62 guys own as much as 3.5 billion others

[SentimentalDisenchantment]

Its getting worse. Is this trend even reversible? Sometimes I think ,let Trump :cursing: be in-charge so that he may fuck up quicker which will lead to the collapse of the system. Dont see things changing in these psuedo-social democracies aka capitalist systems we have now. :confused:
Depressing.

SOURCE GUARDIAN:

The vast and growing gap between rich and poor has been laid bare in a new Oxfam report showing that the 62 richest billionaires own as much wealth as the poorer half of the world’s population.

Timed to coincide with this week’s gathering of many of the super-rich at the annual World Economic Forum in Davos, the report calls for urgent action to deal with a trend showing that 1% of people own more wealth than the other 99% combined.

Oxfam said that the wealth of the poorest 50% dropped by 41% between 2010 and 2015, despite an increase in the global population of 400m. In the same period, the wealth of the richest 62 people increased by $500bn to $1.76tn.
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The charity said that, in 2010, the 388 richest people owned the same wealth as the poorest 50%. This dropped to 80 in 2014 before falling again in 2015.

Mark Goldring, the Oxfam GB chief executive, said: “It is simply unacceptable that the poorest half of the world population owns no more than a small group of the global super-rich – so few, you could fit them all on a single coach.

“World leaders’ concern about the escalating inequality crisis has so far not translated into concrete action to ensure that those at the bottom get their fair share of economic growth. In a world where one in nine people go to bed hungry every night, we cannot afford to carry on giving the richest an ever bigger slice of the cake.”

Leading figures from Pope Francis to Christine Lagarde, the managing director of the International Monetary Fund, have called for action to reverse the trend in inequality, but Oxfam said words had not been translated into action. Its prediction that the richest 1% would own the same wealth as the poorest 50% by 2016 had come true a year earlier than expected.

The World Economic Forum in Davos comes amid fears that the turmoil in financial markets since the turn of the year may herald the start of a new phase to the global crisis that began eight years ago – this time originating in the less-developed emerging countries.

Oxfam said a three-pronged approach was needed: a crackdown on tax dodging; higher investment in public services; and higher wages for the low paid. It said a priority should be to close down tax havens, increasingly used by rich individuals and companies to avoid paying tax and which had deprived governments of the resources needed to tackle poverty and inequality.

Three years ago, David Cameron told the WEF that the UK would spearhead a global effort to end aggressive tax avoidance in the UK and in poor countries, but Oxfam said promised measures to increase transparency in British Overseas Territories and Crown Dependencies, such as the Cayman Islands and British Virgin Islands, had not been implemented.

Goldring said: “We need to end the era of tax havens which has allowed rich individuals and multinational companies to avoid their responsibilities to society by hiding ever increasing amounts of money offshore.

“Tackling the veil of secrecy surrounding the UK’s network of tax havens would be a big step towards ending extreme inequality. Three years after he made his promise to make tax dodgers ‘wake up and smell the coffee’, it is time for David Cameron to deliver.”

Oxfam cited estimates that rich individuals have placed a total of $7.6tn in offshore accounts, adding that if tax were paid on the income that this wealth generates, an extra $190bn would be available to governments every year.

The charity said as much as 30% of all African financial wealth was thought to be held offshore. The estimated loss of $14bn in tax revenues would be enough to pay for healthcare for mothers and children that could save 4 million children’s lives a year and employ enough teachers to get every African child into school.

Oxfam said it intended to challenge the executives of multi-national corporations in Davos on their tax policies. It said nine out of 10 WEF corporate partners had a presence in at least one tax haven and it was estimated that tax dodging by multinational corporations costs developing countries at least $100bn every year. Corporate investment in tax havens almost quadrupled between 2000 and 2014.

The Equality Trust, which campaigns against inequality in the UK, said Britain’s 100 richest families had increased their wealth by at least £57bn since 2010, a period in which average incomes declined.

Duncan Exley, the trust’s director, said: “Inequality, both globally but also in the UK, is now at staggering levels. We know that such a vast gap between the richest and the rest of us is bad for our economy and society. We now need our politicians to wake up and address this dangerous concentration of wealth and power in the hands of so few.”

[BIXX]

I'd be one of those guys if I had won the recent lottery

Fuck I hate being poor

And no I wouldn't give to charity

[Full Metal Bolshevik]

Damn they work really hard, they deserve it if they work as much as 3.5 billion people. :laugh:


I shouldn't laugh tho, this is just sad.

[PikSmeet]

Oxfam said a three-pronged approach was needed: a crackdown on tax dodging; higher investment in public services; and higher wages for the low paid. It said a priority should be to close down tax havens, increasingly used by rich individuals and companies to avoid paying tax and which had deprived governments of the resources needed to tackle poverty and inequality.

Yet none of these would do anything to tackle inequality.
As for tax-dodging, any money a government collects will be balanced out in the economy as the more money governments have to spend, the less private individuals have to spend so the nest gain/loss to the World economy would be zero.
As for investing in public services, see above, but, these services are not really run in the interests of the public but are there to enable the capitalist system to be more efficient, the very system that leads to these economies in the first place.
As for higher wages, now that is one you think might work, but given that wages have never been higher, that is a non-starter too.
But then, did you really think that Oxfam would have the answers? Marx did, replace capitalism with socialism.

[Sinister Cultural Marxist]

Are you guys really surprised?

It's actually not a bad thing, it means we don't need to guillotine as many people.

[The Intransigent Faction]

Are you guys really surprised?

It's actually not a bad thing, it means we don't need to guillotine as many people.

Sure. On the other hand...Billions of people, and we can't muster the revolutionary force to take down 62 oligarchs? I'm starting to think if it came down to a family of four owning 99% of the wealth, those who weren't completely starved into submission would stand around calling for increased taxation and electoral reform.

[Double H]

I don't understand how people still vote for the same (mostly central-right wing) parties after reading this report. This shows the discrepancy between rich and poor is worsening, a fundamental problem in our society.

Would a global millionaire tax help? In my opinion it would...

[PikSmeet]

^^LOL, no it wouldn't taxes don't end inequality. Even Marx lead a revolt against paying taxes.

As we don't have a global government only an insane government would impose a tax on the millionaires as they'd up and leave to a country that didn't have the tax.

[Philosophos]

I don't understand how people still vote for the same (mostly central-right wing) parties after reading this report. This shows the discrepancy between rich and poor is worsening, a fundamental problem in our society.

Would a global millionaire tax help? In my opinion it would...

They vote for this because they are taught to believe that this is the only/best way to do things. They have litteraly been brainwashed since day one of their lives, to think that being a nationalist/patriot and being proud of your country no matter what is of their best interest or mandatory.
They have been taught to believe that some people are lazy and they won't get what they deserve, while the "hard-working middle class" will become rich to live "la vida loca" or sth.

I think you get the main idea here, because it will be extremely tiring writing all the things that they believe in, since it's probably close to thousands if not millions of bullshit.

[Guardia Rossa]

I have just told this info to my workmates, that deeply reject communism.

One said "And how do you think they got rich? By almost enslaving the people, that is".

I don't see why they don't take this though one step forward, but it's good to see that the so-called brainwashing is not all that efficient.

[Comrade Jacob]

guyz, 62 people clearly worked just as hard as the 3.6 billion poorest people. ;)

[Double H]

^^LOL, no it wouldn't taxes don't end inequality. Even Marx lead a revolt against paying taxes.

As we don't have a global government only an insane government would impose a tax on the millionaires as they'd up and leave to a country that didn't have the tax.

Of course it wouldn't end inequality, but it could be one of the means to restore the balance. I won't go into the Marx' statement, as the tax situation was different then than it is now. One could make an entire study of tax evolution since those times.
Don't get me wrong, I am not a taxes maniac, just saying this idea could help restore balance.

Of course those companies would leave the country, so globalisation would be needed. How? That's an entirely different question.

Wheat would you suggest to close the gap between rich and poor, PikSmeet?

[Double H]

They vote for this because they are taught to believe that this is the only/best way to do things. They have litteraly been brainwashed since day one of their lives, to think that being a nationalist/patriot and being proud of your country no matter what is of their best interest or mandatory.
They have been taught to believe that some people are lazy and they won't get what they deserve, while the "hard-working middle class" will become rich to live "la vida loca" or sth.

I think you get the main idea here, because it will be extremely tiring writing all the things that they believe in, since it's probably close to thousands if not millions of bullshit.

Time to wake those people up! :p
Although that's easier said than done...

[John Nada]

guyz, 62 people clearly worked just as hard as the 3.6 billion poorest people. ;)Over 58,064 times harder. Damn, these fucking "job creators" must be gods worked near death! I can't imagine how hard it must be working for a thousand times the minimum wage, let alone this hard. :rolleyes:

This is the flaw in the apologists of capitalism's logic, that there's proportional reward for work.

[Ceallach_the_Witch]

finally, wealth is so concentrated in so few hands that all we need to do is organise a reasonably sized garden party to begin the revolution

[oneday]

I have just told this info to my workmates, that deeply reject communism.

One said "And how do you think they got rich? By almost enslaving the people, that is".

I don't see why they don't take this though one step forward, but it's good to see that the so-called brainwashing is not all that efficient.

Half of the people I work with are like this without being exposed to any Marx or any leftist thought, they understand surplus-value and exploitation perfectly well. They know about the cost and reproduction of labor-power - "they pay us just enough to survive, and so we can reproduce so our children can make them rich too". Some dream of things like general strikes.

But they do it anyway (and so do I). It's like the cynical ideology - "I know perfectly well what I am doing, but I do it anyway."

[oneday]

Over 58,064 times harder. Damn, these fucking "job creators" must be gods worked near death! I can't imagine how hard it must be working for a thousand times the minimum wage, let alone this hard. :rolleyes:

This is the flaw in the apologists of capitalism's logic, that there's proportional reward for work.

Don't forget when someone worth $2 billion invests $10 million how much "risk" they took. They face more "risk" in that decision than most people will ever face in their entire lives, apparently.

[reviscom1]

I think the increasing concentration of wealth in fewer hands is going to lead to revolution very shortly.

The more wealth that is concentrated in private hands, the less there is in government hands.

That means governments are unable to properly fulfil their obligations (which we are seeing at the moment under the heading "austerity debate")

Once governments cease to provide the services that their people have come to expect, spontaneous revolution will be the result.

[Antiochus]

Spontaneous revolutions are a myth. And more importantly, a socialist "spontaneous" revolution will never work either. It would be almost impossible for a conscious society to be created from an unconscious action of people just saying "fuck this".

That isn't to say sparks don't cause explosions. But you need gunpowder, gasoline etc... for it to happen.

[Futility Personified]

The risk in deciding if you can afford to quit one minimum wage job, to move to another area with no immediate guarantee of another minimum wage job, to fail, end up homeless, with a 2 year waiting list to be on the housing ladder, unemployable, alone, friendless and some ridiculous percentage more likely to fucking die is risk. Taking a considerable slash in your luxury, or god forbid, just -having- to work a shit minimum wage job, is not fucking risk.

[oneday]

The risk in deciding if you can afford to quit one minimum wage job, to move to another area with no immediate guarantee of another minimum wage job, to fail, end up homeless, with a 2 year waiting list to be on the housing ladder, unemployable, alone, friendless and some ridiculous percentage more likely to fucking die is risk. Taking a considerable slash in your luxury, or god forbid, just -having- to work a shit minimum wage job, is not fucking risk.

Exactly what I was trying to imply - the only concept of risk that registers to capitalist apologists is risking value. The real risks that many workers face (up to and including death) are incidental to the system.

[reviscom1]

Spontaneous revolutions are a myth. ".



And yet history has produced rather a lot of them.

[John Nada]

And yet history has produced rather a lot of them.Name one. And not some "the masses acted spontaneously, honest officer" type spontaneous.

[Antiochus]

No, they haven't been spontaneous. We don't say the French revolution happened because of "high bread prices". One would only need to see the fact that for much of human history humans have endured conditions far worse than anything now (i.e families eating their children when a famine strikes) and the social order remains untouched.

In fact, we do have examples of this, usually speaking, the governing body is overthrown and then merely replaced. This is how dynasties and royal families rise and fall from power. But the social order is/was the same.

People in Ethiopia are starving. Their lives are far, far worse than anything that could happen to an American under Trump. So why aren't they "spontaneously" establishing a socialist revolution?

[reviscom1]

No, they haven't been spontaneous. We don't say the French revolution happened because of "high bread prices". One would only need to see the fact that for much of human history humans have endured conditions far worse than anything now (i.e families eating their children when a famine strikes) and the social order remains untouched.

In fact, we do have examples of this, usually speaking, the governing body is overthrown and then merely replaced. This is how dynasties and royal families rise and fall from power. But the social order is/was the same.

People in Ethiopia are starving. Their lives are far, far worse than anything that could happen to an American under Trump. So why aren't they "spontaneously" establishing a socialist revolution?

Good point. Maybe awareness/social ties/education/literacy.

Also, the Ethiopians have never had the advanced social democratic state that we have had in the West and consequently cannot get angry at losing it (as the West is losing it under Capitalism)

But the French Revolution was spontaneous, as was the Russian one. They weren't co-ordinated or planned by a cabal of revolutionaries. They developed in response to events and situations.

Now at the time of the next one, the task of Socialists will be to ensure that it develops in a direction we would like (as per the Jacobins and the Bolsheviks) rather than the wet, woolly, useless liberal shit that will undoubtedly be attempted initially.

[John Nada]

Good point. Maybe awareness/social ties/education/literacy.

Also, the Ethiopians have never had the advanced social democratic state that we have had in the West and consequently cannot get angry at losing it (as the West is losing it under Capitalism)Russia and China sure as fuck did not have anything resembling a social democracy, yet had revolutions.
But the French Revolution was spontaneous, as was the Russian one. They weren't co-ordinated or planned by a cabal of revolutionaries. They developed in response to events and situations.

Now at the time of the next one, the task of Socialists will be to ensure that it develops in a direction we would like (as per the Jacobins and the Bolsheviks) rather than the wet, woolly, useless liberal shit that will undoubtedly be attempted initially.That's a fake caricature of both revolutions that even if it was true, would be crushed with the quickness in modern imperialist-capitalist, police-military state the US. I say this myth that the October Revolution and other were spontaneous is possibly the single most toxic yet common belief on the left that has resulted in widespread opportunism, even(especially) amongst those who wish to emulate the Bolsheviks. It results in "waiting for the apocalypse" as opposed to doing anything, and sacrifices any strategic deep when a revolutionary situation does arise. In reality spontaneous rebellions either get you riots that burn out and go nowhere(like the recent anti-police shooting riots), get brutally crushed(tons of times) or coups that change nothing(much of the Arab Spring, various "color revolutions", ect.).

Both the French and Russian Revolutions were in the planning for years, even decades, and highly coordinated, particularly the Bolsheviks in the October Revolution. The Bolsheviks, for example, were a mass movement with tens of thousands and later hundreds of thousands of members, along with millions of sympathizers, that were engaged in propaganda work, strikes, protests and guerrilla warfare for decades. I'm not sure I'd call this "spontaneous".

There was decades and two revolutions(1905 Russian Revolution and February Revolution) between the Narodniks(dudettes/dudes who whacked the Tsar) "Going to the People" campaign(1870s) and the October Revolution(1917). Thousands of revolutionaries were killed, expelled and imprisoned in that time period. There's no way on earth this had no effect on the general populous, until the evil Bolsheviks just popped out of nowhere with 100,000+ members and hoodwinked the entire country when the workers and peasants spontaneously said "fuck this shit!". All while chanting slogans that happened to be the same as the Bolsheviks, and led by people who just so happened to be Bolshevik at the right place and time across the country.:lol:

Beside, I actually find the notion that the masses are a bunch of cattle acting spontaneously on instinct while this evil cabal dupes them offensive. It downplays the fact that there were thousands of Bolsheviks and sympathizers killed and even more imprisoned trying to reach that point. It also deprives the workers and peasants of agency, rather than treating them as intelligent actors who could think for themselves. That they may have heard arguments from the Bolsheviks, agreed with them, provided the vast majority of the cadre and even had their own good ideas and popular demands that the Bolsheviks responded to, makes more sense than it being just a spontaneous outburst and gives the proletariat and peasantry the credit they deserve.

[reviscom1]

Russia and China sure as fuck did not have anything resembling a social democracy, yet had revolutions.That's a fake caricature of both revolutions that even if it was true, would be crushed with the quickness in modern imperialist-capitalist, police-military state the US. I say this myth is possibly the single most toxic yet common belief on the left that has resulted in widespread opportunism, even(especially) amongst those who wish to emulate the Bolsheviks. It results in a "waiting for the apocalypse" as opposed to doing anything, and sacrifices any strategic deep when a revolutionary situation does arise. In reality these spontaneous rebellions either get you riots that burn out and go nowhere, get brutally crushed or coups that change nothing.

Both the French and Russian Revolutions were in the planning for years, even decades, and highly coordinated, particularly the Bolsheviks. The Bolsheviks, for example, were a mass movement with tens of thousands and later hundreds of thousands of members, along with millions of sympathizers, that were engaged in propaganda work, strikes, protests and guerrilla warfare for decades.

There was decades and two revolutions(1905 and February Revolution) between the Narodniks "Going to the People" campaign and the October Revolution. Thousands were killed, expelled and imprisoned. There's no way on earth this had no effect, until the evil Bolsheviks just popped out of nowhere with 100,000+ members and hoodwinked the entire country when the workers and peasants spontaneously said "fuck this shit!". All while chanting slogans that happened to be the same as the Bolsheviks, and led by people who just so happened to be Bolshevik at the right place and time across the country.:lol:

Beside, I actually find the notion that the masses are a bunch of cattle acting on instinct while this evil cabal dupes them offensive. It downplays the fact that there were thousands of Bolsheviks and sympathizers killed and even more imprisoned trying to reach that point. It also deprives the workers and peasants of agency, rather than treating them as intelligent actors who could think for themselves. That they may have heard arguments from the Bolsheviks, agreed with them, provided the vast majority of the cadre and even had their own good ideas and popular demands that the Bolsheviks responded to, makes more sense and gives the proletariat and peasantry the credit they deserve.

Huh???

[John Nada]

Huh???The French Revolution and Russian Revolution were not "spontaneous" in the common sense of the English word. When a lot of Russian theorists spoke of the "spontaneity" of the unfolding revolutionary situation, an alternate translation could be "elemental". Same with "trade-unionism"(which could also translate to basic labor struggles or smashing window), professional revolutionaries(not an elite group but "revolutionary by trade") and "secrecy" or "conspiracy"(more connotations of "the art of not getting arrested", probably the modern equivalent is security culture). This is usually lost in translation, according to the book Lenin Rediscovered.

The Russian Social Democrats(of which the Bolsheviks were a faction and back when Communist still called themselves Social Democrats) and Socialist-Revolutionaries planned, organized, coordinated and executed much of the events prior to and during the October Revolution in Russia. Going all the way back before the Bloody Sunday Massacre of protesters in St. Petersberg that provoked the Russian Revolution of 1905. Which was followed by a decade of guerrilla warfare which killed thousands, possibly tens of thousands if the countryside is included. As well as a bunch of mass strikes involving upwards of 100,000+ workers organized by workers associated with the Russian Social Democratic Labor Party(who'd later changer their name to the Communist Party). There was little spontaneous in the common use of the term about the Russian Revolutions, including the October Revolution.

[Antiochus]

As Juan already pointed out, it is ridiculous to view the French and Russian revolution as "spontaneous" in the 'random' sense of the word.

Just apply some logic to what you're saying. If they were "spontaneous", then they originated from the most proximal "cause". In that case, the rising bread prices and increased taxation. So why the fuck were they demanding a Constitution (Tennis Court Oath)?

Bread prices also rose in many European countries at the same time, so why weren't they demanding the same things? The French bourgeoisie had long been mobilized. The Enlightenment had a huge impact, there were hundreds of 'cafes' were these ideas were debated and they had articulated their desires to the 'common' people.

The same can be said of the American revolution, do you really think it was about "tea and taxes"?

[Comrade #138672]

I don't understand how people still vote for the same (mostly central-right wing) parties after reading this report. This shows the discrepancy between rich and poor is worsening, a fundamental problem in our society.

Would a global millionaire tax help? In my opinion it would...No. Capitalists always find ways to avoid taxes anyway. They are incredibly creative with bookkeeping. Why would we want to allow them to continue to play these silly games? They are incredibly comfortable playing them.

Just expropriate their asse(t)s.

[reviscom1]

As Juan already pointed out, it is ridiculous to view the French and Russian revolution as "spontaneous" in the 'random' sense of the word.

Just apply some logic to what you're saying. If they were "spontaneous", then they originated from the most proximal "cause". In that case, the rising bread prices and increased taxation. So why the fuck were they demanding a Constitution (Tennis Court Oath)?

Bread prices also rose in many European countries at the same time, so why weren't they demanding the same things? The French bourgeoisie had long been mobilized. The Enlightenment had a huge impact, there were hundreds of 'cafes' were these ideas were debated and they had articulated their desires to the 'common' people.

The same can be said of the American revolution, do you really think it was about "tea and taxes"?

Of course they were bloody spontaneous!

No one knew, when the Estates General were summoned, that
the Bastille would fall, that the King would be deprived of his liberty and then dethroned.

The striking and demonstrating workers in February 1917 were not trying to make the Tsar abdicate. They were just expressing their anger at the impossible situation in which they found themselves.

@ Juan Moreno

It is incredibly defeatist and also unrealistic to say that a modern revolution would not succeed because it would be crushed by force. That did not happen in the revolutions of 1917, 1989 or 1991.

Here is a post I made earlier about the role of the military:

"

As Juan already pointed out, it is ridiculous to view the French and Russian revolution as "spontaneous" in the 'random' sense of the word.

Just apply some logic to what you're saying. If they were "spontaneous", then they originated from the most proximal "cause". In that case, the rising bread prices and increased taxation. So why the fuck were they demanding a Constitution (Tennis Court Oath)?

Bread prices also rose in many European countries at the same time, so why weren't they demanding the same things? The French bourgeoisie had long been mobilized. The Enlightenment had a huge impact, there were hundreds of 'cafes' were these ideas were debated and they had articulated their desires to the 'common' people.

The same can be said of the American revolution, do you really think it was about "tea and taxes"?

Of course they were bloody spontaneous!

No one knew, when the Estates General were summoned, that
the Bastille would fall, that the King would be deprived of his liberty and then dethroned.

The striking and demonstrating workers in February 1917 were not trying to make the Tsar abdicate. They were just expressing their anger at the impossible situation in which they found themselves.

@ Juan Moreno

It is incredibly defeatist and also unrealistic to say that a modern revolution would not succeed because it would be crushed by force. That did not happen in the revolutions of 1917, 1989 or 1991.

Here is a post I made earlier about the role of the military:

"The problem of the military for revolutionaries is not as insurmountable as might first seem.

Revolutions tend to happen when the government has mismanaged its affairs to such an extent that it is no longer able to effectively function.

As far as the military is concerned this has 2 effects:

Firstly, it means that they have problems getting paid, supplied and equipped, making them just as sympathetic to revolution as the rest of the working class.

Secondly, in that state of affairs, soldiers will no longer see the State as worth defending. Yes, in a reasonably healthy, prosperous, well run society protest is always going to be a minority interest, and soldiers called in to quell disturbances will do their duty and comply. In a society that is collapsing, when the majority of the populace are running riot or protesting in some way, protest will no longer be seen as the preserve of a few troublemakers but the conventional way to behave. In that situation, soldiers' loyalties will be a lot more divided. They will also ask themselves more questions about what reason they would have to prop up such a moribund state apparatus. Asked to fire lethal bullets at their fellow workers (a difficult thing to do at the best of times) they will not have sufficient incentive to comply.

Both the Russian Revolution of February 1917 and the Anti-Communist Revolutions of 1989 to 1991 relied heavily for success on the refusal of soldiers sent to quell disturbances to fire on the crowds.

Personally I think that when the next anti-Capitalist revolution comes it will be driven not by dedicated revolutionaries but by popular uprisings, as Capitalism becomes more and more inefficient. We can already see plenty of evidence of such inefficiencies if we look around today.

In that sort of revolution, I think it more than feasible that soldiers will refuse to fire on hungry crowds made up of people like them"

[John Nada]

Of course they were bloody spontaneousNo they weren't
No one knew, when the Estates General were summoned, that
the Bastille would fall, that the King would be deprived of his liberty and then dethroned.No one knew the outcome of D-Day, the Battle of Gettysburg or the Battle of Midway beforehand either. That doesn't mean it was "spontaneous".
The striking and demonstrating workers in February 1917 were not trying to make the Tsar abdicate. They were just expressing their anger at the impossible situation in which they found themselves.Read this: https://www.marxists.org/archive/shliapnikov/1923/eve1917/index.html The Bolsheviks were very busy and more involved than casual observers may have believed. It was an underground org, so there's only so much that could've been public.

The Bolshevik and factions of other parties were already agitating against the war. The workers, if they weren't already members of the Bolsheviks, likely knew someone that was or heard their speeches and saw leaflets and posters. Many of those workers striking and protesting before the February Revolution were specifically against the war and the Tsar. There was already many strikes involving tens of thousands, sometimes even hundreds of the thousands. It's hard getting workers to even unionize in the US(where its legal). Can't imagine actually going on strike in Russia(where it was completely illegal and got people killed) would've been easier. There's no way there was just spontaneous perpetually strikes with Russian Social Democratic workers always at the helm for over 18 years without some kind of coordination.
@ Juan Moreno

It is incredibly defeatist and also unrealistic to say that a modern revolution would not succeed because it would be crushed by force. That did not happen in the revolutions of 1917, 1989 or 1991.Where did you find that strawperson? Of course guerrilla warfare and insurrections, possibly leading to revolutions, are very possible. In Kurdistan, India and the Philippines they're clearly managing to wage guerrilla war. Even reactionaries like in Afghanistan, Ukraine or those late 80s/early 90s (counter)"revolutions"/coups prove it's possible to wage insurrections and guerrilla warfare. And reactionaries taking advantage of the "spontaneous" fan-shit encounter is just as likely, if not far more due to the nature of reactionary ideologies legitimized by the capitalist mainstream.
Here is a post I made earlier about the role of the military:

"The problem of the military for revolutionaries is not as insurmountable as might first seem.

Revolutions tend to happen when the government has mismanaged its affairs to such an extent that it is no longer able to effectively function.

As far as the military is concerned this has 2 effects:

Firstly, it means that they have problems getting paid, supplied and equipped, making them just as sympathetic to revolution as the rest of the working class.

Secondly, in that state of affairs, soldiers will no longer see the State as worth defending. Yes, in a reasonably healthy, prosperous, well run society protest is always going to be a minority interest, and soldiers called in to quell disturbances will do their duty and comply. In a society that is collapsing, when the majority of the populace are running riot or protesting in some way, protest will no longer be seen as the preserve of a few troublemakers but the conventional way to behave. In that situation, soldiers' loyalties will be a lot more divided. They will also ask themselves more questions about what reason they would have to prop up such a moribund state apparatus. Asked to fire lethal bullets at their fellow workers (a difficult thing to do at the best of times) they will not have sufficient incentive to comply.That's the "wait for shit to hit the fan" theory that I'm not a fan of. It depends heavily on the military, who may very well have no problem "killing their own people" like tons of civil wars, and the incompetence of the state and ruling class. And out of this unfolding pileup, a revolutionary consciousness will pop out of the aether. Reactionaries and rival bourgeois factions making a power grab, or the masses passively suffering, is a more likely outcome.
Both the Russian Revolution of February 1917 and the Anti-Communist Revolutions of 1989 to 1991 relied heavily for success on the refusal of soldiers sent to quell disturbances to fire on the crowds.The RSDLP and Esars were carrying out recruiting and agitation work in the military. There's also that those soldiers probably didn't want an armed mob firing back. And those coups finishing off drawn out counterrevolutions just illustrates my point about reactionaries taking advantage of that same random could've-been revolutionary situations.
Personally I think that when the next anti-Capitalist revolution comes it will be driven not by dedicated revolutionaries but by popular uprisings, as Capitalism becomes more and more inefficient. We can already see plenty of evidence of such inefficiencies if we look around today.

In that sort of revolution, I think it more than feasible that soldiers will refuse to fire on hungry crowds made up of people like them"I think it's far more feasible that the soldiers won't fire on the hungry crowds because that would just piss them off more.