No such thing as culture

[Horus]

I've spent more time learning about human history and culture probably more than anyone I know. And it's made me wonder how anyone can see themselves as belonging to a specific group or tribe amongst other tribes within the human race.

What I mean is that for thousands of years we humans have wandered across the earth and claimed certain parts of it as belonging to our own people, and this cycle has continued for as long as we have existed. But if all along ever part of earth has belonged to a different people at one point or another, then doesn't a black or asian person have just as much claim to the United States as a white person, and vice versa with asia and africa?

How can we see these evolutions of distinctive art forms and languages (culture) as a distinctive identity worth fighting for?

I think the human race should belong to a single political entity rather being separated by these supposed tribal allegiances and identities.

What do you think?

[cyu]

If the government, mass media, and corporations are all structured in the form of a pyramid, it is easier for those at the top to enforce cultural uniformity throughout the organization they control. If there are independent pyramids, then one would expect different dictators to enforce different cultures in their organization. Then it becomes easy for the top of one pyramid to declare war on another pyramid (although the only people suffering and dying are the cannon fodder, rarely those at the top).

[Broosk]

I have no problem with someone belonging to a cultural group, just as long as they don't force their culture upon others or treat it as superior. I view being proud of one's cultural identity or nation silly, as we have no choice what kind of society we are born into, but it isn't inherently bad, but I'm an existentialist and believe people should make find own identities.
It is a far point that land has belonged to various groups over long periods of time, which is why I am opposed to land as a commodity. One of my favorite quotes is "we do not inherit the earth from our ancestors, we borrow it from our children." Ideally, the world would be much better if the planet and its resources were shared and we stopped bickering over petty manners such the artificially constructed nation one was conceived in or what cultural identity our parents happened to belong to.

[RedWorker]

Culture exists, but this has nothing to do with the concept of the nation-state, which today finds its expression in a bourgeois form. That is, the class which rose to power through the bourgeois revolution (under the economic axis of the Industrial Revolution and the political axis of the liberal revolution), the capitalist class, first characterized as the owners of the factories, is behind all ruling social, political and economic entities, and determines the form of these entities. The nation-state had and has a class character; today this character is bourgeois, and so it is organized under these lines.

The materialist conception of history, first expounded by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, explains the rise of the nation-state as a key element in the occurrences of class history. This element does not arbitrarily rise by the existence of different 'cultures', but rather has its explanation in the workings of social and economic interactions.

They show why after the proletarian-communist revolution occurs, the nation and the state will disappear. This disappearance, however, has nothing to do with a pseudo-disappearance in which all people are to be united under one bourgeois entity; an occurrence which is not possible in the first place.

All currently ruling political are bourgeois entities. Any struggle towards the elimination of the nation-state must involve the revolutionary re-organization of society through communism. The union of all people under one bourgeois entity is not possible, not desirable and at most serves to create illusions.

To abolish the nation-state does not mean to abolish culture. There will always be differences in art forms, popular opinions, etc. between different geographical zones; there will not be, however, the nation-state.

To truly understand the rise of the nation-state and its position within history, most importantly in the history of class society, requires revolutionary reading. It requires assimilating the materialist conception of history, which finds its birth in the criticism and rejection of idealism, therefore; firstly to thoroughly understand idealism, then to reject it, and through its rejection form an understanding of the materialist conception of history. The rejection of idealism and therefore also the exposition of materialism was arguably elaborated in the most efficient fashion in the Chapter 1 of [the Critique of] The German Ideology (https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1845/german-ideology/ch01.htm). To understand the bourgeois expression in particular, and the conditions for its abilition, requires the reading of the Manifesto of the Communist Party (https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/communist-manifesto/ch01.htm).

[Ritzy Cat]

Culture preexists the state. Primitive states formed around cultures, providing a uniting base from which language and religion develops. The more specific and coherent a culture, the easier it is for the state to wage war on other states--drawing the picture to the populace a scary, unknown menace, another culture.

However the most of culture remains unbastardized by the state--cuisine, tradition, language, clothing, etc. are not elements that the state has any interest in manipulating, for they serve no coercive purpose for the oppressors.

[ckaihatsu]

We might say that a regional culture has more *magnitude*, over historical time, than any given nation-state:


[1] History, Macro Micro -- Precision

http://s6.postimg.org/nmlxvtqlt/1_History_Macro_Micro_Precision.jpg (http://postimg.org/image/zbpxjshkd/full/)

[Hezadukii92]

Can't believe no one has mentioned the obvious thing here:

Lauren Laverne keeps playing tumbling dice
Just like you with ya Maharishi shoulder bag
Walking the strip like you fucking own the path
You wonder why you got no mates?
You pretend to be proud of ya own culture
Whilst simultaneously not giving two fucks about ya own culture
What culture? fuck culture, the blueprint for all control
On the dole, money monk, the monastery's faint flicks of reference
Paint a vague idea, a pound in the fruity
Fuck lolly on that scale you ****, ya mugged
The money monks saying its prays on bank books

Sleaford Mods - Bronx in a six

Best working class music since Black Sabbath and the sex pistols.

[Rudolf]

Culture exists, but this has nothing to do with the concept of the nation-state, which today finds its expression in a bourgeois form.

...

To abolish the nation-state does not mean to abolish culture. There will always be differences in art forms, popular opinions, etc. between different geographical zones; there will not be, however, the nation-state.


Just to go on from this... i think it Rudolf Rocker's Nationalism and Culture is worth a read.



Culture is not created by command. It creates itself, arising spontaneously from the necessities of men and their social cooperative activity. No ruler could ever command men to fashion the first tools, first use fire, invent the telescope and the steam engine, or compose the Iliad. Cultural values do not arise by direction of higher authorities. They cannot be compelled by dictates nor called into life by the resolution of legislative assemblies.

Neither in Egypt nor in Babylon, nor in any other land was culture created by the heads of systems of political power. They merely appropriated an already existing and developed culture and made it subservient to their special political purposes. But thereby they put the ax to the root of all future cultural progress, for in the same degree as political power became confirmed, and subjected all social life to its influence, occurred the inner atrophy of the old forms of culture, until within their former field of action no fresh growth could start.

Political power always strives for uniformity. In its stupid desire to order and control all social events according to a definite principle, it is always eager to reduce all human activity to a single pattern. Thereby it comes into irreconcilable opposition with the creative forces of all higher culture, which is ever on the lookout for new forms and new organisations and consequently as definitely dependent on variety and universality in human undertakings as is political power on fixed forms and patterns. Between the struggles for political and economic power of the privileged minorities in society and the cultural activities of the people there always exists an inner conflict. They are efforts in opposite directions which will never voluntarily unite and can only be given a deceptive appearance of harmony by external compulsion and spiritual oppression.