance to seize the power to leave your mark is worth it. It is worth everything. Clearly, however, in retrospect we can see why these failed - we can see why the serfs were unable to have emancipated themselves - this very inevitability of failure, however, wasn't present in these movements! Thomas Munzer's rebellion could not even articulate what was wrong here, because the affirmative demands for a new society, as infantile as they were, were not wrought out of a sophisticated conception of their conditions! Those conditions weren't ripe, but it would have been impossible to know only until after they failed. To put it clearly, the very vision for freedom - as you would like to call it, wrought out ONLY from the worker's movement, was impossible for serfs. That's my point. In China, this was precisely what Mao tried to bypass - the notion of stageism and the necessity of a proletarian base for Communism, that the peasants can in fact emancipate themselves, can be a force of Communism and so on. Clearly he was wrong, but were the Chinese peasantry thinking this? Did this define the dichotomy of struggle in this romantic bourgeois revolution? No! So it is worth commending, even if NOW we know it was in vain.

Serfs can emancipate themselves today if they still exist, or could have a hundred years ago, but the very idea of emancipation, as you describe it, didn't exist before the modern era and before the worker's movement. Communism isn't an abstract idea, which we find vehicles for actualizing. It precisely, and uniquely is a result of capitalism.


but from where I stand- my life and my friends lives would be much better with civilized social structures abolished.


Even if this were true, would it not be better to live in a space utopia with just the ten of you? My point is that we can all try and imagine what would be better for us personally, and those immediately around us. My question to you is: Where's the universality here? What makes your demand, and condition, capable of being universal, and therefore possible? And this is a wholly moral category. One can't pick and choose what is civilized and what isn't. Civilization is a totality. Modern medicine is civilization. You can talk to me about the pharmaceutical industry but that's the point of Communism to begin with - the self-consciousness of civilization and the free association of self-conscious individuals. There isn't a real dichotomy between civilization and non-civilization.


But I think the argument could easily be made that the general social structure was healthier in a lot of cultures.


For the cultures, but that's akin to saying feudalism was healthy for Catholic society. If you want to talk about actual well-being in terms of physical health, they weren't, and looking at infant mortality, hunger and so on will easily demonstrate this. Unless of course having a very small population is fine with you, as I'm sure it would be for most people - but how then will you prevent people from attempting to acquire better means of survival, and therefore the rise of civilization? Violence. So that's the problem - what about civilization can you pick and choose you want, and how does this stay consistent for your qualification for "nice things"? How in any meaningful sense can this be built? I mean, if you want, you and your friends CAN in fact retreat to some remote jungle and live as you please, away from humanity as a whole. If you want to talk about an absence of violence and coercion, that doesn't hold up either - if there are societies that have discovered agriculture which haven't yet enslaved the female sex, it is most likely because they are in transition to it. So what's healthy about female genitle mutilation? Class society rose in all corners of the globe relatively independent of each other. Clearly this is a case of orientalizing - you're romanticizing certain aspects of these societies to conform to what you want for our own.


The way I look at nature has to do with social structures. Basically I think its safe to say that the social structures witnessable before civilization appeared are "natural" ones.

Why? So according to you, one exits nature through social structures, correct? But humans have always had social structures, with the least complex social structures being something akin to chimpanzee societies, with the infinite cycle of the Alpha male. As far as the animal kingdom is concerned, the ever-mobile social structures of hunter-gatherer societies were incredibly complex. Not content with condemning human history as a whole, apparently the evolution of human biology needs to be reversed as well - considering humans are social animals only distinct from the rest by merit of being able to transform "nature".

Nature simply doesn't exist, and if your qualification for measuring it is social complexity, then the only thing which defines nature is some kind of relationship with us humans... Only decipherable through civilization.

[mushroompizza]

Thats right son... and just like any other post on revleft it fell into an intellectual argument on something that has nothing to do with the original post, people are posting entire essay's that I do not take my time to read because well.. they are just too long, others are saying stupid things that go against common sense and eventually someone will post something about a brick.

[BIXX]

There were several movements against serfdom, but every single one was under the backdrop of the acceleration of antagonisms through the rise of capitalist relations to production. Before this, there were plenty of irrational uprisings BY serfs, but in no way was there a clear "vision" of a society without serfdom in these cases. There were no affirmative social characteristics.
One might even say that they were a purely negative movement.


Likewise, you make the same mistake when you claim that: for one there are numerous examples of witches and queers and what have you resisting that very transition. Furthermore its fairly clear how civ negatively impacted queer existence
I think I ought to have worded that differently. I wish I had said resisting domestication. Which would in turn to some extent conform to what you say I'm your next sentence-


They weren't resisting the transition, they simply might have been, consequentially, in the way of the transition.



That did not mean as actual, lived forces they were capable of disallowing this transition from happening. Likewise, it was entirely proximal. It takes a Placenta Cream in 2015 to go back and claim "yes, they were resisting the transition to capitalism with a better society in their hearts".
Not what I'm saying. I'm saying that there were serfs who abandoned ship when they realized leviathan was digesting them, there were indigenous people who were actively being masticated by its armies, and that they resisted the totality that was leviathan to preserve their existence- and in most cases it was their existence, not just the way they existed.


This isn't true - you're projecting what you perceive to be a chance at emancipation today, in 2015 onto events which had nothing to do with it.
You say this a lot but you never say what it is that I perceive that I'm projecting.


To add, the conclusions drawn from this isn't that, as I said - Thomas Muntzer's rebellion, or even the social transformations in China were all in vain. Should the peasants, enthusiastically rising up, should have been told to "keep quiet" and wait for conditions to be in their favor once they become wage laborers? No. The point of any real revolutionary is that even if failure is inevitable, the chance to seize the power to leave your mark is worth it. It is worth everything. Clearly, however, in retrospect we can see why these failed - we can see why the serfs were unable to have emancipated themselves - this very inevitability of failure, however, wasn't present in these movements! Thomas Munzer's rebellion could not even articulate what was wrong here, because the affirmative demands for a new society, as infantile as they were, were not wrought out of a sophisticated conception of their conditions! Those conditions weren't ripe, but it would have been impossible to know only until after they failed. To put it clearly, the very vision for freedom - as you would like to call it, wrought out ONLY from the worker's movement, was impossible for serfs. That's my point. In China, this was precisely what Mao tried to bypass - the notion of stageism and the necessity of a proletarian base for Communism, that the peasants can in fact emancipate themselves, can be a force of Communism and so on. Clearly he was wrong, but were the Chinese peasantry thinking this? Did this define the dichotomy of struggle in this romantic bourgeois revolution? No! So it is worth commending, even if NOW we know it was in vain.
I don't think emancipation comes only in the form of communism- in fact I don't think it can. And anyway, the vision of freedom I talk about has nothing to do with the workers movement but the direct negation of things that hurt us. This is what we've seen throughout history, through eliminating the power of society and civilization to control us. This con be done in many ways, by wrenching a space from civ for ourselves (squats have been an example of this), destroying the mechanisms through which we are attacked (attacking cops), destroying its veins (infrastructure for the transportation of labor and goods), confusing and shorts circuiting its neural pathways (disinformation, propaganda, and the destruction of the means for one part of Empire to communicate with another). There is a lot more I'm sure. In fact this is something that would need to continue in nature societies- I don't believe that they were perfect, and that there would need to be constant negation. However I do think we would be closer to emancipation, even if we never got to touch it, like an asymptotic journey towards freedom.


Serfs can emancipate themselves today if they still exist, or could have a hundred years ago, but the very idea of emancipation, as you describe it, didn't exist before the modern era and before the worker's movement. Communism isn't an abstract idea, which we find vehicles for actualizing. It precisely, and uniquely is a result of capitalism.
Nihilism (and of course, when I say nihilism I am saying it with the knowledge that it means negation) is the precise and unique result of civilization. It needs no ideological background, no "idea of emancipation". It existed before it was given a name. There was no idea of emancipation because one was never needed. Instead it just was.



Even if this were true, would it not be better to live in a space utopia with just the ten of you? My point is that we can all try and imagine what would be better for us personally, and those immediately around us. My question to you is: Where's the universality here? What makes your demand, and condition, capable of being universal, and therefore possible?
I could point out that in a study of nature societies it was found that 1 in 2000 people suffered from minor depression, whereas the number in civilized society is much higher- if I remember correctly closer to 1 in 5. That claim to a desire for better mental health I think could make it more universal. I mean, the universality honestly boils down to the ability to take maximum control over your existence. I think perhaps I don't entirely understand the question though. However, I don't think that a) universality makes something possible or b) it is possible. However, neither is communism IMO, but even if it is it wouldn't change much for me.


And this is a wholly moral category.
I'm not sure why this was thrown in to your response, but its also wrong.


One can't pick and choose what is civilized and what isn't. Civilization is a totality. Modern medicine is civilization.
Civilization absolutely is a totality. I agree. In fact I have more to say about this later on where it is more relevant to responding to you.


You can talk to me about the pharmaceutical industry but that's the point of Communism to begin with - the self-consciousness of civilization and the free association of self-conscious individuals. There isn't a real dichotomy between civilization and non-civilization.
Except there is. It has to do with social structures primarily. Specifically those that arose/changed substantially 8-10 thousand years ago when the canals were dug in the crescent valley (I am worried I have the location name wrong for some reason). That doesn't mean that I think everything was all rosy before that- I do think that the social structures were measurably easier to live under.


For the cultures, but that's akin to saying feudalism was healthy for Catholic society. If you want to talk about actual well-being in terms of physical health, they weren't, and looking at infant mortality, hunger and so on will easily demonstrate this. Unless of course having a very small population is fine with you, as I'm sure it would be for most people - but how then will you prevent people from attempting to acquire better means of survival, and therefore the rise of civilization? Violence.
I'm pretty sure I've told you this many times, and if o remember correctly even in this very thread I have, that I don't favor a return. That is one reason why. Furthermore I think your argument is weak seeing as communists generally don't consider self-defense violence, and even if they do, they generally consider that justified.


So that's the problem - what about civilization can you pick and choose you want, and how does this stay consistent for your qualification for "nice things"? How in any meaningful sense can this be built? I mean, if you want, you and your friends CAN in fact retreat to some remote jungle and live as you please, away from humanity as a whole. If you want to talk about an absence of violence and coercion, that doesn't hold up either - if there are societies that have discovered agriculture which haven't yet enslaved the female sex, it is most likely because they are in transition to it. So what's healthy about female genitle mutilation? Class society rose in all corners of the globe relatively independent of each other. Clearly this is a case of orientalizing - you're romanticizing certain aspects of these societies to conform to what you want for our own.
This whole paragraph shows you don't know what I want. I'm disregarding it because it doesn't pertain to me.



Why? So according to you, one exits nature through social structures, correct?
Sure. I do think that the term nature requires a bit of clarification. I think it is appropriate to call pre-civilized existence natural, however it can only be understood as such once civilization has conceived of wilderness. So in some ways I don't think it is the most appropriate term as wilderness is a part of civilizations totality. So I guess a a good way to say it is that one exits pre-civ existence (which can in turn be described as more natural) through social structures. However nature marks the social and physical location of civilization's prospective expansion (which can be done in several ways, through "nature preserves", or through active destruction) as to eliminate wilderness, which is a civilized concept denoting a place where civilization has no power. I suspect I'm not working that very well but whatever.


But humans have always had social structures, with the least complex social structures being something akin to chimpanzee societies, with the infinite cycle of the Alpha male.
First, there is a difference between civilized social structures and pre civilized ones. They are both harmful. Second, it is not an infinite cycle.


As far as the animal kingdom is concerned, the ever-mobile social structures of hunter-gatherer societies were incredibly complex. Not content with condemning human history as a whole, apparently the evolution of human biology needs to be reversed as well - considering humans are social animals only distinct from the rest by merit of being able to transform "nature".
Social interaction doesn't necessitate social structure, or rather the rigidity which we allow them to take. This is part of the point of permanent negation.


Nature simply doesn't exist, and if your qualification for measuring it is social complexity, then the only thing which defines nature is some kind of relationship with us humans... Only decipherable through civilization.

I agree with this on the whole, other than saying its the complexity which counts. Its just the specific content of those social structures.

I do suspect that you suffer from ideological blindness, rafiq.