My Top 3 Organizing Don'ts

[Sand Castle]

While so many organizers refuse to even acknowledge their imperfections, I will be the first to admit that I have made my share of mistakes and have my weaknesses when it comes to organizing. Although nobody is perfect, I would like to give some advice to my politically active readers by pointing out some mistakes that I’ve seen others make and have occasionally made myself. Although they aren’t in any particular order, here are my top three organizing don’ts.

Don’t neglect social media.

A few years ago I was involved in a certain union vs. union campaign in the federal sector. I’ll leave it all unnamed to avoid any ridiculous flame wars in the comments. The union I was working for absolutely, positively lacked a serious social media presence. The other side, however, had a serious presence online and especially on Facebook. By the time I came along, the other union had made the internet a very hostile terrain that wasn’t worth penetrating given the short amount of time before the election. Needless to say, the union with the bigger online presence won.

During my time with SDS, I had a friend who tended to neglect social media. She wanted to hold a rally on campus, but didn’t bother putting the word out online until a day or so beforehand. Very few people showed up, especially compared to the previous year when a similar rally had been organized by other people who understood the value of social media.

There have been quite a few times during my various campaigns that my issue and organization have gotten serious mainstream media attention due to our presence on social media. For example, one of my SDS “Facebook petitions” was mentioned in Time Magazine. My online work throughout the years has also been mentioned in local newspapers and news radio stations. Not only is social media important for its own sake, but it will be a tremendous help in getting your issue covered by more traditional news outlets that have a larger audience than most campaigns’ social media pages.

Don’t waste paper.

One of the first things in almost everyone’s mind is “let’s make a flyer!” In 1905, that would be a great idea. The only problem is that it’s 2015 and everyone who was alive in 1905 is dead. If you give out flyers on the street, people will view them as bits of litter that haven’t yet found an appropriate place on the ground or trashcan. As for sticking them up on a wall or post, forget about it. Nobody looks at those things.

Before every event I put together, I take a survey to see who showed up because they saw a poster or flyer. Out of hundreds of people, only two have ever raised their hands. Most people raised their hands because they heard about the event on Facebook. Others came because they were emailed about it via email bulletins internal to the university or various organizations.

I’m not saying don’t make flyers, I’m just saying their effective use is significantly more limited than many are willing to admit. If you’re involved in a heated union campaign, they’re a good tool, especially in public sector organizing. If you are at a rally, they’re a great tool to have. If you are already talking with interested people, such as during one-on-one “organizing conversations” or with people who approached your informational booth, go for it. If you’re organizing in a neighborhood where people probably have limited or no internet access, you need flyers for them to spread around. But just leaving them stuck on a wall downtown will get them ignored because they’re just another form of advertisement, and people tend to tune out advertisements.

My advice is that if you absolutely, positively must give out flyers to complete strangers on the street corner, make them funny. If you’re going to tack them up everywhere, make them funny so it will catch people’s attention. Go for some sort of insta-funny, like having an inappropriate word on the flyer made noticeable from a few feet away. Or put a picture of your cat on them. People love cats these days.

Don’t be pushy.

Some organizers can make a pushy approach work for them, but chances are you aren’t one of them. Sadly, with the way some of these “professionals” talk, they’d have you believe that approaching your coworker while he is in the middle of taking a leak in a public restroom is the best way.

A lot of times people won’t be interested no matter how hard you push. As a young person who has had the misfortune of being told to go recruit some older workers, I can assure you that a lot of people won’t take you seriously over petty things like your age.

During the union campaign I mentioned earlier, I was able to recruit one of the more distant, uninterested workers by leaving her alone. She would ignore me every day, and eventually I realized she valued her personal space and uninterrupted thoughts more than any information I had. So I left her alone and didn’t even say hello, just as she wanted. Eventually she respected me for that. I was only an intern at the time, but I succeeded where all the so-called “professionals” failed. I recruited her because I know how to take a hint and use my good manners. If you’re too pushy, a lot of people will view you as another salesperson.

For more organizing commentary, advice, and strategies, read my Authentic Organizing pamphlet (http://libcom.org/library/authentic-organizing-ideas-reviving-grassroots) (it’s free).

Taken from my website at: http://ourstreets.net/2015/09/08/my-top-3-organizing-donts/

[BIXX]

Do you feel as if this fetish for attracting numbers is harmful to (what I assume is) your goal of abolishing capital?

[Sand Castle]

Do you feel as if this fetish for attracting numbers is harmful to (what I assume is) your goal of abolishing capital?

No, you need to reach the people in order to organize them. You need to spread the message of abolition if people are to take it up. Do you think the revolution won't come through the masses, but rather through a small group of putschists? Perhaps I don't understand what you're asking. It isn't a fetish.

[BIXX]

No, you need to reach the people in order to organize them. You need to spread the message of abolition if people are to take it up. Do you think the revolution won't come through the masses, but rather through a small group of putschists? Perhaps I don't understand what you're asking. It isn't a fetish.

I don't think revolution will come at all, and that the numbers gathering game of organizing (+ the actual intent behind organizing) seems that even if capitalism were to be abolished it would create a massive amount of equally bad problems afterward.

[The Feral Underclass]

No, you need to reach the people in order to organize them. You need to spread the message of abolition if people are to take it up. Do you think the revolution won't come through the masses, but rather through a small group of putschists? Perhaps I don't understand what you're asking. It isn't a fetish.

Why do you think that you're best suited to "organise" "the masses" and why is being part of your brand of leftism better for "the masses" than any other brand of leftism?

[John Nada]

Do you feel as if this fetish for attracting numbers is harmful to (what I assume is) your goal of abolishing capital?For me, no. The more the merrier.:wub: Though there is something to be said about the possibility of adopting capitalist logic of getting sales, through no fault of one's own, but from the superstructure and normalization of living in a capitalist society.
I don't think revolution will come at all, and that the numbers gathering game of organizing (+ the actual intent behind organizing) seems that even if capitalism were to be abolished it would create a massive amount of equally bad problems afterward.At least you're honest. Most either dress it up in "Bu-bu-but the material conditions!" and wait for the world to end, or reformist/reactionary,"There is no alternative. Horseshoe theory says fighting back against oppressors and revolution just as bad if not worse than liberal 'democracy'. Neoliberalism is the end of history and 'as good as it gets'(tm)."
Why do you think that you're best suited to "organise" "the masses" and why is being part of your brand of leftism better for "the masses" than any other brand of leftism?For me, because I'm always 100% right. All who disagree are fucking revisionists who'll be lined up against the wall on The Day of JudgementThe Revolution.:lol:

Seriously, I think I'd be horrible at organizing the masses, and wonder what shit's going around that people agree to follow me, because I want to smoke some of that shit!

[GiantMonkeyMan]

I don't think revolution will come at all, .
Get off this website then.


Why do you think that you're best suited to "organise" "the masses" and why is being part of your brand of leftism better for "the masses" than any other brand of leftism?
To use a shitty metaphor, tempered steel is more useful than a lump of iron ore.

[The Feral Underclass]

Get off this website then.

There is a legitimate current within the far-left that shares this same belief. Your ignorance of left politics is not a reason to tell someone to get off RevLeft.


To use a shitty metaphor, tempered steel is more useful than a lump of iron ore.

That makes no sense to me.

[RedWorker]

Good article - sorry most of the replies have been clownish posts.

I don't know if you're right about fliers, though.

[GiantMonkeyMan]

That makes no sense to me.
It's a metaphor. Organised workers are stronger and unorganised workers have potential but don't have the same strength.

[The Feral Underclass]

Good article - sorry most of the replies have been clownish posts.

I don't know if you're right about fliers, though.

You and others need to come to terms with the fact that not everyone on the left agrees with your prescriptions. Your refusal to engage critically with your presuppositions does not make other people's views clownish. Now either have courtesy towards divergent opinions or learn to just hold your tongue.

[The Feral Underclass]

It's a metaphor. Organised workers are stronger and unorganised workers have potential but don't have the same strength.

Okay, but that doesn't really answer my questions...

[Ele'ill]

I think organizing is a ritualized act of collecting ore and making weapons that are about as useful as safety scissors because really that battlefield is an arts and crafts class where the how-to-fight-civilized instructions are taught by enemies for enemies. Every participant knows their professional break through will happen right around the next turn because this is a fatalistic fantasy with the bar set so low that even accidental eye contact from a stranger is considered one step closer to the critical mass.

[GiantMonkeyMan]

The rejection of organising is a facet of the development of contemporary liberal politics - hence, vacuous movements like Occupy or the Indignados. Your rejection of organising has been as co-opted by capitalism as the majority of proletarian organisations themselves.

[The Feral Underclass]

The rejection of organising is a facet of the development of contemporary liberal politics - hence, vacuous movements like Occupy or the Indignados. Your rejection of organising has been as co-opted by capitalism as the majority of proletarian organisations themselves.

I didn't reject organising though. My questions were: 1. Why do you think that you're best suited to "organise" "the masses" and 2. Why is being part of your brand of leftism better for "the masses" than any other brand of leftism?

[Hit The North]

I don't think revolution will come at all, and that the numbers gathering game of organizing (+ the actual intent behind organizing) seems that even if capitalism were to be abolished it would create a massive amount of equally bad problems afterward.


There is a legitimate current within the far-left that shares this same belief.


Sorry, what? Who are these charlatans passing themselves off as revolutionaries who reject both organising and revolution?


Your ignorance of left politics is not a reason to tell someone to get off RevLeft. Why would someone like this want to be on RevLeft, except to either troll or convince the rest of us to abandon organising for the eventual abolition of the the capitalist MoP? The first is a bannable offense while the latter should be done from OI.

[BIXX]

On the other hand I do reject organizing, because its a delusional fantasy to think all your organizing will do anything.

[Lord Testicles]

On the other hand I do reject organizing, because its a delusional fantasy to think all your organizing will do anything.

A total absence of organisation will accomplish?

[BIXX]

Sorry, what? Who are these charlatans passing themselves off as revolutionaries who reject both organising and revolution?

I am not a revolutionary.

But seriously the sheer lack of exposure to outside ideas makes this site worse. That's why I'm here, after all, to learn. And this site has insulated itself from that ability be forcifully removing various viewpoints. Not saying we should keep the fash out or anything, more that this site is almost 100% dominated by folks who accept the logic of civ and so despite all the little disagreements between them there isn't really any difference- like I've said before and I will say again, the society desired by leftists the vast majority of the time has police, money, work, coercion, all while shoving your fingers in your ears and shutting eyes and saying that of course this is what freedom will look like, a society of free producers only free to be producers... Which to me really doesn't sound better than what we've got now. I think the leftkst ideas of organizing and revolution are fantasy- which is OK, I get that. If that's what you need to get through your day then sure, but don't pretend it'll make the revolution come.

[BIXX]

A total absence of organisation will accomplish?

I can safely say that the efforts of every organized front in the history of leftism have not moved us one step closer to communism. And I seriously doubt that "the revolution" as conceived by leftists will lead anyone to freedom at all.


Eta: forgot to actually answer the question.

I don't think a total lack is any more effective other than in case of actual revolution I think it'd only serve to reinstate courts and law and labour which is pretty obviously worse than no courts no law and no labour.

[Lord Testicles]

I can safely say that the efforts of every organized front in the history of leftism have not moved us one step closer to communism. And I seriously doubt that "the revolution" as conceived by leftists will lead anyone to freedom at all.

That's not what I asked, I asked what will a total absence of organisation lead to?

Whilst we're not anywhere near communism, just letting the bourgeoisie have their way doesn't seem like a very convincing alternative.

[The Feral Underclass]

Sorry, what? Who are these charlatans passing themselves off as revolutionaries who reject both organising and revolution?

I'm not going to participate in a conversation that's founded on calling people names. Your questions are also based on assuming your own preconceived ideas of what a revolution is are the right ones.


Why would someone like this want to be on RevLeft, except to either troll or convince the rest of us to abandon organising for the eventual abolition of the the capitalist MoP? The first is a bannable offense while the latter should be done from OI.

I think it's a lot to assume that people would be interested in convincing you of anything. I assume people like that would come here to engage in debate, since that's what the forum is designed for.

[Ele'ill]

The rejection of organising is a facet of the development of contemporary liberal politics - hence, vacuous movements like Occupy or the Indignados. Your rejection of organising has been as co-opted by capitalism as the majority of proletarian organisations themselves.

As much as leftists won't want to hear it or don't want to remember it I think Occupy would immediately be categorized within what we're criticising.

[Hit The North]

I am not a revolutionary.

But seriously the sheer lack of exposure to outside ideas makes this site worse. That's why I'm here, after all, to learn. And this site has insulated itself from that ability be forcifully removing various viewpoints. Not saying we should keep the fash out or anything, more that this site is almost 100% dominated by folks who accept the logic of civ and so despite all the little disagreements between them there isn't really any difference- like I've said before and I will say again, the society desired by leftists the vast majority of the time has police, money, work, coercion, all while shoving your fingers in your ears and shutting eyes and saying that of course this is what freedom will look like, a society of free producers only free to be producers... Which to me really doesn't sound better than what we've got now. I think the leftkst ideas of organizing and revolution are fantasy- which is OK, I get that. If that's what you need to get through your day then sure, but don't pretend it'll make the revolution come.

The posters on this site interact, discuss, argue and whatnot with all manner of people outside of this website. Revleft, on the other hand, is a forum in which revolutionary leftists can come together to discuss those outside interactions and other matters. You are obviously entitled to your own views but, by the rules of the forum, these should be articulated in OI.

To be honest, I'm more interested in bringing this to TFU's attention than in bringing about your exclusion. Nevertheless, your ungenerous description of revolutionaries in the quote above (highlighted) is quite hostile and hardly fraternal.

[The Feral Underclass]

Nevertheless, your ungenerous description of revolutionaries in the quote above (highlighted) is quite hostile and hardly fraternal.

You made a post calling people like PC charlatans...

Also, stop back-seat modding.

[Hit The North]

I'm not going to participate in a conversation that's founded on calling people names.


How very Corbynesque of you.


I think it's a lot to assume that people would be interested in convincing you of anything. I assume people like that would come here to engage in debate, since that's what the forum is designed for.

No, it isn't. It's designed for revolutionaries not non-revolutionaries. Clues in the name.

[Hit The North]

You made a post calling people like PC charlatans...


No, I called people who call themselves revolutionaries but oppose organising as charlatans. PC has admittted (s)he's not a revolutionary.


Also, stop back-seat modding.Mod off.

[The Feral Underclass]

How very Corbynesque of you.

It's not Corbynesque to not try and purposefully provoke negativity.


No, it isn't. It's designed for revolutionaries not non-revolutionaries. Clues in the name.

The board is specifically designed for debate. That's its primary function. I don't understand how you can deny that. Your conceptualisation of revolution or being in the left is not the dominating conception. It may be disagreeable to you, but what you find disagreeable isn't the basis for anything, let alone who is and isn't entitled to post here.

[Hit The North]

Well, you're a moderator of this site so i guess you should know. So what is the purpose of OI?

[Ele'ill]

What is a revolutionary?

[The Feral Underclass]

Well, you're a moderator of this site so i guess you should know. So what is the purpose of OI?

It's for various kinds of capitalists, pro-lifers and third world Maoists.

[Decolonize The Left]

Alright, friendly mod reminder to please stop name-calling and other hostile posts. This thread has merit and I will participate in it shortly, but this is my mod post saying this is a general warning to the thread to please dialogue with respect. Thank you kindly.

[Decolonize The Left]

What is a revolutionary?

I think this is an excellent question and one which I'd appreciate if others answered as well.

For me, a revolutionary is someone who actively participates in the transformation and bettering of everyday life.

[Hit The North]

What is a revolutionary?

Meh, is this how far the site has regressed? How back-to-basics do we need to get?

But just from the p.o.v. of this website: a revolutionary is someone who argues for revolution. Someone who agues that revolution is a fantasy to keep us warm at night is the opposite of a revolutionary.


It's for various kinds of capitalists, pro-lifers and third world Maoists.

But those who oppose organising the working class and agitating for a workers revolution are free to wander the plains of the site? Either you stand for the overthrow of capitalism or you are the friend of capitalism. There's no middle ground - as no doubt you were pointing out in the Jeremy Corbyn thread.

[BIXX]

I do oppose capital tho just not in your way

[Hit The North]

I think this is an excellent question and one which I'd appreciate if others answered as well.

For me, a revolutionary is someone who actively participates in the transformation and bettering of everyday life.

Why is that not a "reformer" or a "missionary"?

A revolutionary must be someone who actively advocates the revolutionary transformation of society. The question then is "what is a revolution?"

[Hit The North]

I do oppose capital tho just not in your way

I'd be interested to understand how you do this.

[BIXX]

I do some stuff at the workplace. Nothing terrible exciting but things that are disruptive (even down to just making my bosses' jobs harder).

[Zoop]

I don't think revolution will come at all.

Out of curiosity, why do you think this is?

Currently, it may seem profoundly unlikely, but things can change which make revolution possible.

[Luís Henrique]

There is a legitimate current within the far-left that shares this same belief. Your ignorance of left politics is not a reason to tell someone to get off RevLeft.

This would be a devastating argument if this message board was called farleft. But it isn't; it is called revleft.

Luís Henrique

[BIXX]

Out of curiosity, why do you think this is?

Currently, it may seem profoundly unlikely, but things can change which make revolution possible.

I just don't see it. If it does happen it won't come from the left though, that's for sure. Radicals are only able to come up with ways to make capitalism more efficient, it seems.

[Rudolf]

organising the working class and agitating for a workers revolution


You know that 'organising the working class' is paternalistic, right?

[The Feral Underclass]

This would be a devastating argument if this message board was called farleft. But it isn't; it is called revleft.

Luís Henrique

And yet we have pacifists and, ahem, social democrats posting on the board.

[The Feral Underclass]

Meh, is this how far the site has regressed? How back-to-basics do we need to get?

But just from the p.o.v. of this website: a revolutionary is someone who argues for revolution. Someone who agues that revolution is a fantasy to keep us warm at night is the opposite of a revolutionary.



But those who oppose organising the working class and agitating for a workers revolution are free to wander the plains of the site? Either you stand for the overthrow of capitalism or you are the friend of capitalism. There's no middle ground - as no doubt you were pointing out in the Jeremy Corbyn thread.

Again, you are basing your disagreement on the assumption that capitalism is "overthrown" and even if it were is done so by organising the working class (paternalistic) and having a "workers" revolution (workerist). This is the arrogance of trad leftist orthodoxy and the workerist fetishism it clings on to.

[Spectre of Spartacism]

For me, a revolutionary is someone who actively participates in the transformation and bettering of everyday life.

According to your definition, all competent social workers are professional revolutionaries.

[Spectre of Spartacism]

Again, you are basing your disagreement on the assumption that capitalism is "overthrown" and even if it were is done so by organising the working class (paternalistic) and having a "workers" revolution (workerist). This is the arrogance of trad leftist orthodoxy and the workerist fetishism it clings on to.

Perhaps we can take this even further. What is this capitalism to be overthrown, and can a person argue that they are revolutionary anti-capitalists because their definition of capitalism is industrialized technology, which they oppose by seeking to dismantle all modern technology?

[The Feral Underclass]

Perhaps we can take this even further. What is this capitalism to be overthrown, and can a person argue that they are revolutionary anti-capitalists because their definition of capitalism is industrialized technology, which they oppose by seeking to dismantle all modern technology?

Yes, you could take it this far, but none of that really makes any sense. To me at least.

[Spectre of Spartacism]

Yes, you could take it this far, but none of that really makes any sense. To me at least.

Neither, to me, does the idea that a self-described "revolutionary" is a person who questions whether capitalism needs to be "overthrown" by workers who have "organized" themselves, hierarchically or not, for that purpose.

[Decolonize The Left]

Why is that not a "reformer" or a "missionary"?

A revolutionary must be someone who actively advocates the revolutionary transformation of society. The question then is "what is a revolution?"

A revolution is not an event. It is not historical in any sense. It is the ultimate transformation of everyday life and thus the transformation of history as well. As my signature suggests, I agree with Henri Lefebvre in that the essence of Marx's critique was everyday life: the life of everyday people, day in and day out, as we live it together and alone. Thus the issue is not "capitalism" or "revolution" but precisely this very life--all we will ever know.

A reformer is an ideologue, as is the missionary, obviously. The revolutionary is one who is rooted in this everyday life and sees it as it is: the entirety of the struggle.


According to your definition, all competent social workers are professional revolutionaries.

There is no such thing as a "professional" revolutionary. The "professional" is pure bourgeois idealism and a professional revolutionary is a most twisted and confused character indeed.

[Spectre of Spartacism]

There is no such thing as a "professional" revolutionary. The "professional" is pure bourgeois idealism and a professional revolutionary is a most twisted and confused character indeed.

I see. All competent social workers are merely revolutionaries then, not professional revolutionaries.

[Decolonize The Left]

I see. All competent social workers are merely revolutionaries then, not professional revolutionaries.

This is a major problem with the left: demanding to know who is and who isn't a "true" revolutionary. Here you demonstrate this perfectly. You are actually trying to bash social workers, perhaps the most valuable service that many people receive in their lives, because they aren't "professional revolutionaries." This approach does one thing: it backs you into a corner and isolates you. It also insults social workers and everyone who relies on them which makes you look... well... not very interested in "the working class" at all.

My point is that "ending capitalism" or "revolution" is a meaningless phrase. What we are really talking about, what Marx was really talking about, was changing everyday life (not the "economy" or "society" or whatever abstract term you want). It is everyday life in which we are alienated. It is everyday life in which we are exploited and oppressed. This is the territory to be conquered, not "revolution" or "capitalism." Transform everyday life, bring it forward into a festival, and the revolution will no longer be a fictitious event but a lived reality.

[Spectre of Spartacism]

This is a major problem with the left: demanding to know who is and who isn't a "true" revolutionary. Here you demonstrate this perfectly. You are actually trying to bash social workers, perhaps the most valuable service that many people receive in their lives, because they aren't "professional revolutionaries." This approach does one thing: it backs you into a corner and isolates you. It also insults social workers and everyone who relies on them which makes you look... well... not very interested in "the working class" at all.

My point is that "ending capitalism" or "revolution" is a meaningless phrase. What we are really talking about, what Marx was really talking about, was changing everyday life (not the "economy" or "society" or whatever abstract term you want). It is everyday life in which we are alienated. It is everyday life in which we are exploited and oppressed. This is the territory to be conquered, not "revolution" or "capitalism." Transform everyday life, bring it forward into a festival, and the revolution will no longer be a fictitious event but a lived reality.

I didn't demand anything of you. I didn't even ask you a question. Somebody else did, you voluntarily answered it, and I pointed out an implication of the answer you gave. If "ending capitalism," is a meaningless phrase, then so is "the beginning of capitalism" and "capitalism" too. This level of deconstruction is fine for a literature class, a little debilitating for political action intended to go beyond knee-jerk reflexes and impressions.

[The Feral Underclass]

Neither, to me, does the idea that a self-described "revolutionary" is a person who questions whether capitalism needs to be "overthrown" by workers who have "organized" themselves, hierarchically or not, for that purpose.

Well let's be clear, what was said is that the workers are organised and that there is a "workers" revolution. Immediately I reject the paternalistic attitude of the former and the fetishisation of the "worker" in the latter.

On the issue of whether capitalism is "overthrown," I reject this idea that the production of communism is somehow an event that occurs at the end of a, as of yet, unexplained process. This outdated concept of "revolutionaryism" does not take into account the restructuring of capitalism or the nature of class in the West. It isn't an updated understanding of reality and because of that should be viewed with suspicion, if not outright contempt. Can capitalism be overthrown? That is a legitimate question that the left have to contend with. I understand that for all you revolutionary knights in shining armour, the very notion that we should ask this question attacks the core of your idealised view of yourselves as revolutionaries, but the question is not intended to imply that it is not possible to have a world without capitalism, but to ask whether the production of communism is really a single event that occurs like some inciting incident leading us into the third act or whether it is more of an actualisation (for want of a better term). The argument being that communism is produced, it is not enacted.

[Luís Henrique]

Again, you are basing your disagreement on the assumption that capitalism is "overthrown" and even if it were is done so by organising the working class (paternalistic) and having a "workers" revolution (workerist). This is the arrogance of trad leftist orthodoxy and the workerist fetishism it clings on to.

So, I guess that the Libertarian Communist Initiative wasn't up to your expectations?

Luís Henrique

[The Feral Underclass]

So, I guess that the Libertarian Communist Initiative wasn't up to your expectations?

Luís Henrique

I don't understand how this question is related to anything I said or anything we are discussing...

[Spectre of Spartacism]

Well let's be clear, what was said is that the workers are organised and that there is a "workers" revolution. Immediately I reject the paternalistic attitude of the former and the fetishisation of the "worker" in the latter.

The passive voice does not necessarily imply that people outside of the working class are swooping down to organize workers like a beneficent bearded pater familias. I think it only implies coordinated effort designed to achieve a goal.


On the issue of whether capitalism is "overthrown," I reject this idea that the production of communism is somehow an event that occurs at the end of a, as of yet unexplained, process. This outdated concept of "revolutionaryism" does not take into account the restructuring of capitalism or the nature of class in the West. It isn't an updated understanding of reality and because of that should be viewed with suspicion, if not outright contempt. Can capitalism be overthrown? That is a legitimate question that the left have to contend with. I understand that for all you revolutionary knights in shining armour, the very notion that we should ask this question attacks the core of your idealised view of yourselves as revolutionaries, but the question is not intended to imply that it is not possible to have a world without capitalism, but to ask whether the production of communism is really a single event that occurs like some inciting incident leading us into the third act or whether it is more of an actualisation (for want of a better term). The argument being that communism is produced, it is not enacted.

But does anybody, knights in shining armor or knights in deconstructionist armor, believe that overthrowing capitalism is a singular event that occurs in a nanosecond, not a process that encompasses wide layers of the working people struggling over a period of time? I think you may be swinging at a strawman.

As for leadership, it exists in any movement. The concept of a movement means that there is a push in a definite political direction with others being carried along, perhaps against their will, perhaps not. Leadership does not necessarily have to be officially recognized by an organization, and it doesn't necessarily refer to an oppressively bureaucratized structure of command.

[The Feral Underclass]

The passive voice does not necessarily imply that people outside of the working class are swooping down to organize workers like a beneficent bearded pater familias. I think it only implies coordinated effort designed to achieve a goal.

Yet this is precisely what happens and what is happening across the West.


But does anybody, knights in shining armor or knights in deconstructionist armor, believe that overthrowing capitalism is a singular event that occurs in a nanosecond, not a process that encompasses wide layers of the working people struggling over a period of time? I think you may be swinging at a strawman.

But then what is a revolution and a revolutionary?


As for leadership, it exists in any movement. The concept of a movement means that there is a push in a definite political direction with others being carried along, perhaps against their will, perhaps not. Leadership does not necessarily have to be officially recognized by an organization, and it doesn't necessarily refer to an oppressively bureaucratized structure of command.

It may not refer to an oppressively bureaucratised structure of command, but as Placenta Cream points out earlier in the thread, the abolishing or "overthrow" of capitalism does not necessarily mean that something better is produced. In my case that something is communism.

[Spectre of Spartacism]

Yet this is precisely what happens and what is happening across the West.

Perhaps, but why? Certainly any answer would have to go well beyond the paternalistic attitudes or language of individuals.


But then what is a revolution and a revolutionary?I prefer Perry Anderson's definition of a revolution. It is "an episode of convulsive political transformation, compressed in time and concentrated in target, that has a determinate beginning-when the old state apparatus is still intact-and a finite end when that apparatus is decisively broken and a new one erected in its stead."

I would supplement that definition by adding that a revolution refers not just to a crisis of the state and the rapid reconfiguration of political relationships but also to the restructuring of the economic relationships that have given rise to the revolution.


It may not refer to an oppressively bureaucratised structure of command, but as Placenta Cream points out earlier in the thread, the abolishing or "overthrow" of capitalism does not necessarily mean that something better is produced. In my case that something is communism.Of course. Capitalism can be "overthrown" by barbarism, as Rosa Luxemburg suggested was a possibility.

[Rafiq]

Why do you think that you're best suited to "organise" "the masses" and why is being part of your brand of leftism better for "the masses" than any other brand of leftism?

The question concerns practice. All other questions relegate to - more broad questions which we could indeed discuss - about why "our ideas" are better than "other ideas" in general, including Fascism, Libertarianism, ruling ideology in general, and so on.

If one's practical aims are the conquest of political power by the proletariat and the destruction of private property, there can be no relativism - there can be no dispute, there can be no subjective controversy - we all share the same platform of debate, and thus, our disagreements will only ever amount to practical ones.

What this means is that no one is, by merit of any essential qualities, "best suited" for organization. Organization is organization - there are no golden "qualifications" that must be met that are ordained by providence, cosmic will, or whatever you want. This is why postmodernism is anti-Communism: Subjectivity is not something we must justify. It is an axiom - all we must do is explain it - scientifically. The characteristics that are important for organization will not be judged at the throne of the collective superego of "the Left", but on the very field of struggle itself - in other words, by merit of the relationship between the practical aims, and the ability to fulfill these aims. What must a new Left ask? What do you want? This is our question. This question is wrought out from, again, the social antagonism that persists in the here and now.

Is the poison fomenting in Europe a result of "ordinary people" whose daily lives are being threatened by immigrants with a "different culture" and "different ways"? Or is it an EXPRESSION of a much more deep-seated, general anger experienced by the worker class?


Again, you are basing your disagreement on the assumption that capitalism is "overthrown" and even if it were is done so by organising the working class (paternalistic) and having a "workers" revolution (workerist). This is the arrogance of trad leftist orthodoxy and the workerist fetishism it clings on to.

Capitalism must be overthrown consciously, because Communism merely denotes the historic, and social self-consciousness of society itself. The whole point is that there is no force to fall back on - there is no autonomous process that will guarantee the success of socialism. This is why Engels speaks of "scientific socialism".

Finally, you speak of "paternalism". But revolutionaries do not have to say "We know what you want" to workers. There is, frankly, a reason why we can organize the working class and a reason why we can't organize other classes on these lines. It has nothing to do with their their ignorance: For the uneducated rural petite-bourgeoisie were always incredibly difficult to mobilize by the intelligentsia. Feral makes the same mistake that the bourgeois historians do in their conception of the rise of the Bolsheviks - the notion that somehow, the intelligentsia are outside the social field and must descend from their ivory towers to "intervene" into natural processes. The problem with this, of course, is that society is is in its constitution a totality, one cannot be outside the social antagonism. Paul Robeson's words haunt us today: The artist (or the intellectual) must choose - freedom or slavery. There is no in-between, no room for neutrality. Thus, the notion of "paternalism" is the greatest possible insult to workers:

Why? Because it assumes that the present ignorance of the worker, and his incapacity to conceive his relation to life holistically, is an essential, inevitable and justified condition of his being. But this is no more true the notion that introducing to other people's the scientific method is "paternalistic" - the irony of most post-colonial intellectuals is that they indirectly convey the kind of racism which makes certain features of Europe, somehow, essential to Europe itself. Postmodern Leftists make the assumption that workers are in the position that they are in (rather than in ivory towers) for any other reason than PROXIMITY and chance. Workers struggle for consciousness already like men lost in caves struggle for light: Intellectuals are PRIVILEGED to be in the position that they are in - not because they are essentially superior, but because of chance. For them to abdicate upon their duty of "organizing the workers" is the greatest form of paternalism, this false respect for "otherness" emanates the same kind that the British had for the oriental world. But the British weren't scared of traditional Chinese culture, they were scared of the Chinese adopting the "European" values and meeting the British toe-to-toe. The antagonism is not introduced. It already expresses itself regularly - any idiot with an iota of experience with the working class knows that yes - it IS a constant, and regular struggle, it is not a question of workers being "motivated", but casting off the ACTIVE MEANS by which their otherwise propensity to fight are suppressed, ideologically, physically or otherwise.

To quote Lassalle, the goal of "organizing" is to disseminate scientific knowledge among the body of people. Frankly, yes workers (or more pertinently today, those who are deprived of work itself) are deprived of this, yes ignorance is a condition of the perpetuation of their conditions of exploitation and hopelessness, YES intellectuals are in an ADVANTAGED position to understand the place of the working class, its GENERAL aims in a way that the mere particular worker cannot (spontaneously). I just fail to see how this is paternalism, Feral. The ideas you ascribe to, and your notion of the world were not wrought from you. Everything is "paternalism" to call something paternalistic implies a means of juxtaposition - and there is nothing more perversely paternalistic than fetishizing the spontaneous impulses of the working class as meaningful expressions of the general class struggle.


On the issue of whether capitalism is "overthrown," I reject this idea that the production of communism is somehow an event that occurs at the end of a, as of yet unexplained, process. This outdated concept of "revolutionaryism" does not take into account the restructuring of capitalism or the nature of class in the West. It isn't an updated understanding of reality and because of that should be viewed with suspicion, if not outright contempt. Can capitalism be overthrown? That is a legitimate question that the left have to contend with. I understand that for all you revolutionary knights in shining armour, the very notion that we should ask this question attacks the core of your idealised view of yourselves as revolutionaries, but the question is not intended to imply that it is not possible to have a world without capitalism, but to ask whether the production of communism is really a single event that occurs like some inciting incident leading us into the third act or whether it is more of an actualisation (for want of a better term). The argument being that communism is produced, it is not enacted.

It is not a stupid question to ask - but this is, so to speak, nothing new as far as traditions go. It is the phrase-mongerers and the righteously confident "revolutionaries" who are the true deviationists, for the tradition of the Left has always been the tradition of constant, merciless and unrelenting criticism - both self-criticism and otherwise. The critical attitude of the left must be perpetual, in other words - and as you recognize, this is lacking today.

At the same time, this does not amount to repeating mistakes of the past. Of course, we need to repeat the successes of the past, and how? By re-approximating the conditions of struggle precisely to the new developments which have transpired, i.e. to point out not SIMPLY how revolutionaries were correct in the past - but to REPEAT this correctness today. There is quite a difference, and here comes the importance of the dialectic - nothing simply exists, it must be regularly and actively reproduced. You're right to assert that such questions must be raised. But at the same time, there are answers for those questions which extend beyond dismissing them with a record broken 6 decades ago, or empty phrases. I mean, perhaps you're not even being critical enough: We should re-evaluate why we are Communists, what Communism means for us, whether it is possible or just a capitalist fantasy, etc. in the first place. Marx's motto was question everything. And we ought to take NOTHING for granted. Communism is NOT a single event - a revolution merely refers to the conquest of political power. More pertinently, it develops from a wider struggle, a wider process - which has not even been initiated today. So it is rather pathetic to see leftists take dignified stances on "reformism" when they have no real position to fall back on. The question is not whether this process is posisble, but why it wouldn't be possible (as ar esult of recent deveopments).

And it is not a rhetorical question. Why WOULDN'T the process be possible today? Inflation of the precariously employed, marginalized, dispossessed masses and so on. The question therefore leads us to a simple answer: The process today is not the same process, qualitively, as it was one hundred years ago. New concrete realities need to be taken into account from the onset of any initiative for organization and struggle. You're right in this sense: We aren't simply in a position to go and organize - for we don't know shit today. Look at the Left - why are we Communists? Most "Communists" are Communists as the expression of their personal idiosyncrasy, a kind of "flavor" no different from a hobby, no different than some stupid triviality you mention to make yourself look interesting in Cafe discussions.


There is no such thing as a "professional" revolutionary. The "professional" is pure bourgeois idealism and a professional revolutionary is a most twisted and confused character indeed.

Right, but the Russian phrase does not insinuate what we think it would mean - "professional" as in superior. Lars Lih points this out in Lenin-rediscovered - in Russian revolutionary culture, there are many misunderstood words by western scholars - much like how we wrought "conspiracy" from a phrase which merely describes a culture of secrecy, street-smarts, etc. from the Okhrana.

The real meaning behind the word is "revolutionary by trade" or "revolutionary by profession', i.e. something people are solely dedicated to.

[Hit The North]

A revolution is not an event. It is not historical in any sense. It is the ultimate transformation of everyday life and thus the transformation of history as well. As my signature suggests, I agree with Henri Lefebvre in that the essence of Marx's critique was everyday life: the life of everyday people, day in and day out, as we live it together and alone. Thus the issue is not "capitalism" or "revolution" but precisely this very life--all we will ever know.


1. The French revolution was an event. The Russian revolution was an event. Sure they take place as links in a chain of development, but if the term is to mean anything it must be separated from other events in this chain such as a general strike or a riot or a war or a military coup.

2. How can a revolution be both "not historical in any sense" and also be the "transformation of history as well"? I fear you've been reading too much French Marxism of the ilk of Lefebvre.

3. Of course Marx's critique is of everyday life, but what is "everyday life" for people who exist under the domination of capital? And what are the issues of everyday life if they are not about capitalism?


A reformer is an ideologue, as is the missionary, obviously. The revolutionary is one who is rooted in this everyday life and sees it as it is: the entirety of the struggle.


Except, by definition, everyone is rooted in the everyday life and as Marx, Lenin and Gramsci would agree, in order to grasp the entirety of the struggle, one must rise above the restricted view of the everyday. And the revolutionary is not someone who merely sees things as they are, she must also have an aspiration towards what could be.

Meanwhile your definition of a revolutionary as "someone who actively participates in the transformation and bettering of everyday life" remains too woolly to be useful and begs the question, "betters life from who's point of view?"

But, to be frank, if it is true, as some argue here, that organizing for revolution is a fantasy and that the revolution is really just a kind of evolution anyway (as you seem to suggest), then who cares what definition of a revolutionary is available?

[Hit The North]

You know that 'organising the working class' is paternalistic, right?

Except when a woman calls for it, then it must be maternalistic, yes?

But, anyway, as a worker who sees other workers as sisters and brothers, I think the word you are looking for is "fraternalistic".

I ain't trying to be your dad, comrade, but I'll tell you one thing. Our whole problem is this: our class enemy is organised but we are not.*

*Apologies to those "revolutionaries of everyday life for everyday people" if this formulation is too rooted in class politics. I'm old fashioned that way.

[BIXX]

Of course. Capitalism can be "overthrown" by barbarism, as Rosa Luxemburg suggested was a possibility.

Honestly I think this is probably a lot closer to what I'd hope a post capitalist existence is. Much better than leftist communism. The communism described by Mari3L and TFU etc... might be more similar to what you think is barbarism- and is quite obviously a more healthy relationship for people to exist in.

[Decolonize The Left]

1. The French revolution was an event. The Russian revolution was an event. Sure they take place as links in a chain of development, but if the term is to mean anything it must be separated from other events in this chain such as a general strike or a riot or a war or a military coup.

2. How can a revolution be both "not historical in any sense" and also be the "transformation of history as well"? I fear you've been reading too much French Marxism of the ilk of Lefebvre.

Revolutions, or general strikes or hurricanes or whatever, are only events in so far as one looks at them historically. History is a story that we tell ourselves about what happened; it is written. And insofar as it is written, all "events" are only such if they are deemed worthy by those with the pens. Thus, a revolution is not historical any more than the planting of a fig tree is. It becomes historical when one looks at it from a certain perspective.

Communism is, I hope, the transcendence of that perspective.


3. Of course Marx's critique is of everyday life, but what is "everyday life" for people who exist under the domination of capital? And what are the issues of everyday life if they are not about capitalism?

And these are questions that matter to normal people. Capitalism is an abstract concept; everyday life is concrete and undisputable. Only through the lens of everyday life does Marxism actually matter.


Except, by definition, everyone is rooted in the everyday life and as Marx, Lenin and Gramsci would agree, in order to grasp the entirety of the struggle, one must rise above the restricted view of the everyday. And the revolutionary is not someone who merely sees things as they are, she must also have an aspiration towards what could be.

This seems to be a false dichotomy. Everyone is indeed rooted in the everyday, in fact, more can be said: everyone only ever exists in the everyday. It is fancy to think otherwise. One cannot "rise above the restricted view of the everyday." Where would one rise to? The expansive view of...? Nowhere. The view of the everyday is the site of struggle; it is the means and end of transformation. The "what could be" only exists in regards to the everyday.


Meanwhile your definition of a revolutionary as "someone who actively participates in the transformation and bettering of everyday life" remains too woolly to be useful and begs the question, "betters life from who's point of view?"

But, to be frank, if it is true, as some argue here, that organizing for revolution is a fantasy and that the revolution is really just a kind of evolution anyway (as you seem to suggest), then who cares what definition of a revolutionary is available?


That's not what I said. I said:
"The revolutionary is one who is rooted in this everyday life and sees it as it is: the entirety of the struggle."
The latter clause of this statement implies a communist agenda ("entirety of the struggle").

Furthermore, I never suggested that the revolution is a form of evolution. In fact, I stated the opposite: that any form of revolution will not be an event but will be an active transformation of everyday life. It will be enacted by those who are revolutionaries and perhaps will manifest "politically," but this is a mere shadow of the real change.

[Decolonize The Left]

Right, but the Russian phrase does not insinuate what we think it would mean - "professional" as in superior. Lars Lih points this out in Lenin-rediscovered - in Russian revolutionary culture, there are many misunderstood words by western scholars - much like how we wrought "conspiracy" from a phrase which merely describes a culture of secrecy, street-smarts, etc. from the Okhrana.

The real meaning behind the word is "revolutionary by trade" or "revolutionary by profession', i.e. something people are solely dedicated to.

But "by trade" and "by profession" are currently bound by bourgeois ideology to be a means to an end: money. Thus, to be a "professional revolutionary" is to be someone outside of the framework of capitalism who is brought immediately into this framework.

Furthermore, the idea of "sole dedication" is dangerous. What about one's loved ones? Is a "professional revolutionary" to abandon them in favor of the revolution (whatever that may be)? And if so, what does this say about the values of the revolution itself? In other words, why wage a revolution when loved ones are cast aside in such a similar manner as under capitalism itself?

[#FF0000]

Honestly I think this is probably a lot closer to what I'd hope a post capitalist existence is. Much better than leftist communism. The communism described by Mari3L and TFU etc... might be more similar to what you think is barbarism- and is quite obviously a more healthy relationship for people to exist in.

yea but how do y'all expect to get there?

i don't wanna be the dude that says "so whats your solution" because I think y'all post good and valuable things in terms of critique but I don't think I've ever seen any of you post anything that comes even close to a statement that even hints at an alternate course of action.

[Sand Castle]

Why do you think that you're best suited to "organise" "the masses" and why is being part of your brand of leftism better for "the masses" than any other brand of leftism?

I never said I was best suited, I only said I was sharing my experiences. As far was what makes one's "brand" of leftism better, that would be a subjective statement. That conversation could go on forever with no conclusive end. When I write about organizing, it is to share my experiences and opinions and research with the hopes that others will use them or learn from them. This isn't some sort of conversion propaganda like your average M-L party article.

Which leads into how I feel this isn't paternalistic. Organizing is social science. There shouldn't be any sacred cows, and there shouldn't be any dogmas. The free exchange of ideas works towards preventing such things. If workers learn something from me, good. If a worker-organizer posts something and I learn from them, good. If we put our heads together, even better. To assume anyone who wants to organize the workers is paternalistic assumes that those doing the organizing aren't workers themselves. Of course, going into my life would open a whole debate about what is and isn't a worker. I've been a worker, and I've been a student, and I've organized outside of the workplace as a community member who shared the burdens of others in the community (such as our shitty transit system).

In my pamphlet, Authentic Organizing, I write that people should see themselves in the organizer and vice versa. They should be one. Some of the best organizers in history have come from among the masses, as opposed to intervening from somewhere else. I'm not saying stop what you're doing and go get a job at Amazon, though chances are you'll have to do that regardless due to the economy, I'm just saying know your place and know that organizing isn't the same as sales (but god forbid the unions recognize that).

[The Feral Underclass]

yea but how do y'all expect to get there?

i don't wanna be the dude that says "so whats your solution" because I think y'all post good and valuable things in terms of critique but I don't think I've ever seen any of you post anything that comes even close to a statement that even hints at an alternate course of action.

You've not been paying attention to my posts then. GET READING!

[The Feral Underclass]

Perhaps, but why? Certainly any answer would have to go well beyond the paternalistic attitudes or language of individuals.

Because leftists maintain their outdated forms of practice and view political militancy as something you bring to the working class. It's based on their failure to understand the restructured nature of capitalism and the changes to class composition.


I prefer Perry Anderson's definition of a revolution. It is "an episode of convulsive political transformation, compressed in time and concentrated in target, that has a determinate beginning-when the old state apparatus is still intact-and a finite end when that apparatus is decisively broken and a new one erected in its stead."

I would supplement that definition by adding that a revolution refers not just to a crisis of the state and the rapid reconfiguration of political relationships but also to the restructuring of the economic relationships that have given rise to the revolution.

And how is this contextualised within contemporary capitalism and present class composition?


Of course. Capitalism can be "overthrown" by barbarism, as Rosa Luxemburg suggested was a possibility.

The point being then that communism cannot be produced using the forms and methods of the leftist paladins, such as Sand Caslte, who see their role as bringing forth the noble cause of anti-capitalism and just like your beloved Trotksy, end up, whether they like it or not, being the prodigies of a new ruling class.

[Luís Henrique]

Honestly I think this is probably a lot closer to what I'd hope a post capitalist existence is. Much better than leftist communism. The communism described by Mari3L and TFU etc... might be more similar to what you think is barbarism- and is quite obviously a more healthy relationship for people to exist in.

We already have barbarism.

Just look at the newspapers, they will show some barbarism at work in Syria, or perhaps in a theatre next to you, in the form of a gunman who had unduly mixed Nietzche with cocaine and wanted to show his will of power and disgust for the concepts of good and evil.

Barbarism isn't a new mode of production; it is just capitalism taken to its logical consequences.

Luís Henrique

[Luís Henrique]

You know that 'organising the working class' is paternalistic, right?

The working class is already organised.

That it isn't organised for the ends we think it should, is a different issue.

Luís Henrique

[The Feral Underclass]

As far was what makes one's "brand" of leftism better, that would be a subjective statement. That conversation could go on forever with no conclusive end. When I write about organizing, it is to share my experiences and opinions and research with the hopes that others will use them or learn from them. This isn't some sort of conversion propaganda like your average M-L party article.

But herein lies the problem: you have no clear understanding of what you are and why you exist, and therefore you just become an 'organiser.' You have presented your experiences of organising, but why? What are we to learn from your experiences? How will it better serve the proletariat in its historic mission of abolishing itself?


Which leads into how I feel this isn't paternalistic. Organizing is social science. There shouldn't be any sacred cows, and there shouldn't be any dogmas. The free exchange of ideas works towards preventing such things. If workers learn something from me, good. If a worker-organizer posts something and I learn from them, good. If we put our heads together, even better. To assume anyone who wants to organize the workers is paternalistic assumes that those doing the organizing aren't workers themselves. Of course, going into my life would open a whole debate about what is and isn't a worker. I've been a worker, and I've been a student, and I've organized outside of the workplace as a community member who shared the burdens of others in the community (such as our shitty transit system).

Paternalism has nothing to do with what class you belong to, but about your attitude towards how the class seeks its interests. Your view is that 'workers' should become organisers and go into communities and organise other workers who you can also make into organisers who then go out and organise other workers. To what end, is not really clear. Presumably it's to fight for better conditions within capitalism, such as a better transit system. Putting aside the obvious issues surrounding reformism, the issue I have is that none of this actually addresses the core problem facing the working class, which is the entirety of present conditions and what measures we take to produce communism.


In my pamphlet, Authentic Organizing, I write that people should see themselves in the organizer and vice versa. They should be one. Some of the best organizers in history have come from among the masses, as opposed to intervening from somewhere else. I'm not saying stop what you're doing and go get a job at Amazon, though chances are you'll have to do that regardless due to the economy, I'm just saying know your place and know that organizing isn't the same as sales (but god forbid the unions recognize that).

Putting aside the horrendousness of the term "the masses," the problem I'm having is that you're just talking about organising for organising sake. Organising seems to the the goal in-and-of-itself. You're becoming organisers for the sake of being organisers. Who cares where organisers come from, the point is what is their purpose and how does it relate to the production of communism.

If you are not alking about communism and the measures necessary to produce it, it makes no difference how you use social media, how much paper you use or how annoying you may or may not be to other people.

[Spectre of Spartacism]

Because leftists maintain their outdated forms of practice and view political militancy as something you bring to the working class. It's based on their failure to understand the restructured nature of capitalism and the changes to class composition.

I'll repeat that I don't find this explanation persuasive. The original argument we are talking about here is why you think the model that workers are being organized paternalistically from the outside predominates today. Your answer is to blame the tiny segment of people who would identify as "leftists." I think this is granting people on the far left a power far outside their capacity. It is actually quite paternalistic in how it depicts workers.

To the extent that workers are not rising up to organize each other, leaving the few who are organized outside of bourgeois politics to be culled by those outside the working class, the ultimate cause has to be sought in the working class itself and how that class is responding to an intensifying class struggle in which capital is on the offensive with take-backs and austerity. Workers organizing into an anti-capitalist force capable of transforming society is not and cannot ever be the product of the whims of leftists outside the class. It may involve people outside the class, but only the working class has the power to organize to change society, whether persuaded to do so by fringe left-coms or Trotskyists or nobody. The working class cannot be forced to do it paternalistically. Just ask the Stalinist bureaucracy, who had just such a model. Oh, wait, you can't, because their attempt at building "socialism" that way predictably resulted into dissolving into a full-blown restoration of capitalism.


And how is this contextualised within contemporary capitalism and present class composition?I don't know what you are asking here.


The point being then that communism cannot be produced using the forms and methods of the leftist paladins, such as Sand Caslte, who see their role as bringing forth the noble cause of anti-capitalism and just like your beloved Trotksy, end up, whether they like it or not, being the prodigies of a new ruling class.Why do you think your "forms and methods" are superior?

[Hit The North]

Revolutions, or general strikes or hurricanes or whatever, are only events in so far as one looks at them historically.

I don't know what you mean. Just because we often know that an event has taken place after the event, doesn't mean we can't be aware of experiencing events as they happen (getting caught in the event of a hurricane or a protest march, for instance).

Even my FB has a more concrete operational sense of what an event is, as it informs me that I am due at an event this weekend. And, guess what, I am! I also get invited to events all the time in my social networks. Unsurprisingly, not having a time machine, all these events are taking place in the future.

But I don't want to get into a semantic-crunching debate about what we mean by an event, as it is beside the point. I think we can agree that shit happens and that revolutions happen (however you want to characterise one).


History is a story that we tell ourselves about what happened; it is written. And insofar as it is written, all "events" are only such if they are deemed worthy by those with the pens. Thus, a revolution is not historical any more than the planting of a fig tree is. It becomes historical when one looks at it from a certain perspective.
Well, any history that neglected the French revolution and the Russian revolution in favour of a history of fig tree plantation might be interesting for fig-tree growers and fig-tree enthusiasts but of little interest to anyone else. I've yet to come across a historian who argues that these revolutions did not take place, but, hey, maybe you can be the first?


Communism is, I hope, the transcendence of that perspective.The transcendence of partial, written history? Yes, and the transcendence of much more beside!


And these are questions that matter to normal people. Capitalism is an abstract concept; everyday life is concrete and undisputable. Only through the lens of everyday life does Marxism actually matter.
"Everyday life" is equally an abstract concept if it is emptied of any content or context; and understood separately from the "definite relations that are indispensable and independent" of the will of social actors (as someone wrote).

Why does Lefebvre argue that Marx's critique is rooted in everyday life? It is because Marx understood that capital was, above all, a social relation: that capital creates labour as an indispensable condition of its own existence; that its reproduction depends upon the regulation of the everyday life of the masses as both producers and consumers; that workers reproduce their own exploitation and alienation when they turn up to work.

So, you can say that capitalism is merely an abstract concept but I prefer to see it as the predominant shaper of everyday life - at all levels: the private and the public, the local and the global.


This seems to be a false dichotomy. Everyone is indeed rooted in the everyday, in fact, more can be said: everyone only ever exists in the everyday. It is fancy to think otherwise. One cannot "rise above the restricted view of the everyday." Where would one rise to? The expansive view of...? Nowhere. The view of the everyday is the site of struggle; it is the means and end of transformation. The "what could be" only exists in regards to the everyday.

That's not what I said. I said:
"The revolutionary is one who is rooted in this everyday life and sees it as it is: the entirety of the struggle."
The latter clause of this statement implies a communist agenda ("entirety of the struggle").Actually, you did write that and I quoted it accurately. Don't make me out to be a liar. That isn't very friendly. But how does the re-articulation of your second and preferred definition in the quote above differ from a Leninist position? And won't you concede that your formulation must depict the revolutionary as an agent who rises above the everyday life in order to see the "entirety of struggle" (which you must equally concede is not transparent to everyday experience)?


Furthermore, I never suggested that the revolution is a form of evolution. In fact, I stated the opposite: that any form of revolution will not be an event but will be an active transformation of everyday life. It will be enacted by those who are revolutionaries and perhaps will manifest "politically," but this is a mere shadow of the real change
This might be due to my own binary thinking, but if you deny that a revolution is a transforming event then it must be a process of transformation which, I think I'm being fair here, makes it evolutionary. Personally, I have no problem with the assertion that a revolution is both the result of, and further impetus to, "the active transformation of everyday life."

.............

[BIXX]

We already have barbarism.

Just look at the newspapers, they will show some barbarism at work in Syria, or perhaps in a theatre next to you, in the form of a gunman who had unduly mixed Nietzche with cocaine and wanted to show his will of power and disgust for the concepts of good and evil.

Barbarism isn't a new mode of production; it is just capitalism taken to its logical consequences.

Luís Henrique

I think it's fairly obvious I am using barbarism to show lack of civ, not brutality (which, realistically, I'm not horribly opposed to- just like I'm not opposed to people defending themselves from brutality).

[Luís Henrique]

I think it's fairly obvious I am using barbarism

As well, it is fairly obvious that when Rosa Luxemburg spoke of "barbarism", she wasn't talking of idyllic primitivism, but of the brutal realities of WWI.

So it is you who is messing with fair obvieties, for the sake of edginess.

Luís Henrique

[The Feral Underclass]

I'll repeat that I don't find this explanation persuasive. The original argument we are talking about here is why you think the model that workers are being organized paternalistically from the outside predominates today. Your answer is to blame the tiny segment of people who would identify as "leftists." I think this is granting people on the far left a power far outside their capacity. It is actually quite paternalistic in how it depicts workers.

I'm slightly confused. You asked me why the left acts in a certain way. I am not suggesting that if they acted in a different way that the working class would somehow be organised.


To the extent that workers are not rising up to organize each other, leaving the few who are organized outside of bourgeois politics to be culled by those outside the working class, the ultimate cause has to be sought in the working class itself and how that class is responding to an intensifying class struggle in which capital is on the offensive with take-backs and austerity. Workers organizing into an anti-capitalist force capable of transforming society is not and cannot ever be the product of the whims of leftists outside the class. It may involve people outside the class, but only the working class has the power to organize to change society, whether persuaded to do so by fringe left-coms or Trotskyists or nobody. The working class cannot be forced to do it paternalistically. Just ask the Stalinist bureaucracy, who had just such a model. Oh, wait, you can't, because their attempt at building "socialism" that way predictably resulted into dissolving into a full-blown restoration of capitalism.

The working class, or at least sections of it, have responded in various ways to austerity. There have been many struggles, some more radical than others, waged by the class against the state and capitalism. The issue is that there has been no real organised communist intervention.


I don't know what you are asking here.

Well you gave a definition of what a revolution is and I am asking you to explain to me how your definition relates to contemporary capitalism and class composition. I.e. how do you see present conditions arriving at this definition of yours.


Why do you think your "forms and methods" are superior?

There are no forms or methods beyond the existence of a well-organised minority communist organisation that can intervene in struggle. There is only the proletariat organised against the bourgeoisie seeking to abolish itself.

[BIXX]

As well, it is fairly obvious that when Rosa Luxemburg spoke of "barbarism", she wasn't talking of idyllic primitivism, but of the brutal realities of WWI.

So it is you who is messing with fair obvieties, for the sake of edginess.

Luís Henrique

I didn't actually know she was referring to the brutality of WWI. Also I'm not a primitivist, and you should come up with something better than just calling anti-civ thought "edgy".

[Spectre of Spartacism]

I'm slightly confused. You asked me why the left acts in a certain way. I am not suggesting that if they acted in a different way that the working class would somehow be organised.

Let me try to clarify. Your initial statement was to say that people outside of the working class swooping down to organize workers is the model of left organizing that is occurring all across the West. I asked why you thought that was the case. That is not a question that pertains exclusively to the behavior of "the left." It also pertains to the behavior of the leftist and non-leftist working class, since the workers are the people being organized (or opting not to enter an organization) and they aren't being commanded into these organizations by the state. They are exercising a choice either way.

This is why I think it's paternalistic to talk about that kind of recruitment as though the workers aren't playing any role in that process, like blobs of clay that are being molded into figures by nefarious Leninists. That doesn't mean that this form of recruitment is free of problems. What it does mean is that these problems need to be examined by digging deeper than the ritual condemnations of the behavior of certain leftists, and should be examined in light of the depressed level of organized working class struggle in the West. At times when workers are demoralized and largely immoblized, it shouldn't be surprising that radical left politics has veered into lifestylism, small-scale propagandizing by intellectuals who are inordinately (but not exclusively) petty bourgeois in class position, among many other less-than-ideal practices.


The working class, or at least sections of it, have responded in various ways to austerity. There have been many struggles, some more radical than others, waged by the class against the state and capitalism. The issue is that there has been no real organised communist intervention.Yes, I agree with this. On why I think there hasn't been much of an organized communist intervention, see my previous paragraph. The struggles that have taken place have occurred in a context where the far left is just recovering from a decades-long onslaught of the capitalist class against the gains the working-class enjoyed, in part we should remember as the result of imperialist spoils following the second world war. One of the consequences of this is that, to the extent communists are participating in workers' struggles in an organized fashion, most of them are trying to generate popularity by hiding their communist program and burrowing within liberal and social-democratic political campaigns.


Well you gave a definition of what a revolution is and I am asking you to explain to me how your definition relates to contemporary capitalism and class composition. I.e. how do you see present conditions arriving at this definition of yours.The definition I gave of a revolution is "an episode of convulsive political transformation, compressed in time and concentrated in target, that has a determinate beginning-when the old state apparatus is still intact-and a finite end when that apparatus is decisively broken and a new one erected in its stead." If we applied this to contemporary capitalism, this would mean that the current state is run by the representatives of the capitalist class on behalf of that class, and that a revolution will have occurred once that state apparatus has been smashed by a working class organized around a revolutionary program.

If you are wondering what that looks like in its specifics, you may as well be asking what, concretely, baking bread looks like. You can list ingredients and talk about how they are to be mixed and prepared in a general sense, but if you want details, you are opening up a wide enough array of possibilities to make their listing on a forum impossible.


There are no forms or methods beyond the existence of a well-organised minority communist organisation that can intervene in struggle. There is only the proletariat organised against the bourgeoisie seeking to abolish itself.Once more, I don't know what you mean by this. There are no forms of methods of doing what? Organizing workers? Smashing the state?

[Spectre of Spartacism]

I am not a revolutionary.
...
I think the leftist ideas of organizing and revolution are fantasy.

Do you mind me asking why somebody who isn't a revolutionary or a leftist would be interested in posting on RevLeft?

[BIXX]

revleft is a playground

filled with children

forced to play

and they are all the same child

fighting each other in their minds

and their name is

avanti

[Hatshepsut]

Basically the radical Left is not willing to die for what it thinks it believes in, while the patriotic bourgeois Rightists are. That's why we're not seeing organized communist intervention in too many places. Or any other movement against the world system itself. I have nothing against trade union or student organizing in particular, but it's not a revolutionary activity.

This was just as true in the 1960s with Tom Hayden's and Todd Gitlin's SDS. That organization represented a form of cultural upheaval but it wasn't revolutionary. Hayden became a California state senator when he grew up and Gitlin is a media studies professor now. The original SDS was effectively dead by 1972, after mass shootings at Kent State and Jackson State barely a week apart in May 1970, both occasioned by students acting outside formal organizations, failed to radicalize a broader constituent base. Once the draft lottery closed everyone went back to their dorms. The student unrest never had a goal of ending the American state.

Here we note that Lenin was not a “leftist,” but a professional revolutionary. He got his crucial armed support from soldiers and workers in Petrograd. He knew what he wanted and had people willing to throw their lives down backing him.

[Sand Castle]

That's why we're not seeing organized communist intervention in too many places.

I would have to say, based on where I live, we aren't seeing that intervention because there aren't that many communists (or anarchists). In other instances, people aren't receptive to that message. Hell, many aren't even open to reformist ideas such as having a union or providing better help for the homeless.

Then there is the issue of this weird lifestylism I'm seeing among the more anarchist types (not all, probably not even most, just some). They don't have jobs....or much of anything. They just sneak onto freight trains or hitchhike throughout the country just because they can. They panhandle for their money, begging from normal working-class people. They never stay in one place too long. They're like a crust-punk Beach Boys, couch surfin' USA. At the end of the day, that doesn't do any good. I think it's also a bad move if you hope to one day pick an area to live in and begin working to support yourself when you get older.

But don't take that last paragraph too seriously, one shouldn't overestimate their impact.



you have no clear understanding of what you are and why you exist, and therefore you just become an 'organiser.' You have presented your experiences of organising, but why? What are we to learn from your experiences? How will it better serve the proletariat in its historic mission of abolishing itself?
:rolleyes: I'm a regular person who believes regular, working people should organize for change. Every struggle raises class consciousness. And in every struggle I'm involved in, I always insert the communist "line" into things. Whether or not people are receptive is a whole other matter. You can lead horses to water, but you can't make them drink. Regardless, you still need to move those fucking horses. Is organizing a silver bullet? No. Is it necessary? Yes. What revolutions have happened without some sort of organizing? None. Is organizing perfect? No, but neither are the fallible human beings that make up the working-class (and every other class). Dealing with people isn't like a math problem. 2+2 will always make 4, but this and that with 10 different people will produce different results each time.

The thing is, with these anti-organizing, anti-do anything, I'm-not-a-revolutionary types, it's clear nothing we say will convince them or make them happy. They're just going to come back with some question or another. I don't mean to seem like a jerk, but I can't help but come off that way when I say half of your questions are dumb. The other half don't make sense. It's like you're saying things just for the sake of saying them. Being nit-picky just because. If some communist archangel came out of communist heaven and presented us with perfect answers to all of life's questions, from how to make a revolution to how cure the common cold and how to eat a burrito without it falling apart, you'd take issue with it.

Bottom line, this conversation isn't worth having. I don't know what you do for the sake of communism or whatever you believe in, but if it's so much better than what I do then please share.

[#FF0000]

You've not been paying attention to my posts then. GET READING!

lol

but for real tho

[Luís Henrique]

revleft is a playground

filled with children

forced to play

[...]

In other words, you troll, under the belief that trolling is the only possible action here.

Luís Henrique

[Hatshepsut]

Every struggle raises class consciousness. And in every struggle I'm involved in, I always insert the communist "line" into things...

Unfortunately, not every struggle raises class consciousness. For instance, the struggle of the bourgeoisie for emancipation from the lords and absolute monarchs of their day proceeded on a basis of enlightenment idealism, not class consciousness—the bourgeoisie saw themselves as individuals, not as a class defined by material factors. The rarely-convened French Estates-General was the closest thing to such awareness before Marx’s time, and it recognized only clergy, nobles, and commoners. Perceiving a division of society into groups isn’t the same thing as class consciousness, which comes from knowledge that you make a living through communal labor—but by means of tools belonging to someone else, and independently of the person on the same job next to you—due to the plutocrat’s having separated you from that worker, who could be fired though you survive.

Where trade unions descend into false consciousness is that, while they realize the above is true on their own shop floor, they, like the medieval guild, see their interest only in their own industry, missing the comradeship of the proletariat in other industries and other countries. Student organizers similarly lapse in that they want “democratic” individualism while forgetting how today’s economic state of affairs emerged from new traditions of enlightenment individualism itself. We love to believe each person unique and valuable for his or her own sake when in reality, the value of people in Marxism derives from their social labor and is hence a communal, not an individual, value. If I don’t regard Trotsky’s political analysis or predictions fully reliable, he did have this to say about the U.S. worker:


“It is a fact that the American working class has a petty bourgeois spirit, lacks revolutionary solidarity, is used to a high standard of life, and the mentality of the American working class corresponds not to the realities of today but to the memories of yesterday....”

On Political Backwardness of American Worker
https://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1940/05/backwardness.htm

In short, you are not a communist and need not try to put a “communist line” on anything. You will enjoy better luck if you don’t.

[The Feral Underclass]

lol

but for real tho

There are plenty of threads where I've talked about what needs to be done.

[The Feral Underclass]

In other words, you troll, under the belief that trolling is the only possible action here.

Luís Henrique

Please stop back-seat modding. Accusing people of trolling is not productive and contributes nothing to debate.

[BIXX]

In other words, you troll, under the belief that trolling is the only possible action here.

Luís Henrique

Seeing as everyone's response to me is either "lol edgy" or "ur trolling" rather than actual conversation then I don't see how I could be the troll.

[Rafiq]

Furthermore, the idea of "sole dedication" is dangerous. What about one's loved ones? Is a "professional revolutionary" to abandon them in favor of the revolution (whatever that may be)? And if so, what does this say about the values of the revolution itself? In other words, why wage a revolution when loved ones are cast aside in such a similar manner as under capitalism itself

Often times, a revolutionary organization (if genuine - i.e. Russia) itself becomes its own community, wherein one's loved ones are also one's comrades. Obviously this was not the case entirely: the relatives of "professional revolutionaries" were often times still quite close with them, i.e. Lenin and his mother, Dzerzhinsky and his relatives, etc. But often times relatives do have to be cast aside. Even bourgeois revolutionaries like Castro underwent this when he nationalized family businesses, to the rage of his relatives. Revolutionaries have a responsibility to cut off their roots - to be boundless in action.

By sole dedication, all that is really meant is you are doing this rather than pursuing a career or a certain job - you don't have another profession, in other words. So revolutionary by trade simply means - revolutionary as a sole form of social activity (i.e. by social, I mean - instead of a job).

[Ele'ill]

People heavily disagreeing with the 'absolute basics' is probably a big clue as to where to start discussion and I'm pretty comfortable not having a program when having one means exactly dick.

[The Feral Underclass]

:rolleyes: I'm a regular person who believes regular, working people should organize for change. Every struggle raises class consciousness. And in every struggle I'm involved in, I always insert the communist "line" into things. Whether or not people are receptive is a whole other matter. You can lead horses to water, but you can't make them drink. Regardless, you still need to move those fucking horses. Is organizing a silver bullet? No. Is it necessary? Yes. What revolutions have happened without some sort of organizing? None. Is organizing perfect? No, but neither are the fallible human beings that make up the working-class (and every other class). Dealing with people isn't like a math problem. 2+2 will always make 4, but this and that with 10 different people will produce different results each time.

Making statements like "working people should organise for change" is utterly void of meaning. Surely everyone with a job is a working person? Organise how and change to what? Vague platitudes are not political positions. It is also absolutely not true that every struggle raises class consciousness. If the struggles you are participating in have not moved or are not moving towards communising measures then the struggles you are talking about are limited, if not outright reformist, so how is class consciousness at work there?

I also think it's incredibly arrogant of you to assume that just because someone criticises the vagueness of your politics and praxis that they are somehow against organising. I'm not against organising, I just think if you're going to make statements about how to organise you shouldn't rely on presuppositions about your organising being correct and you should be prepared to explain yourself, as well as address criticism.


The thing is, with these anti-organizing, anti-do anything, I'm-not-a-revolutionary types, it's clear nothing we say will convince them or make them happy. They're just going to come back with some question or another. I don't mean to seem like a jerk, but I can't help but come off that way when I say half of your questions are dumb. The other half don't make sense. It's like you're saying things just for the sake of saying them. Being nit-picky just because. If some communist archangel came out of communist heaven and presented us with perfect answers to all of life's questions, from how to make a revolution to how cure the common cold and how to eat a burrito without it falling apart, you'd take issue with it.

I think what this paragraph demonstrates is that not only are you completely incoherent when it comes to your own politics and praxis, you are actually quite comfortable with just shutting down criticism without even attempting to understand it. If you're unwilling or unable to explain yourself or even attempt to understand why someone might criticise you, then why should any one trust anything you say?


Bottom line, this conversation isn't worth having. I don't know what you do for the sake of communism or whatever you believe in, but if it's so much better than what I do then please share.

I don't know what you do because you refuse to tell me.

[The Feral Underclass]

Let me try to clarify. Your initial statement was to say that people outside of the working class swooping down to organize workers is the model of left organizing that is occurring all across the West. I asked why you thought that was the case. That is not a question that pertains exclusively to the behavior of "the left." It also pertains to the behavior of the leftist and non-leftist working class, since the workers are the people being organized (or opting not to enter an organization) and they aren't being commanded into these organizations by the state. They are exercising a choice either way.

I don't think the left is swooping. That sounds far too organised. If anything it's shambling towards the class armed with its papers and placards and good intentions. The working class look over their shoulder in weary disgust, as if they've just sneezed snot all over their clothes. I argue that it is entirely the behaviour of leftists that's of concern here because the vast majority of the class have absolutely no interest in anything you have to say or do. Any matters they have are taken into their own hands with varying degrees of success or they look to right opportunism, which the left can only counter with their own brand of opportunism, although no one really wants to listen to a geography teacher. The point is that the issue is the left. The conditions for rupture exist. The left just isn't organised, nor does it understand what it's supposed to be doing.


This is why I think it's paternalistic to talk about that kind of recruitment as though the workers aren't playing any role in that process, like blobs of clay that are being molded into figures by nefarious Leninists. That doesn't mean that this form of recruitment is free of problems. What it does mean is that these problems need to be examined by digging deeper than the ritual condemnations of the behavior of certain leftists, and should be examined in light of the depressed level of organized working class struggle in the West. At times when workers are demoralized and largely immoblized, it shouldn't be surprising that radical left politics has veered into lifestylism, small-scale propagandizing by intellectuals who are inordinately (but not exclusively) petty bourgeois in class position, among many other less-than-ideal practices.

Are the workers in the West demoralised and immbolised? I'm not sure I accept that argument.


Yes, I agree with this. On why I think there hasn't been much of an organized communist intervention, see my previous paragraph. The struggles that have taken place have occurred in a context where the far left is just recovering from a decades-long onslaught of the capitalist class against the gains the working-class enjoyed, in part we should remember as the result of imperialist spoils following the second world war. One of the consequences of this is that, to the extent communists are participating in workers' struggles in an organized fashion, most of them are trying to generate popularity by hiding their communist program and burrowing within liberal and social-democratic political campaigns.

I'm sorry, I just don't buy into this narrative. There are plenty of communists around who could have quite easily organised themselves properly and had real communist intervention into the numerous struggles and insurrections that have happened throughout the West. They chose not to. In fact, they chose to continue their tired trad nonsense and clinging onto the orthodoxies that relegate them into irrelevancy instead of understanding the changed nature of reality and the task at hand. I'm sorry, but the left shouldn't get off that lightly and I'm personally not going to tolerate such bullshit excuses. There is no one and nothing to blame but ourselves.


The definition I gave of a revolution is "an episode of convulsive political transformation, compressed in time and concentrated in target, that has a determinate beginning-when the old state apparatus is still intact-and a finite end when that apparatus is decisively broken and a new one erected in its stead." If we applied this to contemporary capitalism, this would mean that the current state is run by the representatives of the capitalist class on behalf of that class, and that a revolution will have occurred once that state apparatus has been smashed by a working class organized around a revolutionary program.

That wasn't what I was asking you.


If you are wondering what that looks like in its specifics, you may as well be asking what, concretely, baking bread looks like. You can list ingredients and talk about how they are to be mixed and prepared in a general sense, but if you want details, you are opening up a wide enough array of possibilities to make their listing on a forum impossible.

So as far as your concerned in terms of getting from present conditions to this revolution you described, there is no possibility of having a coherent understanding of what needs to be done?


Once more, I don't know what you mean by this. There are no forms of methods of doing what? Organizing workers? Smashing the state?

Well you asked me why I thought "my" forms and methods were superior, so presumably you had an understanding of what that related to, otherwise what were you asking me? I am talking about organising, but it can also apply to smashing the state.

[Ele'ill]

I would have to say, based on where I live, we aren't seeing that intervention because there aren't that many communists (or anarchists). In other instances, people aren't receptive to that message. Hell, many aren't even open to reformist ideas such as having a union or providing better help for the homeless.

Then there is the issue of this weird lifestylism I'm seeing among the more anarchist types (not all, probably not even most, just some). They don't have jobs....or much of anything. They just sneak onto freight trains or hitchhike throughout the country just because they can. They panhandle for their money, begging from normal working-class people. They never stay in one place too long. They're like a crust-punk Beach Boys, couch surfin' USA. At the end of the day, that doesn't do any good. I think it's also a bad move if you hope to one day pick an area to live in and begin working to support yourself when you get older.

But don't take that last paragraph too seriously, one shouldn't overestimate their impact.



:rolleyes: I'm a regular person who believes regular, working people should organize for change. Every struggle raises class consciousness. And in every struggle I'm involved in, I always insert the communist "line" into things. Whether or not people are receptive is a whole other matter. You can lead horses to water, but you can't make them drink. Regardless, you still need to move those fucking horses. Is organizing a silver bullet? No. Is it necessary? Yes. What revolutions have happened without some sort of organizing? None. Is organizing perfect? No, but neither are the fallible human beings that make up the working-class (and every other class). Dealing with people isn't like a math problem. 2+2 will always make 4, but this and that with 10 different people will produce different results each time.

The thing is, with these anti-organizing, anti-do anything, I'm-not-a-revolutionary types, it's clear nothing we say will convince them or make them happy. They're just going to come back with some question or another. I don't mean to seem like a jerk, but I can't help but come off that way when I say half of your questions are dumb. The other half don't make sense. It's like you're saying things just for the sake of saying them. Being nit-picky just because. If some communist archangel came out of communist heaven and presented us with perfect answers to all of life's questions, from how to make a revolution to how cure the common cold and how to eat a burrito without it falling apart, you'd take issue with it.

Bottom line, this conversation isn't worth having. I don't know what you do for the sake of communism or whatever you believe in, but if it's so much better than what I do then please share.

So if you recognize that people aren't receptive and you can't force people into organization how can you say that organizing is essential, especially the traditional/formal methods of organizing that you seem to like?


How are crust punks, or any tiny group of people living a certain way, a political rival of yours worth mentioning in this thread? If it was a provoking jab at anarchists it was misplaced since I don't think anyone in this thread is an anarchist.

[Spectre of Spartacism]

I don't think the left is swooping. That sounds far too organised. If anything it's shambling towards the class armed with its papers and placards and good intentions. The working class look over their shoulder in weary disgust, as if they've just sneezed snot all over their clothes. I argue that it is entirely the behaviour of leftists that's of concern here because the vast majority of the class have absolutely no interest in anything you have to say or do. Any matters they have are taken into their own hands with varying degrees of success or they look to right opportunism, which the left can only counter with their own brand of opportunism, although no one really wants to listen to a geography teacher. The point is that the issue is the left. The conditions for rupture exist. The left just isn't organised, nor does it understand what it's supposed to be doing.

You expect it to be shambling toward the (rest of) the working class with bazookas and large armies? I don't think it can be over-emphasized just how small the self-identifying far left is. Probably most of that minuscule population don't hew to the cadre-building approach to revolutionary politics. The fact that the working class isn't revolutionary at the present moment, that it isn't organized, is not the result of heavy-handed recruitment techniques or abstentionism by the far left. The left doesn't create working class movements, dictating their start or stop points. The working class as a whole does, and the best the left can hope to do is to influence it, potentially by winning a leadership role. The fortunes of the working class in the present are not the result of the far left at all, unless you want to view the present state of the working class as the result of revolutionary failures occurring under leftist leadership 70 years ago. It's a result of the class struggle, of workers being dealt a series of staggering blows over the past forty years, a time when the left has been all but irrelevant to the class struggle, sadly. That explains the sorry state of the left as well as the sorry state of the working class. The two questions cannot be separated.


Are the workers in the West demoralised and immbolised? I'm not sure I accept that argument.Relative to where the working class was politically from 1850-1950, on a global scale, yes.


I'm sorry, I just don't buy into this narrative. There are plenty of communists around who could have quite easily organised themselves properly and had real communist intervention into the numerous struggles and insurrections that have happened throughout the West. They chose not to. In fact, they chose to continue their tired trad nonsense and clinging onto the orthodoxies that relegate them into irrelevancy instead of understanding the changed nature of reality and the task at hand. I'm sorry, but the left shouldn't get off that lightly and I'm personally not going to tolerate such bullshit excuses. There is no one and nothing to blame but ourselves.Who are these communists choosing not to intervene in the class struggle? Do you have specifics? I'm also not sure that my insistence on situating the many problems of the left in the context of class struggle is excusing those problems. It's trying to understand those problems in order to move beyond them.


So as far as your concerned in terms of getting from present conditions to this revolution you described, there is no possibility of having a coherent understanding of what needs to be done?If you are looking for a detailed roadmap of how to get from today to the post-revolution society, you are asking for a vision so specific in its particulars that it will likely look very different from the revolutionary movement as it develops in reality. How useful do you think such a vision would be? I would be very concerned about anybody who would attempt to provide a highly specific roadmap, as that person almost certainly either thinks he is a psychic or has the mistaken belief that he, and not the working class, is going to create the revolution.

I do know what I think needs to be done at the present moment.


Well you asked me why I thought "my" forms and methods were superior, so presumably you had an understanding of what that related to, otherwise what were you asking me? I am talking about organising, but it can also apply to smashing the state.I'm not sure what your forms and methods are, since you've not elaborated on them anywhere near to the level of specificity you've asked of people you're discussing with.

[The Feral Underclass]

You expect it to be shambling toward the (rest of) the working class with bazookas and large armies?

If you say so.


I don't think it can be over-emphasized just how small the self-identifying far left is. Probably most of that minuscule population don't hew to the cadre-building approach to revolutionary politics. The fact that the working class isn't revolutionary at the present moment, that it isn't organized, is not the result of heavy-handed recruitment techniques or abstentionism by the far left. The left doesn't create working class movements, dictating their start or stop points. The working class as a whole does, and the best the left can hope to do is to influence it, potentially by winning a leadership role. The fortunes of the working class in the present are not the result of the far left at all, unless you want to view the present state of the working class as the result of revolutionary failures occurring under leftist leadership 70 years ago. It's a result of the class struggle, of workers being dealt a series of staggering blows over the past forty years, a time when the left has been all but irrelevant to the class struggle, sadly. That explains the sorry state of the left as well as the sorry state of the working class. The two questions cannot be separated.

Right, yeah okay, you've said this, but my point is that if communists are going to influence the working class, they have to a) understand reality and b) be organised and no what the task at hand is. Since they have not achieved any of those things, the issue remains the left.


Relative to where the working class was politically from 1850-1950, on a global scale, yes.

Saying the working class isn't politically like the working class from 1850-1950 isn't the same as saying the working class are demoralised and immobilised.


Who are these communists choosing not to intervene in the class struggle? Do you have specifics?

Every single communist organisation that exists. I mean, how many communists in the UK are organised into political organisations? Organisations that foolishly seek mass parties or mass movements, instead of creating a well-organised, well-resourced minority communist organisation that can insert itself into struggle and push for communist measures -- not in an effort to recruit or to build mass electoral or campaign movements, but to communise and expropriate; to break through the logic of capitalism and to escalate conflict. And always defending the class and keeping a communist line.


I'm also not sure that my insistence on situating the many problems of the left in the context of class struggle is excusing those problems. It's trying to understand those problems in order to move beyond them.

You're not situating the problems of the left in the context of class struggle, you're just providing cover for the incompetencies of communists by peddling the narrative that capitalism's escape has somehow bamboozled the left. Class struggle exists. The class are involved in it on a daily basis. I'm sorry, I just do not and will not accept that capitalism's victories are what are to blame here. The conditions for rupture exist. Capitalism's victory is precisely the reason why the time has been ripe for years. The left are just incompetent.


If you are looking for a detailed roadmap of how to get from today to the post-revolution society, you are asking for a vision so specific in its particulars that it will likely look very different from the revolutionary movement as it develops in reality. How useful do you think such a vision would be? I would be very concerned about anybody who would attempt to provide a highly specific roadmap, as that person almost certainly either thinks he is a psychic or has the mistaken belief that he, and not the working class, is going to create the revolution.

No, I'm not asking for a roadmap, I'm asking you to tell me what your plan is.


I do know what I think needs to be done at the present moment.

Right...So...


I'm not sure what your forms and methods are, since you've not elaborated on them anywhere near to the level of specificity you've asked of people you're discussing with.

I've answered that question already.

[PhoenixAsh]

I generally liked your posts...for reasons that I will highlight below.

Yet there are points that are conflicting:


Saying the working class isn't politically like the working class from 1850-1950 isn't the same as saying the working class are demoralised and immobilised.

Not addressing you TFU


How about saying the working class is ideologically embedded within the super structure because the revolutionary left is part of the status quo and doesn't offer solutions but more of the same?

... rather than stooping to the point where we make the working class out to be either lazy, dumb, betrayed, demoralized....rather than assuming they are active, intelligent actors?



Every single communist organisation that exists. I mean, how many communists in the UK are organised into political organisations? Organisations that foolishly seek mass parties or mass movements, instead of creating a well-organised, well-resourced minority communist organisation that can insert itself into struggle and push for communist measures -- not in an effort to recruit or to build mass electoral or campaign movements, but to communise and expropriate; to break through the logic of capitalism and to escalate conflict. And always defending the class and keeping a communist line.

I like this idea. Yet...it needs further expanding on. Can you expand on how you see this?



You're not situating the problems of the left in the context of class struggle, you're just providing cover for the incompetencies of communists by peddling the narrative that capitalism's escape has somehow bamboozled the left. Class struggle exists. The class are involved in it on a daily basis. I'm sorry, I just do not and will not accept that capitalism's victories are what are to blame here. The conditions for rupture exist. Capitalism's victory is precisely the reason why the time has been ripe for years. The left are just incompetent.

This. So much this.



Now....for the part I find problematic.




No, I'm not asking for a roadmap, I'm asking you to tell me what your plan is.

Right...So...

I've answered that question already.

Several points...which goes for PC as well:

1). Post left (anarchism) and like ideals are not well understood on this site. I don't know what PC's affiliation is. But these discussions are an ideal setting to explain them.

2). The rejection of traditional inherent themes of the revolutionary left (revolution/organization) therefor legitimately raises questions about the nature of your politics and their presence on a board for the revolutionary left. This may be annoying but it does make sense.

3). I understand it is tiresome to rehash and defend your position but the place to do so is by it's very nature a discussion on praxis.

5). It doesn't serve a discourse purpose to refer back to your post history....we have new members. And nobody is going to track each and every of your posts. At the very least create links if you don't feel you want to rewrite.

[Spectre of Spartacism]

Right, yeah okay, you've said this, but my point is that if communists are going to influence the working class, they have to a) understand reality and b) be organised and no what the task at hand is. Since they have not achieved any of those things, the issue remains the left.

I keep repeating my explanation about why the "left" behaves as it does because of point a. If we don't really understand why things are happening as they are, what hope will we have of changing it?


Saying the working class isn't politically like the working class from 1850-1950 isn't the same as saying the working class are demoralised and immobilised.I'm not just saying the working class from 1850-1950 is different from today's. I'm saying that on average they were far more mobilized, organized, and confident.


Every single communist organisation that exists. I mean, how many communists in the UK are organised into political organisations? Organisations that foolishly seek mass parties or mass movements, instead of creating a well-organised, well-resourced minority communist organisation that can insert itself into struggle and push for communist measures -- not in an effort to recruit or to build mass electoral or campaign movements, but to communise and expropriate; to break through the logic of capitalism and to escalate conflict. And always defending the class and keeping a communist line.I know this must be hyperbole because I have been in a communist organization that exists, and it has made organized and disciplined interventions into working class movements, struggles, and insurrections.


You're not situating the problems of the left in the context of class struggle, you're just providing cover for the incompetencies of communists by peddling the narrative that capitalism's escape has somehow bamboozled the left. Class struggle exists. The class are involved in it on a daily basis. I'm sorry, I just do not and will not accept that capitalism's victories are what are to blame here. The conditions for rupture exist. Capitalism's victory is precisely the reason why the time has been ripe for years. The left are just incompetent.I haven't just attributed this miserable state of the left to the victories of the bourgeoisie. What I have done is to say that you're not going to have masses of experienced communists in the vanguard of working class movements in a period when minority sections of the working class have obviously been fighting back, but in disorganized, confused, often nihilistic and individualistic ways. What you're going to get is the left we have: small, insular, and inordinately comprised of non-working-class elements.


No, I'm not asking for a roadmap, I'm asking you to tell me what your plan is.

Right...So...It is essentially the same as yours, if yours is indeed to build "a well-organised, well-resourced minority communist organisation that can insert itself into struggle and push for communist measures -- not in an effort to recruit or to build mass electoral or campaign movements, but to communise and expropriate; to break through the logic of capitalism and to escalate conflict."

[The Feral Underclass]

I keep repeating my explanation about why the "left" behaves as it does because of point a. If we don't really understand why things are happening as they are, what hope will we have of changing it?

Right...


I'm not just saying the working class from 1850-1950 is different from today's. I'm saying that on average they were far more mobilized, organized, and confident.

...Towards a particular sort of organising. The working class are just as confident and just as willing to be mobilised, but class composition has eroded the usefulness and possibilities for traditional organising methods and the left haven't caught up with that yet, so what we're left with is people saying, "oh it's not like it was in the 1950s." Well yeah, because capitalism and the composition of the class isn't the same as it was in the 1950s, and mass movements and unions struggles that prevailed then are irrelevant now.


I know this must be hyperbole because I have been in a communist organization that exists, and it has made organized and disciplined interventions into working class movements, struggles, and insurrections.

I don't believe you.


I haven't just attributed this miserable state of the left to the victories of the bourgeoisie. What I have done is to say that you're not going to have masses of experienced communists in the vanguard of working class movements in a period when minority sections of the working class have obviously been fighting back, but in disorganized, confused, often nihilistic and individualistic ways. What you're going to get is the left we have: small, insular, and inordinately comprised of non-working-class elements.

Yeah, you can say it as much as you want mate, I'm not going to agree with you.


It is essentially the same as yours, if yours is indeed to build "a well-organised, well-resourced minority communist organisation that can insert itself into struggle and push for communist measures -- not in an effort to recruit or to build mass electoral or campaign movements, but to communise and expropriate; to break through the logic of capitalism and to escalate conflict."

Fair enough.

[The Feral Underclass]

I like this idea. Yet...it needs further expanding on. Can you expand on how you see this?

Unless you have specifics, I can only really give a broad explanation. There's no living example, but essentially it's a Bakuninist model of organisation. You have a small, well-organised, well-prepared, well-resourced minority organisation that focuses full time on actively seeking out struggles -- based around coherent objectives -- to insert themselves into. Once inserted firmly into those struggles, the point then would be to attempt to escalate them through communising measures and generalise them. A communising measure being those measures that break from the logic of capitalism and build genuine communist dual power that can confront the state.

[Luís Henrique]

I'm not just saying the working class from 1850-1950 is different from today's. I'm saying that on average they were far more mobilized, organized, and confident....Towards a particular sort of organising. The working class are just as confident and just as willing to be mobilised, but class composition has eroded the usefulness and possibilities for traditional organising methods and the left haven't caught up with that yet, so what we're left with is people saying, "oh it's not like it was in the 1950s."

The difference, however, is not due to "class composition" or changes in it, but actually to the success of social democracy. What we see as social democracy's "inneffectivity" (if I can use such a word without being accused of being homophobic) results from the fact that capitalism has been reformed, to the extent that it can be reformed, and such reform was due to social democracy, which in turn is what made social democracy useless, or irrelevant.

Social democracy is a failure as a strategy for revolution, for the replacement of capitalism by socialism. But it organised working class for resisting effectively against capital within capitalism, and yanked out from capital whatever capital could possibly concede without jeopardising its iron grip on society.

What we see nowadays results from a change not in the working class, but in capital. It is not the working class that is less pugnacious today; it is capital that has recovered its own brutality and recklessness.

Because social democracy (and Stalinism is no different in this regard) could not go ahead past the 60's welfare State, or better saying, because it never wanted to go past that, it lost its raison d'être, and because the working class hasn't found an alternative form of organisation (and has rejected each and every alternative proposed by the left), we have the impression that the working class isn't up to its fabled past of infinite energy and pugnacity, which we in turn confuse with a revolutionary disposition (but it wasn't - it was directed to merely reformist aims, which at some point of history only seemed possible to attain through very radical means).


Well yeah, because capitalism and the composition of the class isn't the same as it was in the 1950s, and mass movements and unions struggles that prevailed then are irrelevant now.

They will eventually become relevant back again, if capital indeed goes on to repeal the reforms of the third quarter of the 20th century. Perhaps even this is what is happening in the UK Labour party as of now: it is coming back to relevance because radical social democracy, or maximalism, or something similar, is becoming relevant again, which in turn is happening because capital is slowly but relentlessly trying and recreating the 19th century into the 21st.



I know this must be hyperbole because I have been in a communist organization that exists, and it has made organized and disciplined interventions into working class movements, struggles, and insurrections.I don't believe you.

It depends, of course, of what one considers to be a "communist organisation". Marx and Engels wrote that


The Communists fight for the attainment of the immediate aims, for the enforcement of the momentary interests of the working class; but in the movement of the present, they also represent and take care of the future of that movement.

In this sence, I have to agree with you. Spectre of Spartacism's organisation quite probably isn't communist, because it probably does not fight for the attainment of the immediate aims of the working class (if it is like 99.99% of the petty bourgeois organisations that claim to be communist, it probably rather fights against the attainment of the immediate aims of the working class, under the pretext that these immediate aims are "reformist").

*********************

To sum it up, you (y'all, as they say in Perryland, not you The Feral Underclass individually) seem to be concerned with what you call "the failure of social democracy". But the real problem seems to be the success of social democracy; it is this that we have to actually overcome, if we are to build a movement to put an end to capitalism, and not merely a movement to bring back the golden days of welfare State.

Luís Henrique

[Hatshepsut]

...if it is like 99.99% of the petty bourgeois organisations that claim to be communist, it probably rather fights against the attainment of the immediate aims of the working class, under the pretext that these immediate aims are "reformist."

Or without such a pretext, does no such thing, depending on where you are. In the USA at least, why should anyone gasp in disbelief at Commie Credentials? It's easy to join; just click on the "join" button, fill out the application, and pay $60. Unfortunately, they don't enroll folks from across the pond, but York, Leeds, & Manchester aren't missing much: Over the years, the CPUSA has softened from a hammer-wielding proletariat determined to destroy capitalism to merely downgrading the rough edges on Donald Trump's new Gilded Age:


"A better and peaceful world is possible — a world where people and nature come before profits. That’s socialism. That’s our vision. We are the Communist Party USA."
http://www.cpusa.org/

I don't think the FBI bothers to track their membership list. No surprise; the Commies aren't communist anymore. What a contrast from the early 1950s when we had HUAC, Senator McCarthy, loyalty oaths, the executions of the Rosenbergs man & wife, and professionals blackballed for life if even suspected of a pink tint. Unfortunately, in 1989, Emperor Trajan marched through his Triumphal Arch to bury Communism in a reversal of Khrushchev's 1960 words. And it was Ronald Reagan who got the credit for the fall of the USSR even though G.H.W. Bush had taken office. This hagiography is a pile of rotten pork bellies of course, yet it remains totally ascendant in the USA, and had prevailed over Western Europe as well until the 2003 invasion of Iraq.

The class composition has indeed changed. Alongside its rise of income & wealth. Today's American and European workers are richer than 99.9% of all the people who have ever lived, and they know it. The homeless on American streets today eat better than a 12-hour a day Manchester factory worker did in 1840. That may have something to do with the difficulty of meaningful agitprop.

[Rafiq]

That may have something to do with the difficulty of meaningful agitprop.

Or perhaps the fact that Communism today is a perversion of most Leftists, or of the population in general. The people see Communism only insofar as it - as a historic force - has shaped the world they live in today.

But you should know, time alone did not "make things better". This rise in the standard of living was fought for, it was conceded.

Communist propaganda today cannot emulate or mimic that in the 19th century. That is ridiculous! But alas, the relative levels of poverty and misery say nothing about the human capacity for passion, struggle, and vitality. That is to say, the working people might be infinitely better off, but it does not make a damned difference as far as their propensity to destroy the existing order, for they still have nothing to lose. What does it mean? People today cannot be compared with people in the 19th century in a non-dialectical way.

It means that, you cannot simply abstract the worker of 2015 and 1844 from their respective contexts, swap them, and qualify them on that basis (Which leads us to the notion that the poorest individual today is the richest man in 1844). We live in a new totality. We live in a new world where new things make people tick, where new things inflame people's sensitivities. We might be materialists - but we are not "materialists" in the American/casual sense of the word. Oppression, poverty, degradation and misery are not measured in possessions or material well-being on a trans-historic level (Who says hunter-gatherer tribes were less happy?), but can only be conceived from the basis of unraveling the inner-logic of each respective historic epoch.

Communism's absence as a political force is NOT owed to any inevitable condition of "class struggle" (which is ALWAYS existing). It is - yes I will say it - the absence of faith in a Communism of today. Faith in the ideas of Communism, faith that the present world does not have to exist, faith that the masses of dispossessed souls living in misery, hell, suffering and degradation can be given the hope to set this rotten world aflame. The worker class, living relatively better off than it was, is not to blame for their unfreedom. It is we who are to blame. Why would they have faith in us, if we do not have faith in them?

[contracycle]

I... literally cannot believe what I'm reading in this thread.

I mean for god's sake, who would join, say, a forum for the discussion of cake baking only to argue that cakes should not be baked?

Has this place been taken over by Blairites or something? This is just nuts.

Well, at least I can knock a couple of names off the list of "people to be taken seriously".

[The Feral Underclass]

I... literally cannot believe what I'm reading in this thread.

I mean for god's sake, who would join, say, a forum for the discussion of cake baking only to argue that cakes should not be baked?

Has this place been taken over by Blairites or something? This is just nuts.

Well, at least I can knock a couple of names off the list of "people to be taken seriously".

If you wish to have a productive experience on this website, my suggestion to you would be not to go into discussions with preconceived notions of what people should and should not believe. You should also try and refrain from having a myopic and ignorant attitude towards ideas you don't understand. All you do is come across as arrogant and conceited.

[contracycle]

https://pbs.twimg.com/profile_images/2816970539/092b1803fcbe2b22f95acc4e80a44847_400x400.jpeg

[The Feral Underclass]

https://pbs.twimg.com/profile_images/2816970539/092b1803fcbe2b22f95acc4e80a44847_400x400.jpeg


Using pictures on the forum

Posting non-topical pictures in forums outside of Chit-Chat is strictly against the rules...Non-topical pictures are those which are not directly related to the subject at hand (LOL pics, etc...). An acceptable picture (or thumbnail) would be a graph, a picture related to a news story which is important to debate, etc... Again, please refrain from posting pictures in forums outside of Chit Chat, the action forums, and the cultural forums.

http://www.revleft.com/vb/faq.php?faq=general#faq_faqforumrules

Consider this a verbal warning. If you continue like this, you'll receive an infraction.

[Luís Henrique]

It is said that Caesar's wife needs to look honest. And so should a moderator in revleft. Which means they should at the very least ask another moderator to do their dirty business when they are confronted by us commoners. Taking administrative revenge against someone who has just disagreed with you should be completely off-borders.

... by the way, I see that you are again in a position to exert your unbearable authoritarianism. That's really a new low for revleft: making a traitor who purposefully and personally endangers other people for no good reason a forum moderator, after having giving you some shady amnesty that was never even explained to any of us.

Congratulations, quisling. Now go back to your power schemes, they fit you wonderfully.

Luís Henrique

[Ele'ill]

That's fair modding though. An explanation about making meaningful posts and then just a verbal not to post meme pictures. The dispute wasn't thread topic oriented it was based on forum operations.

[The Feral Underclass]

Let's stay on topic please. If anyone has taken issue with my modding, it might be best to contact an admin directly.

:)

[Hatshepsut]

...then just a verbal not to post meme pictures.

Oddly, creating a second copy of the clothes iron just below the first. :lol:

Perhaps it is merely an organizing don't: With fire safety in mind, do not forget to unplug your iron before heading to the next rally. I've mentioned another possible organizing don't on another thread: Avoid living the capitalist lifestyle if you wish onlookers from the proletariat to take you at face value. When a thread titled "How Was Your Workout?" bills tops each day on this forum, you wonder. Why are we patronizing the corporate Gold's and Fat Cats to get our exercise if we reject capitalism's premises? Granted we can't avoid all shopping and use of money in the world we have today, but it might help our causes if people can see that we do not subscribe to that world's belief system. And this needs to be materially visible in our daily routines.

[Luís Henrique]

I... literally cannot believe what I'm reading in this thread.

I mean for god's sake, who would join, say, a forum for the discussion of cake baking only to argue that cakes should not be baked?

Has this place been taken over by Blairites or something? This is just nuts.

Well, at least I can knock a couple of names off the list of "people to be taken seriously".

Yes, at times one has to wonder what's so fun about coming to a forum called "revolutionary left" to explain why and how revolution cannot work. It is a testament to our patience that we even have a specific forum for that end - like a cake-baking message board that had a section for "anti-cake" discussion.

But I think here the issue is a bit more complicated, because it involves a discussion of what, after all, exactly is a "revolution". To some of us, it seems that "revolution" is something rather unreal, metaphysical, outlandish. To others, "revolution" is something much more commonplace, and it is brewing everywhere, though for the most part it is going unnoticed because there are no fireworks.

Let me again quote that bearded guy:


Bourgeois revolutions, like those of the eighteenth century, storm more swiftly from success to success, their dramatic effects outdo each other, men and things seem set in sparkling diamonds, ecstasy is the order of the day – but they are short-lived, soon they have reached their zenith, and a long Katzenjammer [cat’s winge] takes hold of society before it learns to assimilate the results of its storm-and-stress period soberly. On the other hand, proletarian revolutions, like those of the nineteenth century, constantly criticize themselves, constantly interrupt themselves in their own course, return to the apparently accomplished, in order to begin anew; they deride with cruel thoroughness the half-measures, weaknesses, and paltriness of their first attempts, seem to throw down their opponents only so the latter may draw new strength from the earth and rise before them again more gigantic than ever, recoil constantly from the indefinite colossalness of their own goals – until a situation is created which makes all turning back impossible, and the conditions themselves call out:

Hic Rhodus, hic salta!

It would seem that some of our brave co-revolutionaries do miss the storming, the swift successes, the dramatic effects, the sparkling diamonds, the daily renewed ecstasy of bourgeois revolutions. And so, when situations come that call out themselves Hic Rhodus, hic salta!, they have to first wonder whether that would be a revolutionary jump, or... a reformist jump.

There are no shortcuts to revolution; it demands patient, daily, unrelenting work of many kinds: agitating, organising, writing, understanding, reading, analysing. But such work has to be in connection to what is actually happening in the world. It is our task to understand phenomena like Syriza or Jeremy Corbyn, and situate them in the context of the constant interruptions, the returns to the already accomplished, the half-measures, weaknesses, paltriness and the derision thereof, the recoiling, the false starts, etc.

In fewer words, bourgeois revolutions are romantic, proletarian revolutions are modern; the former end in a predictable coda that leds to final cadenza that ends in a tonic chord, the latter frolic around like a piece by Webern, and seem to never conclude.

And as good romantics that we for the most part still are, we still crave for the badaboom-tish of a good old bourgeois revolution. But as the era of bourgeois revolution is over, we can only have final cadenzas that end in the tonic chord of the restauration of bourgeois order.

Luís Henrique

[Quail]

Although technically TFU shouldn't have issued a warning because he was heavily involved in the discussion, it was a fair warning and will be upheld.

[The Garbage Disposal Unit]

Sorry for being an absent mod. I will get back in the game for real next week.

A few themes in this thread that seem worth expanding on:

Everyday Life
I think there's some confusion about the use of this term in the thread. I believe its intended usage is in the context of "capitalism as totality". So, for example, social workers don't transform everyday life - its "improvement" in bread and butter terms within capitalism doesn't really get to the core of the idea. By contrast, I think what talking about "everyday life" points to is a "communizationist" critique - transformation of the daily activity that produces capitalist society. It's not a question of activities that immediately "improve conditions" (which is a complicated thing to access in any case) but transform relations.

Organizing the working class
I don't think there's necessarily condescending about this idea - it's rather a question of who's saying it and what they mean by it. Certainly, I think there is something deeply problematic in many leftist notions of "organizing the working class", in which a small group of "enlightened" activists aim to herd the cattle in the correct direction (see: most of social democracy). By contrast, I don't see why this same phrase couldn't be shorthand for "participating in the self-organization of the class in struggle". The difference being primarily in that this longer formulation, while more specific, is probably in-speak gobbledegook to most ears.

Best brand of leftism
I don't think one needs to be secure in having the "best brand" or "The Correct Line" or whatever to organize. In fact, such hubris probably does more harm than good. Rather, one just needs to have a "good brand" and be invested in learning lessons as one goes. Realistically, if the entire left were more politely critical, and gave more people encouragement to just "do their thing", we'd maybe see some interesting outcomes.
Of course, everyone's guilty of some sectarianism and shit-talking, but . . .

Avanti
I'm a bit worried that, in Nova Scotia, the collapse of capitalism will lead to a takeover by hippies who will lock me up, feed me LSD, and rub me with crystals until my mind snaps.

[Guardia Rossa]

my suggestion to you would be not to go into discussions with preconceived notions of what people should and should not believe.

"Home of the revolutionary left - REVLEFT - www.revleft.com"

Quite straightforward...

[The Feral Underclass]

"Home of the revolutionary left - REVLEFT - www.revleft.com"

Quite straightforward...

Okay, thanks. I've been a member of the forum for 13 years, so you know, I think I'm fairly aware of what the name of the forum is. The fact the forum is called RevLeft doesn't actually preclude people from across all tendencies of the left from coming here. That's why we have social democrats, pacifists, Christian anarchists and others.

[The Feral Underclass]

Best brand of leftism
I don't think one needs to be secure in having the "best brand" or "The Correct Line" or whatever to organize. In fact, such hubris probably does more harm than good. Rather, one just needs to have a "good brand" and be invested in learning lessons as one goes. Realistically, if the entire left were more politely critical, and gave more people encouragement to just "do their thing", we'd maybe see some interesting outcomes.
Of course, everyone's guilty of some sectarianism and shit-talking, but . .

Correct me if I'm wrong, but you seem to be saying people should just do whatever they want but never believe what they're saying is the right thing...

[Guardia Rossa]

The fact the forum is called RevLeft doesn't actually preclude people from across all tendencies of the left from coming here.

I'm not arguing that, I read the forum rules, I am arguing you cannot criticise contracycle for logical thinking.

[The Feral Underclass]

I'm not arguing that, I read the forum rules, I am arguing you cannot criticise contracycle for logical thinking.

Well yeah I can if they're wrong.

[Decolonize The Left]

"Home of the revolutionary left - REVLEFT - www.revleft.com"

Quite straightforward...

Actual global mod here:
Verbal warning to Guardia Rossa for off-topic/spam/troll post.

Verbal warning to The Feral Underclass for inappropriate use of mod powers.

General warning to the thread: this is a very good and lively discussion. Please keep it on-topic and respectful. Thank you kindly.

[The Garbage Disposal Unit]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but you seem to be saying people should just do whatever they want but never believe what they're saying is the right thing...

One should believe they're saying a right thing.

[The Feral Underclass]

One should believe they're saying a right thing.

So in your view all revolutionary left struggles and ideas are equally valid and correct, even if you don't agree with them?

[The Garbage Disposal Unit]

So in your view all revolutionary left struggles and ideas are equally valid and correct, even if you don't agree with them?

I think anyone who makes pronouncements about "all revolutionary struggles and ideas" ought to check their hubris.
I think one ought to struggle how one sees best, but . . . the correctness of one idea (formulated in a particular time and place by particular people) doesn't necessarily prove another incorrect.
That doesn't mean one should never criticize - it means one should avoid falling into dogmatism.

[The Feral Underclass]

I think anyone who makes pronouncements about "all revolutionary struggles and ideas" ought to check their hubris.

Hmm, I'm not really sure I'm convinced by that argument. I don't think pride or self-confidence, whether excessive or otherwise, has anything to do with making pronouncements about revolutionary struggles and ideas. If your view is that the correctness of ones idea doesn't necessarily prove another incorrect, this essentially means that you are in fact saying all revolutionary struggles and ideas are valid, or at least have the potential to be, even if you don't agree with them. If that is your position, I don't see what hubris has to do with it.


I think one ought to struggle how one sees best, but . . . the correctness of one idea (formulated in a particular time and place by particular people) doesn't necessarily prove another incorrect.
That doesn't mean one should never criticize - it means one should avoid falling into dogmatism.

In any case, I don't agree with your position. I think it's noble, and unnecessary, that people wish to democratise debate and provide platforms for everyone. Most groups and organisations on the libertarian far-left pander to this notion of inclusivity. My view of that is -- and it's particularly notable in the British anarchist movement -- that there has been a liberalising tendency emerging which has encouraged this inclusivity, broad-tent academic mentality i.e. every view is valid, should have space and should be respected etcetera. The word dogmatism is often used as a code-word for militants, but that seems to me to be a cloak to pacify criticism from radicals. I'm not saying that's what you're doing, but implying that having too much self-confidence or pride in ones ideas and praxis is somehow negative or that being clear, pointed and insistent about what one thinks is right, creates a [false] caricature that is easy to dismiss. This is a very common tactic used by liberals to shut down debate.

[Luís Henrique]

One should believe they're saying a right thing.

And be certain that they probably aren't.

Luís Henrique

[The Garbage Disposal Unit]

Hmm, I'm not really sure I'm convinced by that argument. I don't think pride or self-confidence, whether excessive or otherwise, has anything to do with making pronouncements about revolutionary struggles and ideas. If your view is that the correctness of ones idea doesn't necessarily prove another incorrect, this essentially means that you are in fact saying all revolutionary struggles and ideas are valid, or at least have the potential to be, even if you don't agree with them. If that is your position, I don't see what hubris has to do with it.



In any case, I don't agree with your position. I think it's noble, and unnecessary, that people wish to democratise debate and provide platforms for everyone. Most groups and organisations on the libertarian far-left pander to this notion of inclusivity. My view of that is -- and it's particularly notable in the British anarchist movement -- that there has been a liberalising tendency emerging which has encouraged this inclusivity, broad-tent academic mentality i.e. every view is valid, should have space and should be respected etcetera. The word dogmatism is often used as a code-word for militants, but that seems to me to be a cloak to pacify criticism from radicals. I'm not saying that's what you're doing, but implying that having too much self-confidence or pride in ones ideas and praxis is somehow negative or that being clear, pointed and insistent about what one thinks is right, creates a [false] caricature that is easy to dismiss. This is a very common tactic used by liberals to shut down debate.

I don't think, however, that is a question of democratizing debate, or inclusivity, or whatever. In a sense, is something like the opposite - I think "the left" should be less concerned with "the left".
When one lays claim to "the answer" it is always implicitly a call to "unity". It contains in it that all others must come around to the answer, or remain in the wrong.
I don't see any particular use for such unity. Rather, the proliferation of struggles with different sets of analyses, tactics, and so on is more likely, in my mind, to point to "the answer" by a sort of "triangulation" than any one organization, strategy, etc.'s theoretical justifications.

[The Feral Underclass]

I don't think, however, that is a question of democratizing debate, or inclusivity, or whatever. In a sense, is something like the opposite - I think "the left" should be less concerned with "the left".
When one lays claim to "the answer" it is always implicitly a call to "unity". It contains in it that all others must come around to the answer, or remain in the wrong.
I don't see any particular use for such unity. Rather, the proliferation of struggles with different sets of analyses, tactics, and so on is more likely, in my mind, to point to "the answer" by a sort of "triangulation" than any one organization, strategy, etc.'s theoretical justifications.

Knowing that "the answer" is an independent (against the "left", mass movements and mass parties), autonomous (acting for itself in its own interests outside of permanent or even transitory organisation) working class is not a call to unity. On the contrary, it's a rejection of the left and a ruthless criticism of leftists who continue to work against it that answer.

Any struggles, analyses, tactics and so on that do not have as its premise an independent, autonomous working class is wrong. Plain and simple. Liberals call this dogmatism, but of course they have a vested interest in portraying this radicalism and militancy as a negative thing.

And to be honest I don't see how this, "I don't think, however, that is a question of democratizing debate, or inclusivity, or whatever" is much different to this, "the proliferation of struggles with different sets of analyses, tactics, and so on is more likely, in my mind, to point to "the answer".

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

Revolutions, or general strikes or hurricanes or whatever, are only events in so far as one looks at them historically. History is a story that we tell ourselves about what happened; it is written. And insofar as it is written, all "events" are only such if they are deemed worthy by those with the pens. Thus, a revolution is not historical any more than the planting of a fig tree is. It becomes historical when one looks at it from a certain perspective.


I apologise for being a little late, but I feel that there is a misconception in your post.

History is not a story we tell ourselves. History did happen and is borne out by the facts; it's true that often the 'victors write the history', as is obvious by the dramatically boring mainstream historical literature on the cold war, Soviet Russia, East Germany, and so on. But this doesn't change the basic idea that events still happened. As historians we highlight and accentuate, analyse and argue, and identify and categorise events into periods, main causes, effects, changes, and continuities. But - if we are a historian worth our salt - we aren't constructing a bogus narrative. We are arranging facts - evidence, truth - and turning them from a half-completed jigsaw into a completed puzzle. For example, there may be several different interpretations of the Russian Revolution - Marxist, mainstream, revisionist, nationalist. Each puts together a narrative, based on facts. The facts state that, objectively, there was a revolution. The nature of that revolution, its causes, its effects, the duration of that revolution and the extent to which it had a continuous pace of change or was characterised by uneven change is open to some interpretation, based on factual testimony, archival records and so on. But the revolution itself did happen.

What this means is that your contention that revolutions are not events and are not historical doesn't hold water. Revolutions are events, contain events, and are probably periods of time, since like you I don't accept that bourgeois romanticised 'knight in shining armour' story of revolutions. But if we want to ever construct accurate, fair, and balanced accounts of historical revolutions and determine as objectively as possible their causes, effects, and the nature of their changes, then we should accept that objectively events do happen outside of the mind of the person holding the pen. Their only job is to shape the narrative being told, according to the evidence.