Bernie: Build a Mass Socialist Party of the Working Class! [Archive]

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Red Terror Dr.

10th June 2016, 21:36

Supporting Hillary Clinton to defeat Trump is—to quote from the late David Bowie—“putting out the fire with gasoline.”

My take: Bernie Sanders should run as independent and kiss the Democratic party good-bye! The rank and file should line up behind his excellent candidacy!!! Screw the mainstream. All Power To The People !!!!!!!!!!!!

http://www.marxist.com/bernie-build-a-mass-socialist-party-of-the-working-class.htm

Konikow

10th June 2016, 21:42

Yes we can! Build another capitalist party! Three capitalist parties is better than two! Workers: sign up for the next class-collaborationist betrayal! signed: "Marxists" P.S.: AMLO Akbar!!!!

- - - Updated - - -

Why don't you call on Donald Trump or Jebcito Bush to build a "socialist" party? They are just as socialist as Bernie Sanders and just as likely to do it.

GLF

12th June 2016, 02:41

Is this thread a joke?

Trump = Populist reactionary
Clinton = Corporatist
Sanders = Social Democrat

Take your pick. I think they all suck and at this point couldn't care less.

openminded

12th June 2016, 02:55

As a Social Democrat I think this is a great idea.

Not only is Clinton a Corporatist but a warmonger. I could never vote for her. If Bernie joins Hillary's gang then I may as well vote for Jill Stein. I won't vote for Trump or Hillary.

Konikow

12th June 2016, 03:04

= Blatherous, yakbatterous labels for the impressionistic gut instincts of political fools mesmerized by the electoral pageant.

Sanders is not a "social democrat" because he and his party are not part of the labor movement and never have been.

They are bourgeois politicians, enemies of the working class.

All other silly labels presented here and elsewhere have no bearing on what any of these politicians or their parties do or will do. They are simply verbal symptoms of the incurable idiocy of the people who employ them as "theoretical" props.

Freeloader

14th June 2016, 01:26

I have sympathies with a position of building a mass socialist party of the working class led by Bernie Sanders. But what is really being called for is a reformist left party, which in American politics wouldn't be bad if it can challenge the Republicans and Democrats. Simply calling it "Socialist" and "Working class" will not make it so (But Marxist.com says they will fix that :unsure:). If Sanders can gather around him the major labour unions, this would be important, and if this happens then the building of such a party becomes important. But do the unions show clear support for Sanders, i got the impression (mostly from the NYtimes) that they were split ?

GLF

8th July 2016, 22:41

As a Social Democrat I think this is a great idea...
So you're a social democrat? Why not just go all the way and become a Fascist. That's what doctrinal, Mussolinean Fascism originally was after all. The only difference is that Fascists take it one step further and want to subjugate the individual as well as the private sector, and always "in the interest of the common good". It's class collaborationist, syncretic nonsense. Fascism is social democracy, infused with nationalism, on steroids. We should not tolerate social fascists nor fascist fascists. Why a social fascist is allowed on revleft I have no clue.

Moggallana

8th July 2016, 23:48

So you're a social democrat? Why not just go all the way and become a Fascist. That's what doctrinal, Mussolinean Fascism originally was after all. The only difference is that Fascists take it one step further and want to subjugate the individual as well as the private sector, and always "in the interest of the common good". It's class collaborationist, syncretic nonsense. Fascism is social democracy, infused with nationalism, on steroids. We should not tolerate social fascists nor fascist fascists. Why a social fascist is allowed on revleft I have no clue.

Dude what the fuck? How'd you go from social democrat to social fascist (which is just barely even a real thing, unless you're still living in the post-purge Stalinist Comintern of the 30's) so quickly? Why is a social democrat closer to fascism than democratic socialism (and beyond, to revolutionary socialism/communism)? Why would you knowingly and passive-aggressively push someone to become an enemy instead of an ally? A vast majority of the social democrats that I've come across have been nudged towards the revolutionary left instead of the reactionary right. In the same amount of words that you used in your post, you could have encouraged that person to either revise their ideological standpoint, or to look into revolutionary politics (or even democratic socialism, which would at least be a stepping stone in the right direction; it would be less of a "shock" than to go from soc-dem to straight communist, if nothing else). Stop polluting the already-toxic environment/movement; little good will come of it. Act like a communist: we're supposed to spread class consciousness and help people remove the veil of false consciouness that envelops their minds, not push them away or turn them into enemies. We already have enough enemies as it is, don't you think?

LeftistsAreRadical

9th July 2016, 01:42

This thread went from bad to idiotic real quick...as far as 2016 politicians go, Bernie is the best, but ultimately is still a reformist that would only lengthen the reign of capitalism. And social democrats are not fascists, I honestly have no idea where that came from.

(A)

9th July 2016, 01:51

I think any politician that progressive is probably a secret socialist. You cant run for office on a platform for destroying capitalism.

Konikow

9th July 2016, 01:58

You cant run for office on a platform for destroying capitalism.

Speak for yourself. You can't for one simple reason, because you support capitalism not-so-secretly.

Here's what one actual socialist wrote about the main message of an actual socialist election campaign:

“the substance and mainspring of the Social-Democratic [that's what Marxists called themselves at the time] election platform can be expressed in three words: for the revolution!” ( V.I. Lenin, “The Election Campaign and the Election Platform,” October 1911).

LeftistsAreRadical

9th July 2016, 02:01

Secret socialists still don't bring about socialism.

(A)

9th July 2016, 02:06

LeftistsAreRadical

9th July 2016, 02:10

OK well then where is your campaign pages and where can I donate?

If you think its possible to run a political campaign in america on a socialist revolution why not try? I will donate if either of you do so.

I'm not saying I think it's possible. In fact, I am saying just the opposite. It's why the current political system is an absolute joke. "The oppressed are allowed once every few years to decide which particular representatives of the oppressing class are to represent and repress them." -- Karl Marx

(A)

9th July 2016, 02:30

LeftistsAreRadical

9th July 2016, 02:37

Berni Sanders has done more for class consciousness and the revolution in the past year then most will do in their entire life's.
This fight is not all or nothing. Its a war of attrition. If we have any hope at all then we must give everything we have for every inch of ground.
Anything less would be surrender.
You cant sit back and say "Well if the revolution comes I will fight" or "Well that's not my idea of progress so I will sit this one out."

No Social democracy will not end capitalism; but any action that supports the working class and opens peoples eyes inches us closer and is worth the effort and my respect.

Bernieism is hurting the leftist cause if anything. With a mass of centrist liberals calling themselves "socialists", not only do they give everyone else a false idea of what socialism is, but they give themselves the false idea of what socialism is. And we all know that we don't need any more help with people's misconceptions of socialism.

Konikow

9th July 2016, 02:38

Two things: First, when you put something in quotation marks, like "this," that is taken to mean that you are quoting something that someone said or wrote.

Second, Bernie Sanders is a politician of and for the class enemy. When the workers fight for "an inch of ground" (see, there I quoted something you wrote!) the Democrats send their cops against them.

In conclusion, why are you here? Oh right, because you are a fine representative of the "Revolutionary Left"! As I've mentioned before, the Revolutionary Left is (evidently) the self-designation of people who support U.S. imperialism and its Democratic Party. Evidence: this bloody website!

(A)

9th July 2016, 02:56

So every novel ever writen is a direct quote? No I think quotations are also used to identify speech.

"Example:
She wrote: 'I don't paint anymore. For a while I thought it was just a phase that I'd get over.
Now, I don't even try.' "

See, a quote of fictional speech quoted with a quote.

LAR; But they learn; that's the point. Eventually they will say; hey what is socialism and start to learn.
Fuck if people stopped using socialism as a Dirty word and started self identifying with it then think how easy it will be to expand their understanding.

What about all the people who have started taking action against the system and against capitalism. Already their are more people running for lesser offices and realizing that
capitalism does not work for them.

I understand he is not a revolutionary but he fights and he moves forwards and I respect that. If you dont; maybe you are just wearing Socialism as a pin on your chest.

Tell you what I am going to go and get something productive done; make some flyers; call a politician; stand in front of a random business and start yelling "Union, union, union."
Feel free to do the same.

LeftistsAreRadical

9th July 2016, 03:16

D:

But do they really learn? I have yet to talk to a current or former Bernie supporter who understands socialism for what it actually is, rather than thinking that Scandinavia is socialist and everywhere else that's actually socialist is just "dirty, corrupt communism". Bernie supporters and people looking at socialism in the modern day don't learn what socialism actually is because Bernie supporters have completely construed a false idea of socialism, and that's the only thing that can be found in research today. Reform just doesn't work, especially not when the reforms are coming at the hands of wealthy politicians. He may "fight and move forward" but he is not moving toward socialism and returning the means of production to the proletariat, he is fighting to 'fix' capitalism.

Konikow

9th July 2016, 03:48

Look why are we even having this conversation now? "Bernie: build a mass socialist..." No he won't! It should be obvious now that he won't, if it wasn't obvious that he wouldn't from the beginning!

What we have here is a couple people telling the basic truth and a bunch of "revolutionary leftists" yabbering away about their lalaland capitalist fantasies starring Bernie.

Like I've said before, one might just as well call on Donald Trump to "build a mass socialist..." blablabla.

I quit, you are all a bunch of idiots, excuse me, I meant to say, "revolutionary leftists."

GLF

9th July 2016, 16:47

ckaihatsu

9th July 2016, 17:56

They want to lure the workers into a silent slumber and pacify them with petty comforts.

Um, so no petty comforts, then -- ?

: (

= )

Moggallana

9th July 2016, 18:34

The reason I say that social democracy is akin to Fascism is because it's the same bourgeoisie reaction to class conflict. Merge State and Capital to appease the working classes and have them collaborate in it's defense. It's fascism lite - a prettier, gentler kind of Fascism. It has the same goal, the only difference is they do it a little more nicely. The desired end is to eradicate class conflict and set up a big brother, regulatory, interventionist and protectionist State. Fuck that noise.

In the end, you're either with us or against us. We have all these political ideologies and they're all about one thing: taking over the proverbial plantation. Fascists want to take it over. Social democrats want to take it over. Communists want to abolish it. There is no middle ground. This is revolution. Death to those who want to work with the system or fix the system. They are even more dangerous in my opinion. They want to lure the workers into a silent slumber and pacify them with petty comforts. You're either with us in trying to abolish the plantation or your against us. Bernie Sanders is against us.

Why is this so hard?

You very clearly missed the points I was trying to make, so let me try to make this a bit clearer. This is not the revolution right now, but if you want to go around killing class enemies, by all means, go ahead. I never said that social democrats aren't dangerous. I wholeheartedly agree that social democracy as a functioning system is a travesty and is dangerous beyond belief. That is not up for debate. What I was trying to say is that regular people, like you and me and other people, unless we're entirely closed up and narrow minded and suffering delusions stemming from a false consciousness, there is always the chance of furthering our political knowledge and education. That person from earlier that you called a social fascist could be a poor working class person who's been duped or misinformed, and instead of pushing them away and creating this barrier between us and them, you could have done something to effect a positive change. They become class enemies when they unwaveringly become cemented in their beliefs, not before. Yes, bourgeois politicians/supporters that are either part of the extant social democratic ruling ideology or trying their best to get to that point, those are class enemies (though even they could change their ways with the right information or experiences).

This sort of black and white thinking ("you're with us or against us, there's no middle ground, this is revolution, death to those who want to work with system", etc) is questionable in multiple ways. If one were to take that "death to those" statement seriously, what you're implying is nothing short of genocide and crimes against humanity. This might come as a surprise, but most people aren't revolutionary. That doesn't mean that they will always be that way, nor does it give you the permission to call for death upon them. Again, this is not the revolution right now. And even if it was, if there were indiscriminate killings such as what you seem to be suggesting by revolutionaries during that time, then that revolution is trash. I'm not going to spend my time in a revolution cleaning up the piles of dead bodies in the streets because some edgy black-and-white-thinking pseudo-communists refused to have dialogue or engage with other human beings because of their petty personal beliefs. We're supposed to build movements and class consciouness, not walls around our playground.

ckaihatsu

9th July 2016, 19:34

By Patrick Kelly
5 July 2016

Prominent businessman Gerry Harvey has bewailed the outcome of last Saturday’s election in Australia and suggested the formation of a dictatorship in order to resolve the political crisis and impose anti-working class economic “reform” measures.

https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2016/07/05/harv-j05.html

Heretek

9th July 2016, 21:21

Well, if your definition of revolution involves no revolution, I don't think you should be advocating on a site for Revolution.

Every revolution in history has been violent, and there has been death basically indiscriminately. The Terror wasn't called as such for nothing. But is was not simply because of 'close-minded-ness,' or 'genocide.' It is because during the actual revolution, regardless if you're just "uninformed" (which is unlikely due to the nature of communism requiring class consciousness) or a full-blown fascist counter-revolutionary, if you are opposing the revolution, the revolutionaries will eliminate you, in one way(death) or another(jailing). Someone calling for a 'return to order,' for a 'popular referendum, and an end to chaos' is as much of an enemy of the working class seizing power as another advocating death camps, police states, and war. Regardless if they are bourgeois, or if they are proletarian. Class traitors do exist. The point of the revolution is, again, to remove the current state of affairs and replace them with a socialist one, rather than simply switching the face of the oppressors and changing nothing. As such, all regressive vestiges of the last order must be swept away in the fires. Otherwise, the revolution has failed and will collapse into capitalism once again. It is why feudalism no longer exists save for what was progressive to humanity or simply doesn't matter. And it will be much the same between socialism and capitalism.

Alet

9th July 2016, 22:19

Recently, there have been discussions on this board about the reasons for the degeneration of RevLeft and whatever, and that it actually could serve as a platform for socialists to organize, intellectualize, and so on. If one takes a quick look at other leftist message boards, one reason that is given among others is that RevLeft's members are always talking about the same things over and over again. I'm not familiar with other cultures on other boards, but they are nevertheless dead right. And while this might be helpful - to a certain degree, necessary even - for fresh members (and, God forbid, even I learn something new because of such discussions, however this is not the point), it reveals a lot about not only the quality of RevLeft but the inclination and seriousness of self-proclaimed communists here. Some participants in this thread are excused because they are relatively new - others are not for various reasons. But this is not the point. The point is that we always go through the same shit again and again, discuss "basic stuff" while there is a lot to talk about if all of us (or at least most of us) were inclined socialists willing to ruthlessly criticize by having no sanctuaries and willing to use this board for exactly this purpose. But right now, with our present Left, which task, in striving for a new Left, could be more urgent than to purge such platforms of reactionary sentiments? (And I'm not referring to the recent bans - I'm talking about purging in an intellectual way)

The reason I write such an "introduction" is that especially this topic, among others, has already been discussed endlessly here - and, I'm afraid, not only here. Indeed, it is not RevLeft's culture in particular that is a hindrance, it is a problem of the present Left in general. Have you ever noticed how every thorough discussion about any topic turns into a more thorough discussion about the "basics" of Marxism (materialism etc.)? Why is that so? It is because, in our epoch, two Marxists do not share the same ideological inclination. In other words, one of them only identifies with Marxism and full stop. His core beliefs are ultimately reactionary, his Marxism is formalized and vulgar. But he still thinks that he belongs to us, that we have the same "goal", and so on, so he discusses politics and "how to have a revolution today" with us. But his hidden reactionism, of course, has wider implications, so that one has to deal with all this shit before being able to talk about the initial topic again. I claim that this why RevLeft is presently shit although it doesn't have to be: Because the vulgarity of those Marxisms have to be exposed over and over again before we can have fruitful intellectualizing and fruitful debates on political subjects.

We should always remember that when Marxists talk about ruthless criticism and having nothing to lose, this is not a joke. The "organizational crisis" of present-day communists, that is, their ignorance regarding their political strategy and their tactical practice, is not solely owed to a lack of scientific analyses of the present state of things. It is ultimately an ideological crisis because they are not ready, they are afraid to take the risk. This is what they tell us by what they are not telling us, which is their secretly reactionary ideology.

It is not a shame to be wrong. But it is a shame to uncritically insist on one's ignorance. I am dead certain that at least one of the people I'm attacking will do exactly this, and I think that others will follow.

Before we explore the implications of the beliefs of the vulgar Marxists, let's just take a quick look at what they are thinking of themselves. Notice how they passive-aggressively make use of sarcasm, not only, not even necessarily as an attempt to appear funny but first of all as a substitution for a political, intellectual involvement. They take their positions for granted, so much so that they don't think they have to actually justify them, elaborate upon their beliefs. They uncritically take so much for granted that they are not ready to literally intellectualize, and that's why you have this self-righteous mocking. It's not that their sarcasm is an outburst or just a sideline - it is their very way of arguing, their very way of confronting what would otherwise confront and challenge what they take for granted. If he wouldn't be (that is, pretend to be) proud of this eponym, I would call this type of behavior Konikowism - just because he has recently been the most obnoxious and most annoying one. Just look at his way of arguing:

Yes we can! Build another capitalist party! Three capitalist parties is better than two! Workers: sign up for the next class-collaborationist betrayal! signed: "Marxists" P.S.: AMLO Akbar!!!!

This is not reducible to the behavior of an "internet troll, don't feed him, it is not worth confronting" etc. This is ideological and, ultimately, political. And then you have:

Is this thread a joke?

Trump = Populist reactionary
Clinton = Corporatist
Sanders = Social Democrat

Take your pick. I think they all suck and at this point couldn't care less.

Notice their confidence. "It's all the same, it's all bourgeois™, can't you see this? Not caring is our task! It's so self-evident, you got2b kiddin", and whatever. Their right to ridicule their opponents derives from the fact that they take too much for granted. This is why they are not ready to ruthlessly criticize the present order of things. For reasons of coherency, I will not respond post by post but rather non-consecutively quote the statements made in this thread, in order to elaborate on my point. Don't think that anything I'll write is reducible to a discussion with an individual. Everything here is consistent and directed against every defeatist vulgar Marxist, I just want to avoid repeating myself. So let's begin with the most basic statement:

as far as 2016 politicians go, Bernie is the best, but ultimately is still a reformist that would only lengthen the reign of capitalism.

Then, what does it mean to be a revolutionary as opposed to being a "reformist" in 2016? What are the practical tasks of revolutionaries, whose implications would not "only lengthen" capitalism but shorten it? Your instant thought might be something along the lines of "calling for a revolution" or "calling for the expropriation of the expropriators" etc. but this is not how this works. A revolution is not something you make by finding the appropriate rhetoric carrying insurgent ideas. Actual workers with actual problems don't care about the idea of socialism and proletarian revolution, and they won't be convinced if you keep yelling at them that only socialism will in the long term heal their wounds. Those problems have to be faced in their immediate proximity, where socialism is yet not graspable or meaningful but... yes, reforms are. Class consciousness is not something you teach by giving workers lectures on Marxism, it is the result of struggles - especially political ones - which have a positive and sensible effect on the everyday life of the workers. Only when the worker class has developed class consciousness, only when they are ready and willing to overthrow bourgeois rule, can we meaningfully speak of reformism as opposed to revolutionary activity.

In other words, fighting for reforms is not the same as reformism. Reformism means that there could have been an alternative to realizing reforms, an alternative which is neither doing nothing nor preaching the expropriation of the expropriators (which is actually the same), but actual revolutionary actions, the actual destruction of the bourgeois state. The meaningful existence of reformism presupposes a worker movement that is consciously ready to fight the bourgeoisie. We don't have this today nor is it an inevitable development of capitalism - the will of individual socialists alone, who recognize that the worker class has yet to advance, can bring about the socialist movement. Furthermore, reformism often - if not always - precludes the workers from being politically active subjects, reformists are in a way "technocratic" in that they do their job, pretending to know what's good for the people. This is not what Bernie represents. Actual struggle for reforms does not confine itself to parliamentary activity. Politics is much more than that. Bernie has understood this, and that's why he didn't end his campaign.

The fact of the matter is that - and I will elaborate upon this as soon as I confront Location C - Sanders represents much more than his individual beliefs which convince others and which he wanted to carry to the presidential office. He represents an outright political movement, one that articulates its discontent with capitalism as progressively as context in the US allows. The vulgar Marxists don't realize that what they call "social democratic reformism as usual" is actually revolutionary (not subversively revolutionary but rather "look, a brand new technology!"-revolutionary) in the US today. Everybody knows it, tacitly at least. It's not business as usual, it inspires people, gives them hope and confidence. And don't get me wrong: The Sanders campaign is not congruent with class consciousness or revolutionary socialism. But it is a step toward it, and why? Because Sanders bequeathed to us a movement of active policital subjects, a movement actually inclined communists can radicalize in fighting against Trump and whatever. Yes, it's true that Bernie Sanders is not a revolutionary, thank you for emphasizing this banal truism. But alas (or luckily?) the truth of the matter is that he is still closer to being a practical socialist than Konikow will ever be.

If Bernie Sanders possesses the qualifications of a "reformist", every practical Marxist in history was a "reformist", and everybody who is familiar with for example Marx or Lenin or even the history of revolutionary Social Democracy knows that. Pray tell, what did they call for in fighting for socialism, and why? Social Democracy always stressed that political freedom was "light and air" for the proletariat. Lenin often seemed to be a liberal democrat rather than a revolutionary socialist sometimes, and if I remember correctly, he even directly used the term "reform" with a positive connotation. Do I really have to give examples? Even Marx stated unambiguously when attacking the "true socialists":
It is well known how the monks wrote silly lives of Catholic Saints over the manuscripts on which the classical works of ancient heathendom had been written. The German literati reversed this process with the profane French literature. They wrote their philosophical nonsense beneath the French original. For instance, beneath the French criticism of the economic functions of money, they wrote “Alienation of Humanity”, and beneath the French criticism of the bourgeois state they wrote “Dethronement of the Category of the General”, and so forth.

The introduction of these philosophical phrases at the back of the French historical criticisms, they dubbed “Philosophy of Action”, “True Socialism”, “German Science of Socialism”, “Philosophical Foundation of Socialism”, and so on.

The French Socialist and Communist literature was thus completely emasculated. And, since it ceased in the hands of the German to express the struggle of one class with the other, he felt conscious of having overcome “French one-sidedness” and of representing, not true requirements, but the requirements of Truth; not the interests of the proletariat, but the interests of Human Nature, of Man in general, who belongs to no class, has no reality, who exists only in the misty realm of philosophical fantasy.

This German socialism, which took its schoolboy task so seriously and solemnly, and extolled its poor stock-in-trade in such a mountebank fashion, meanwhile gradually lost its pedantic innocence.

The fight of the Germans, and especially of the Prussian bourgeoisie, against feudal aristocracy and absolute monarchy, in other words, the liberal movement, became more earnest.

By this, the long-wished for opportunity was offered to “True” Socialism of confronting the political movement with the Socialist demands, of hurling the traditional anathemas against liberalism, against representative government, against bourgeois competition, bourgeois freedom of the press, bourgeois legislation, bourgeois liberty and equality, and of preaching to the masses that they had nothing to gain, and everything to lose, by this bourgeois movement.

[Let's stop here for a moment - doesn't this sound familiar? "Build another capitalist party!", "(Trump and Bush) are just as socialist as Bernie Sanders", "I think they all suck and at this point couldn't care less", “So you're a social democrat? Why not just go all the way and become a Fascist” etc.? Indeed, as we shall see later, our modern vulgar Marxists are very similar to the true socialists back then.]

German Socialism forgot, in the nick of time, that the French criticism, whose silly echo it was, presupposed the existence of modern bourgeois society, with its corresponding economic conditions of existence, and the political constitution adapted thereto, the very things those attainment was the object of the pending struggle in Germany.

To the absolute governments, with their following of parsons, professors, country squires, and officials, it served as a welcome scarecrow against the threatening bourgeoisie.

It was a sweet finish, after the bitter pills of flogging and bullets, with which these same governments, just at that time, dosed the German working-class risings.

While this “True” Socialism thus served the government as a weapon for fighting the German bourgeoisie, it, at the same time, directly represented a reactionary interest, the interest of German Philistines. In Germany, the petty-bourgeois class, a relic of the sixteenth century, and since then constantly cropping up again under the various forms, is the real social basis of the existing state of things.

To preserve this class is to preserve the existing state of things in Germany.

What is the struggle for political freedom if not a struggle for reform? Or recall what Marx said about the Ten Hours' Bill:
After a 30 years’ struggle, fought with almost admirable perseverance, the English working classes, improving a momentaneous split between the landlords and money lords, succeeded in carrying the Ten Hours’ Bill. The immense physical, moral, and intellectual benefits hence accruing to the factory operatives, half-yearly chronicled in the reports of the inspectors of factories, are now acknowledged on all sides. Most of the continental governments had to accept the English Factory Act in more or less modified forms, and the English Parliament itself is every year compelled to enlarge its sphere of action. But besides its practical import, there was something else to exalt the marvelous success of this workingmen’s measure. Through their most notorious organs of science, such as Dr. Ure, Professor Senior, and other sages of that stamp, the middle class had predicted, and to their heart’s content proved, that any legal restriction of the hours of labor must sound the death knell of British industry, which, vampirelike, could but live by sucking blood, and children’s blood, too. In olden times, child murder was a mysterious rite of the religion of Moloch, but it was practiced on some very solemn occassions only, once a year perhaps, and then Moloch had no exclusive bias for the children of the poor. This struggle about the legal restriction of the hours of labor raged the more fiercely since, apart from frightened avarice, it told indeed upon the great contest between the blind rule of the supply and demand laws which form the political economy of the middle class, and social production controlled by social foresight, which forms the political economy of the working class. Hence the Ten Hours’ Bill was not only a great practical success; it was the victory of a principle; it was the first time that in broad daylight the political economy of the middle class succumbed to the political economy of the working class.

There is no revolutionary struggle that skips the struggle for reforms. Every Marxist understands this.

Trump = Populist reactionary
Clinton = Corporatist
Sanders = Social Democrat

Take your pick. I think they all suck and at this point couldn't care less.

Beautiful. “Take your pick.” Politics is now reduced by vulgar Marxists to worthless phrases and simple categories so that even 5 year olds can experience what being a revolutionary socialist means. Notice how this kind of thinking does not in the least require any scientific analysis or critical evaluation of concrete, worldly processes but is in fact an outright substitution of it. One doesn’t need to know what it means, concretely and practically, to be a “populist reactionary” etc., what the concrete implications in our present society are, one does not need further ideological criticism beyond these brands, one only needs those labels and that’s it. It doesn’t matter that there is an actual movement behind every of these individuals, each a politically meaningful one, which can be analyzed and understood scientifically in relation to the reproduction of our capitalist order. Location C says: Fuck it, it’s not necessary, I only need those abstract labels to evaluate their true implications etc.

You are an insult not only to the tradition of Marxism but to the legacy of the Enlightenment even. What do you think Marxism is about? Did Marx and Engels simply provide some eternal qualifications for counterrevolutionaries so communists can distinguish themselves from them without further investigation? Is this what their legacy is reducible to? In contrast to you, our predecessors understood what it means to be a communist in the context one finds themselves in – in other words, while you have no idea of what it means to be a communist today, they knew full well what it meant to be a communist back then. Why is that so? It’s because they actually thoroughly analyzed the processes they were confronting – for them, it wasn’t enough to call political subjects this or that, it was necessary that they understood why they were; and they didn’t come to this conclusion with a checklist, finding out whether they meet the qualifications of certain definitions. Instead, they understood their opponents in relation to the concrete historical/political conditions, how they concretely related to them, how they ideologically conceived them, how they practically affected them, and so on. You don’t do this. You uncritically let our predecessors talk for you, abstracting them from their own historical predicament so as to apply their analyses to the present, so that you effectively reduce politics to silly phrasemongering and have no idea of the processes in the real world. You are an anti-materialist, and ultimately a reactionary, for this reason.

Let me put it this way: If I asked you why Bernie is a “social democrat”, you would say something along the lines of: “Well, he wants to enact reforms and not to expropriate the expropriators”, and so on. According to you, “social democracy” is synonymous with reforms. What these reforms practically mean, how they relate to the lives of people, to classes, the political significance of these reforms and of the act of proposing them, all of this doesn’t matter. You don’t need to have an idea of this (and you actually don’t, because if you had, you wouldn’t hide behind this clownish phrasemongering), you have your “definition” you can work with and that’s it.

According to you, political positions are reducible to individuals and their beliefs, but in actual fact, these individuals, especially Trump and Sanders, represent something much wider. Trump and Sanders represent political movements, which do not only relate to the reproduction of the capitalist order but are significant for its own movement and how it qualitatively changes on its course. Even if we presuppose that Trump himself, as an individual, weren’t a neo-fascist, he nevertheless represents the rise of fascism in the 21st century. I’ve already talked about it in another thread and I’ve used the German AfD as an example: The party is currently to a certain extent disunited, and ambiguous toward certain political beliefs, not necessarily – but, of course, also – fascist ones. It ranges from social policies and the membership in the EU to the NPD and antisemitism. Do these heavy disagreements within the party in any way destroy or at least stop the rise of fascism in Germany or Europe? It doesn’t because while political power and tactical practice of the fascists are ultimately necessary for their reign, it is nevertheless secondary and irreducible to the fascists themselves, organized in a party or sitting in parliaments. The real danger of the AfD is not that their party in particular is able to rule the country, it’s that they facilitated a fascist discourse among the public. The AfD represents an ideological part of the society, it is this part that is a danger, not the AfD themselves.

The same holds true for Trump. Not he as an individual matters but the sentiments he represents. It’s because you don’t understand this that you are unable to recognize the political significance and the practical meaning of Sanders’, Clinton’s, and Trump’s campaign. They are according to you all equally significant for the reproduction of capitalism and for communists because they don’t call for a worker revolution. But guess what, one doesn’t pull a worker revolution out of one’s ass. It is necessary to begin with small demands because the context for a revolution is not existent, yet. Sanders’ campaign created a fighting spirit, it literally created a fighting spirit, one that raised the hope of all real socialists. Sanders is not a Marxist, and yet closer to socialism than your phrasemongering because the movement he bequeathed is something to begin with. And regarding Trump: The fact that you don’t recognize his threat, and that you “couldn’t care less” reveals that you are nothing but a hidden reactionary and completely useless for the radical Left. Let’s deal with it, shall we?

So you're a social democrat? Why not just go all the way and become a Fascist.

Let’s make one thing absolutely clear before we confront this line of thought: Location C’s notion of “social democracy” applies to Sanders, and probably to everything that is today labelled as “democratic socialism”. So we’re not talking about the social democrats of the 1920s who ultimately supported the Nazis in crushing a possible revolution, we are talking about the presently most progressive forces. The movement behind Bernie Sanders, according to him, amounts to nothing else than fascism. The politics of Hilary Clinton amounts to nothing else than fascism. Sanders, Clinton and Trump are the same. Beautiful, isn’t it?

What you don’t understand, Location C, is that being a “social democrat” in the 1920s is not the same as being a “social democrat” in 2016. Being a “social democrat” is today much more radical than your phrasemongering. We all agree on the fact that our only answer to fascism is class struggle. But you clearly have no idea of class struggle, what it means in July, 2016. The fact of the matter is that the militancy of the worker class has yet to develop. We don’t have a ready-made worker class that is ready to lose everything in fighting for socialism. You can come at us with your silly phrases and call for “class struggle” and “worker revolution” but you don’t know how to concretely oppose the growing reaction we are facing. You can come at us with your books on historical materialism and whatever you like, but you offer us no political program, no political strategy. The “social democrats” today are different. Their proposals might not always be sufficient or even the right ones but at least they have a program, at least they fucking do something that appeals to the masses because it relates to their discontent. Through “social democracy”, that is, through the struggle for such reforms, a movement is built that can be radicalized and can fight fascism.

Today, right know, the only meaningful opponent to fascism is what you call “social democracy”. A blind man can see this: Our “communists” are not a meaningful political force they don’t appeal to any worker, they are completely worthless. Unlike the “social democrats”, who actually have an impact on politics. That is not to say that their positions are sufficient but they are something to even begin with – your vulgar socialism is not.

Why is that so? Because the vulgar Marxists think that it is sufficient to “call for” a revolution and that communist practice is nothing else than expropriating the expropriators etc. They presuppose a ready-made militant worker class or think that telling them to fight for socialism will already persuade them. But the fact of the matter is that workers don’t care about your class struggle, they don’t care about your socialist worker revolution. They are struggling with their everyday life and are yet not ready to relate their immediate problems to socialism. Before they can do this, they need to gain experience in political struggle, that is, in a struggle for reforms, which improve their living conditions. This is why the “social democrats” are way ahead of you, the movements they represent are political and potentially impactful. You, on the other hand, necessarily find yourselves preaching dialectical materialism while nobody is listening. You are doing all this meaningless shit which makes you effectively apolitical subjects who literally “don’t care” about who is being elected, while the neo-fascist reaction is growing. This is the irony, you accuse others of effectively being fascists but you are the ones who facilitate their victory in not supporting and strengthening the only forces which can presently oppose them. Being a communist means to radicalize the struggle as it exists not as you would like it to exist. There is no context for a worker revolution right now, our present task is still to fight for its preconditions. You think you are the advanced strata, the vanguard of the worker class but the real world, in fact, outpaces you, and that’s why you are ultimately reactionary. But somehow, you still tell yourself that you are a true socialist – well, you fucking are, if we refer to the German true socialists of the 19th century: You talk about revolution and despise reforms, which ultimately supports the reactionaries. You have much in common with the scum Marx has already attacked.

We have all these political ideologies and they're all about one thing: taking over the proverbial plantation. Fascists want to take it over. Social democrats want to take it over. Communists want to abolish it.

However, communists do not abolish “it” from without. You see, this is an example for what I meant when I was talking about the fact that present-day communists have no idea of our practical political tasks for ideological reasons. Location C thinks that communism means “abolishing” capitalism as opposed to taking “it” over as the “social democrats” do. He’s unaware of the meaning of the concept of Aufhebung, sublation. Communism is, for him, not the real movement that sublates the present order of things, it is an ideal that reality will have to adjust itself to.

In order to bring an end to capitalism, we have to start with the conditions that are presently given. We want to actively change reality as it exists, and it will be a long and difficult struggle. If you think that it doesn’t matter whether we find ourselves in a bourgeois democracy or in fascism, you are dead fucking wrong. One might think so, if they believe that socialist practice is reducible to “worker revolution™”, but for actual socialists who understand the necessity of concrete struggles and reforms it does make a difference. Yes, fascists do effectively lengthen the rule of the bourgeoisie, but they do so at the expense of our ability to overthrow it. Fascism is not reducible to your “social democracy with extreme nationalism” bullshit. It puts us back to Stone Age and forces us to fight for bourgeois democracy again first and foremost, so we can make use of the political means to move toward socialism. Your pseudo-revolutionary rhetoric won’t help us, neither in fighting fascism, nor in sublating bourgeois democracy.

Bernieism is hurting the leftist cause if anything. With a mass of centrist liberals calling themselves "socialists", not only do they give everyone else a false idea of what socialism is, but they give themselves the false idea of what socialism is. And we all know that we don't need any more help with people's misconceptions of socialism.

Your mistake, however, is that you think that a conception of socialism exists on its own and doesn’t relate to a wider social/political reality. People don’t misunderstand socialism out of ignorance alone, they simply have no reason to understand it. Think of it this way: Even if you successfully convince one of the true meaning of socialism, his attitude toward the subject wouldn’t change. Again, socialism is not the “inevitable result of inner contradictions of capitalism”. A class-conscious worker movement is yet to be built. Workers have to learn, experience the meaning of socialism. Before we can publicly talk about false rhetoric, there has to be a context for attacking it successfully with direct political, radical implications.

Build another capitalist party! Three capitalist parties is better than two!

It’s so ridiculous that you literally have no idea of even politics in general. The American bourgeoisie has currently no reason to establish a third party. The mere existence or potential existence of one would inevitably be congruent with a shake of the present order of things to the very foundations because it requires a radically polarized political situation. If there would be a party that is able to change the establishment, there would also be a worker movement that is willing to change reality. What else could facilitate the existence of a third party?

Your wrong assumption is that what is presently going on is just capitalism as usual. Of course, your qualifications for “capitalism” are bullshit, as shown above. That’s why you don’t understand how politically controversial the present presidential campaign is. According to you, it’s all the same. You ignore reality and thus become an apolitical subject because you don’t have a stance on anything as the context for a revolution does not exist. But the actual truth of the matter is that all three candidates each represent a different relation to the reproduction of capitalism. While Clinton, yes, desperately tries to preserve the status quo, Trump’s victory is not simply synonymous with bourgeois rule, it is the victory of fascism, and there is no excuse for a self-proclaimed communist to equate it with bourgeois democracy. Alas, I actually had to elaborate on it, thanks to Location C’s unfamiliarity with the history of socialism.

Why is this so hard?

Because it’s not as easy as you think it is or want it to be. What is this complaining? Do you think that intellectualizing or ruthless criticism is “easy”? Is this all just supposed to be a hobby for you? You take too much for granted, and now you’re being confronted with it. The real world is way too complex for your formalized Marxism.

Cliff Paul

9th July 2016, 22:36

Bernieism is hurting the leftist cause if anything. With a mass of centrist liberals calling themselves "socialists", not only do they give everyone else a false idea of what socialism is, but they give themselves the false idea of what socialism is. And we all know that we don't need any more help with people's misconceptions of socialism.

So Bernie supporters trying to claim the idea that socialism is social democracy not some 'totalitarian' police state (which is the current definition of socialism in most of America) is actively harming the leftist movement?

GLF

9th July 2016, 22:53

Konikow

9th July 2016, 23:00

A whole lot of "intellectualizing" to get us to support the ruling party of U.S. capitalism because the other capitalist candidate is "fascist"! (never heard that one before!)

No you can keep your "intellectualizing" (i.e. forgetting all the hard won lessons of the workers movement).

No we aren't going to sacrifice the revolutionary program because some genius on the Internet thought they were thinking something new, when they were just rearranging age-old received "wisdom" of bourgeois ideology!

No support to capitalist parties!

Cliff Paul

9th July 2016, 23:13

Your wrong assumption is that what is presently going on is just capitalism as usual. Of course, your qualifications for “capitalism” are bullshit, as shown above. That’s why you don’t understand how politically controversial the present presidential campaign is. According to you, it’s all the same. You ignore reality and thus become an apolitical subject because you don’t have a stance on anything as the context for a revolution does not exist. But the actual truth of the matter is that all three candidates each represent a different relation to the reproduction of capitalism. While Clinton, yes, desperately tries to preserve the status quo, Trump’s victory is not simply synonymous with bourgeois rule, it is the victory of fascism, and there is no excuse for a self-proclaimed communist to equate it with bourgeois democracy. Alas, I actually had to elaborate on it, thanks to Location C’s unfamiliarity with the history of socialism.

I fail to see how a Trump victory is the victory of fascism. Sure Trump's rhetoric empowers racist zealots but so did Wallace and Pat Buchanon. An actual fascist movement, the annul any semblence of democracy in the bourgeios state, crush any potential leftist threats type movement will probably be pleased by a Trump presidency, but their ideas will still remain scoffed upon and irrelevent. Until we see the masses of the bourgeiosie losing faith in the "legitimacy" of their parliamentary democracy, the threat of fascism will remain in the shadows. It's only under specific circumstances that fascism can flourish and those circumstances aren't present. Of course any leftist would agree that a Clinton presidency is preferable to a Trump one, but fascism is not one of the reasons why.

Moggallana

10th July 2016, 01:33

Full Metal Bolshevik

10th July 2016, 02:32

I don't know if it has been posted on this site, but this feels appropriate for the discussion @ Konikow and Location C

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6-T5ye_z5i0&feature=youtu.be

Moggallana

10th July 2016, 03:03

That was very well stated, thanks for sharing.

Konikow

10th July 2016, 05:12

Pablo Iglesias is a bourgeois enemy of the workers and oppressed! The hell with him!

Accept no alternatives! The workers need their own party! Anyone who says otherwise is an enemy!

(A)

10th July 2016, 05:52

Pablo Iglesias is a bourgeois enemy of the workers and oppressed! The hell with him!

Accept no alternatives! The workers need their own party! Anyone who says otherwise is an enemy!

Who carry's the Ban-hammer round here?

Full Metal Bolshevik

10th July 2016, 06:12

LeftistsAreRadical

10th July 2016, 06:18

Alet:

I understand where you're coming from, I've been grappling between the argument that I posted and the counterargument you made. I've found myself slipping back and forth between the two, as I can really see both sides. Although Bernie is, ultimately, a bourgeois politician, I still think that we, as leftists, should vote for him (as he is the only candidate that is actually legitimately progressive and not an absolute idiot). However, I think it is very important that we still make the distinction - both to supporters and non-supporters - between socialism and the democratic socialism that Bernie advocates, and not lose sight of the end goal. And I do understand the difference between reformism and the making of reforms. Each and every one of us is a 'reformist' to some degree. The difference between Lenin, Marx, et al and Bernie is that they were revolutionary reformists dedicated to the socialist cause, while Bernie is a political reformist advocating for left-centrism, which still allows for private ownership of the means of production. I think that is where the danger lies: losing sight of the end goal amidst positive political reformism. As long as we can continue to make that distinction, we should be okay.

So Bernie supporters trying to claim the idea that socialism is social democracy not some 'totalitarian' police state (which is the current definition of socialism in most of America) is actively harming the leftist movement?

No, the harm comes where the distinction between what socialism is and what democratic socialism is becomes erased or replaced. The issue is not that Bernie supporters are saying that the idea of socialism is "not some totalitarian police state", the issue is that they are replacing the idea of socialism with center-leftism, and leaving the idea of the "totalitarian police state" equated with radical leftism.

Moggallana

10th July 2016, 06:19

And where is that party?
And why do you create more enemies than what you can handle?

Ah, you might have missed the memo. Creating enemies is now en vogue & très chic.

Cliff Paul

10th July 2016, 07:26

No, the harm comes where the distinction between what socialism is and what democratic socialism is becomes erased or replaced. The issue is not that Bernie supporters are saying that the idea of socialism is "not some totalitarian police state", the issue is that they are replacing the idea of socialism with center-leftism, and leaving the idea of the "totalitarian police state" equated with radical leftism.

The idea that all the positives effects of the Bernie campaign (showing a left-wing alternative to neo-liberalism, sloganeering/politicizing class struggle, etc.) are somehow outweighed because some social democrats are starting to conflate social democracy with socialism is ridiculous.

GLF

10th July 2016, 07:41

...However, I think it is very important that we still make the distinction - both to supporters and non-supporters - between socialism and the democratic socialism that Bernie advocates, and not lose sight of the end goal...No, the harm comes where the distinction between what socialism is and what democratic socialism is becomes erased or replaced...

Okay, let's talk about distinctions. The first distinction that should be made is that Bernie Sanders is NOT a democratic socialist. That's the wrong designation, and a sad commentary on the political ignorance of Americans, including the Senator himself. Mr. Sanders is a social democrat.

Democratic Socialists want to transition from capitalism to socialism, but by means of the democratic process as opposed to revolution and overthrow. Social democrats, on the other hand, do not wish for any such transition, either by democratic ballot or revolution. The goal of social democrats is to bring about the positive conditions of socialism, but within a capitalist framework. This is accomplished using regulatory measures and government reforms. That's why it's so akin to Fascism.

Fascism is not about skinheads and white power. It's about class collaboration and state regulation of both labour and capital. Fascism is basically the State forcing the workers and the capitalists to kiss and make up. Unions are set up and collaborate with the government as referee. The State decides when both sides are deadlocked. This is just a little more hardcore than social democracy but it's all the same BS - fixing a system that's unfixable by forcing the workers and their lords to "play nicely".

You know, this is really basic stuff. Social democrats are bad news. How are we even debating this? Did I log on to the wrong forum? We are communists here, right?

(A)

10th July 2016, 08:44

Fascism is not about skinheads and white power. It's about class collaboration and state regulation of both labor and capital. Fascism is basically the State forcing the workers and the capitalists to kiss and make up. Unions are set up and collaborate with the government as referee. The State decides when both sides are deadlocked. This is just a little more hardcore than social democracy but it's all the same BS - fixing a system that's unfixable by forcing the workers and their lords to "play nicely".

You know, this is really basic stuff. Social democrats are bad news. How are we even debating this? Did I log on to the wrong forum? We are communists here, right?

Fascism is a form of radical authoritarian nationalism that came to prominence in early 20th-century Europe.

Yes fascism is about White nationalism (or other ethnic or state nationalisms), and Totalitarianism. The Only thing it shares is what is below.

Fascism opposes liberalism, Marxism and anarchism and is usually placed on the far-right within the traditional left–right spectrum.

Social Democracy is not fascism; they just share opposition to our goals.

Recuperation

10th July 2016, 14:23

Who an individual casts a vote for come election day is irrelevant from the perspective of revolutionary politics. The problem facing social democrats is that their entire strategy boils down to voting for a specific politician in a given election and nothing else. It's a dead end as far a social change goes and has been for over a century. Sanders doesn't offer anything from the future only a return to old tactics, tactics which were not enough to secure victory the first time around when something like a labor movement actually existed in this country. This is the farce that Marx mentions in his quote about history repeating itself.

GLF

10th July 2016, 15:55

Heretek

10th July 2016, 16:10

Yes fascism is about White nationalism (or other ethnic nationalism), and Totalitarianism. But it is also about the below.

So yes we should oppose it as it is against our goals but we should also recognize the progressive elements as well. They often help workers and help us keep our rights under Capitalism.

If you have to vote conservative or Social Democrat one is clearly better then the other.

Did I just read this right? Was that apologism for fascism?

There are absolutely, positively zero 'progressive' elements to fascism. A wikipedia article should always be taken with a grain of salt, but bullshit equating fascism and communism should be totally ignored. But reading that doesn't seem to imply that, unless that is a misquote?

Fascism exists as a reaction to worker's consciousness, a counter-revolutionary movement in its purest, most disgusting form. Fascism arises when ideologues realize liberalism, meaning bourgeois democracy, has failed to crush the agitation of the working class. And so the fascist organizes all possible organs of power to restrain the worker's movement, regardless of their original 'class nature.' They will use the police, the military, war, racism, and genocide to silence the workers' revolt. They will commandeer 'democracy,' the unions, and the parties and make them all organs of the state designed to oppress the left and ensure the conditions of class consciousness (bourgeois democracy) can never rise again. The unions will be used as pressure valves to relieve worker agitation, much like they do now, and to ostracize the 'trouble makers.' 'Rights to work' will ensure the complete enslavement of wage laborers to 14 hour clocks, make any kind of unemployment a death sentence, and empower employers to slash wages and rights. Fascism is the degradation of capitalism, it is the barbarism to our socialism, and it is the ultimate weapon against the workers, because it uses our own forces against us. To mistake to statification of unions and 'worker-employer' harmony as 'progressive' in the scheme of humanity is among the gravest of mistakes to be made, by anyone. Fascism is the ultimate contradiction of capitalism. The very term "National Socialist" is a contradiction and a disgusting disservice to the workers' movement.

Worse still, modern liberals use this against us, having accepted fascism==communism. Simply search socialism on the internet and plenty of charts showing the "toll of socialism" will appear comparing the Nazis, Stalinists, and Maoists, as all the same (this is, of course, another problem, to have socialism so misconstrued as any of these). And then come the 'tankies.' Fascists wearing the garb of 'communists'. Many of these eventually end up advocating for fascism, seeing the similarities between those three. Even worse, actual, potential socialists will be discouraged by such comparisons, by such definitions. Plenty of potential leftists end up floating around, voting for 'green parties' because "socialism=fascism=bad." So no, there is nothing 'progressive' to recognize in the embodiment of the arch-enemy.

GLF

10th July 2016, 18:09

Exactly. I don't think there is any question that Fascism has that effect on the working classes - I myself have said that Fascism is the kryptonite of the workers. But I have to admit that I really don't know whether or not the original blackshirts intended for Fascism to have that effect. I know at least some were former socialists, including Mussolini who was expelled for supporting the war. Fascists, like social democrats, actually believe they are fighting the good fight and believe their doctrine to be true socialism in a very organic and hyper-democratic sense (at least according to their quotes but they contradicted themselves a lot). They're utterly delusional, not necessarily evil. Personally, this is one of the reasons I make very little distinction between social democrats and the fascists. Keep in mind I'm talking about ideological fascists and not what the name is taken to mean today.

I think the important thing is to never tolerate Fascism...but also never tolerate it's little brother, social democracy.

Exterminatus

10th July 2016, 19:45

Oh god

Location, pull the brake a little. My advice: return to the previous page and study Alet's post extensively. It's a really great post written with language accessible to the beginners. If you have any more questions after grappling with the post then let us know and it will be addressed. If you do this, conceptions of fascism, social democracy and how each of them relates to Communism in 2016 will slowly start crystallizing in your head. I don't mean this in a condescending manner, i myself do this all the time when trying to grasp what users more versed in Marxism are talking about.

(A)

10th July 2016, 21:43

I deleted a line while working on it last night. I fixed it now.

Fascism is not about skinheads and white power. It's about class collaboration and state regulation of both labor and capital. Fascism is basically the State forcing the workers and the capitalists to kiss and make up. Unions are set up and collaborate with the government as referee. The State decides when both sides are deadlocked. This is just a little more hardcore than social democracy but it's all the same BS - fixing a system that's unfixable by forcing the workers and their lords to "play nicely".

You know, this is really basic stuff. Social democrats are bad news. How are we even debating this? Did I log on to the wrong forum? We are communists here, right?

Fascism is a form of radical authoritarian nationalism that came to prominence in early 20th-century Europe.

Yes fascism is about White nationalism (or other ethnic or state nationalisms), and Totalitarianism. The Only thing it shares is what is below.

Fascism opposes liberalism, Marxism and anarchism and is usually placed on the far-right within the traditional left–right spectrum.

Social Democracy is not fascism; they just share opposition to our goals.

LeftistsAreRadical

11th July 2016, 00:49

The idea that all the positives effects of the Bernie campaign (showing a left-wing alternative to neo-liberalism, sloganeering/politicizing class struggle, etc.) are somehow outweighed because some social democrats are starting to conflate social democracy with socialism is ridiculous.

I'm not attacking the alternative leftism, I'm saying that the distinction between center-leftism and leftism is being erased by the campaign and that it could be dangerous to the socialist movement in the future.

- - - Updated - - -

Location C:

Dude. Tone it down man, you're calling chihuahuas rabid bull dogs.

Freeloader

11th July 2016, 01:01

There is no revolutionary struggle that skips the struggle for reforms. Every Marxist understands this.
I couldn't agree more.
But every Marxist also participates in support of political reforms with the added critisism that those reforms are never safe-never truely won under capitalism, and that socialism is the only way to secure those reforms.

They [workers] are struggling with their everyday life and are yet not ready to relate their immediate problems to socialism. Before they can do this, they need to gain experience in political struggle, that is, in a struggle for reforms, which improve their living conditions.

This can to some extent even be applied to the reformist leadeship those who are not really "socialist", who still beleive in capitalism to some degree. It is only through the struggle of fighting for, enacting, defending and enhancing reforms that they can move to a really socialist position.

In order to bring an end to capitalism, we have to start with the conditions that are presently given. We want to actively change reality as it exists, and it will be a long and difficult struggle. If you think that it doesn’t matter whether we find ourselves in a bourgeois democracy or in fascism, you are dead fucking wrong. One might think so, if they believe that socialist practice is reducible to “worker revolution™”, but for actual socialists who understand the necessity of concrete struggles and reforms it does make a difference. Yes, fascists do effectively lengthen the rule of the bourgeoisie, but they do so at the expense of our ability to overthrow it. Fascism is not reducible to your “social democracy with extreme nationalism” bullshit. It puts us back to Stone Age and forces us to fight for bourgeois democracy again first and foremost, so we can make use of the political means to move toward socialism. Your pseudo-revolutionary rhetoric won’t help us, neither in fighting fascism, nor in sublating bourgeois democracy.

I have heard it expressed that the general marxist position on a transition from capitalism to socialism would be quick, with some bourgoise prejudices left over. I never really beleived this and so its refeshing to see the idea of socialist transformation as a long and difficult struggle, we shouldnt be under any illusions.

The only issue i take here is there is a danger of saying that becasue Trump has fascistic tendencies, Bernie was right to stick with the democrats and Hilary to unify against any possible Trump win. This can to easily lead movements astray into pure defensive manuverings against anything which could potentially be bad.
Similarily i dont think just becasue a triumph of fascism would put us back to the "stone age" that we would have to neccessarily fight for bourgoise democracy, it may be the case but the specific and material circumstances could allow for proletarian democracy. In anutshell the fear of fascism or its knocking at the door shouldnt be used to paralyse any political movements or progressive splits.

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

On a side note - British Marxists, and others, should be engaged against the british Labour party coup against its current leader. There you have a left reformist, who has spent a career on the left as a "socialist" (more left than bernie sanders) now elected leader, the party machinery has organised using whatever means neccessary to get rid of him. It is wrong for Marxists to dismiss these events as meaningless or not about the working class or socialism. It is fundementally a battle of politics- of class politics- of safeguarding capitalism, or safeguarding workers.

ckaihatsu

11th July 2016, 17:43

2016 Elections Underscore Need For Independent Labor Political Action

Once again the U.S. electorate is given the "choice" between two corporate parties and urged to vote for one of the two, despite their low ratings even among their members and supporters, not to mention independents.

To be sure, insurgents -- first Sen. Bernie Sanders, who ran in the Democratic primary, and Jill Ireland, expected to be the Green's candidate (their convention is in August) -- are throwing unexpected wrenches in the election machinery cycle.

The ultra radical reactionary anti-labor Donald Trump will be the third insurgent in a presidential election year where a dissatisfied electorate shows unmistakable signs of disgust with business as usual.

And once again the predominate labor leadership will pour hundreds of millions of dollars into the coffers of the Democratic Party nominee, regardless of its collaboration in whittling away at issues affecting working people. And once again AFL-CIO president Richard Trumka continues to declare that a Trump victory would be an unmitigated disaster for the labor movement, implying that a Democratic win would be a victory for the working class.

As has long been the pattern of labor politics -- with a growing number of dissenters among several unions and millions of rank-and-file workers -- "lesser evil" is the controlling consideration in determining labor's strategy. But how is that working out?

As these lines are being written, the Democratic Platform Committee in an initial draft has rejected single-payer health care, opposition to the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), and opposition to fracking. To be sure, this will be challenged in the days and weeks ahead with the controversy settled at the Party's convention in Philadelphia in late July. Sanders 1900 delegates show no signs of buckling into the fold easily.

But the question is this: labor has been characterized as the base of the Democratic Party so why should there be any issue regarding including its priorities being capstones in the Party's program?

The answer to that question is that the Democratic Party is corporate- controlled and remains subservient to the big money rollers, not to the working class. Today that Party stands exposed for the sham that it continues to perpetrate as the "party of the people."

Needed: An Independent Labor Movement With Its Own Political Party

It is high time for labor to challenge the monopoly that Big Business exercises in the electoral arena. To be sure, this requires the spearheading of a coalition with its community allies. Labor could be a magnetic force in helping to unite tens of millions in support of a program that reflects the needs of workers, communities of color, youth, environmentalists, and other progressive forces.

For the above reasons, the Labor Fightback Network urges the formation of independent labor-community coalitions in cities and states around the country based on a program collectively decided. Such coalitions, functioning democratically, could serve as building blocks for a national party, which is indispensable, and in the meanwhile run its own candidates to challenge the status quo. The alternative is despair, dissolution, and irrelevance.

Labor's failure to seize this rare moment will mean a continuation of the old politics, which has led to a deepening of multiple crises: unending imperialist wars, as in Afghanistan; the escalation of gunning down unarmed people of color on our streets by cops out of control; social programs under attack by both parties; massive unemployment and under-employment; mass incarceration; runaway military spending; the further poisoning of our environment; 50 million people living in poverty while 2/3 of all corporations pay no income taxes; upending assaults on abortion rights (despite the recent Supreme Court decision); climate change and more fracking.

If you agree with the above perspective, please let us know by calling 973-975-9704; writing PO box 187, Flanders, N.J. 07836; emailing conference @labor fightback.org; or visiting our website at laborfightback.org. Facebook link https://www.facebook.com/laborfightback

Issued by the Labor Fightback Network. For more information, please call
973-975-9704 or email [email protected] or write Labor Fightback Network, P.O. Box 187, Flanders, NJ 07836 or visit our website at laborfightback.org. Facebook link : https://www.facebook.com/laborfightback

Donations to help fund the Labor Fightback Network based on its program of solidarity and labor-community unity are necessary for our work to continue and will be much appreciated. Please make checks payable to Labor Fightback Network and mail to the above P.O. Box or you can make a contribution online. Thanks

GLF

11th July 2016, 19:43

Moggallana

11th July 2016, 23:49

(A)

12th July 2016, 00:12

So, unless I'm mistaken, some of you guys are saying that Statism is okay? Because that's what social democracy is. Let me again say that I'm not talking about democratic socialism which has been falsely attritubed to Benard Sanders. I'm talking about State regulation, State reforms, State mandates, State arbitration, State steered social democracy and everything that comes with it. Social democracy is about compromise. It doesn't take the knife away from the capitalists, it's just the State putting limits on how far they're allowed to twist it. It's class collaborationist, Statist nonsense. The only thing we should be talking about in regards to the State is how to smash it. NOT how to give it more power as long as they promise to bring reforms. This is fucking insanity.

Smash the state. Sanders can take his big brother cares BS and shove it.

I dont think anyone is supporting the state. I think we are trying to reconcile the effect that politics has on the working class. Some think that their is no point in fighting against tyranny within a capitalist state and others believe that that is the whole point.

In the Dialectic of Spontaneity and Organisation; Rosa Luxemburg's stance was:

"The working classes in every country only learn to fight in the course of their struggles ... Social democracy ... is only the advance guard of the proletariat, a small piece of the total working masses; blood from their blood, and flesh from their flesh. Social democracy seeks and finds the ways, and particular slogans, of the workers' struggle only in the course of the development of this struggle, and gains directions for the way forward through this struggle alone."

"Social democracy is simply the embodiment of the modern proletariat's class struggle, a struggle which is driven by a consciousness of its own historic consequences. The masses are in reality their own leaders, dialectically creating their own development process. The more that social democracy develops, grows, and becomes stronger, the more the enlightened masses of workers will take their own destinies, the leadership of their movement, and the determination of its direction into their own hands. And as the entire social democracy movement is only the conscious advance guard of the proletarian class movement, which in the words of the Communist Manifesto represent in every single moment of the struggle the permanent interests of liberation and the partial group interests of the workforce vis à vis the interests of the movement as whole, so within the social democracy its leaders are the more powerful, the more influential, the more clearly and consciously they make themselves merely the mouthpiece of the will and striving of the enlightened masses, merely the agents of the objective laws of the class movement."

"The modern proletarian class does not carry out its struggle according to a plan set out in some book or theory; the modern workers' struggle is a part of history, a part of social progress, and in the middle of history, in the middle of progress, in the middle of the fight, we learn how we must fight... That's exactly what is laudable about it, that's exactly why this colossal piece of culture, within the modern workers' movement, is epoch-defining: that the great masses of the working people first forge from their own consciousness, from their own belief, and even from their own understanding the weapons of their own liberation."

GLF

12th July 2016, 00:54

GLF

12th July 2016, 23:28

The Intransigent Faction

13th July 2016, 02:42

Well, well, well... After all the sanctimonious, revisionist apologism and mental gymnastics I've had to endure on this forum the last couple of days, I'd hate to say I told you so. But...I told you so.

1933. 2016. Different years, same old Social Democrats...eager to betray the workers the first sign of trouble. Except this time, instead of running from communism into the welcoming arms of Fascism they are running from populism into the waiting arms of corporatism. Social democrats are spineless cowards, false prophets, and deserve no less than to be smashed along with the Bourgeois apparatus for which they show such affinity.

Rot in hell, Bernard Sanders. And all your apologists, too.

But wait! Maybe this was all part of Bernie's plan, and he's just testing his followers to make sure they won't abandon socialism even when when they think he has!

Just kidding!

This directly contradicts what he and his campaign, and certain elements in the "alternative media" have trumpeted about Bernie Sanders's "political revolution".

This campaign has never been about any single candidate. It is always about transforming America.

I think he was able to present himself as a "democratic socialist" and hoodwink a lot of people (including some you'd expect not to fall for it) because of the degree to which his campaign stretched, at least rhetorically, the need for a "political revolution" extending beyond Bernie Sanders's candidacy, and the way he consistently repeated policy demands further to the left than hitherto "mainstream" discourse. There was always some ambiguity about this "revolution".

So, this outcome tells us nothing new (or at least nothing we shouldn't have already known) about the nature of social democracy. What it does show is the limitations of "democratic socialism" insofar as its incrementalist demands make it practically indistinguishable from social democracy regardless of its supposed aims.

A sustained movement motivated by sloganeering and demands for incremental change can easily be adapted to the existing system while cloaking itself in a "radical" image---but one which is radical only from a liberal or reactionary hegemonic perspective. So, even among "Bernie or Bust", ideas of a continued movement for "change" are limited, and they'll be won over to Clinton or a fringe candidate far more easily than they would be to an actual socialist revolution.

Heretek

13th July 2016, 19:41

Sorry, what? I noticed you just changed your avatar to be the Anarchist A, yet your profile states that you identify as a Maoist. When you talk about smashing the state, what do you mean, exactly? What happens after the state is smashed? After how many years of the protacted people's war will the state be smashed? Can this people's war take place in developed countries or does it have to take place in a jungle? :confused::grin:

No communist is 'pro-state.' Even Stalinists will argue 'eventually we'll give it up.' Communism is, again, a classless, stateless society, so it stands to reason we would be opposed to states and governments. The only difference between this and anarchism (worth mentioning here anyways) is the existence of a transition state in the form of the dictatorship of the proletariat, which could appear to be 'state-like.' Of course some people refuse to accept that definition and are inherently opposed to it because of a simple dislike of terminology. (And yes I understand the post I'm replying to is an off topic jab at another user)

- - - Updated - - -

But wait! Maybe this was all part of Bernie's plan, and he's just testing his followers to make sure they won't abandon socialism even when when they think he has!

Just kidding!

This directly contradicts what he and his campaign, and certain elements in the "alternative media" have trumpeted about Bernie Sanders's "political revolution".

I think he was able to present himself as a "democratic socialist" and hoodwink a lot of people (including some you'd expect not to fall for it) because of the degree to which his campaign stretched, at least rhetorically, the need for a "political revolution" extending beyond Bernie Sanders's candidacy, and the way he consistently repeated policy demands further to the left than hitherto "mainstream" discourse. There was always some ambiguity about this "revolution".

So, this outcome tells us nothing new (or at least nothing we shouldn't have already known) about the nature of social democracy. What it does show is the limitations of "democratic socialism" insofar as its incrementalist demands make it practically indistinguishable from social democracy regardless of its supposed aims.

A sustained movement motivated by sloganeering and demands for incremental change can easily be adapted to the existing system while cloaking itself in a "radical" image---but one which is radical only from a liberal or reactionary hegemonic perspective. So, even among "Bernie or Bust", ideas of a continued movement for "change" are limited, and they'll be won over to Clinton or a fringe candidate far more easily than they would be to an actual socialist revolution.

I just read an article from People's World (the CPUSA newspaper, yes I know it's trash). Apparently, as per their usual reformist crap, they see Clinton and Sanders as a "United Front against Trump," and "We're stronger together." And of course they believe the platitude of "We promise to work towards the reforms Senator Sanders has brought up."

Moggallana

13th July 2016, 21:05

No communist is 'pro-state.' Even Stalinists will argue 'eventually we'll give it up.' Communism is, again, a classless, stateless society, so it stands to reason we would be opposed to states and governments. The only difference between this and anarchism (worth mentioning here anyways) is the existence of a transition state in the form of the dictatorship of the proletariat, which could appear to be 'state-like.' Of course some people refuse to accept that definition and are inherently opposed to it because of a simple dislike of terminology. (And yes I understand the post I'm replying to is an off topic jab at another user)

This is confusing. Is this apologism for Stalinists and other similar name-ists? Or is it a defence of Location C?

Communism is, again, a classless, stateless society, so it stands to reason we would be opposed to states and governments.

the existence of a transition state [...] which could appear to be 'state-like.'

This is the point where a right winger would derogatorily say "tsk tsk, those typical leftists didn't learn anything from history, and they think that, next time, the transitional state will work for sure!"

Heretek

13th July 2016, 23:58

This is confusing. Is this apologism for Stalinists and other similar name-ists? Or is it a defence of Location C?

No. Maybe if read with context, it would be clearer I refer rather derogatorily to Stalinists 'and similar name-ists.' Perhaps my signature wasn't visible?

It is a 'defense,' as if we need protecting, against fools for whom differentiation, terminology, theory, and practice have no meaning if their opposition identifies as 'communist,' however broad that term is, literally encompassing unaligned and contrary movements.

This is the point where a right winger would derogatorily say "tsk tsk, those typical leftists didn't learn anything from history, and they think that, next time, the transitional state will work for sure!"

I'm absolutely positive you mean to refer to scum such as 'democratic socialists' and 'social democrats,' or even so-called 'anarchists' (but as I and others have said, modern 'anarchists' are very bad at actually being anarchists), as that ilk has already stated such things before. A right wing response is a) irrelevant, and b) chronically opposed to leftism, hence the term 'rightist.' If you really want to fraternize with racists, misogynists, and outright fascists, you can message our oh-so-generous administration for restricted access.

Then of course, reformist nonsense has worked so well for the working class now hasn't it? Two world wars, the abandonment of internationalism, the rise of fascism, the collapse of the Russian and Spanish revolutions, the institutionalization of unions, world hegemony of Western capital, housing, food, water, and immigration crises, and countless wars for the interests of capital interests. The list goes on, and continues to grow. Perhaps the recent 'betrayal' of Sanders to the side of Clinton? (This is irrelevant of course, he was always reformist and would always have toed the line of the left of capital, such is bourgeois democracy).

Moggallana

14th July 2016, 05:32

I'm absolutely positive you mean to refer to scum such as 'democratic socialists' and 'social democrats,' or even so-called 'anarchists' (but as I and others have said, modern 'anarchists' are very bad at actually being anarchists), as that ilk has already stated such things before. A right wing response is a) irrelevant, and b) chronically opposed to leftism, hence the term 'rightist.' If you really want to fraternize with racists, misogynists, and outright fascists, you can message our oh-so-generous administration for restricted access.

Dude, what the fuck are you even on about?

Heretek

14th July 2016, 12:05

Dude, what the fuck are you even on about?

How irrelevant your post was, how irrelevant your future posts will be (such as this one), and how the criticisms of social democrats should not concern the left. The criticisms of the rightists already should not matter, but according to you they do. Drawing conclusions based upon what little you have actually provided to the board, you're a reformist, looking to slightly make 'better capitalism' and prevent a disruption of the system. To cause a rift with the right is criminal in your mind, to divorce ourselves from the current state of affairs. A communist is simply a crazed ideologue with harmful ideas to you, looking to destroy your 'way of life.'

For example, rather than address the points presented, you have simply conflated what I presented with nonsense, therefore in your mind absolved the need to actually answer, for who would bother to argue with a fool? Just to be clear, I am not arguing against you, because I don't care about whatever the hell it is you do. The only reason I respond is because others read these forums, and to let nonsensical crap to float around instead of actual material simply harms the userbase, the potential userbase, and all current and potential leftists.

Your refusal to address any of the other points is also noted but not unexpected.

leftwinger2007

14th July 2016, 12:36

Bernie Sanders claims to be a Democratic Socialist but not a Marxist is this true ?

GLF

14th July 2016, 18:47

Bernie Sanders claims to be a Democratic Socialist but not a Marxist is this true ?It is true that he claims to be a democratic socialist. If he actually were a democratic socialist, then I wouldn't have as big a problem with his movement. Though I myself am not a democratic socialist, I see the movement as innocuous if not somewhat helpful when it comes to instilling class consciousness in the workers.

The problem with Bernie Sanders is that he is not a democratic socialist; his platform has nothing to do with democratic socialism. Democratic socialists seek a transition from bourgeois democracy to a socialist democracy, using non-revolutionary means, and bring about a direct democracy in the functioning of a semi-stateless, socialist society.

Bernie Sanders is a social democrat. Social democrats want their cake and to eat it, too. The idea is to take the so-called "best elements" from capitalism (private ownership, self motivation, free-enterprise) and combine them with the so-called "best elements" of socialism (provisions for the needy, healthcare for all, etc). The way they go about doing this is by giving even more power to the bourgeois state apparatus.

Bernie Sanders is a traitor to the working classes. He promises free stuff but wants to strengthen the State. He is also a zionist. Last but not least, he wants to disarm the proles. This guy is so anti-communist it's not even funny. Trump would be better because Trump's a moron who would screw things up (which would lead to more class conflict). Sanders would pacify and disarm the workers while strengthening the State.

I'm in "worse is better" mode. Sanders would NOT bring about the conditions conducive to class conflict.

Heretek

14th July 2016, 19:42

Kohai

14th July 2016, 22:56

Well since Bernie has endorsed Clinton, what do we do now? Do we just say fuck it and vote for Stein or do we have other plans?

Kohai

14th July 2016, 23:02

we must understand that Sanders is an EVOLUTIONARY Socialist, not a Revolutionary Socialist. He believes in getting voted in and having a Majority rule like Germany did about a century ago. he doesn't want an actual revolution, he wants reform and also to keep a capitalist system with "regulations". Democratic Socialism has changed since Red October and it's not what we want as social anarchists. we want revolution and CHANGE not Tracing the outlines of the old system like Sanders is willing to do.

Heretek

14th July 2016, 23:14

What are you talking about.

You have two contradictory posts and arguments. Voting does not and will not affect change in the current state of affairs, and nothing has changed about 'democratic socialism.' It has never existed except as the title of the Scandinavian countries as bestowed by capital. Social democracy has always been social democracy and something the revolutionary left opposes.

Almost none of the users here are anarchists in the first place, but what the hell is a 'social anarchist?' Revolution cannot occur without the accompanying economic and social change. Without altering the system, you are simply a 'revolutionary' social democrat.

xFIRESTORMx

15th July 2016, 04:16

Sanders is not a "social democrat" because he and his party are not part of the labor movement and never have been.

I was under the impression he was a social democrat, obviously he isn't a democratic socialist but if I am correct a social democrat is basically a state capitalist that advocates a more prominent welfare state and an increase in economic regulation and social benefits, which is basically what is is.

(A)

15th July 2016, 04:40

Almost none of the users here are anarchists in the first place, but what the hell is a 'social anarchist?'

"Social anarchism (sometimes referred to as socialist anarchism) is a non-state form of socialism and is considered to be the branch of anarchism which sees individual freedom as being dependent upon mutual aid. Social anarchist thought emphasizes community and social equality as complimentary to autonomy and personal freedom."

This includes all the more anarchist trends of libertarian Socialism~

Mutualism
Collectivist anarchism
Anarchist communism
Anarcho-syndicalism
Communialism (Libertarian Municipalism)
Platformism (Anarchist vanguardism)

As for Sanders. IF he is really a Democratic Socialist as he claims he is either non-revolutionary or he simply knows that saying he wants to destroy capitalism would also destroy his political carrier so is a reformist.

We should be clear tho;

Democratic socialism is a political ideology that advocates political democracy alongside social ownership of the means of production, often with an emphasis on democratic management of enterprises within a socialist economic system. The term "democratic socialism" is sometimes used synonymously with "socialism"; the adjective "democratic" is often added to distinguish it from the Marxist–Leninist brand of socialism. Democratic socialism is not specifically revolutionary or reformist, as many types of democratic socialism can fall into either category, with some forms overlapping with social democracy, supporting reforms within capitalism as a prelude to the establishment of socialism.

Luxemburgism for instance is a Marxist, revolutionary form of democratic socialism that seeks to overthrow Capitalism and establish Communism.

Moggallana

15th July 2016, 06:17

How irrelevant your post was, how irrelevant your future posts will be (such as this one), and how the criticisms of social democrats should not concern the left. The criticisms of the rightists already should not matter, but according to you they do. Drawing conclusions based upon what little you have actually provided to the board, you're a reformist, looking to slightly make 'better capitalism' and prevent a disruption of the system. To cause a rift with the right is criminal in your mind, to divorce ourselves from the current state of affairs. A communist is simply a crazed ideologue with harmful ideas to you, looking to destroy your 'way of life.'

For example, rather than address the points presented, you have simply conflated what I presented with nonsense, therefore in your mind absolved the need to actually answer, for who would bother to argue with a fool? Just to be clear, I am not arguing against you, because I don't care about whatever the hell it is you do. The only reason I respond is because others read these forums, and to let nonsensical crap to float around instead of actual material simply harms the userbase, the potential userbase, and all current and potential leftists.

Your refusal to address any of the other points is also noted but not unexpected.

I apologize if I have not made myself clear enough to be understood, but I think that you've had animosity towards me from my first post, and that might be colouring how you're reading what I've written. You call my stuff "nonsensical crap", so I will elucidate things so that, perhaps, it may be understood more clearly.

The way I see it, we are in a time in history where revolutionary potential is basically nil. We have had over 150 years of repression from the ruling class, as you are quite aware, this has led to the lack of "opposition" and revolutionary potential today. When I say "revolutionary potential", I do not mean the potential for revolt. Revolts may happen and may even result in the toppling of a state or two (if it even gets that far, which, historically, it usually doesn't), but they do not consitute the Revolution (which you could define as the event/process that has enough power, momentum, and class consciousness that it could topple global capitalism). Because of the lack of revolutionary potential today (which ebbs and flows as time and events shape the tide), tactics have changed and will continue to do so. This is a good time to think and rethink what we need to do. A lot has happened in the past 150 years and a lot of conditions have changed. We need to have our ear to the ground to get a feel for the conditions of today. Being divorced from material reality does no favors for anyone.

This may perhaps come as a shock to you but the vast majority of people aren't communists. Nor anarchists. Nor revolutionary. The vast majority of working class people have grown up and been socialized by the capitalist hegemony, and it's very obvious that a lot of them hold reactionary views. Is our job as revolutionaries to push them away or to educate them? Are we, as communists, not to embody the "advanced elements" of the working class, ones that can help shine the light of class consciousness into the dark cave of the false consciousness that systematically plagues the working class?

I'm absolutely positive you mean to refer to scum such as 'democratic socialists' and 'social democrats,' or even so-called 'anarchists' [...] If you really want to fraternize with racists, misogynists, and outright fascists, you can message our oh-so-generous administration for restricted access.

This is just absurd. Again, this may shock you, but did you know that a lot of democratic socialists and social democrats are *gasp* working class human beings? I also don't know why you think that I fraternize with racists and fascists (when I have pretty much explicitly stated the opposite about the latter, at least). What I do is engage other people, to try to stimulate the growth of class consciousness in them, so that they may eventually shed off the shackles of ignorance that keep them chained to their reactionary ideologies, which could lead to them committing to and fully understanding (to the best of their ability, as people have a variance in the level of political development that they are currently on, so to speak) the revolutionary political movement, whether that means some sort of anarchist or communist, or a sympathizer. And even communists and anarchists have various degrees and levels of understanding. I don't understand why you would call democratic socialists "scum" when they are pretty much one epiphany away from giving up their reformist ideas for revolutionary ones. Social democrats could be two epiphanies away. Pushing them away instead of educating them and trying to get them on our side is folly. We should be building movements and organizations, not walls and unnecessary divisions. In all of this, I absolutely and only refer to people from the working class. Social democrats/democratic socialists that are in power/part of the ruling class are class traitors or class enemies. There is no question about that.

The right wingers may be way farther away from understanding/accepting revolutionary politics, but that doesn't mean they're lost causes. A quick example would be Trump's supporters in the US. A very, very large portion of his supporters are poor, working class people, that have a thick veil of false consciousness clouding their minds. Are we to turn our backs on them and view them as enemies? If so, then you not only alienate a large portion of the working class from the class consciouness they so truly and desperately need (perhaps more so than any other denomination of people), but you also bottleneck the growth of the revolutionary movement, as those people will be class enemies in the event of a revolt or even the Revolution. Nazis and fascists (and their ilk) are class traitors and the only time to engage with them is if someone understands their folly, renounces their ways, and shows the authentic desire to learn about revolutionary politics (and even then they must be kept at a distance, as fascists are known for their infiltrationism). During any other time, I'd say that "no platform" is in effect, and the only time to engage a fascist is when you engage their face into the pavement :lol:.

You say that I am a reformist but I engage in no such activities. I do not want to make a "better capitalism", as I am thoroughly anti-capitalist. I hold only contempt for the bourgeois political/economic system and I do not engage with it in any positive way, nor do I condone reformism in any sense of the word. I hold no views that the political system should be taken over by participating in bourgeois elections, nor do I call for anything other than the abolition of it. I am staunchly against class collaboration. The only disruption of the system that I would be against is one that is clearly suicidal (like attempting a revolt that would clearly fail and dwindle our numbers and waste human resources unnecessarily; a living communist is infinitely more useful than a martyred one in a ditch).

Because we are in a time of low revolutionary potential, with a dwindling number of real, committed communists/anarchists/revolutionaries, we need to be extremely careful and mindful of our activities, so that we don't engage in useless work, and so that we can be as productive as our limitations allow. We need theory desperately, but that theory needs to be applicable today. Sitting around and hypothesizing about how a transitional state will look like after the revolution breaks out (for example) is all fine and dandy but if the revolution comes twenty years from now, and the conditions of those future times are different than they are now (especially technologically but also socially and politically), then that whole theorization (or at least a decently large chunk of it) can go into the trash, rendering useless those hours spent on it. Those precious hours could have instead been used more wisely, like planting the seeds of class consciousness in society (for example), so that, if that revolution still breaks out in those same twenty years (or sooner), it would have a higher chance of success. An increase in class consciousness might even allow for that same "transitional theorization" to happen much more fruitfully in the future, closer to the revolution, where it would be grounded in the conditions of those times.

Yesterday I went to a bi-weekly reading group, which I set up, involving one of the local farmers unions. There were about thirty people. We read and discussed a few of the chapters from Kropotkin's The Conquest of Bread, and there were a lot of great questions raised. A month ago most of these people were skeptical of anarchism, and as of yesterday (which was the third time we met up to do this kind of thing), a lot of them have warmed up to it. Even the "social democrat"-type farmers (which basically makes up at least half of them), that, at first, were saying that the best way to help farmers is to elect a party that would hold them in esteem, now, after some rich open discussions, they're starting to understand the futility of bourgeois politics. Soon we'll finish the book, and I've given them other stuff to read in the meantime (there will be Q&As and discussions about them). Absolutely none of them knew anything about anarchism or revolutionary politics in general before we had our first meetup, and the only thing they knew about communism was "Stalin killed seven trillion people". And now, in such a short period of time, they know quite a bit. And in the near future, I think that they'll be extremely sympathetic to the revolutionary movement. And yet I'm a reformer, right? I don't mention this story just to puff out my chest or to show off, but the point will be made in the next paragraph.

I am not 100% sure what you're about but if you hold such contempt for large swaths of the working class while having an attitude of being in an "elite communist clubhouse", and that everybody just marginally to the right of you is scum, then I don't know what to tell you. I actually don't really need to tell you anything, because the numbers speak volumes. Let's take those farmers from my previous paragraph as a quick, final example. They're "social democrats" (ideologically, and not necessarily officially, as in a party affiliation, for example), as are probably a lot of workers that work in the food industry. Are they scum? If you truly think they are, then I wish you good luck with your future "revolution", which not only is not around the corner, but, from the very beginning, it will be fought on an empty stomach.

leftwinger2007

15th July 2016, 07:23

Bernie Sanders supports Clinton it shows that he is not a true Socialist in my opinion/views.

GLF

15th July 2016, 15:12

Class conflict is not something we should find desirable, we seek to destroy class in its entirety, it is something we find necessary and inevitable.

I am in complete disagreement about Trump. The accelerationism thread expresses my and others views adequately. Repression through force is just as bad for the working class as repression through ignorance. One is not worse than another, both are equally destructive. The only 'benefit' from social democracy that it has over repression is public discourse is allowed. If we lived under total authoritarianism of which Trump is supported by, this site would not be safe (it isn't safe now). The 'benefit' of repression is an increased disunity between the ruling class as they compete (but of course workers die in their conflicts).

http://www.revleft.com/vb/threads/195692-Let-s-Talk-Accelerationism?highlight=accelerationism

One month ago I would've agreed with you on Trump. After some contemplation I honestly think people are giving the guy too much credit. I think Trump is an attention seeking moron, not a Fascist. He's flip-flopped so much in the last month that I've lost all fear of him. I see him as a joke now. Now what he is stirring up is no joking matter - there is a movement behind him that we should definitely take seriously. But I don't think Trump would be able to channel this movement because I don't think he cares about anything but himself.

I honestly don't care what happens. I won't be voting (never voted once in my life and that won't change).

I respectfully disagree with you on class conflict. While I admit that it's not desirable, conditions conducive to class struggle help bring about an end to capitalism. When your belly is full you want sleep, not conflict.

ckaihatsu

15th July 2016, 17:17

http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2016/07/15/gree-j15.html

leftwinger2007

16th July 2016, 15:53

Is the Green Party better compared to the Democratic Party ?

ckaihatsu

16th July 2016, 19:46

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Is the Green Party better compared to the Democratic Party ?

There is nothing “revolutionary” about either the Sanders’ campaign or the Green Party. As the Socialist Equality Party warned from the beginning, Sanders has worked to tap into anticapitalist sentiment that has grown during the Obama years of bank bailouts and endless wars in order to contain and strangle it.

There is a division of labor between Sanders on the one side and the Greens, which are nominally independent from the Democrats, on the other. While the Vermont senator and Democratic operatives like Jackson, Dean and Kucinich before him perpetuated the myth that the Democrats could be pushed to the left from the inside, the Greens seek to pressure the Democrats from the outside. In either case, such a perspective is a political dead end for the working class.

While the Greens maintain an organizational independence from the Democratic Party, they are not an anticapitalist, let alone working-class or socialist, party. Far from seeking the overthrow of capitalism, the Greens advance the interests of a specific section of the middle class seeking “green business” opportunities and greater influence in corporate and government policy.

http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2016/07/15/gree-j15.html

Alet

18th July 2016, 23:47

Look, I will be the first to admit that I'm not perfect. And you're right - I don't really do as much good as I would like. But I do try and I am learning. I don't know half as much as some of the people on this site - perhaps including you. And I will admit that I and others on this site come across as dismissive

You are so fucking far beyond the point, I don’t even know where to start. Despite lacking the time to devote myself to the thread, I kept following it last week, and every single time I’ve read one of your beautiful revolutionary-in-spirit-posts I felt disappointed, distressed, infuriated and, most of all, provoked. Here we can read your claim that you are truly struggling to become a practical communist, to become a critical thinker, and for a short moment I was actually thinking that you are genuine. But then we get this shit, which just serves to reaffirm my points, which you still haven’t addressed because you are unable to do this.

First off, the problem is not that you are “dismissive” alone, the problem is that your “dismissiveness” is an expression of your reactionary sentiments, which impede your ability to ruthlessly criticize everything. In other words, I didn’t argue that you are “dismissive” and that’s why you are reactionary, I’ve quite explicitly said that you are “dismissive” because you are reactionary and take way too much for granted. Why did other people understand this while you didn’t? Furthermore, the problem is not that you are “not perfect”. What a hilarious excuse when I unambiguously and explicitly said that: “It is not a shame to be wrong. But it is a shame to uncritically insist on one's ignorance.” This is your problem: Not that you are not an intellectual but that you are not even ready to become one. This is the reason I get this “you got a point, comrade, you are smart, comrade, but I will never ever support a social democrat etc.” from you. You haven’t even tried to understand what I was talking about, that’s the whole point.

What it means to be a communist is basically… dependent on how much you take for granted and how much you are ready to ruthlessly criticize to the point where your criticism has practical implications for you as a living being, an active part of the bourgeois order. Your communism is an identity and your critical thinking – is just as fake. And let’s just make one thing clear: We are not comrades and we will never be comrades until you stop reaffirming my initial points. But this requires genuine engagement on your part.

I will not sell out for a social democrat.

Be honest, have you actually addressed any argument critically and thoroughly? If so, why did you think that it isn’t necessary to share your thoughts with us? And if not – what the hell are you even doing on this board? Or did you just read the first few paragraphs and thought that the rest of my post is irrelevant and not even a contribution to the controversy? You see, this is exactly what I was talking about when I was demonstrating that you and Konikow are hidden reactionaries. You respond to my post, with your back to the wall, and you still manage to escape by pretending that you address my points. You don’t do this not because you are stupid but because you have something to insist upon and this very fact translates into war cries such as: “I will not and cannot except a social democrat” although you have no idea what being a Social Democrat actually means (but we will come to that later). Don’t get me wrong, it’s not your definition of Social Democracy itself which you are not ready to criticize, there are numerous things behind it – personal, psychological roots, which translate into this pseudo-revolutionary rhetoric. This is why I claim that you are not ready, and all you do is confirm this.

What clearly constitutes my response to your garbage is that your qualifications for being a “social democrat” are unjustified in the first place. You can keep coming at us with your “social democrats are ultimately fascists because they facilitate its rise” etc. but what you don’t understand, what you probably don’t even want to understand is that this does not in the least apply to Bernie Sanders. This is what sustains my post and you still haven’t addressed this. Your line of thought is based on the groundless premise that Sanders is simply a “social democrat” but you don’t have any idea of social democracy or Sanders’ political significance whatsoever.

That fact of the matter is that- no, why do I even have to repeat my points now? I have elaborated on my position above, you have not addressed one single statement, yet. So feel free to counter my arguments or don’t even respond at all. If you can’t thoroughly defend your position, you should seriously ask yourself what you are doing on this board.

But the more I think about it the more I think Trump would be better than Sanders because at least Trump would screw things up so bad people would demand change.

Beautiful, more vulgar Marxist bullshit that has been literally ripped apart on this board numerous fucking times, not even solely by me. But if you want to have this discussion with me, I have addressed this already here (http://www.revleft.com/vb/threads/194202-Bernie-Sanders?p=2867819#post2867819) and here (http://www.revleft.com/vb/threads/195692-Let-s-Talk-Accelerationism?p=2872334#post2872334). Feel free to (self-)critically address my points or don’t engage in this discussion at all.

Democratic Socialists want to transition from capitalism to socialism, but by means of the democratic process as opposed to revolution and overthrow.

And this is totally meaningless because it is either a fantasy or it is actually a possible, tactically preferable alternative to a violent revolution – if so, it’s not even distinct from “traditional” Marxism/Communism at all, considering that Marx himself approved this for (I think) the Netherlands. I think we all agree that the former applies to Democratic Socialists. While the revolution, of course, plays a decisive role in communist ideology, it’s not because it is what essentially sustains Communism – we “merely” consider it a necessity (notice that I’m careful with this phrasing). As opposed to that, the insistence on the “transition from capitalism to socialism, but by means of the democratic process as opposed to revolution and overthrow” is not simply a matter of strategy, which might vary from country to country, it is ideologically distinct from Communism.

You might misunderstand this because ideology is, according to you, reducible to positive claims and various aims, but in actual fact, ideological currents are much more than this. Democratic Socialism is not reducible to “striving for the transition from capitalism to socialism, but by means of the democratic process as opposed to revolution and overthrow” just like capitalism is not reducible to “free markets and private property” and just like Communism is not reducible to “classless, stateless society”, and so on. The insistence on a peaceful, “democratic” transition as opposed to violent revolution is an expression of a much wider relation to social reality.

In other words, you fail to understand ideological currents in their relation to the reproduction of capitalism, i.e. how they relate to reality (why they exist in the first place etc.), how they translate reality in their consciousness and how they actually influence reality. This is the reason for your “Trump = reactionary populist, Clinton = corporatist, Sanders = social democrat” in the first place. You have no clue what actually constitutes their political significance, you simply evaluate it according to their rhetoric and their proposals, as if there were a checklist for Social Democracy or fascism. Your qualifications for political ideologies are ultimately anti-materialist, and that’s why you ultimately fail to appreciate the progressive that Sanders represents.

If there is one meaningful way we can speak of Democratic Socialism as a distinct ideological current, it has to recognize its inherently progressive character, progressive insofar as it, confronting the era of neoliberalism, offers short-term proposals which do not significantly differ from those Marxists could offer. While our true communist heroes talk of revolution and expropriation, Democratic Socialists are at least potentially able to do something in the realm of Realpolitik, of course, not in the spirit of a socialist future (although they think that what they are striving for is socialism, but this is the point of understanding ideology in relation to reality) but they are our necessary starting point. Of course, the proposals of Democratic Socialists are not always sufficient, sometimes even dangerously wrong, I have already stressed this. But before one can criticize them on this basis, one first, as a Marxist, has to acknowledge that they are way more revolutionary than Konikow and his crew.

The goal of social democrats is to bring about the positive conditions of socialism, but within a capitalist framework.

And this line of thought just proves my point that you have no idea how to assess ideological currents in their relation to capitalism. You think that Communism is about everyone having a socially acceptable life, eliminating the gap between the rich and the poor, everybody hugging and kissing, and all those fancy features. You would understand that there are no “positive conditions of socialism” within the framework of capitalism, if you knew what it means to be a Communist in the first place. And no, it’s not that the “positive conditions of socialism within a capitalist framework” are merely not possible because of “material conditions” or the necessity of capital accumulation, and so on; the point is that hypothetically speaking even, there could not even exist “positive conditions of socialism” within capitalism. That is because being a Communist entails not only the devotion to the revolutionary cause, which will bring about a completely new society, it is first of all an “ethical” stance, it is a “mode of consciousness”, if you will. It is not about the desire to establish a classless, stateless society with these and those features, it is not reducible to a mere political position, it is live-changing for the Communist individual.

It is really hard to explain this to someone who wouldn’t understand because he refuses to engage in ruthless self-criticism and is therefore not ready to become a Communist. Let me put it this way: Communism changes you not only as a political subject but first and foremost as an individual, as an “ethical subject”. It does so necessarily because it entails various philosophical, ontological etc. positions which are not reconcilable with one’s former bourgeois consciousness that one acquired necessarily by not only living in but by being an active part of bourgeois society. Communism “kills” your bourgeois consciousness, if you will, in ruthlessly criticizing what you formerly took for granted. This is why the ruling classes cannot recognize the true meaning and the practical implications of Socialism without committing moral suicide, to paraphrase Kautsky.

That is why Socialism can only ever be negative within the framework of capitalism.

This is accomplished using regulatory measures and government reforms. That's why it's so akin to Fascism.

And you don’t understand fascism for the exact same reason you don’t understand Democratic Socialism, Social Democracy or Socialism. These fucking laughable abstractions “fascists use regulatory measures and government reforms… oh, and they are extremely nationalist” full stop. This is what qualifies fascism in your mind. Do you really believe this? Do you really believe that this is what essentially constitutes facism? It’s so laughable to stress that these are meaningless abstractions. That’s the reason why he throws buzzwords like “social fascist” around. “Regulatory measures and government reforms”. Do you literally want me to give you examples for regulatory measures and government reforms that were 100% not fascist, because they were either established before one could meaningfully speak of fascism or because they were an achievement of the worker class – or both? I don’t even want to play this game with you. The Ten Hours’ Bill was social fascism, I guess. And what about the concessions following 1848 or the concessions following the uprisings in Russia in the early 20th century, parliaments etc.? Is this “liberal fascism” or what?

I have already explained why Sanders does not and cannot facilitate the victory of fascism. In fact, he is the one who creates the spirit to fight this scum. If Sanders would facilitate the victory of fascism by advocating reforms, there would be a tactical alternative, a different political program which is more radical and which is not phrasemongering. You offer us none, Konikow offers us none, there is not a single true socialist who can give us a concrete idea of what is to be done.

You know, this is really basic stuff.

Yes, this is indeed really basic stuff, hence I said: “Have you ever noticed how every thorough discussion about any topic turns into a more thorough discussion about the "basics" of Marxism (materialism etc.)? Why is that so? It is because, in our epoch, two Marxists do not share the same ideological inclination.” Don’t pretend that we have the same goal but simply different strategies of achieving this goal. The difference between you and actually inclined socialists is fundamental. This is not simply a tactical controversy anymore. You can keep complaining that “this is so hard although it’s actually so basic and so easy” but it’s really just because you are not ready to engage in ruthless self-criticism.

A whole lot of "intellectualizing" to get us to support the ruling party of U.S. capitalism because the other capitalist candidate is "fascist"! (never heard that one before!)

You self-righteously mock your opponents although you have no fucking idea what you are talking about, although you don’t actually understand (if you even tried to understand) what they are saying. Every single time one reads your post, they know that you haven’t read what has been written. It is simply too obvious and it’s laughable how literally every single line in your uncritical, lazy post is nothing but a strawman because you are not able to think.

Sanders is not reducible to “the ruling party of U.S. capitalism” and I’ve fucking elaborated upon this already. I really don’t know how one could come to this conclusion. If my point was simply about supporting the Democratic Party because the Republicans have a fascist, if my argument merely amounts to the line of thought that “capitalism as usual is still better than fascism”… why, pray tell, WHY wouldn’t I have advocated for supporting Hillary Clinton? I mean, it’s so obvious that Sanders could and should have surrendered a long time ago, if it was simply about becoming president or defeating Trump. Yet, this shit for brains assumes that I support Sanders because I think he is the “lesser evil” or something.

Again, my whole point was that Sanders is not simply a candidate of the Democratic Party, he does not simply represent bourgeois capitalism “as usual” – he, in fact, represents a movement within society. You see, my aim is not to determine the “best candidate” or the “lesser evil”, I don’t care about the candidates as individuals. You can keep your “this is capitalist election, this is capitalist candidates”, but people who are truly wholly committed to class struggle care about the movements behind the candidates, how these movements relate to the present political context and how they can be radicalized. So my point is fucking not “vote for Bernie because he is better than fascism” because I’m fully aware of the fact that elections alone cannot defeat fascism. The point is that Bernie has bequeathed to us a precondition for a movement that can do this, because he has paved the way for a politically controversial discourse, one that a new radical Left can conquer.

The point that is being made is not even that complex. Yet, Konikow would like to think that it is even simpler, nothing but an extrapolation of “voting for the lesser evil”. You see, I knew this would happen. I knew he would just ignorantly insist on his inability to critically deal with my arguments. He doesn’t even bother. We have this “because the other capitalist candidate is "fascist"!” although I explicitly said that:

[I]Even if we presuppose that Trump himself, as an individual, weren’t a neo-fascist, he nevertheless represents the rise of fascism in the 21st century. I’ve already talked about it in another thread and I’ve used the German AfD as an example: The party is currently to a certain extent disunited, and ambiguous toward certain political beliefs, not necessarily – but, of course, also – fascist ones. It ranges from social policies and the membership in the EU to the NPD and antisemitism. Do these heavy disagreements within the party in any way destroy or at least stop the rise of fascism in Germany or Europe? It doesn’t because while political power and tactical practice of the fascists are ultimately necessary for their reign, it is nevertheless secondary and irreducible to the fascists themselves, organized in a party or sitting in parliaments. The real danger of the AfD is not that their party in particular is able to rule the country, it’s that they facilitated a fascist discourse among the public. The AfD represents an ideological part of the society, it is this part that is a danger, not the AfD themselves.

The same holds true for Trump. Not he as an individual matters but the sentiments he represents. It’s because you don’t understand this that you are unable to recognize the political significance and the practical meaning of Sanders’, Clinton’s, and Trump’s campaign. They are according to you all equally significant for the reproduction of capitalism and for communists because they don’t call for a worker revolution. But guess what, one doesn’t pull a worker revolution out of one’s ass. It is necessary to begin with small demands because the context for a revolution is not existent, yet. Sanders’ campaign created a fighting spirit, it literally created a fighting spirit, one that raised the hope of all real socialists. Sanders is not a Marxist, and yet closer to socialism than your phrasemongering because the movement he bequeathed is something to begin with. And regarding Trump: The fact that you don’t recognize his threat, and that you “couldn’t care less” reveals that you are nothing but a hidden reactionary and completely useless for the radical Left.

But he comes at me with this ridiculous “capitalism, capitalism, capitalism” while any idiot can see that Trump and Sanders are politically significant in the face of capitalism “as usual”. For Konikow, capitalism is a synonym for evil. Fascism? Capitalist bullshit. Bourgeois democracy? Equally capitalist bullshit. Jacobinism? Capitalist bullshit. The French Revolution? Capitalist bullshit. The fact that he apolitically doesn’t give a fuck, literally, makes him a reactionary. He doesn’t care if we can enjoy bourgeois-democratic freedoms or if we face fascism. And this, in his mind, is revolutionary and materialist. If I ever think like that, please kill me.

No you can keep your "intellectualizing" (i.e. forgetting all the hard won lessons of the workers movement).

One problem with your lazy oneliners is that I’m not entirely sure what you even mean exactly. I really hope that you are not suggesting that being an intellectual is effectively staying out of the struggle of the worker movement. If so, anyone who is remotely familiar with the history of revolutionary Social Democracy knows that you are full of shit. No, not even you would be that stupid, and holy shit, don’t even disagree with me on this one, you really don’t want to do this. However, if you are merely saying that my positions amount to anticommunist, antirevolutionary politics, fucking feel free to address my points instead of going on with this worthless phrasemongering, you lazy coward. I have thoroughly elaborated on my position, and what follows is that it is not me who is “forgetting all the hard won lessons of the worker movement”. If you want to, you are allowed to challenge my position but we get this “capitalism here, capitalism there, don’t support it” etc.

You see, intellectualism is absolutely pivotal for a Marxist, and I’ll again only point to revolutionary Social Democracy, the merger of the worker movement and scientific socialism. If you are somehow suggesting that I only pretend to be an intellectual – you still have to fucking assume the role of one to prove it. Nobody cares about your worthless oneliners because this is not how this works.

No we aren't going to sacrifice the revolutionary program

And this is exactly the stupidity of your worthless phrasemongering. It is not about sacrificing the revolutionary program, if you actually read my post! Anyone who has just skimmed it could rip your precious response apart. Do you think merely repeating your phrasemongering will somehow lend substance to it? My point remains unaddressed:

Then, what does it mean to be a revolutionary as opposed to being a "reformist" in 2016? What are the practical tasks of revolutionaries, whose implications would not "only lengthen" capitalism but shorten it? Your instant thought might be something along the lines of "calling for a revolution" or "calling for the expropriation of the expropriators" etc. but this is not how this works. A revolution is not something you make by finding the appropriate rhetoric carrying insurgent ideas. Actual workers with actual problems don't care about the idea of socialism and proletarian revolution, and they won't be convinced if you keep yelling at them that only socialism will in the long term heal their wounds. Those problems have to be faced in their immediate proximity, where socialism is yet not graspable or meaningful but... yes, reforms are. Class consciousness is not something you teach by giving workers lectures on Marxism, it is the result of struggles - especially political ones - which have a positive and sensible effect on the everyday life of the workers. Only when the worker class has developed class consciousness, only when they are ready and willing to overthrow bourgeois rule, can we meaningfully speak of reformism as opposed to revolutionary activity.

In other words, fighting for reforms is not the same as reformism. Reformism means that there could have been an alternative to realizing reforms, an alternative which is neither doing nothing nor preaching the expropriation of the expropriators (which is actually the same), but actual revolutionary actions, the actual destruction of the bourgeois state. The meaningful existence of reformism presupposes a worker movement that is consciously ready to fight the bourgeoisie. We don't have this today nor is it an inevitable development of capitalism - the will of individual socialists alone, who recognize that the worker class has yet to advance, can bring about the socialist movement.

[…]

If Bernie Sanders possesses the qualifications of a "reformist", every practical Marxist in history was a "reformist", and everybody who is familiar with for example Marx or Lenin or even the history of revolutionary Social Democracy knows that. Pray tell, what did they call for in fighting for socialism, and why? Social Democracy always stressed that political freedom was "light and air" for the proletariat. Lenin often seemed to be a liberal democrat rather than a revolutionary socialist sometimes, and if I remember correctly, he even directly used the term "reform" with a positive connotation. Do I really have to give examples?

[…]

There is no revolutionary struggle that skips the struggle for reforms. Every Marxist understands this.

And so on, and so on. The whole point I made was that there is currently no context for a “revolutionary program”. Nobody cares about your rhetoric, literally nobody – not the Bernies, not the workers, and that’s why it is ultimately worthless. Revolution is a long-term “goal”, and not something that can be “made”: Reforms will precede your precious worker revolution, because it is currently meaningless and doesn’t relate to workers and their lives.

because some genius on the Internet thought they were thinking something new, when they were just rearranging age-old received "wisdom" of bourgeois ideology!

You see, this is exactly this anti-dialectical, ahistorical argument our vulgar Marxists keep repeating in order to abdicate their responsibility to scientifically approach and analyze reality as it exists right now. You say this “‘wisdom’” is “age-old” but you ignore that the meaning of this “‘wisdom’”, i.e. its political significance, its political implications, were different in Germany in the 1920. Today, the struggle for reforms…

Why do I fucking have to repeat my points? Why don’t you have the guts to actually address the arguments at hand, which have already ripped your uncritical positions that you keep insisting on apart?

No support to capitalist parties!

And he actually thinks that this Spartacist-esque rhetoric is somehow revolutionary and carries emotional substance, unaware of its ridiculousness.

The difference between Lenin, Marx, et al and Bernie is that they were revolutionary reformists dedicated to the socialist cause, while Bernie is a political reformist advocating for left-centrism, which still allows for private ownership of the means of production.

The point is that currently, right now, the movement behind Sanders is the most progressive force in the U.S. I’m not saying that we should forget the revolution, neither am I saying that Sanders is our new Lenin, who will lead the future revolution. On the contrary, I am fully aware of the fact that he might become our enemy once push comes to shove. However, Communists have to recognize that his presidential campaign has raised the spirits of the masses, and that’s why he isn’t our enemy or a “traitor” right now. This is the real controversy here.

Would it make a significant difference for present political controversies if Sanders would believe in a communist future “which, however, is not within our grasp, yet”? Who cares about a socialist revolution? The workers don’t give a fuck because it doesn’t relate to their lives, they are not militant enough, yet. Before this can happen, they have to mature politically, and this is facilitated by something like Sanders or Syriza before summer 2015. And the Democratic Socialists don’t give a fuck because the workers don’t. The only ones who really care are… other revolutionaries but your long-term proposals would not even be controversial here.

It is simply pointless to publicly insist upon the identity of a Communist as long as it remains an identity and doesn’t translate into tangible political implications. The same holds true for the meaning of the term “socialism”, you hysterically overestimate language. Socialism is not reducible to a future society with certain features, it is an ethical stance. The meaning of Socialism cannot be taught by defining it, workers have to experience it through political struggle and personal discipline. And even if the Democratic Socialists’ legacy was that we lose our term, why does it matter? We still have Communism and we can find others. Right now, insisting on this is just as fruitless as insisting on the socialist revolution. It might even be harmful – not because I fear ostracism but because we waste energy on delegitimizing our progressive Bernies although we need to focus it on the political struggle for reforms.

An actual fascist movement, the annul any semblence of democracy in the bourgeios state, crush any potential leftist threats type movement will probably be pleased by a Trump presidency, but their ideas will still remain scoffed upon and irrelevent. Until we see the masses of the bourgeiosie losing faith in the "legitimacy" of their parliamentary democracy, the threat of fascism will remain in the shadows.

The opposite is true: Fascist ideas are significantly and rapidly growing in popularity. One only has to observe everyday language, the way ordinary people are speaking and thinking etc. Of course, nobody wants to identify as a fascist because it is still a stigma – yes there are indeed still forces which don’t allow open racism, shamelessly frank fascist ideas because it is “a matter of course”, and so on. But don’t take our bourgeois-democratic political standards for granted, don’t underestimate the growing fascism: It’s anything but irrelevant because it’s ideologically the logical conclusion of common sentiments. Today’s cosmopolitans who defend the notion of human nature are tomorrow’s scientific racists. Today’s open-minded thinkers who strive for neutral truth evaluating pros and cons will be tomorrow’s apologists for anti-democratic technocracy. Today’s true socialists who think that material conditions will inevitably bring about a revolution… are tomorrow’s tame obedient servants of fascism.

The masses of the bourgeoisie are losing their faith only after fascism became a necessity. However, we are talking about developments. Right now, there is a way to fight neo-fascism, there is still an alternative to it. But if we don’t seize the opportunity and remain content with our true socialist heroes, neo-fascism will irreversibly grow. Notice how Trump’s success is congruent with the rise of right-wing populist parties in Europe, the growth of the Silicon Ideology, frankly racist everyday language, and so on. It’s naïve to think that everything will turn out well in the end. Trump and, in Europe, the right-wing parties have not only paved the way for a fascist discourse – they are also able to establish it along with themselves as their political success suggests. More and more people turn to them and escape the shadows.

The reason for Trump’s and the European parties’ popularity is the dying middle class, which is the result of the “natural” path of capitalist (i.e. neo-liberalism). In other words, this “capitalism as usual” destroys the life, the dreams and the hopes that many people took for granted. Fascism is an alternative to “capitalism as usual” in that it provides the promise to return to ordinary life, entailing frank reactionary sentiments. It is, therefore, reaction that seizes power – and Trump and the European populists are certainly able to do this.

Bernie Sanders supports Clinton it shows that he is not a true Socialist in my opinion/views.

What is a “true Socialist” anyway? Nobody argued that he is a revolutionary Communist and nobody expected him to be one. However, it doesn’t change the fact that he represents a progressive force and offers concrete proposals as opposed to the “true Socialists” you can find here. The fact of the matter is that the future election… as pathetic as Clinton might be, is actually a political ground leftists can fight on. I’ve said that neo-fascism will not disappear if Trump loses the presidential election but preventing his victory as opposed to passively let it happen is something a leftist movement can do, it is a political act. And don’t get me wrong, voting as an individual is indeed worthless but a whole political movement that is ideologically committed can use the elections as a means to fight, both against Trump as a representative of neo-fascism and for their own community spirit. It is a political victory they can achieve. Of course, and this goes without saying, what is important is that it is not done in the spirit of Clinton but in the spirit of their own (the movement’s) faith. In other words, voting for Clinton must not result in uncritical ideological support for her, it has to be understood as a temporary support within the context of a reviving radical left. If this is acknowledged, voting for Clinton is not anti-Communist or bourgeois per se but actually a considerable tactical demand.

Hermes

19th July 2016, 01:49

First off, I’m sorry for mixing your post around, I just think that the more I type, the less intelligible I become, and many of your responses seem to be thematically similar due to the number of different posts you were addressing. If I’ve missed my mark in understanding what you’ve written, I apologize.

In other words, you fail to understand ideological currents in their relation to the reproduction of capitalism, i.e. how they relate to reality (why they exist in the first place etc.), how they translate reality in their consciousness and how they actually influence reality. This is the reason for your “Trump = reactionary populist, Clinton = corporatist, Sanders = social democrat” in the first place. You have no clue what actually constitutes their political significance, you simply evaluate it according to their rhetoric and their proposals, as if there were a checklist for Social Democracy or fascism. Your qualifications for political ideologies are ultimately anti-materialist, and that’s why you ultimately fail to appreciate the progressive that Sanders represents.

If there is one meaningful way we can speak of Democratic Socialism as a distinct ideological current, it has to recognize its inherently progressive character, progressive insofar as it, confronting the era of neoliberalism, offers short-term proposals which do not significantly differ from those Marxists could offer. While our true communist heroes talk of revolution and expropriation, Democratic Socialists are at least potentially able to do something in the realm of Realpolitik, of course, not in the spirit of a socialist future (although they think that what they are striving for is socialism, but this is the point of understanding ideology in relation to reality) but they are our necessary starting point. Of course, the proposals of Democratic Socialists are not always sufficient, sometimes even dangerously wrong, I have already stressed this. But before one can criticize them on this basis, one first, as a Marxist, has to acknowledge that they are way more revolutionary than Konikow and his crew.

To what extent does Democratic Socialism represent a way to stand against the era of neoliberalism, though? An honest analysis of Sanders’ political goals and aspirations shows that he doesn’t fundamentally disagree or offer any challenge to neoliberalism. As well, I think that it’s important, at this point, to recognize that Democratic Socialists, like all others, are as capable of supporting the current order of things (the example that jumps to mind is the opportunistic support of the two World Wars, both by Socialists in America as well as in Europe).

And you don’t understand fascism for the exact same reason you don’t understand Democratic Socialism, Social Democracy or Socialism. These fucking laughable abstractions “fascists use regulatory measures and government reforms… oh, and they are extremely nationalist” full stop. This is what qualifies fascism in your mind. Do you really believe this? Do you really believe that this is what essentially constitutes facism? It’s so laughable to stress that these are meaningless abstractions. That’s the reason why he throws buzzwords like “social fascist” around. “Regulatory measures and government reforms”. Do you literally want me to give you examples for regulatory measures and government reforms that were 100% not fascist, because they were either established before one could meaningfully speak of fascism or because they were an achievement of the worker class – or both? I don’t even want to play this game with you. The Ten Hours’ Bill was social fascism, I guess. And what about the concessions following 1848 or the concessions following the uprisings in Russia in the early 20th century, parliaments etc.? Is this “liberal fascism” or what?

I do agree that to conflate all reforms as regulatory measures, and from there to move on to fascism, is a little simplistic, but there should exist a critique of strengthening the state without regard to the knowledge that it will still, inevitably, act in the interests of the ruling class. For instance, gun control becomes a contentious issue (for Socialists, not in general), but so does police ‘reform,’ nationalization, and so on. I’m not sure if you already agree with this view, though, and simply object to conflating it with Fascism.

Again, my whole point was that Sanders is not simply a candidate of the Democratic Party, he does not simply represent bourgeois capitalism “as usual” – he, in fact, represents a movement within society. . . . You can keep your “this is capitalist election, this is capitalist candidates”, but people who are truly wholly committed to class struggle care about the movements behind the candidates, how these movements relate to the present political context and how they can be radicalized. . . . The point is that Bernie has bequeathed to us a precondition for a movement that can do this, because he has paved the way for a politically controversial discourse, one that a new radical Left can conquer.

. . .

The same holds true for Trump. Not he as an individual matters but the sentiments he represents. It’s because you don’t understand this that you are unable to recognize the political significance and the practical meaning of Sanders’, Clinton’s, and Trump’s campaign. They are according to you all equally significant for the reproduction of capitalism and for communists because they don’t call for a worker revolution. But guess what, one doesn’t pull a worker revolution out of one’s ass. It is necessary to begin with small demands because the context for a revolution is not existent, yet. Sanders’ campaign created a fighting spirit, it literally created a fighting spirit, one that raised the hope of all real socialists. Sanders is not a Marxist, and yet closer to socialism than your phrasemongering because the movement he bequeathed is something to begin with.

I have already explained why Sanders does not and cannot facilitate the victory of fascism. In fact, he is the one who creates the spirit to fight this scum.

This is a little tangential, but to what extent does Sanders represent the actually progressive movement within society, now that he’s endorsed Clinton? Wouldn’t it be more fair to say that the Green Party has picked up the torch that Sanders dropped, and now represents the progressive movement within society moreso than Sanders does, regardless of whether or not she actually has any chance of electoral success?

Moving on, though, I primarily don’t agree that Sanders has ‘bequeathed’ a movement to us – I think that, in the same way that Obama did for the past two elections, he has hijacked an organic movement that is fed up with the current establishment politics – in that sense, I’m not even sure I can agree that he ever represented the progressive movement in society in the first place, and would instead argue that the movement is more accurately represented by non-parliamentary movements such as BLM, the Fight for Fifteen, and so on, while still acknowledging their more liberal nature.

The masses of the bourgeoisie are losing their faith only after fascism became a necessity. However, we are talking about developments. Right now, there is a way to fight neo-fascism, there is still an alternative to it. But if we don’t seize the opportunity and remain content with our true socialist heroes, neo-fascism will irreversibly grow. Notice how Trump’s success is congruent with the rise of right-wing populist parties in Europe, the growth of the Silicon Ideology, frankly racist everyday language, and so on. It’s naïve to think that everything will turn out well in the end. Trump and, in Europe, the right-wing parties have not only paved the way for a fascist discourse – they are also able to establish it along with themselves as their political success suggests. More and more people turn to them and escape the shadows.

The reason for Trump’s and the European parties’ popularity is the dying middle class, which is the result of the “natural” path of capitalist (i.e. neo-liberalism). In other words, this “capitalism as usual” destroys the life, the dreams and the hopes that many people took for granted. Fascism is an alternative to “capitalism as usual” in that it provides the promise to return to ordinary life, entailing frank reactionary sentiments. It is, therefore, reaction that seizes power – and Trump and the European populists are certainly able to do this.
While the popular historical answer for the rise of fascism has been the declining middle class, I don’t think that this can explain the popularity that Trump, and other right-wing movements in Europe and otherwise, are currently enjoying. The reason that people are turning to Trump, and others, is, I think, contained in what Cliff Paul wrote, and what you responded to: more and more, people are becoming dissatisfied with the continuance of the same politics performed day after day, and that, regardless of whether it happens to be a Republican or a Democrat that’s in office, continually, and increasingly obviously, operate without regards to the great majority of people.

I think it’s in this that the real danger in any kind of advocacy for Clinton lies, and especially so in re: to Sander’s endorsement of her.

It is not about sacrificing the revolutionary program, if you actually read my post! My point remains unaddressed:
Then, what does it mean to be a revolutionary as opposed to being a "reformist" in 2016? What are the practical tasks of revolutionaries, whose implications would not "only lengthen" capitalism but shorten it? Your instant thought might be something along the lines of "calling for a revolution" or "calling for the expropriation of the expropriators" etc. but this is not how this works. A revolution is not something you make by finding the appropriate rhetoric carrying insurgent ideas. Actual workers with actual problems don't care about the idea of socialism and proletarian revolution, and they won't be convinced if you keep yelling at them that only socialism will in the long term heal their wounds. Those problems have to be faced in their immediate proximity, where socialism is yet not graspable or meaningful but... yes, reforms are. Class consciousness is not something you teach by giving workers lectures on Marxism, it is the result of struggles - especially political ones - which have a positive and sensible effect on the everyday life of the workers. Only when the worker class has developed class consciousness, only when they are ready and willing to overthrow bourgeois rule, can we meaningfully speak of reformism as opposed to revolutionary activity.

In other words, fighting for reforms is not the same as reformism. Reformism means that there could have been an alternative to realizing reforms, an alternative which is neither doing nothing nor preaching the expropriation of the expropriators (which is actually the same), but actual revolutionary actions, the actual destruction of the bourgeois state. The meaningful existence of reformism presupposes a worker movement that is consciously ready to fight the bourgeoisie. We don't have this today nor is it an inevitable development of capitalism - the will of individual socialists alone, who recognize that the worker class has yet to advance, can bring about the socialist movement.

[…]

If Bernie Sanders possesses the qualifications of a "reformist", every practical Marxist in history was a "reformist", and everybody who is familiar with for example Marx or Lenin or even the history of revolutionary Social Democracy knows that. Pray tell, what did they call for in fighting for socialism, and why? Social Democracy always stressed that political freedom was "light and air" for the proletariat. Lenin often seemed to be a liberal democrat rather than a revolutionary socialist sometimes, and if I remember correctly, he even directly used the term "reform" with a positive connotation. Do I really have to give examples?

[…]

There is no revolutionary struggle that skips the struggle for reforms. Every Marxist understands this.

And so on, and so on. The whole point I made was that there is currently no context for a “revolutionary program”. Nobody cares about your rhetoric, literally nobody – not the Bernies, not the workers, and that’s why it is ultimately worthless. Revolution is a long-term “goal”, and not something that can be “made”: Reforms will precede your precious worker revolution, because it is currently meaningless and doesn’t relate to workers and their lives.

The point is that currently, right now, the movement behind Sanders is the most progressive force in the U.S. I’m not saying that we should forget the revolution, neither am I saying that Sanders is our new Lenin, who will lead the future revolution. On the contrary, I am fully aware of the fact that he might become our enemy once push comes to shove. However, Communists have to recognize that his presidential campaign has raised the spirits of the masses, and that’s why he isn’t our enemy or a “traitor” right now. This is the real controversy here.

Would it make a significant difference for present political controversies if Sanders would believe in a communist future “which, however, is not within our grasp, yet”? Who cares about a socialist revolution? The workers don’t give a fuck because it doesn’t relate to their lives, they are not militant enough, yet. Before this can happen, they have to mature politically, and this is facilitated by something like Sanders or Syriza before summer 2015. And the Democratic Socialists don’t give a fuck because the workers don’t. The only ones who really care are… other revolutionaries but your long-term proposals would not even be controversial here.

It is simply pointless to publicly insist upon the identity of a Communist as long as it remains an identity and doesn’t translate into tangible political implications. The same holds true for the meaning of the term “socialism”, you hysterically overestimate language. Socialism is not reducible to a future society with certain features, it is an ethical stance. The meaning of Socialism cannot be taught by defining it, workers have to experience it through political struggle and personal discipline. And even if the Democratic Socialists’ legacy was that we lose our term, why does it matter? We still have Communism and we can find others. Right now, insisting on this is just as fruitless as insisting on the socialist revolution. It might even be harmful – not because I fear ostracism but because we waste energy on delegitimizing our progressive Bernies although we need to focus it on the political struggle for reforms.
I guess the question that I would have to ask is: at what point do communists begin actually advocating for communist demands, and stop tactically supporting ‘progressives’ that don’t actually seem to represent a progressive opportunity? Isn’t it the responsibility of communists to, constantly and consistently, offer an alternative to the already-established politics that we exist in?
I think that fighting for reforms is necessary, but I think that to do it in a political field that supports candidates that the electorate are already disillusioned with does nothing but discredit us and give them support that they don’t need. Pressuring politicians – of all stripes – to enact legislation that is to our benefit can be done (and I’d argue, obviously, that it should be done) without advocating for people we have no common interest with.

What is a “true Socialist” anyway? Nobody argued that he is a revolutionary Communist and nobody expected him to be one. However, it doesn’t change the fact that he represents a progressive force and offers concrete proposals as opposed to the “true Socialists” you can find here. The fact of the matter is that the future election… as pathetic as Clinton might be, is actually a political ground leftists can fight on. I’ve said that neo-fascism will not disappear if Trump loses the presidential election but preventing his victory as opposed to passively let it happen is something a leftist movement can do, it is a political act. And don’t get me wrong, voting as an individual is indeed worthless but a whole political movement that is ideologically committed can use the elections as a means to fight, both against Trump as a representative of neo-fascism and for their own community spirit. It is a political victory they can achieve. Of course, and this goes without saying, what is important is that it is not done in the spirit of Clinton but in the spirit of their own (the movement’s) faith. In other words, voting for Clinton must not result in uncritical ideological support for her, it has to be understood as a temporary support within the context of a reviving radical left. If this is acknowledged, voting for Clinton is not anti-Communist or bourgeois per se but actually a considerable tactical demand.

I don’t think that there’s any evidence that supporting Clinton, even only tactically, will actually lead to a reviving radical left, though; I think that it’s much more likely that such support can only demoralize the hopes that workers have for any kind of alternative – other than that of Trump, and I think that’s my primary concern.

At a certain point, supporting Clinton, and the increasing shift of the Democrats to the right, and therefore the Republicans as well, is synonymous with supporting a rise in far-right politics, if not necessarily neo-fascism. It also inadvertently robs the radical left of any kind of authority it might have to advocate for an alternative.

--

Again, I’m sorry for the jumbled-up post, and I hope that I’m at least somewhat cogent. I tried to be as concise and to-the-point as possible.

Alet

19th July 2016, 15:52

To what extent does Democratic Socialism represent a way to stand against the era of neoliberalism, though? An honest analysis of Sanders’ political goals and aspirations shows that he doesn’t fundamentally disagree or offer any challenge to neoliberalism.

I've mentioned neoliberalism primarily to bind Democratic Socialism to it, as it is first and foremost a phenomenon of the recent few centuries, wherein neoliberalism obtained hegemony. Democratic Socialism is insofar its opponent as it offers progressive short-term proposals during this era in the absence of a politically significant radical Left (a Communist movement). Democratic Socialism might lack the power to lead its own proposals to their highest conclusion, which is, yes, Communism, or the overthrow of bourgeois rule. They are nevertheless our starting point when it comes to building the preconditions for a movement that can be radicalized, and this is what I've tried to explain above.

As well, I think that it’s important, at this point, to recognize that Democratic Socialists, like all others, are as capable of supporting the current order of things

However, the phrasing "the current order of things" is too vague for the controversy at hand. If you mean capitalism in general and imply that Democratic Socialists are opposed to a Communist revolution, so they will sooner or later become counterrevolutionaries, you don't even attack my point because I have already acknowledged the possibility. The problem begins when we start approaching present conditions from the perspective of a future which is yet uncertain because one does so necessarily at the expense of taking a step towards this future in the first place. In other words, our true socialists can only see revolution but they don't know how a revolution and its preconditions concretely evolve, how a revolution would concretely look like, and so on. The fundamental point of this discussion is that a revolution is yet not seizable at a time where radical Leftists are still struggling to be taken seriously in becoming a relevant political force. A radical movement has to develop through political struggles; the task of Communists is therefore to intensify present antagonisms, and Democratic Socialism right now, in our present context provides the starting point to accomplish this task, as can be seen from Syriza, Sanders or Podemos among others.

I do agree that to conflate all reforms as regulatory measures, and from there to move on to fascism, is a little simplistic, but there should exist a critique of strengthening the state without regard to the knowledge that it will still, inevitably, act in the interests of the ruling class.

It's true that hard-won reforms can eventually become a structural part of capitalism because they lose their radical nature. It's common to point to our living standards in this context (worker rights, welfare systems and the like). This is why it is important that we never take our political/economic standards for granted, that we are never content with them, but instead keep struggling for more. Reforms are for us not an end in themselves, only constant struggle is. The point is that the Ten Hours' Bill, for example, was a concession against the backdrop of a radical worker movement. We all know that limited working hours are now common and have lost their political significance. But it's this very fact and that they were radical 150 years ago which proves my point, which is that anyone who despises the struggle for reforms on the basis that they are not revolutionary is an idiot.

Today, we can observe many pseudo-empirical, formalist approaches from self-proclaimed Marxists to considerable, even necessary reforms. Supporting the European integration is opposed on the basis that it is an acknowledgement of the necessity of economic imperialism. Voting is opposed on the basis that it inherently legitimizes bourgeois rule and its political framework as a matter of principle. Unconditional basic income is opposed on the basis that it makes capitalism appear "nicer", and that it disguises oppression. In other words, what does not instantly expropriate the expropriators and establish a communist society reproduces the current order of things, according to the vulgar Marxists. This is dangerous and, at times when the means of production are yet not directly seizable, an apolitical stance, which is ultimately reactionary. This is what I've elaborated upon in my two posts.

This is a little tangential, but to what extent does Sanders represent the actually progressive movement within society, now that he’s endorsed Clinton?

First off, notice that we started the discussion before Sanders officially endorsed Clinton. The movement behind him thus emerged way earlier. My whole point is that Sanders is not reducible to him as an individual and his political positions. What actually matters is that he paved the way for a public political discourse, a controversial one. Whether his campaign was sufficient or whether he could have done more... is for the discussion at hand secondary. The fact of the matter is that he is currently the most progressive figure in U.S. politics, and people stick to him because he channels and expresses their discontent in a progressive way (as opposed to a reactionary one, as Trump does).

Moving on, though, I primarily don’t agree that Sanders has ‘bequeathed’ a movement to us – I think that, in the same way that Obama did for the past two elections, he has hijacked an organic movement that is fed up with the current establishment politics – in that sense, I’m not even sure I can agree that he ever represented the progressive movement in society in the first place, and would instead argue that the movement is more accurately represented by non-parliamentary movements such as BLM, the Fight for Fifteen, and so on, while still acknowledging their more liberal nature.

The significance is that Sanders did not stop with the presidential campaign. As I've said, if it was about "hijacking" organic sentiments in order to become president, he would have surrendered a long time ago - but he didn't. He saw it through to the finish and tried to force Clinton to adopt more progressive proposals because he understood that it was not about him and that politics is not reducible to parliaments. Of course, he gained supporters because they were fed up with the establishment but that's tautological - who else would support someone who is opposed to it? Sanders' great deed is that he provided an alternative in making a political influence on the "business as usual" possible. Mere expressions of discontent with the establishment or even protests in the manner of BLM alone (that's not to say that BLM protests are inherently worthless, on the contrary) are not sufficient. Sanders was a political force, endangering the establishment politics, and this... "radicalized" a lot of Americans.

While the popular historical answer for the rise of fascism has been the declining middle class, I don’t think that this can explain the popularity that Trump, and other right-wing movements in Europe and otherwise, are currently enjoying. The reason that people are turning to Trump, and others, is, I think, contained in what Cliff Paul wrote, and what you responded to: more and more, people are becoming dissatisfied with the continuance of the same politics performed day after day, and that, regardless of whether it happens to be a Republican or a Democrat that’s in office, continually, and increasingly obviously, operate without regards to the great majority of people.

I don't even know if we can meaningfully talk of a middle class in the modern sense in Europe prior to the post-war era. So I don't see how "a" declining middle class is "the popular historical answer for the rise of fascism". Anyway, the reason you provide is extremely vague, so much that it is a meaningless tautology. Of course, a political change requires a dissatisfaction with politics as usual, this does not contradict my point, it is... a banality that is not being questioned. However, what you don't explain is why people are dissatisfied with it. It's not that the continuance of the same politics every day inherently upsets the masses because it becomes "boring" or whatever. If it upsets them, it means that it fails to live up to their desires and expectations, and where can these be found if not in their material being (which includes consciousness)? What I know for sure is that the AfD gains popularity mainly among the lower middle class, and I think the same holds true for Trump. I didn't take the trouble to look at other right-wing populists concerning this matter, but the fact of the matter is that the middle class is dying and fascism entails the promise to retain the status quo.

I guess the question that I would have to ask is: at what point do communists begin actually advocating for communist demands, and stop tactically supporting ‘progressives’ that don’t actually seem to represent a progressive opportunity? Isn’t it the responsibility of communists to, constantly and consistently, offer an alternative to the already-established politics that we exist in?

But look, making a difference between "advocating for communist demands" and "tactially supporting progressive ones" is already the problem. The point is that fighting for those small demands is communist. I almost feel disposed to say that it just happens that non-Communists are (currently) on our side in fighting for the same demands. Think of it this way: We are not hijacking an organic movement so that it deviates from its "natural" path, in actual fact, if the Democratic Socialists would not exist, we would have to propose their demands. It's because they do represent a progressive opportunity in the short-term, which has been my point all the time.

You should remember that we have nothing right now, we are nothing. Our starting point... is technically zero. Yes, we Communists do have insight into our historical/political conditions, but the workers don't. They are not militant, they are often not even politically experienced. Before we can talk about radicalizing them, we have to successfully fight for small demands first.

I don’t think that there’s any evidence that supporting Clinton, even only tactically, will actually lead to a reviving radical left, though; I think that it’s much more likely that such support can only demoralize the hopes that workers have for any kind of alternative – other than that of Trump, and I think that’s my primary concern.

Let's just ignore this problematic "evidence" phrasing (what? what kind of "evidence"?), you still misunderstand the point. It's not that voting for Hillary will revive the radical Left. I've argued that an already existing movement which already strives for a revived Left can consider voting for her as a means to fight fascism in the guise of Trump. If the movement that was behind Sanders shall not vanish, it has to keep struggling and to keep fighting for small political influences, and the defeat of fascism's electoral success can be one of them. I've explicitly stressed that the support for Clinton must not be ideological but in the spirit of the movement so that it doesn't "demoralize the hope that workers have for any kind of alternative".

GLF

20th July 2016, 01:58

...This is your problem: Not that you are not an intellectual but that you are not even ready to become one...

You can say that again. I read your entire post and I disagree with much of it, but I did consider what you said, and I do try to learn; and regardless of what you may believe, I do consider communism to be desirable and don't presume for a second that I have the answers for how to bring it about. But I'm afraid I have to concede that you and I are just not on the same page ideologically speaking. No reason to question one's loyalty to communism. I can be quite simplistic and brashly dismissive in my approach to non-Marxist forms of socialism, I will admit this. I'm sorry. I despise them as counterfeits. What do you want me to do? I will remain civil with other users regardless of their beliefs, and I do believe our hearts are all in the right place. But I have no desire to become a fucking intellectual. I almost spat soda all over my screen when I read that. I'm a simple person, blue collar, a worker and a Marxist.

Konikow

20th July 2016, 02:53

I was under the impression he was a social democrat, obviously he isn't a democratic socialist but if I am correct a social democrat is basically a state capitalist that advocates a more prominent welfare state and an increase in economic regulation and social benefits, which is basically what is is.

I know this is the Internet, where Revolutionary Leftists combine random words to create unique personalized labels for their fringe variants of capitalist ideology.

But in the real history of mankind, Social Democrat refers to a particular movement based on the working class. Which Bernie has never been a part of.

Also, in the real world, "democratic socialist" is a promise that fake-socialists make to bow before their bourgeois masters and drown the revolution in blood if necessary.

- - - Updated - - -

Anyway, the Revolutionary Leftists who put out the call that started this thread have moved on. It is a new day.

Bernie Sanders has "betrayed" the "revolution"!

Now it's time for Jill Stein! Huzzah! We need another trap for the workers! Down with class consciousness! Up with class collaboration! Long live capitalism and Revolutionary Leftism!

Hermes

20th July 2016, 06:15

I've mentioned neoliberalism primarily to bind Democratic Socialism to it, as it is first and foremost a phenomenon of the recent few centuries, wherein neoliberalism obtained hegemony. Democratic Socialism is insofar its opponent as it offers progressive short-term proposals during this era in the absence of a politically significant radical Left (a Communist movement). Democratic Socialism might lack the power to lead its own proposals to their highest conclusion, which is, yes, Communism, or the overthrow of bourgeois rule. They are nevertheless our starting point when it comes to building the preconditions for a movement that can be radicalized, and this is what I've tried to explain above.
I don’t think that this is always true, though – I think we can see plenty of times in history in which progressive short-term proposals have served to strengthen and reinforce capitalism, as well as capitalist ideology. For instance, look at the beginning to World War 1, where FDR enacted many of the same reforms that the SPA had at that time been advocating, which not only drained whatever strength was currently in the SPA at that time, but also reinforced capitalist ideology.
That is, I don’t think that it’s as cut-and-dried as short-term proposals as a starting point for a radicalized movement.

However, the phrasing "the current order of things" is too vague for the controversy at hand. If you mean capitalism in general and imply that Democratic Socialists are opposed to a Communist revolution, so they will sooner or later become counterrevolutionaries, you don't even attack my point because I have already acknowledged the possibility. The problem begins when we start approaching present conditions from the perspective of a future which is yet uncertain because one does so necessarily at the expense of taking a step towards this future in the first place. In other words, our true socialists can only see revolution but they don't know how a revolution and its preconditions concretely evolve, how a revolution would concretely look like, and so on. The fundamental point of this discussion is that a revolution is yet not seizable at a time where radical Leftists are still struggling to be taken seriously in becoming a relevant political force. A radical movement has to develop through political struggles; the task of Communists is therefore to intensify present antagonisms, and Democratic Socialism right now, in our present context provides the starting point to accomplish this task, as can be seen from Syriza, Sanders or Podemos among others.
No, I’m not attacking your argument re: the possibility of a revolution occurring under present conditions at all – I agree with you. I disagree, however, that Democratic Socialism always, or even frequently, allows Communists to get their shoe in the door (so to speak), and would say that supporting Democratic Socialists is not the only way to intensify present antagonisms, or to engage ‘politically’ (in the broader sense of the term, including non-parliamentarian tactics).
I think that one can look at Podemos, at Syriza, at Sanders, and see that this is so, especially so for Syriza (I think it’s a little too early yet to necessarily speak for either Sanders or Podemos). Not only did Syriza not provide a platform for Communists to increase their political relevance, but they took the progressive movement that put them into power and demoralized them completely. I’m not sure I understand how workers are supposed to become radicalized when the same people who should be presenting the alternatives are supporting those who demoralize them. This is what I meant when I mentioned demoralization – the movement itself rejects these figureheads once they’ve shown that they’re incapable of providing what it is that the movement desires.

It's true that hard-won reforms can eventually become a structural part of capitalism because they lose their radical nature. It's common to point to our living standards in this context (worker rights, welfare systems and the like). This is why it is important that we never take our political/economic standards for granted, that we are never content with them, but instead keep struggling for more. Reforms are for us not an end in themselves, only constant struggle is. The point is that the Ten Hours' Bill, for example, was a concession against the backdrop of a radical worker movement. We all know that limited working hours are now common and have lost their political significance. But it's this very fact and that they were radical 150 years ago which proves my point, which is that anyone who despises the struggle for reforms on the basis that they are not revolutionary is an idiot.

Today, we can observe many pseudo-empirical, formalist approaches from self-proclaimed Marxists to considerable, even necessary reforms. Supporting the European integration is opposed on the basis that it is an acknowledgement of the necessity of economic imperialism. Voting is opposed on the basis that it inherently legitimizes bourgeois rule and its political framework as a matter of principle. Unconditional basic income is opposed on the basis that it makes capitalism appear "nicer", and that it disguises oppression. In other words, what does not instantly expropriate the expropriators and establish a communist society reproduces the current order of things, according to the vulgar Marxists. This is dangerous and, at times when the means of production are yet not directly seizable, an apolitical stance, which is ultimately reactionary. This is what I've elaborated upon in my two posts.
No, I definitely agree, for the most part. Reforms are, for the most part, a defensive gain, but it’s necessary to fight for them within the system of capitalism, not least of all because we’re all workers, and we’d be living in shit conditions if we didn’t, not to mention being even more separated from the rest of the population then we already are, due to our ideology.

I know that I keep saying this over and over again, but I think it’s important to just throw in there, again, that one doesn’t need to involve oneself in the realm of parliamentarian politics in order to fight for reform. I’m just reiterating this because I can’t tell, explicitly, from your posts whether or not you agree.

First off, notice that we started the discussion before Sanders officially endorsed Clinton. The movement behind him thus emerged way earlier.
No, I know, I’m just trying to update the conversation based on recent developments. But still, I think I take issue with your phrasing, unless I’m misunderstanding you. Before there was a movement ‘behind’ Sanders, there was widespread discontent against both the Republican and the Democratic parties, as well as a less-developed discontent against ‘the state,’ so on.

My whole point is that Sanders is not reducible to him as an individual and his political positions. What actually matters is that he paved the way for a public political discourse, a controversial one. Whether his campaign was sufficient or whether he could have done more... is for the discussion at hand secondary. The fact of the matter is that he is currently the most progressive figure in U.S. politics, and people stick to him because he channels and expresses their discontent in a progressive way (as opposed to a reactionary one, as Trump does).

The significance is that Sanders did not stop with the presidential campaign. As I've said, if it was about "hijacking" organic sentiments in order to become president, he would have surrendered a long time ago - but he didn't. He saw it through to the finish and tried to force Clinton to adopt more progressive proposals because he understood that it was not about him and that politics is not reducible to parliaments. Of course, he gained supporters because they were fed up with the establishment but that's tautological - who else would support someone who is opposed to it? Sanders' great deed is that he provided an alternative in making a political influence on the "business as usual" possible. Mere expressions of discontent with the establishment or even protests in the manner of BLM alone (that's not to say that BLM protests are inherently worthless, on the contrary) are not sufficient. Sanders was a political force, endangering the establishment politics, and this... "radicalized" a lot of Americans.
Again, just tangentially, I’m interested to know, within this narrative, what your opinion re: Stein/the Green Party is. You never really answered.
Back to your post, I’m not saying that Sanders deliberately attempted to hijack a movement for personal ambition, and I’m not attacking him personally, either. I recognize what he was trying to do. The end result, however, is his endorsement for Clinton, and the question I think that we need to ask is: what does this do to the movement, that existed before Sanders, but that he came to represent? Is this at all analogous to the situation that Syriza brought about in Greece, and why or why not? To what extent will the ‘radicalization’ of those who supported Sanders survive within their support for Clinton?
I think these are important questions, and I don’t think that any of us can really give a definitive answer one way or the other.

I don't even know if we can meaningfully talk of a middle class in the modern sense in Europe prior to the post-war era. So I don't see how "a" declining middle class is "the popular historical answer for the rise of fascism".
I’m sorry, I should have been more specific. It was first posited (I believe, anyway) by Trotsky, in ~1932, especially shown in this selection: https://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/works/1944/1944-fas.htm

The fascists find their human material mainly in the petty bourgeoisie. The latter has been entirely ruined by big capital. There is no way out for it in the present social order, but it knows of no other. Its dissatisfaction, indignation, and despair are diverted by the fascists away from big capital and against the workers. It may be said that fascism is the act of placing the petty bourgeoisie at the disposal of its most bitter enemies. In this way, big capital ruins the middle classes and then, with the help of hired fascist demagogues, incites the despairing petty bourgeoisie against the worker. The bourgeois regime can be preserved only by such murderous means as these. For how long? Until it is overthrown by proletarian revolution.
I’ve seen the same analysis most often by others on the left, but I’ve also seen other historians engage with it as well, esp. in demographic studies of Germany during the 30s.

Anyway, the reason you provide is extremely vague, so much that it is a meaningless tautology. Of course, a political change requires a dissatisfaction with politics as usual, this does not contradict my point, it is... a banality that is not being questioned. However, what you don't explain is why people are dissatisfied with it. It's not that the continuance of the same politics every day inherently upsets the masses because it becomes "boring" or whatever. If it upsets them, it means that it fails to live up to their desires and expectations, and where can these be found if not in their material being (which includes consciousness)?
I guess my answer to your question will be as banal as my previous statement, which is that capitalism can’t deliver on the promises of its ideology to either the workers or the middle classes, and I don’t really think we’re in disagreement about this. Because it’s so, people turn to radical politics perceived to be outside what they hazily conceive of as capitalism, either to fascism or, possibly, to the left (this is part of the reason why ‘the left,’ as small as it is, is making a tactical mistake by supporting, say, Clinton: by doing so, they become irreparably associated in the minds of many with the politics of Clinton, even if supporting her was only a tactical choice).

What I know for sure is that the AfD gains popularity mainly among the lower middle class, and I think the same holds true for Trump. I didn't take the trouble to look at other right-wing populists concerning this matter, but the fact of the matter is that the middle class is dying and fascism entails the promise to retain the status quo.
I’d be interested to see if this was true – most demographic studies of Trump’s support base that I’ve seen wouldn’t really support the claim that his greatest support was among the middle class. That being said, there haven’t been any exhaustive studies done on the subject (that I’ve seen, at least), owing to how difficult it would be to carry out.

But look, making a difference between "advocating for communist demands" and "tactially supporting progressive ones" is already the problem. The point is that fighting for those small demands is communist. I almost feel disposed to say that it just happens that non-Communists are (currently) on our side in fighting for the same demands. Think of it this way: We are not hijacking an organic movement so that it deviates from its "natural" path, in actual fact, if the Democratic Socialists would not exist, we would have to propose their demands. It's because they do represent a progressive opportunity in the short-term, which has been my point all the time.
No, I agree – fighting for progressive demands is definitely communist. Where I disagree is in directly lending support to progressive politicians instead of fighting for these demands and furthering the movement in a non-parliamentarian fashion – support of BLM, the Fight for Fifteen, and other political/economic struggles.
That is, I don’t understand quite how you get from fighting for progressive reform to supporting progressive politicians.

You should remember that we have nothing right now, we are nothing. Our starting point... is technically zero. Yes, we Communists do have insight into our historical/political conditions, but the workers don't. They are not militant, they are often not even politically experienced. Before we can talk about radicalizing them, we have to successfully fight for small demands first.

We are nothing right now, yes, in the same way that the worker’s movement is very little. I agree that fighting for small demands has the greatest possibility of raising class consciousness. I think that explicitly doing so within the parliamentary system, though, has the greatest possibility to lower class consciousness, or at least stagnate it, rather than increase it.
The same dead horse is back again, but for all of its flaws, the New Deal was undoubtedly ‘progressive’ – and yet it coincided with the death throes of one of America’s only significant Socialist parties. If progressive demands necessarily increase class consciousness/radicalization, shouldn’t its popularity have increased?

Let's just ignore this problematic "evidence" phrasing (what? what kind of "evidence"?), you still misunderstand the point. It's not that voting for Hillary will revive the radical Left. I've argued that an already existing movement which already strives for a revived Left can consider voting for her as a means to fight fascism in the guise of Trump. If the movement that was behind Sanders shall not vanish, it has to keep struggling and to keep fighting for small political influences, and the defeat of fascism's electoral success can be one of them. I've explicitly stressed that the support for Clinton must not be ideological but in the spirit of the movement so that it doesn't "demoralize the hope that workers have for any kind of alternative".

No, I agree, the concept of evidence is problematic, and ‘history’ is not always as clear as we’d like to believe it is, even with perfect hindsight. I think that a lot of the sentiment in this last part of your post I tried to address above, but if you think I’ve neglected something, please say so and I’ll try to respond to this part in more detail.

Alet

20th July 2016, 14:38

But I have no desire to become a fucking intellectual. I almost spat soda all over my screen when I read that. I'm a simple person, blue collar, a worker and a Marxist.

And again, you fail miserably to get the point. If you say that you have no desire to become an intellectual... you also have no desire to become a Marxist, that is, a true one. I mean, even generally it isn't possible to be a Marxist and not be an intellectual (and this has clear roots back to Marx and revolutionary Social Democracy, don't even challenge me on this one), but especially at times when we have literally nothing, when there is no communist movement, when the Left is in a deep ideological crisis, it is absolutely pivotal that a Marxist is first and foremost a theoretician. What else do you think could Marxists do right now? And even this question itself is an intellectual one and can only be answered on this very basis. Being a Communist is, as I've already said and as you should know since you claim that you have read my post, a matter of consciousness and nothing else.

Anyone who has read and understood my first post knows what this discussion is about: The fact of the matter is that the radical Left, the self-proclaimed "communists" are politically worthless. They have no concrete idea of what they are supposed to do practically. But it's not that they are solely lacking a serious approach to reality or that their cluelessness amounts to mere tactical questions - their "organizational crisis" is in fact a deeply ideological one, one that can only be fought against on a... theoretical basis, that is, through intellectual confrontations. The precondition for a revived Left is intellectualism, and anyone who denies this is either ignorant or an idiot. If you claim that you have read my post but still choose to insist on your ignorance, to avoid confronting my points intellectually, you are a foe of Communism and an impediment to its revival, simple as that.

You are missing the entire point, if you say that you "do consider communism to be desirable", because this is not what is being questioned. No, you might even genuinely believe this for all I care, and probably you even do. But you don't understand the simple fact that this very desire... is practically worthless. Again, if you had actually read and understood my posts, you would know that being a Communist does not amount to (or is at least not reducible to) "considering communism to be desirable", whatever this is supposed to mean. Any shit for brains can identify as a Communist but this does not mean anything. I don't know how you can't understand that your identity as a Communist is being challenged or why you, if you did understand this, don't consider it necessary to confront it. The point is that, yes, there are plenty of reasons to question one's loyalty to Communism. We have a fucked up left, a deeply reactionary left, and at times when any shit for brains arch-reactionary can claim to be a communist, one must not take for granted (yes, that again) other "communists'" loyalty to the cause.

And shit, why do you even consider it necessary to mention "blue collar" and "worker"? Do you think that, as a blue collar worker, you are shuffled out of the responsibility to defend your positions thoroughly and intellectually? That it is, thus, a matter of course that you are a Communist and a Marxist? Do you think that it's just "natural" for a worker to become a Marxist? Because, sorry, it's not. Being a worker does not entail becoming a revolutionary, there is no A to B relationship, and if you argue the converse, you prove your materialism to be vulgar, superstitious and reactionary. And believe me, this is not a random shot in the dark - we can really go over this, I foresee the implications of this line of thought, you will not get away with that without being stigmatized as a reactionary.

You claim that you have no desire to become an intellectual, and yet you are here on RevLeft, despising others as "social fascists", explaining how "social democracy" amounts to nothing else but fascism, and how Sanders betrays the working class... while failing to recognize that these are purely intellectual controversies! What do you think is RevLeft about? Do you think it is a medium to internationally organize the radical Left? Before it could - hypothetically - serve as this, there needs to be an ideological consensus among the members, which - as can be seen here - is still lacking. RevLeft is solely a board for intellectuals, or at least for people striving to become intellectuals. So it's clear what it implies when you say that you have no desire to become an intellectual. It proves my point that you are not ready to become a Marxist and not ready to engage in discussions on this board.

GLF

20th July 2016, 22:18

Alet

20th July 2016, 22:50

In any case, you keep asking me to defend my points but you haven't really made your point. Explain to me why supporting social democrats and Bernie Sanders facilitates a communist revival. Please. I'm all ears.

I'm not lying: Barely 10 or maybe 15 minutes before I read this, I was still writing my response to Hermes, and I vow that I'm not telling you a cuck-and-bull story - I sat down for 2 minutes and was wondering if I might have been too hard on him. I honestly had to laugh because I feel so stupid now. You literally claim that I have not "really" made my point. Excuse me, but... was I... somehow not clear enough? Is there something you didn't understand? Or am I somehow not realizing that the only substance to my posts is the baseless claim that you are a reactionary? It's so pathetic how you try to avoid the discussion by now, NOW, after you had DOZENS of chances you are NOW saying that I have not even made a point. I can explain to you why you are wrong, I can literally repeat every single fucking thing I've said, if I have to. But I cannot think for you. Holy shit. Read my posts!

Everything else will be addressed tomorrow.

Exterminatus

20th July 2016, 22:52

I think you are underestimating the presence and power of the modern revolutionary left. Times are changing in our favor. Every time someone like Trump or La Pen opens their big mouth, normal everyday people are disgusted by it and pushed closer to our camp.

Every time Trump opens his mouth, "normal everyday people" salivate over most vile and disgusting rhetoric imaginable and if you don't want to see this it is because you are not a Marxist there's nothing we can say to you.

Antifascism is as strong now as ever and young people are becoming educated and radicalized all across the west. And more young people have a positive view of socialism now than at anytime in the last 50 years. That's incredible, and it's something to be optimistic about.

I can guarantee you with my life that if you asked common people (and especially lower class) in most European countries about Antifa, they would be critical or outright hostile. You can blow my brains out if i'm wrong on this one. And needless to say, this wasn't always the case.

And pray tell us, who is responsible for the increasing popularity of socialism, that social-fascist Bernie Sanders or "modern revolutionary left" (what?)? I don't think you actually think critically about things, you just write something to appear more-radical-than-thou and get in last word. But what's the point of getting in last word if your thought is stagnating? And this is because, like Alet said, your Communism is just another layer of your identity, it is wholly cosmetic.

In any case, you keep asking me to defend my points but you haven't really made your point. Explain to me why supporting social democrats and Bernie Sanders facilitates a communist revival. Please. I'm all ears.

It has been explained in detail in at least three different posts. I mean didn't you yourself explain it in the previous paragraph where you said that socialism is growing more popular in the US. To whom can we attribute this growth other than Bernie Sanders?

Biggest problem here is your intellectual laziness which stems from your refusal to employ ruthless criticism against yourself - your refusal to become a Marxist. Why don't you try to actually grapple with the points at hand i.e. actually analyze them, ponder on them, then connect them into something larger etc..You are in a debate with someone who knows far more than you about this, so why not use this chance to learn and develop your Marxism rather than rabidly dismiss it like some petulant child? It's frankly disgusting, this whole mentality.

GLF

21st July 2016, 02:47

I am not a theoretician and I am not particularly educated nor do I pretend to be. I am not qualified to engage on a deep intellectual level when it comes to Marxist theory because I am not as well read as most of you and I readily admit it. I am here on revleft because I am sympathetic to you guys and hope to one day see the workers prevail over capitalism. I have done quite a bit of reading and am attracted quite a bit to the ideas of Mao Zedong but I don't want to give the false impression that I am well studied or that I'm particularly committed to one form of communism over the other because I'm not. I am here to learn from guys like yourself, Alet, and am not above direction, nor am I above admitting when I am wrong about something.

Yes, I am genuinely hostile to the centre-left but I'm not at all hostile to those who honestly want to advance the interest of the workers, even if we do see things from a different angle. In any case, let's try not to make this discussion anymore about me than it already has become. I will concede to the seniority of the more educated Marxists and try to consider what you have been saying.

Alet

21st July 2016, 22:18

I think we can see plenty of times in history in which progressive short-term proposals have served to strengthen and reinforce capitalism, as well as capitalist ideology.

And if this is the case, those short-term proposals were in fact not even progressive at all. That is because “progressive” is not synonymous with “social” (politically), that is to say, contrary to what is commonly understood by this term, progressive short-term proposals are not simply progressive because they are about worker rights, the poor, the marginalized, redistribution of wealth, and so on. When I say “progressive”, I mean it with regard to our historical predicament and our possibilities to confront it. Thus, if short-term proposals serve to reproduce the capitalist order because they are not radical and cannot potentially be a hard-won success of a mass movement, they are most likely reactionary and not progressive.

The point is that, with regard to Democratic Socialists, the short-term proposals they offer are radical, insofar as these – during the age of neoliberalism, which organically leads to (or is synonymous with) waves of privatization, the destruction of the “welfare state”, and the dying middle class – can only be fought for against the backdrop of a movement that is radical and, to a certain extent, “militant” in nature. This is why Democratic Socialism provides a starting point – not necessarily because it is congruent with it but because it provides proposals, which require a highly controversial discourse with radical implications.

I don’t understand how one could think that Democratic Socialism does not at least provide the starting point, when their ability to touch the hearts of the masses and to politicize them radically is so obvious – and again, I’ll only point to Sanders, who enjoyed admiration for his struggle to shape U.S. politics more left-wing, and to Syriza and Podemos, who built an emotional and confident anti-austerity mass movement. Only an apolitical stance can lead one to the conclusion that neither those movements nor business as usual were worthy of support – but this is reactionary in nature, as I have already explained thoroughly. You might argue that the masses are important, not the democratic-socialist individuals such as Tsipras or Varoufakis. And you’d be right to a certain extent, however, you fail to understand that only Democratic Socialism gave those masses a voice and provided them a political ground to fight on – they couldn’t have done this on their own, without political organization, which channels their voices. Even if the Democratic Socialists often failed ultimately – this is not the point because their failure was not a necessity, which means that they are indeed a starting point, a radical one even.

I disagree, however, that Democratic Socialism always, or even frequently, allows Communists to get their shoe in the door (so to speak)

And even if this is true, my point was not based on the premise that they “always, or even frequently” facilitate a communist movement. I said that… as opposed to 90% of all self-proclaimed communists, they do have short-term proposals which are progressive. That is to say, these short-term proposals could have been offered by Communists as well, insofar as these are a starting point for political struggle, which paves the way for the possibility to radicalize the worker masses. It doesn’t matter how many sufficiently progressive short-term proposals the Democratic Socialists provide, and it is even less important how many short-term proposals they provide in relation to their entire political short-term program with all its stupidities. THE controversial point of this very discussion was that they are infinitely beyond the political/practical capacities of Location C and Konikow for the simple reason that they have nothing except for their worthless phrasemongering. This is why one has to acknowledge the “progressive nature” of Democratic Socialists when talking about them as a distinct ideological current: as opposed to our true socialist heroes.

Furthermore, it is not the fault of Democratic Socialists that the Communists did not get their shoe in the door – nor is it their job to ensure this, after all, why should they care? The fact of the matter is that the Communists themselves have to ensure their own success, and the only way to do this is not by opposing Democratic Socialists as a matter of principle, but by keep pushing forward, by keep struggling for and together with the discontent masses. It’s so hilarious to suggest that the Democratic Socialists in actual fact impede the success of Communists, when… there are only a handful of Communists who would have done what I’m advocating for here, if there are any at all. Tell me, where weren’t “communists” able to get their shoe in the door where they otherwise – that is, without the Democratic Socialists – would have been? Which “communists” are you even referring to? The KKE, which are of the same type as Konikow?

and would say that supporting Democratic Socialists is not the only way to intensify present antagonisms, or to engage ‘politically’ (in the broader sense of the term, including non-parliamentarian tactics).

I know that I keep saying this over and over again, but I think it’s important to just throw in there, again, that one doesn’t need to involve oneself in the realm of parliamentarian politics in order to fight for reform. I’m just reiterating this because I can’t tell, explicitly, from your posts whether or not you agree.

I can only heave a very deep sigh here. Not because what you say is wrong – but because of what you don’t say when writing this. In other words, when you mention this in this context, you imply that it is unnecessary to engage in the controversies the Democratic Socialists engage in and that we should keep away from their struggles. Now we have to go over all this bullshit again although I literally have devoted two thorough texts and one supplement to this topic already, and I naively thought I could have been done after the second post. I can tell you, directly and explicitly, whether or not I agree with this statement. But I cannot do this without addressing the political dimension behind this ostensibly mere empirical claim.

Of course there are infinitely more ways to intensify present antagonisms for there are dozens of antagonisms, and this is not being questioned. However, the point is that, I should say, the important and crucial point is that Sanders DID intensify antagonisms, and also paved the way for going beyond him. This is the point: The phenomenon of Sanders facilitated a highly controversial discourse among the public even to a point where it was about fundamental principles, it allowed people to take a side, being politically active subjects, it allowed the Left to confront the establishment against the backdrop of discontent masses turning to the left side of the spectrum. And to add insult to injury… Sanders provided us a political fighting ground in the context of a growing fascism in the guise of Donald Trump, which makes it even more important that we take this chance.

You want to turn to non-parliamentarian tactics… but you fail to see the astonishing significance of Sanders’ presidential campaign. Sanders’ campaign, as I have stressed literally a thousand fucking times, was not reducible to him becoming president and to his potential policy making. The fact of the matter is that the mere possibility of him becoming president put a severe pressure on business as usual politics and furthermore on Clinton, who was forced to adopt left-wing proposals because of Sanders’ and his movement’s impetus. This is why he was worthy of support: He “was something” and he was able to change something, not despite but because he engaged in parliamentary politics.

Let me explain: The presidential campaign in the USA is somewhat “special” as it concerns its political nature. It has the potential to become, that is, to be made highly controversial. In Germany, for example, we don’t really have something similar. In other words, the American presidential campaign provides a platform to politicize, and to a certain extent, to “radicalize” the masses, or – rather – to stimulate them. Sanders has seen this chance, and he took it. The fact of the matter is that his presidential campaign was a wonderful fighting ground for political reforms, it was fucking effective. This is what true socialists don’t recognize and this is the problem of our present Left.

Why do “revolutionary communists” hysterically shit their pants when it comes to parliamentarian activity? That there are dozens of non-parliamentarian tactics worth considering is not being questioned at all. However, Sanders was something and he was something big, this is the point. Preferring to stay out of the topic of the presidential campaign with all its controversies amounts to nothing else than an apolitical stance. This is reactionary because an apolitical attitude ultimately means that one idly lets the processes of reproduction happen – which, against the backdrop of the rise of neo-fascism, is a capital crime for a self-proclaimed communist. If you are serious about devoting yourself to the revolutionary cause, that is, if you are serious about intensifying antagonisms, you must be able to take a side everywhere, and not only when it’s aesthetically more “revolutionary” than parliamentarian politics.

Not only did Syriza not provide a platform for Communists to increase their political relevance, but they took the progressive movement that put them into power and demoralized them completely.

That the Syriza government conceded victory to Brussels was not an inevitability, however. This is shown both by the party base and by Varoufakis, both adherents of Democratic Socialism and both opposed to the capitulation of the government, the latter striving to carry on its legacy building a pan-European movement. You fail to understand that it’s because Syriza, Podemos and Sanders were able to fail miserably they prove to be a starting point for communist struggle. They take the risk of falling down and succeed in moving something. Here lies the key for Communists to set something in motion but they choose to blacken our inspiring role models as “reformists”, “social democrats” or “betrayers of the worker class”.

I’m not sure I understand how workers are supposed to become radicalized when the same people who should be presenting the alternatives are supporting those who demoralize them. This is what I meant when I mentioned demoralization – the movement itself rejects these figureheads once they’ve shown that they’re incapable of providing what it is that the movement desires.

Support to what extent? This is what you misunderstand again and again, and I can’t help being puzzled by your line of thought. The figureheads are not “incapable” of achieving the aims that are set because, as I’ve said, this is not an inevitability. They might lose the guts to do this, and this is why it is important to keep pushing forward and to keep struggling.

You clearly confuse the context here. You used the term “demoralize” to describe the effect of endorsing Clinton in her struggle against Trump. I'm yet not even entirely sure that this tactic will be successful in today's context, but I claim that it is nevertheless a considerable one. This is not because I think that Clinton is progressive in the sense that Democratic Socialists are, but merely because this is about Trump, about defeating him and about pushing back neo-fascism. I’m not saying that Clinton is supposed to be the figurehead of a revived Left but a revived Left should exploit her campaign as a means to fight Trump because it does provide a possibility to become politically active.

The support for Democratic Socialists, on the other hand, goes beyond mere endorsement for tactical reasons. They are worthy of support because they provide a starting point (which Clinton does not) but this is what I’ve already thoroughly elaborated upon. Let me stress the difference this way: The significance of Democratic Socialists is that actual, actually inclined and devoted Communists, when advocating short-term proposal, would not be differentiated from Democratic Socialists by Konikow, Location C and the like.

My point? If it actually happens, in my ideal narrative, that Democratic Socialists ultimately do demoralize their former supporters (which is not because they identify as Democratic Socialists), inclined Communists will have to carry on their legacy – but it would, in the short term, amount to nothing else than imitating the former heroes.

Before there was a movement ‘behind’ Sanders, there was widespread discontent against both the Republican and the Democratic parties, as well as a less-developed discontent against ‘the state,’ so on.

So? What is your point? Again:

Of course, he gained supporters because they were fed up with the establishment but that's tautological - who else would support someone who is opposed to it? Sanders' great deed is that he provided an alternative in making a political influence on the "business as usual" possible. Mere expressions of discontent with the establishment or even protests in the manner of BLM alone (that's not to say that BLM protests are inherently worthless, on the contrary) are not sufficient. Sanders was a political force, endangering the establishment politics, and this... "radicalized" a lot of Americans.

Again, just tangentially, I’m interested to know, within this narrative, what your opinion re: Stein/the Green Party is. You never really answered.

I refused to answer because I don’t see how it relates to the fundamental controversy of the discussion. I thought you only wanted a supplement because I haven’t been clear enough on some points, however, if I had known that our controversy requires more thoroughness, I would have gone into detail right from the beginning.

But if you’re really interested, for whatever reason: I don’t think that Stein and the Green Party are able to carry on the torch, at least not as it concerns their aim to field a presidential candidate. They are not relevant, not politically strong enough to put pressure on the establishment. And this is especially true when considering Trump’s popularity, which just keeps growing from day to day. Recently, there has been a statement by the Green Party, or I even think that it was Stein who said that Sanders has to realize that he cannot have a revolution “in a counterrevolutionary party”. What they fail to appreciate is the fact that Sanders was able to meaningfully talk about a “revolution” only because he was a Democrat. The American state apparatus is a de facto two-party system, and it remains one as long as there is no radical, militant movement, which is yet to be built (again, Sanders’ movement is a precondition for this). Only the Democratic Party could have provided the platform for a political figure like Sanders, a political figure with the ability to touch the hearts of the masses.

If Sanders’ movement shall not die, it has to engage in… yes, “non-parliamentarian activities”, primarily. But this is not because the presidential campaign is a “bourgeois framework” and “capitalism”, it’s only because there is no (relevant) left-wing candidate anymore. That Sanders tried, however, was not worthless. This has to be recognized.

what does this do to the movement, that existed before Sanders, but that he came to represent? Is this at all analogous to the situation that Syriza brought about in Greece, and why or why not? To what extent will the ‘radicalization’ of those who supported Sanders survive within their support for Clinton?
I think these are important questions, and I don’t think that any of us can really give a definitive answer one way or the other.

It is not analogous to Syriza’s capitulation because the endorsement for Clinton is not necessarily tantamount to betraying one’s ideals, as it was with Tsipras. But we will come back to that. The other questions, however, are indeed very important. These are tactical ones as they concern the radical Left’s task to politicize the masses, hard questions I’d like to discuss more often here. This is what I have already touched upon in my first post here. The problem we cannot have such discussions is because of deep, very deep ideological disagreements, which have alarming practical implications. What makes this thread controversial are not mere tactical questions but fundamental differences, which only appear at the level of concrete tactics such as Sanders’ potential presidency. This necessarily amounts to fundamental questions concerning the nature of capitalism, what capitalism and bourgeois really mean as opposed to Communism and proletarian, what “the real movement abolishing the present state of things” really means, questions concerning materialism, and so on. That’s what this thread is really about.

I’m sorry, I should have been more specific. It was first posited (I believe, anyway) by Trotsky, in ~1932, especially shown in this selection: https://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/works/1944/1944-fas.htm

The fascists find their human material mainly in the petty bourgeoisie. The latter has been entirely ruined by big capital. There is no way out for it in the present social order, but it knows of no other. Its dissatisfaction, indignation, and despair are diverted by the fascists away from big capital and against the workers. It may be said that fascism is the act of placing the petty bourgeoisie at the disposal of its most bitter enemies. In this way, big capital ruins the middle classes and then, with the help of hired fascist demagogues, incites the despairing petty bourgeoisie against the worker. The bourgeois regime can be preserved only by such murderous means as these. For how long? Until it is overthrown by proletarian revolution.

I’ve seen the same analysis most often by others on the left, but I’ve also seen other historians engage with it as well, esp. in demographic studies of Germany during the 30s.

It should be made clear that when I’m speaking of the middle class “in the modern sense” I’m not referring to the middle classes in the original Marxist sense. The modern middle class is not the petty bourgeoisie, instead, it is… “sociologically” speaking, proletarian in nature, especially as it concerns the lower middle class. What I mean by that is that they are forced to sell their labor power. However, at the same time, they are still differentiated from the lower strata of the proletariat, the precariat and so on, because they are privileged, insofar as their wealth and the level of their contentment significantly exceed miserable living standards. The modern middle class is this part of the proletariat which, by virtue of wealth and privilege, deceives itself into thinking that they’re on the same level as the bourgeoisie. Striving to become the universal bourgeois subject is what ideologically reproduces capitalism. The middle class represents this striving insofar as their living standards have become the qualifications for “living a full life”. The middle class I’m referring to is a phenomenon of the Cold War era, the heyday of (non-revolutionary) social democracy. It used to be, and still is, the majority of Western population, but these strata are diminishing now.

I guess my answer to your question will be as banal as my previous statement, which is that capitalism can’t deliver on the promises of its ideology to either the workers or the middle classes, and I don’t really think we’re in disagreement about this.

If it is as banal, why do you assume that it’s a sufficient answer this time? It can be attacked on the very same basis, which is that you deliver to us a meaningless truism but no concrete analysis of the reproduction processes of capitalism. It doesn’t allow us to have a better understanding of the rhetoric and the ideology of neo-fascists, it doesn’t allow us to understand the implications of their proposals in relation to the trajectory of capitalism, it doesn’t allow us to develop concrete strategies, in one word: We have literally no use for this. I’m not sure if you just don’t realize that I don’t disagree with this statement because I have effectively said the same. The difference is that you, insisting on banal and abstract truisms, can’t explain why capitalism “can’t deliver the promises of its ideology”, that is, not generally but as it concerns our present predicament, in the here and now. What is it that workers are fretting about, concretely? Or maybe you forgot the context of this controversy. Cliff Paul questioned the impact of neo-fascist thought. The dying middle class is my answer, that’s why we have to take it seriously. Nobody is asking for a theory of fascism, the controversy is about how neo-fascism is on the rise.

I’d be interested to see if this was true – most demographic studies of Trump’s support base that I’ve seen wouldn’t really support the claim that his greatest support was among the middle class. That being said, there haven’t been any exhaustive studies done on the subject (that I’ve seen, at least), owing to how difficult it would be to carry out.

The problem of many studies concerning demographics is that there are many different concepts of “the middle class” in the field of sociology. However, apart from empirical studies, we have another indicator: Ideology. Trump’s buzzwords are “job creation” and “manufacturing”, among others. It is clear that he attempts to appeal to the lower middle class, whose basis of existence is endangered. And, to add insult to injury, the AfD even directly refers to the dying middle class as the pillar of society. The fact of the matter is that the middle class is dying, and that’s why fascism, being an alternate modernity, must entail the promise of retaining the status quo, ideologically at least. Hence, neo-fascism’s “human material”, in Trotsky’s words, is today the modern middle class, which is dying. True, there are also many middle class workers who oppose Trump or the AfD. Nobody claimed that neo-fascism has already triumphed.

I think that explicitly doing so within the parliamentary system, though, has the greatest possibility to lower class consciousness, or at least stagnate it, rather than increase it.

I have already addressed this above thoroughly, but only to stress this again because I can’t help being stunned: Do you really believe this? I mean, have you even recognized the impact of Sanders and Syriza? It facilitated controversial discourses even in Germany, especially the latter paved the way for this. They were able to change something, they were able to do something big. You can choose to stay away from this but this means that you choose to be a reactionary.

The same dead horse is back again, but for all of its flaws, the New Deal was undoubtedly ‘progressive’ – and yet it coincided with the death throes of one of America’s only significant Socialist parties. If progressive demands necessarily increase class consciousness/radicalization, shouldn’t its popularity have increased?

Actually, I’ve already tried to argue that the struggle for reforms, a necessary struggle, as every Marxist acknowledges, is not the same as reformism, that can be found in the previous century. I’ve tried to stress the fundamental point that we’re living in an entirely different context today, which leads us to the next fundamental point, which is that the same proposals offered nine decades ago, being reformist in nature – meaning that they, indeed, aimed at appeasing the proletariat and successfully did so – can only be fought for against the backdrop of a movement which necessarily questions the current order of things, practically. But nevermind, maybe I was simply not clear enough.

The New Deal was in no way whatsoever “progressive” because, yes, this is indeed a typical example for reformism. The U.S. government had to react to a proletariat that is infinitely more radical and politicized, and infinitely more militant than the proletariat today. One only needs to point to the strike movement that preceded the New Deal: It was, to a certain extent, characterized by violence. This and the economic crisis forced the government to “reshuffle the pack” and ensure certain social standards.

Furthermore, the New Deal was much more than mere social securities aimed at contenting the masses: It ushered in a new era of capitalism, changing the interrelation between the state apparatus and capital in the long run. The whole New Deal aimed at overcoming the economic crisis and avoiding future crises entailing similar consequences. In other words, it served to strengthen the state apparatus, making it more resistant to both radicals and capitalism’s tendency toward crises.

The difference is that, today, we have nothing. The same proposals that would have been reformist 90 years ago cannot be opposed to a militant worker movement that is today not existent. People got used to take the social and political standards for granted but the fact of the matter is that the bourgeoisie has less and less reasons to maintain them. Fighting for short-term demands is necessarily congruent with politicized masses, which are ready to oppose the current state of affairs.

I think that a lot of the sentiment in this last part of your post I tried to address above, but if you think I’ve neglected something, please say so and I’ll try to respond to this part in more detail.

At this point, I can only rephrase what has already been said. Our present task is to politicize the masses, so that they become a politically meaningful force that is able to change something. In order to accomplish this task, we have to take every opportunity we can get to attain political successes, which are by necessity small ones in the beginning. Sanders has started to build the preconditions for such a movement. However, his campaign has come to an end – if what he has set in motion shall live on, it has to keep struggling for successes in the spirit of reviving the radical Left, staying true to radical ideals.

One possible victory this movement can chalk up – again, in the spirit of a revived Left, and maybe under a new leadership – is the defeat of Trump, which is indeed only possible by voting for Hillary Clinton. This is not to fucking say that Clinton is supposed to be the leader of this movement, that she carries on Sanders’ torch, and so on. She does not represent the ideals of a revived Left, they do not build their hope on her – this whole thing is simply about defeating Trump. It only happens that Clinton is the one this movement has to support – this is not because she is in any respect progressive but because she is the only presidential candidate left.

I might appear hilarious emphasizing this hysterically – but for some mysterious reason you fail to get the point and I don’t know if this is my fault. You responded that tactical “support” (the term is extremely misleading) for her will not revive the radical Left and, instead, demoralize the people, implying that I seem to be under the impression that Clinton is supposed to give hope to the workers according to my narrative. But this is not the point: There is a great ideological gap between the movement and Clinton, and the elections only serve as a medium for antifascist practice, although it’s – again, I say that explicitly – not Clinton herself who is antifascist.

If this is still too vague, I can only advise you to reread the paragraphs in question because I don’t know how to stress my point.

Maybe it was this what I didn’t address sufficiently: You claim that supporting Clinton, being the only alternative to Trump, will impede the hopes for a socialist society (“hopes for any kind of alternative”). However, the fact of the matter is that there is no context for a socialist society, yet. We have to face the situation as it is and not as we want it to be: Clinton is, right now, the only alternative to Trump. This is a fact we have to recognize. Now it’s our choice: Do we apolitically watch the processes happen and let Clinton gain ideological support among the masses, risking the possibility of a Trump presidency; or do we lead the movement Sanders has bequeathed to us, so that the “support” for Clinton (again, which does not amount to ideological endorsement) is only a provisional one in order to defeat Trump?

We have to deal with the world as it exists, which is the exact same point which constitutes my attacks on Konikow and Location C. Meaningless fantasies of a socialist alternative will get us nowhere if this is not translated into concrete political activity. Defeating Trump is a way to keep the progressive masses politicized, and as there is no socialist candidate, voting for Clinton is the only alternative. I mean, you could put forward the exact same arguments when it comes to reforms: One could say that fighting for small demands demoralizes the workers to the point where they lose hope for an alternative to capitalism. This is silly because everybody knows that the struggle for reforms is the bridge to the realization of this alternative in the first place.

Alet

21st July 2016, 22:50

I am not a theoretician

Yes you are a theoretician, which was the point of my last more or less profound post, if you forgot it. The point is that you are engaging in hard theoretical, intellectual controversies. Outside of this... we are nothing, especially as it concerns RevLeft.

I am not qualified to engage on a deep intellectual level when it comes to Marxist theory because I am not as well read as most of you and I readily admit it. I am here on revleft because I am sympathetic to you guys and hope to one day see the workers prevail over capitalism. I have done quite a bit of reading and am attracted quite a bit to the ideas of Mao Zedong but I don't want to give the false impression that I am well studied or that I'm particularly committed to one form of communism over the other because I'm not. I am here to learn from guys like yourself, Alet, and am not above direction, nor am I above admitting when I am wrong about something.

Yet, the only thing that hinders your ability to "engage on a deep intellectual level" is your own will to ruthlessly criticize everything, and nothing else. You can keep telling me how educated and qualified I am but the fact of the matter is... one can be educated when it comes to Marxist theory and in the next moment talk straight out of his ass. That I might be educated as opposed to others doesn't mean anything. The only meaningful difference between us is that I'm not trying to avoid confrontations that force me to engage in difficult intellectual controversies. My point is that, and I mean it, there is literally nothing special about me. There is nothing that constitutes the positions I defend apart from reason, which every human being has equal access to - no genes, no God, no soul is responsible for the arguments I put forward. I could advocate the same positions you advocate and vice versa. The only guarantee of truth... are humans themselves, and only humans. Getting at the truth, however, requires engagement in intellectual controversies, to the point where it is insane and "scary". This is what it means to take nothing for granted.

What I am trying to say is that I'm just as worthless as you are. Only as it concerns your own will to think, you are failing miserably.

In any case, let's try not to make this discussion anymore about me than it already has become.

Again, you have not understood the point that this discussion has never been about you, about Location C as an individual, never, not even in the slightest. This discussion is about an ideological current you as an individual only happen to be a part of. Insofar, you serve as a strawman so others can attack the whole ideology in general. Again: What one human can think, any other human is able to think just as well. As it concerns intellectual controversies, our "individuality" (just because I couldn't find a better term) doesn't matter. This has never been personal - every single snit fit, every insult, every attack - was not because of you in particular but was directed against neo-true socialism and its implications, both practical ones concerning politics and psychological ones.

I will concede to the seniority of the more educated Marxists and try to consider what you have been saying.

And if you are honest you know that this is a lie. Only 4 hours earlier you claimed that I haven't even really said anything at all. You know it and I know as well that this is just another attempt to avoid confrontation with the difficult questions put forward and with their hard implications. But let me be clear: As long as you are trying to appear as an engaged subject in this controversy, in other words, as long as you post in this thread, you are not going to get away without being attacked, until you have the guts to think critically.

Konikow

21st July 2016, 22:58

The Intransigent Faction

22nd July 2016, 00:46

Some criticisms are criticaler than others. Above all, what must be criticized, nay, rejected, is the political independence of the working class. Modern communism will emerge from political support to the ruling party of U.S. imperialism. See, I can be an intellectual too.

Now you're getting it!
Remember, democratic socialism and social democracy are the same thing. That's why Bernie Sanders called on workers to vote for his reforms, which he insisted would ultimately lead to workers' control of the means of production.

No true radical leftist would ever be so misguided as to support reforms that limit the starvation or homelessness of the working class. Only a browbeaten working class which communists ensure have suffered to the utmost can truly organize an independent movement, because as any leftist will tell you, that's the only way to make workers do anything.

The Intransigent Faction

22nd July 2016, 00:47

Konikow

22nd July 2016, 00:56

Now you're getting it!
Remember, democratic socialism and social democracy are the same thing. That's why Bernie Sanders called on workers to vote for his reforms, which he insisted would ultimately lead to workers' control of the means of production.

No true radical leftist would ever be so misguided as to support reforms that limit the starvation or homelessness of the working class. Only a browbeaten working class which communists ensure have suffered to the utmost can truly organize an independent movement, because as any leftist will tell you, that's the only way to make workers do anything.

At the risk of taking you seriously, you seem to be operating under the belief that capitalism is reformed by voting for, or otherwise supporting, capitalist parties. This is a key part of the doctrine known as Revolutionary Leftism.

Some revisionists, however, insist on reviving Marx's obsolete doctrine that capitalism sometimes concedes reforms as a result of class struggle against the capitalist parties and their government.

The Intransigent Faction

22nd July 2016, 01:19

At the risk of taking you seriously, you seem to be operating under the belief that capitalism is reformed by voting for, or otherwise supporting, capitalist parties. This is a key part of the doctrine known as Revolutionary Leftism.

Some revisionists, however, insist on reviving Marx's obsolete doctrine that capitalism sometimes concedes reforms as a result of class struggle against the capitalist parties and their government.

Of course! As is well known, the capitalists of the Socialist Party of Canada, and the infamous Eugene Debs, CEO & President of Wobblies Inc. and the Socialist Party of America™ eschewed class struggle in favour of parliamentary reformism until the glorious enlightened revolutionaries arrived and explained to their members that only by following the dictums of a Marxist-Leninist party could they become truly independent.

Konikow

22nd July 2016, 01:26

Of course! As is well known, the capitalists of the Socialist Party of Canada, and the infamous Eugene Debs, CEO & President of Wobblies Inc. and the Socialist Party of America™ eschewed class struggle in favour of parliamentary reformism until the glorious enlightened revolutionaries arrived and explained to their members that only by following the dictums of a Marxist-Leninist party could they become truly independent.

Again, silly me, I forgot that for Revolutionary Leftism, the class line is a meaningless concept.

A working class party, or a union, is fundamentally the same as the Democratic Party, the ruling party of what the Wobblies used to call the "boss class."

Supporting Bernie Sanders is the same as unionizing the railroads, according to Revolutionary Leftism.

I have so much to learn.

The Intransigent Faction

22nd July 2016, 02:50

Supporting Bernie Sanders is the same as unionizing the railroads, according to Revolutionary Leftism.

Well, as long as you're learning, I should inform you that Bernie Sanders is a social democrat, not a democratic socialist, but that both unionization and supporting a reformist candidate represent necessarily limited activities within a capitalist society. Both of these things can help prevent workers from starving or ensure access to health care, but neither can lead to an independent working class or to socialism.

Of course, some prefer to sit back and let things get worse, hoping that starvation, homelessness, and brutal exploitation in general will position the working class to overthrow capitalism out of desperation. Fortunately, we know better.

Konikow

22nd July 2016, 03:36

Bernie Sanders is a social democrat, not a democratic socialist

Again with this nonsense. Symptomatic of idiocy on top of idiocy.

First of all, the idiotic assumption that the workers should support "social democrats" or "democratic socialists," who for over a century have been an indispensable pillar of the capitalist state.

Second, the delusion that there is any difference between the two, aside from branding preference. Folks ought to read more Marx and less Wikipedia.

Third and most fundamentally, the idea that a lifetime bourgeois politician, recently a losing contender to the the presidential candidate of the ruling capitalist party in the U.S., is either a "democratic socialist" or a "social democrat." Bernie Sanders is not a traitor to the working class! He is a representative of the class enemy.

but that both unionization and supporting a reformist candidate represent necessarily limited activities within a capitalist society.

Sure, so is golfing. So what? But unionization is organization of our class. The Revolutionary Left's "reformist candidate" is a representative of the class enemy.

Which side are you on? The class line is fundamental. But it is precisely the class line that the Revolutionary Left can not see.

Both of these things can help prevent workers from starving.....

Really? Voting prevents workers from starving?

Does the Revolutionary Left also believe in the power of prayer? Or the power of positive thinking?

And after that, it just gets sillier.

Kohai

22nd July 2016, 19:20

nothing has changed about 'democratic socialism.' It has never existed except as the title of the Scandinavian countries as bestowed by capital.

Okay well you obviously didn't know that Lenin called his movement "Democratic Socialism" and it has been a popular term ever since then. And no anarchists on this site? the banner at the top of the website is an Anarcho-Communist flag along with a Hammer+Sickle and an A for anarchy. there may not be a LOT of anarchists on this site, but dont make us feel unwelcomed with your "far-left" bullshit.

Hermes

22nd July 2016, 20:43

And if this is the case, those short-term proposals were in fact not even progressive at all. That is because “progressive” is not synonymous with “social” (politically), that is to say, contrary to what is commonly understood by this term, progressive short-term proposals are not simply progressive because they are about worker rights, the poor, the marginalized, redistribution of wealth, and so on. When I say “progressive”, I mean it with regard to our historical predicament and our possibilities to confront it. Thus, if short-term proposals serve to reproduce the capitalist order because they are not radical and cannot potentially be a hard-won success of a mass movement, they are most likely reactionary and not progressive.

I agree with your assessment of reforms and your definition of progressive as re: our current situation, but I also argue, below, that in the context of the current American predicament, a win for Clinton is not progressive either. Not because she's another capitalist, or because elections are inherently bourgeois, or whatever.

The point is that, with regard to Democratic Socialists, the short-term proposals they offer are radical, insofar as these – during the age of neoliberalism, which organically leads to (or is synonymous with) waves of privatization, the destruction of the “welfare state”, and the dying middle class – can only be fought for against the backdrop of a movement that is radical and, to a certain extent, “militant” in nature. This is why Democratic Socialism provides a starting point – not necessarily because it is congruent with it but because it provides proposals, which require a highly controversial discourse with radical implications.

I don’t understand how one could think that Democratic Socialism does not at least provide the starting point, when their ability to touch the hearts of the masses and to politicize them radically is so obvious – and again, I’ll only point to Sanders, who enjoyed admiration for his struggle to shape U.S. politics more left-wing, and to Syriza and Podemos, who built an emotional and confident anti-austerity mass movement. Only an apolitical stance can lead one to the conclusion that neither those movements nor business as usual were worthy of support – but this is reactionary in nature, as I have already explained thoroughly. You might argue that the masses are important, not the democratic-socialist individuals such as Tsipras or Varoufakis. And you’d be right to a certain extent, however, you fail to understand that only Democratic Socialism gave those masses a voice and provided them a political ground to fight on – they couldn’t have done this on their own, without political organization, which channels their voices. Even if the Democratic Socialists often failed ultimately – this is not the point because their failure was not a necessity, which means that they are indeed a starting point, a radical one even.

I think it's important here to stress that Sanders, Syriza, and Podemos, are most often, as you say, touching the hearts of the masses, and influencing them in an emotional way.

These changes are, however, only temporary.

The organization of a body which channels the voices of the discontented is probably a necessity, I definitely agree – I disagree that this is represented by Sanders, Syriza, or Podemos, because they fail to articulate a clear alternative, and instead have continually led those they've influenced to believe that the chance for change is the greatest within the current system, at least for the present moment (Sanders' endorsement of Clinton in order to defeat Trump, Syriza's defeat at the hands of Brussels as opposed to the wishes of their membership, etc).

And even if this is true, my point was not based on the premise that they “always, or even frequently” facilitate a communist movement. I said that… as opposed to 90% of all self-proclaimed communists, they do have short-term proposals which are progressive. That is to say, these short-term proposals could have been offered by Communists as well, insofar as these are a starting point for political struggle, which paves the way for the possibility to radicalize the worker masses. It doesn’t matter how many sufficiently progressive short-term proposals the Democratic Socialists provide, and it is even less important how many short-term proposals they provide in relation to their entire political short-term program with all its stupidities. THE controversial point of this very discussion was that they are infinitely beyond the political/practical capacities of Location C and Konikow for the simple reason that they have nothing except for their worthless phrasemongering. This is why one has to acknowledge the “progressive nature” of Democratic Socialists when talking about them as a distinct ideological current: as opposed to our true socialist heroes.

This is true in part, I think. Currently, because of the lack of a truly independent Democratic Socialist alternative, a social democrat like Sanders is infinitely ahead of any Communist in his ability to pass reform – I don't think that anyone here disagrees with this statement.

I don't think it necessarily follows, however, that these deserve our support. Rather, I think that they should encourage us, instead of merely issuing empty phrasemongering, to actually create an alternative political movement.

Furthermore, it is not the fault of Democratic Socialists that the Communists did not get their shoe in the door – nor is it their job to ensure this, after all, why should they care? The fact of the matter is that the Communists themselves have to ensure their own success, and the only way to do this is not by opposing Democratic Socialists as a matter of principle, but by keep pushing forward, by keep struggling for and together with the discontent masses. It’s so hilarious to suggest that the Democratic Socialists in actual fact impede the success of Communists, when… there are only a handful of Communists who would have done what I’m advocating for here, if there are any at all. Tell me, where weren’t “communists” able to get their shoe in the door where they otherwise – that is, without the Democratic Socialists – would have been? Which “communists” are you even referring to? The KKE, which are of the same type as Konikow?

I don't think that it's really useful to talk about whether or not something is the 'fault' of one party or another.

What I do think that it's important to recognize, and this is something that in the present context is more-or-less useless to us, but it may be important in the future, is that independent third parties (thinking here again of the SPA) have repeatedly been first led astray, and then demolished (intentionally or not), by those who believe that the best chance of success, especially for their short-term reforms, lie in the hopes provided by the Democratic party, or in attempting to pressure the Democratic party into reforming itself.

Of course there are infinitely more ways to intensify present antagonisms for there are dozens of antagonisms, and this is not being questioned. However, the point is that, I should say, the important and crucial point is that Sanders DID intensify antagonisms, and also paved the way for going beyond him. This is the point: The phenomenon of Sanders facilitated a highly controversial discourse among the public even to a point where it was about fundamental principles, it allowed people to take a side, being politically active subjects, it allowed the Left to confront the establishment against the backdrop of discontent masses turning to the left side of the spectrum. And to add insult to injury… Sanders provided us a political fighting ground in the context of a growing fascism in the guise of Donald Trump, which makes it even more important that we take this chance.

You want to turn to non-parliamentarian tactics… but you fail to see the astonishing significance of Sanders’ presidential campaign. Sanders’ campaign, as I have stressed literally a thousand fucking times, was not reducible to him becoming president and to his potential policy making. The fact of the matter is that the mere possibility of him becoming president put a severe pressure on business as usual politics and furthermore on Clinton, who was forced to adopt left-wing proposals because of Sanders’ and his movement’s impetus. This is why he was worthy of support: He “was something” and he was able to change something, not despite but because he engaged in parliamentary politics.

Let me explain: The presidential campaign in the USA is somewhat “special” as it concerns its political nature. It has the potential to become, that is, to be made highly controversial. In Germany, for example, we don’t really have something similar. In other words, the American presidential campaign provides a platform to politicize, and to a certain extent, to “radicalize” the masses, or – rather – to stimulate them. Sanders has seen this chance, and he took it. The fact of the matter is that his presidential campaign was a wonderful fighting ground for political reforms, it was fucking effective. This is what true socialists don’t recognize and this is the problem of our present Left.

I think that the history of the Democrats in America shows a remarkable ability, and one that often surprises even the most pessimistic of politicians, to absorb and co-opt groups that attempt to exert pressure against them. This can be seen through various circumstances, from Henry Wallace's campaign, to the CPPA and the La Follette campaign, to the American Labor Party, even all the way up to Ralph Nader's campaign for the Greens. Those parties who fail to clearly and consistently advocate an indepenent party that is outside of the realm of the two-party system, and who fail to go beyond a pressure group attempting to influence change in the Democratic party, fail to achieve their goal, and the Democratic party emerges stronger from the 'conflict.'

I think you may carry some assumptions about American presidential elections that aren't true in reality. The word you use here that is most to-the-point, in my mind, is 'stimulate.' Once this stimulus is removed, all action in the body dies. That is, elections in America do, usually, polarize the population, to an extent that is surprising – until their conclusion. The majority of the American population retains none of this stimulation, and I think your analysis that Sanders' campaign will have lasting effects on the 'fighting ground for political reforms' is misleading due to this.

Why do “revolutionary communists” hysterically shit their pants when it comes to parliamentarian activity? That there are dozens of non-parliamentarian tactics worth considering is not being questioned at all. However, Sanders was something and he was something big, this is the point. Preferring to stay out of the topic of the presidential campaign with all its controversies amounts to nothing else than an apolitical stance. This is reactionary because an apolitical attitude ultimately means that one idly lets the processes of reproduction happen – which, against the backdrop of the rise of neo-fascism, is a capital crime for a self-proclaimed communist. If you are serious about devoting yourself to the revolutionary cause, that is, if you are serious about intensifying antagonisms, you must be able to take a side everywhere, and not only when it’s aesthetically more “revolutionary” than parliamentarian politics.

Sanders was something, and is something, and I don't think anyone questions that.

I think you're mischaracterizing your opponents by saying that they 'stay out of the topic of the presidential campaign.' I think they're taking a side, and that it constitutes more than an apolitical stance.

That the Syriza government conceded victory to Brussels was not an inevitability, however. This is shown both by the party base and by Varoufakis, both adherents of Democratic Socialism and both opposed to the capitulation of the government, the latter striving to carry on its legacy building a pan-European movement. You fail to understand that it’s because Syriza, Podemos and Sanders were able to fail miserably they prove to be a starting point for communist struggle. They take the risk of falling down and succeed in moving something. Here lies the key for Communists to set something in motion but they choose to blacken our inspiring role models as “reformists”, “social democrats” or “betrayers of the worker class”.

I'm not necessarily arguing that Syriza failing was inevitable from the beginning. I think in order for me to respond more fully to this point, I'll need you to expand on what it is that you think Syriza, Podemos, and Sanders accomplished in 'failing miserably.'

As an attempt to respond to a little of this, however, I'd argue that it's significant that, despite a party base opposed to Syriza's capitulation, as well as a prominent member of the party, the fact that Syriza did, in the end, capitulate is, I think, indicative of the leadership's ideological bent, and a warning to beware of similar bents in similar movements.

Support to what extent? This is what you misunderstand again and again, and I can’t help being puzzled by your line of thought. The figureheads are not “incapable” of achieving the aims that are set because, as I’ve said, this is not an inevitability. They might lose the guts to do this, and this is why it is important to keep pushing forward and to keep struggling.

You clearly confuse the context here. You used the term “demoralize” to describe the effect of endorsing Clinton in her struggle against Trump. I'm yet not even entirely sure that this tactic will be successful in today's context, but I claim that it is nevertheless a considerable one. This is not because I think that Clinton is progressive in the sense that Democratic Socialists are, but merely because this is about Trump, about defeating him and about pushing back neo-fascism. I’m not saying that Clinton is supposed to be the figurehead of a revived Left but a revived Left should exploit her campaign as a means to fight Trump because it does provide a possibility to become politically active.

The support for Democratic Socialists, on the other hand, goes beyond mere endorsement for tactical reasons. They are worthy of support because they provide a starting point (which Clinton does not) but this is what I’ve already thoroughly elaborated upon. Let me stress the difference this way: The significance of Democratic Socialists is that actual, actually inclined and devoted Communists, when advocating short-term proposal, would not be differentiated from Democratic Socialists by Konikow, Location C and the like.

My point? If it actually happens, in my ideal narrative, that Democratic Socialists ultimately do demoralize their former supporters (which is not because they identify as Democratic Socialists), inclined Communists will have to carry on their legacy – but it would, in the short term, amount to nothing else than imitating the former heroes.

I would stress that we keep in mind the ideological processes at work in the current context, here, rather than ending the analysis at defeating Trump. Defeating Trump is a concrete goal that we can aspire to, yes, and it's also one that Clinton and Sanders have effectively rallied much of the population to.

It's not analogous to a defeat of neo-fascism, however. Further, I don't believe that the fight against Trump allows either communists or workers to become politically active, and this is for the same reason that I believe there is a fundamental difference between short-term reforms (whether or not one believes that these are useful) advocated by Social Democrats (I agree with Brad here, in identifying Sanders as a Social Democrat) and short-term reforms advocated by Democratic Socialists, or revolutionary socialists, even.

The long-term goal of socialism, even in the case of Democratic Socialists, where we both agree they may never actually desire to get there, recognizes and admits that the short-term reforms that we're fighting for aren't the goal-in-themselves, whereas the Social Democrat not only has no desire for any type of transformative politics, but fails even to provide the illusion of them. It's this difference that neuters any attempt at working class organization.

I think that we can only talk about communists, or even democratic socialists, carrying on the legacy of social democrats, in the context of an independent working class movement, which as of yet doesn't exist.

I refused to answer because I don’t see how it relates to the fundamental controversy of the discussion. I thought you only wanted a supplement because I haven’t been clear enough on some points, however, if I had known that our controversy requires more thoroughness, I would have gone into detail right from the beginning.

But if you’re really interested, for whatever reason: I don’t think that Stein and the Green Party are able to carry on the torch, at least not as it concerns their aim to field a presidential candidate. They are not relevant, not politically strong enough to put pressure on the establishment. And this is especially true when considering Trump’s popularity, which just keeps growing from day to day. Recently, there has been a statement by the Green Party, or I even think that it was Stein who said that Sanders has to realize that he cannot have a revolution “in a counterrevolutionary party”. What they fail to appreciate is the fact that Sanders was able to meaningfully talk about a “revolution” only because he was a Democrat. The American state apparatus is a de facto two-party system, and it remains one as long as there is no radical, militant movement, which is yet to be built (again, Sanders’ movement is a precondition for this). Only the Democratic Party could have provided the platform for a political figure like Sanders, a political figure with the ability to touch the hearts of the masses.

Can I just clarify something here really quickly? I'm not attacking you. I agree with you that this controversy is important, and though we obviously have different analyses, and therefore answers, I responded to your post, and continue to respond to them, because I value your analysis and what you have to say, as well as the opportunity in general to actually engage with other viewpoints.

While I obviously believe in what little I'm arguing here, I also realize that I'm not always correct, and that in the end I have more questions than I have hesitant answers anyway. So, that's the reason I was interested, and still am.

If Sanders’ movement shall not die, it has to engage in… yes, “non-parliamentarian activities”, primarily. But this is not because the presidential campaign is a “bourgeois framework” and “capitalism”, it’s only because there is no (relevant) left-wing candidate anymore. That Sanders tried, however, was not worthless. This has to be recognized.

What they fail to appreciate is the fact that Sanders was able to meaningfully talk about a “revolution” only because he was a Democrat. The American state apparatus is a de facto two-party system, and it remains one as long as there is no radical, militant movement, which is yet to be built (again, Sanders’ movement is a precondition for this). Only the Democratic Party could have provided the platform for a political figure like Sanders, a political figure with the ability to touch the hearts of the masses.

So? What is your point? Again:
Of course, he gained supporters because they were fed up with the establishment but that's tautological - who else would support someone who is opposed to it? Sanders' great deed is that he provided an alternative in making a political influence on the "business as usual" possible. Mere expressions of discontent with the establishment or even protests in the manner of BLM alone (that's not to say that BLM protests are inherently worthless, on the contrary) are not sufficient. Sanders was a political force, endangering the establishment politics, and this... "radicalized" a lot of Americans.

I'll agree, with reservations that are explored further below, but going back to the section of your post above, 'my point' is that the movement pre-existing Sanders' presidential campaign is significant because it represents a willingness on the part of the population to examine alternatives to the two-party system.

What the 'use' of this insight is depends on what I, you, we, think our priorities are. Like I said above, I have no definite answers, but I think that a revitalization of a genuine, working-class, third-party movement is one possibility, though I'm right there with you in thinking that establishing such in the American climate is extremely difficult.

It is not analogous to Syriza’s capitulation because the endorsement for Clinton is not necessarily tantamount to betraying one’s ideals, as it was with Tsipras. But we will come back to that.

You didn't really elaborate on this further down in your post, but an expansion of this line of thinking would be interesting.

The other questions, however, are indeed very important. These are tactical ones as they concern the radical Left’s task to politicize the masses, hard questions I’d like to discuss more often here. This is what I have already touched upon in my first post here. The problem we cannot have such discussions is because of deep, very deep ideological disagreements, which have alarming practical implications. What makes this thread controversial are not mere tactical questions but fundamental differences, which only appear at the level of concrete tactics such as Sanders’ potential presidency. This necessarily amounts to fundamental questions concerning the nature of capitalism, what capitalism and bourgeois really mean as opposed to Communism and proletarian, what “the real movement abolishing the present state of things” really means, questions concerning materialism, and so on. That’s what this thread is really about.

Yes, I agree. Echoing your own sentiments later in your response, I think this is also the reason why it's important to remain rooted in the actual reality of the situations in which we are all living through, and to discuss concrete strategies as they effect those situations.

It should be made clear that when I’m speaking of the middle class “in the modern sense” I’m not referring to the middle classes in the original Marxist sense. The modern middle class is not the petty bourgeoisie, instead, it is… “sociologically” speaking, proletarian in nature, especially as it concerns the lower middle class. What I mean by that is that they are forced to sell their labor power. However, at the same time, they are still differentiated from the lower strata of the proletariat, the precariat and so on, because they are privileged, insofar as their wealth and the level of their contentment significantly exceed miserable living standards. The modern middle class is this part of the proletariat which, by virtue of wealth and privilege, deceives itself into thinking that they’re on the same level as the bourgeoisie. Striving to become the universal bourgeois subject is what ideologically reproduces capitalism. The middle class represents this striving insofar as their living standards have become the qualifications for “living a full life”. The middle class I’m referring to is a phenomenon of the Cold War era, the heyday of (non-revolutionary) social democracy. It used to be, and still is, the majority of Western population, but these strata are diminishing now.

The problem of many studies concerning demographics is that there are many different concepts of “the middle class” in the field of sociology. However, apart from empirical studies, we have another indicator: Ideology. Trump’s buzzwords are “job creation” and “manufacturing”, among others. It is clear that he attempts to appeal to the lower middle class, whose basis of existence is endangered. And, to add insult to injury, the AfD even directly refers to the dying middle class as the pillar of society. The fact of the matter is that the middle class is dying, and that’s why fascism, being an alternate modernity, must entail the promise of retaining the status quo, ideologically at least. Hence, neo-fascism’s “human material”, in Trotsky’s words, is today the modern middle class, which is dying. True, there are also many middle class workers who oppose Trump or the AfD. Nobody claimed that neo-fascism has already triumphed.

You will, hopefully, forgive me if I assumed that we would be using the Marxist vocabulary here. Since we're referring to the middle class in the sociological sense, especially as re: how the majority of Americans view themselves or self-identify, then, I would most certainly agree.

If it is as banal, why do you assume that it’s a sufficient answer this time? It can be attacked on the very same basis, which is that you deliver to us a meaningless truism but no concrete analysis of the reproduction processes of capitalism. It doesn’t allow us to have a better understanding of the rhetoric and the ideology of neo-fascists, it doesn’t allow us to understand the implications of their proposals in relation to the trajectory of capitalism, it doesn’t allow us to develop concrete strategies, in one word: We have literally no use for this. I’m not sure if you just don’t realize that I don’t disagree with this statement because I have effectively said the same. The difference is that you, insisting on banal and abstract truisms, can’t explain why capitalism “can’t deliver the promises of its ideology”, that is, not generally but as it concerns our present predicament, in the here and now. What is it that workers are fretting about, concretely? Or maybe you forgot the context of this controversy. Cliff Paul questioned the impact of neo-fascist thought. The dying middle class is my answer, that’s why we have to take it seriously. Nobody is asking for a theory of fascism, the controversy is about how neo-fascism is on the rise.

If I'm repeating banal observations, it's because I'm afraid that, due to the fact that we all recognize them almost habitually, their consequences are being overlooked, and that this is having an effect on your proposed concrete strategy.

I repeat this further down in my response, but in this particular context, the reason that I believe that my repeated banal answers are important is because I believe that a victory for Clinton reinforces the rise of neo-fascism, and thus constitutes not an alternative to a neo-fascist candidate, if that is what Trump is, but rather would signal the continued growth of the neo-fascist movement in America.

I have already addressed this above thoroughly, but only to stress this again because I can’t help being stunned: Do you really believe this? I mean, have you even recognized the impact of Sanders and Syriza? It facilitated controversial discourses even in Germany, especially the latter paved the way for this. They were able to change something, they were able to do something big. You can choose to stay away from this but this means that you choose to be a reactionary.

Yes, I do really believe this. Yes, I believe I have recognized the impact, or lack thereof, that Sanders and Syriza have had on their respective countries and populations. We're obviously in disagreement over this point, however, so, apart from whatever discourses they may have generated, what concrete changes have Sanders or Syriza made? Not even just in terms of the current political realities of America and Greece, but in their ideologies, and the ideologies of their populations.

Actually, I’ve already tried to argue that the struggle for reforms, a necessary struggle, as every Marxist acknowledges, is not the same as reformism, that can be found in the previous century. I’ve tried to stress the fundamental point that we’re living in an entirely different context today, which leads us to the next fundamental point, which is that the same proposals offered nine decades ago, being reformist in nature – meaning that they, indeed, aimed at appeasing the proletariat and successfully did so – can only be fought for against the backdrop of a movement which necessarily questions the current order of things, practically. But nevermind, maybe I was simply not clear enough.

The New Deal was in no way whatsoever “progressive” because, yes, this is indeed a typical example for reformism. The U.S. government had to react to a proletariat that is infinitely more radical and politicized, and infinitely more militant than the proletariat today. One only needs to point to the strike movement that preceded the New Deal: It was, to a certain extent, characterized by violence. This and the economic crisis forced the government to “reshuffle the pack” and ensure certain social standards.

Furthermore, the New Deal was much more than mere social securities aimed at contenting the masses: It ushered in a new era of capitalism, changing the interrelation between the state apparatus and capital in the long run. The whole New Deal aimed at overcoming the economic crisis and avoiding future crises entailing similar consequences. In other words, it served to strengthen the state apparatus, making it more resistant to both radicals and capitalism’s tendency toward crises.

The difference is that, today, we have nothing. The same proposals that would have been reformist 90 years ago cannot be opposed to a militant worker movement that is today not existent. People got used to take the social and political standards for granted but the fact of the matter is that the bourgeoisie has less and less reasons to maintain them. Fighting for short-term demands is necessarily congruent with politicized masses, which are ready to oppose the current state of affairs.

I agree with this, with the caveat that the proletariat being 'infinitely more radical/politicized' than today is still indicative of a very weak movement. Again, one only really needs to look at the Socialist Party during that time period to have some idea of this.

How is what Clinton advocates not an attempt to perform the same maneuvers that Roosevelt and the New Deal did? Is her campaign not also, in a sense, an attempt to 'reshuffle the pack' and increase the stability of capitalism?

The context today is entirely different than that of the 30's, there is no disagreement there whatsoever. What I disagree with is that the end result will be the same, and that the question we need to ask is what to do when confronted with this strategy.

At this point, I can only rephrase what has already been said. Our present task is to politicize the masses, so that they become a politically meaningful force that is able to change something. In order to accomplish this task, we have to take every opportunity we can get to attain political successes, which are by necessity small ones in the beginning. Sanders has started to build the preconditions for such a movement. However, his campaign has come to an end – if what he has set in motion shall live on, it has to keep struggling for successes in the spirit of reviving the radical Left, staying true to radical ideals.

I don't think that you've convincingly argued that the course of action you propose will politicize the masses, or lead to a situation in which the masses will be politicized.

One possible victory this movement can chalk up – again, in the spirit of a revived Left, and maybe under a new leadership – is the defeat of Trump, which is indeed only possible by voting for Hillary Clinton. This is not to fucking say that Clinton is supposed to be the leader of this movement, that she carries on Sanders’ torch, and so on. She does not represent the ideals of a revived Left, they do not build their hope on her – this whole thing is simply about defeating Trump. It only happens that Clinton is the one this movement has to support – this is not because she is in any respect progressive but because she is the only presidential candidate left.

I might appear hilarious emphasizing this hysterically – but for some mysterious reason you fail to get the point and I don’t know if this is my fault. You responded that tactical “support” (the term is extremely misleading) for her will not revive the radical Left and, instead, demoralize the people, implying that I seem to be under the impression that Clinton is supposed to give hope to the workers according to my narrative. But this is not the point: There is a great ideological gap between the movement and Clinton, and the elections only serve as a medium for antifascist practice, although it’s – again, I say that explicitly – not Clinton herself who is antifascist.

Maybe it was this what I didn’t address sufficiently: You claim that supporting Clinton, being the only alternative to Trump, will impede the hopes for a socialist society (“hopes for any kind of alternative”). However, the fact of the matter is that there is no context for a socialist society, yet. We have to face the situation as it is and not as we want it to be: Clinton is, right now, the only alternative to Trump. This is a fact we have to recognize. Now it’s our choice: Do we apolitically watch the processes happen and let Clinton gain ideological support among the masses, risking the possibility of a Trump presidency; or do we lead the movement Sanders has bequeathed to us, so that the “support” for Clinton (again, which does not amount to ideological endorsement) is only a provisional one in order to defeat Trump?

We have to deal with the world as it exists, which is the exact same point which constitutes my attacks on Konikow and Location C. Meaningless fantasies of a socialist alternative will get us nowhere if this is not translated into concrete political activity. Defeating Trump is a way to keep the progressive masses politicized, and as there is no socialist candidate, voting for Clinton is the only alternative. I mean, you could put forward the exact same arguments when it comes to reforms: One could say that fighting for small demands demoralizes the workers to the point where they lose hope for an alternative to capitalism. This is silly because everybody knows that the struggle for reforms is the bridge to the realization of this alternative in the first place.

If you think that I'm not engaging with the present reality, I can only assume you're not reading my posts, you're not taking me seriously, or you've conflated my position with that of other members in this thread. I'm not talking about any immediate transition to a socialist society, nor do I believe that I have in any of my previous posts. Advocacy for the creation of a truly independent third-party group whose long-term goal is socialism isn't an admission on my part that I believe socialism is right around the corner, nor is it necessarily an admission that such a party is guaranteed, or likely, to get us anywhere at all – it is, to me, however, the only action socialists can take with the present historical and ideological conditions existing in America that has any meaning in a parliamentary analysis.

That the revolutionary left has any power to 'lead the movement Sanders has bequeathed to us' in a provisional movement to defeat Trump by electing Clinton is, in my mind, a massive miscalculation, especially if you believe we can do so while still maintaining 'ideological purity.'

Further, the idea that the masses defeating Trump will somehow keep them 'politicized' seems, to me, to display certain misinformation concerning American elections and the ideological currents that are generated by them. A victory for Clinton simply delays a victory for Trump, someone like Trump, or someone worse than Trump in the near future. It doesn't represent an alternative.

GLF

23rd July 2016, 02:25

Again with this nonsense. Symptomatic of idiocy on top of idiocy.

First of all, the idiotic assumption that the workers should support "social democrats" or "democratic socialists," who for over a century have been an indispensable pillar of the capitalist state.

That's not fair. Democratic socialists have done some good in getting workers to understand we have a common interest. That's the first and most important step to make.

I think it's very dangerous lumping democratic socialists in which social democrats. I myself support neither, but it has to be understood that democratic socialists do in fact strive for the victory of socialism, even if they are grossly mistaken on how we should go about it. The same cannot be said for social democrats.

For me, it's quite simple. Do they advocate for social ownership of the means of production or not? Democratic socialists do. Social democrats do not. The latter believes in collective bargaining and state arbitration of labour disputes, government reforms and such. The closest social democrats will get to socialism is in socializing the industries vital to State function. To me this reeks of fascism even if they are technically different.

I am cool with Democratic socialists because I believe their hearts are in the right place. Posters like Alet are correct in that the revolutionary left isn't exactly doing a whole lot of good for the workers these days. Democratic socialists are doing a lot of good. I do not believe social democrats are doing any good whatsoever because in the end, social democracy strengthens the bourgeois apparatus. It's like making a deal with the devil. That's where I draw the line.

And if you are honest you know that this is a lie. Only 4 hours earlier you claimed that I haven't even really said anything at all. You know it and I know as well that this is just another attempt to avoid confrontation with the difficult questions put forward and with their hard implications. But let me be clear: As long as you are trying to appear as an engaged subject in this controversy, in other words, as long as you post in this thread, you are not going to get away without being attacked, until you have the guts to think critically.
Point taken. I will try and defend my positions in an intelligent manner as they are challenged.

The Intransigent Faction

23rd July 2016, 07:09

If I may, I'd like to quote myself:

You can't properly face democratic socialism from a revolutionary perspective if you can't tell the difference between it and neoliberalism.

That is what you, Konikow, in all your disingenuous insistence on a strawman argument, fail to understand.

(A)

23rd July 2016, 09:04

Alet

23rd July 2016, 13:59

Just to be clear.
Democratic Socialism is NOT reformist. Their are Both reformists and revolutionary's who strive for Democratic Socialism.

Democratic Socialism is simply a socialist society or state run Democratically.

Rosa Luxemburg was a revolutionary Democratic Socialist; Lenin was as well.

As it concerns the specific controversy of this thread, it is meaningless to refer to Lenin and Luxemburg as democratic Socialists. "Democratic Socialists" as opposed to what? The only way one could talk of democratic Socialism as a distinct ideological current which was already existent a hundred years ago is by referring to meaningless abstractions. But our predecessors did not try to distinguish themselves from the Communism that is today associated with violence, authority and totalitarianism. For Luxemburg and Lenin, it was a self-evident truism that Communism, the same Communism, is inherently democratic. However, this notion of democracy, as opposed to bourgeois or post-modern notions, had absolutely nothing to do with the insistence on peaceful politics or on bourgeois-democratic freedoms as eternal rights, not even necessarily with concepts of the majority. This does not hold true for Democratic Socialism as the term is generally understood today: In our epoch, if it is supposed to identify a distinct movement, it can only meaningfully refer to Die Linke, Syriza, Podemos or, yes, Bernie Sanders, among others. They are indeed not reformist because their short-term proposals cannot be opposed to a revolutionary movement, for the sole reason that there is currently none. Social democracy, on the other hand, as composed of advocators of "benevolent" reforms and social welfare that are embedded in the very reproduction of capitalism because they serve to content the masses and strengthen bourgeois rule - this social democracy is dead. Today, the struggle for these kinds of reforms can only ever be waged by an inherently progressive movement.

ckaihatsu

23rd July 2016, 14:22

Why Sanders' and Warren's Embrace of Hillary Clinton Comes As No Surprise

Sanders and Warren Embrace Hillary Clinton -- Why This Should Come As No Surprise

During the primary season, Elizabeth Warren declined to endorse Bernie Sanders, despite their presumed similarity of views. Instead, she has now enthusiastically endorsed Hillary Clinton. What is instructive about this is that in 2001 Warren sharply criticized Hillary Clinton for her position on the then-pending bankruptcy bill.

Clinton affirmed not long ago that she never "changed a view or a vote because of any donation that I ever received” (Hillary Clinton, in the fifth Democratic debate, Feb. 4, 2016). Moments after the former Secretary of State (and N.Y. Senator) made this statement, the Bernie Sanders campaign issued a news release titled, “Elizabeth Warren on How Wall Street Has Influenced Hillary Clinton.”

The news release recounted how Sen. Warren (D-Mass.), in a 2003 book, blamed campaign contributions from banking interests for why Clinton flipped from being opposed to an overhaul of bankruptcy laws as First Lady -- calling it “awful”-- to voting to advance the bill as a freshman Senator.
Warren noted that Clinton had received $140,000 in campaign contributions from banking industry executives as she sought a Senate seat. “Big banks were now part of Senator Clinton’s constituency. She wanted their support, and they wanted hers --including a vote in favor of ‘that awful bill,’” Warren wrote.

But this is not all. Warren has been a staunch opponent of the Trans-Pacific Partnership treaty, one of whose main architects was then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton (who is now calling for some cosmetic changes to TPP to allow her to parade as a critic of the treaty).

Warren was one of 38 U.S. Senators who voted against a bill that would allow the President to “fast track” the TPP. She said that “the deal [TPP] makes things even worse and even more dangerous for America's hardest-working families . . . as it would tilt the playing field even more in favor of a big multinational corporations and against working families.”

Not surprisingly, Warren has had to downplay, if not put behind her altogether, her opposition to TPP as she jumps on the Hillary Clinton bandwagon.

As for Sanders, during the recently concluded primary season, he pilloried Clinton for several months for her Wall Street connections and the massive financial contributions she received from big corporations. But like Warren, he has endorsed Clinton.

Sanders received 13 million votes during the primary campaign and inspired a large part of the young generation, among others. But now he is encouraging supporters to embrace Clinton, as he has done. When Jill Stein and the Greens publicly invited him to join with them in an independent campaign, with Sanders heading up the ticket, he spurned the invitation, failing to even acknowledge it.

What We Can Learn From This Experience
The Labor Fightback Network believes that there is no basis for depending on would-be reformers of the Democratic Party. That party is owned, operated, and tightly controlled by Big Money -- and efforts to change its character is an exercise in futility.

Today there are vibrant and significant social movements that are in the forefront in the struggle for progressive change, such as Black Lives Matter, immigrant rights, climate change, opposition to mass incarceration, single payer health care, LGBTQ rights, environmental protections, end fracking, and others.

Unfortunately, the labor movement for the most part remains on the sidelines with regard to these struggles. While labor has been waging a vigorous campaign against the TPP, it remains preoccupied with electing Democrats, as if that is the way forward. But even here, it is stymied, as we can see by the Democratic Party's Platform Committee's failure to take a stand against the TPP. So why should labor continue to support such a party or even be part of it?

We again urge transition steps to forming a party of our own. As we wrote previously:
"It is high time for labor to challenge the monopoly that Big Business exercises in the electoral arena. To be sure, this requires the spearheading of a coalition with its community allies. Labor could be a magnetic force in helping to unite tens of millions in support of a program that reflects the needs of workers, communities of color, youth, environmentalists, and other progressive forces.

"For the above reasons, the Labor Fightback Network urges the formation of independent labor-community coalitions in cities and states around the country based on a program collectively decided. Such coalitions, functioning democratically, could serve as building blocks for a national party, which is indispensable, and in the meanwhile run its own candidates to challenge the status quo. The alternative is despair, dissolution, and irrelevance.

"Labor's failure to seize this rare moment will mean a continuation of the old politics, which has led to a deepening of multiple crises: unending imperialist wars, as in Afghanistan; the escalation of gunning down unarmed people of color on our streets by cops out of control; social programs under attack by both parties; massive unemployment and under-employment; mass incarceration; runaway military spending; the further poisoning of our environment; 50 million people living in poverty while 2/3 of all corporations pay no income taxes; upending assaults on abortion rights (despite the recent Supreme Court decision); climate change and more fracking.”

If you agree with the above perspective, please let us know by calling 973-975-9704; writing PO box 187, Flanders, N.J. 07836; emailing conference @labor fightback.org; or visiting our website at laborfightback.org. Facebook link https://www.facebook.com/laborfightback
Issued by the Labor Fightback Network. For more information, please call
973-975-9704 or email [email protected] or write Labor Fightback Network, P.O. Box 187, Flanders, NJ 07836 or visit our website at laborfightback.org. Facebook link : https://www.facebook.com/laborfightback

Donations to help fund the Labor Fightback Network based on its program of solidarity and labor-community unity are necessary for our work to continue and will be much appreciated. Please make checks payable to Labor Fightback Network and mail to the above P.O. Box or you can make a contribution online. Thanks

Konikow

23rd July 2016, 16:26

You can't properly face democratic socialism from a revolutionary perspective if you can't tell the difference between it and neoliberalism.

Neither can Greek workers.

To face Democratic Socialism from a revolutionary perspective is to realize that it is a brand name that appeals to contemporary Revolutionary Leftists.

And we all know from experience that Revolutionary Leftists exist to support capitalism and its bloody attacks on the workers and oppressed.

"Neoliberalism" is when those attacks are carried out by politicians that don't appeal to the Revolutionary Left market segment.

"Democratic Socialism" is what these policies are called when they are being carried out by allies of the Revolutionary Left.

"Social Democracy" is what they are called after they have been tarnished by experience and the Revolutionary Left is jonesing for its next class-collaborationist fix.

I propose that people who want to understand the world and change it ought to seek out the class content of, and class interests served, by the real political elements.

Or, if you are a Revolutionary Leftist, continue to play Wikipedia-political adjective-Mad Libs while supporting the ruling party of racist U.S. imperialism.

pepezefrog

24th July 2016, 18:43

if he surrendered his rhetoric so quickly out of fear for a fringe right candidate who will be a complete puppet even if he gets into office, how can bernie be trusted to keep his promises?

Pancakes RÃ¼hle

24th July 2016, 18:57

Oh look, it's our old pal social democracy.

Heretek

24th July 2016, 20:39

Weren't social democrats restricted before? Not that I expect anything from the mods, none of which have even been online in forever.

Good to see the apologism burning out with the 'betrayal' of Sanders. Of course the majority of these same people think that voting for Trump because of 'reasons' and other accelerationist bullshit or sectarian nonsense breeding some hatred for Clinton (who's different from Sanders how?) is the best course of action.

GLF

24th July 2016, 22:24

See, that's how social democrats are. Always scare easily, and won't think twice to betray the workers at the very first sign of trouble. And let me tell you, Sanders would be skipping right along, singing the praises of Mussolini in 20s Italy if the communists threatened power. Cause that's how them social democrats roll, baby! Viva la revolucion!

The Intransigent Faction

25th July 2016, 02:00

To face Democratic Socialism from a revolutionary perspective is to realize that it is a brand name that appeals to contemporary Revolutionary Leftists.

...Which is what makes it potentially more insidious, but also a source of a working class movement more misguided than reactionary, whose members (not the leaders but rank-and-file working class members who see socialism as desirable) can be potentially won over to revolutionary socialism. Looks like you finally get it! Congratulations!

If workers are actually won over to a movement that expresses a need for socialism, this represents an entirely different state of consciousness from, say, workers who support Golden Dawn, and we should not gloss over this even though SYRIZA itself is not a vehicle for revolution.

Also, fuck Wikipedia, but I've expressed my contempt for it before in other threads, so that's for another time.

(A)

25th July 2016, 10:58

I was watching the live-stream of a rally at the DNC and what is clear; regardless of the position of Sanders that their is a tangible anger and movement still alive and well in America.
The Media has done a great job steering the population back and forth between Socially liberal liberals and Socially conservative Liberals but the fire rages on.

The question is how to best bring the working class back into the fold. Social Media; rally's; Unions?

ckaihatsu

25th July 2016, 18:47

Terrorist rule of the 1%: Understanding fascism

http://www.fightbacknews.org/sites/default/files/imagecache/article-lead-photo/rncCleveland.jpg

By Dave Schneider

Jacksonville, FL - The world watched in horror on the night of July 21 as billionaire casino mogul Donald J. Trump officially became the Republican Party's nominee for president.

Worth an estimated $6 billion, Trump embodies big business and corporate America. Unlike most previous GOP candidates, however, Trump's campaign shocked the country with its open racism and unapologetic xenophobia. Many liberals assumed this would torpedo his campaign. Instead, it helped him win the Republican nomination.

Trump's disturbing blend of right-wing populism has critics on the left and even some parts of the right labeling him a fascist. And on the surface, it's not hard to see a lot of similarities. Trump's calls to ban Muslim immigrants, create a database of Muslims in the U.S. and raid mosques are disturbingly similar to the Nazis' policies against Jews in Germany. Other aspects – racist demagoguery against Latinos, cynical populism directed at the working class, and outright violence against protesters at campaign rallies – bear a striking resemblance to the tactics of Mussolini and Hitler. White supremacist and neo-Nazi groups have flocked to support Trump, including former Ku Klux Klan grand wizard David Duke. Even the man himself keeps a well-worn copy of Hitler's speeches on his nightstand, according to his ex-wife, and sprinkles Mussolini quotes into his insane rants on Twitter.

Most people are familiar with the unspeakable crimes committed by fascists in the 20th century. The word brings to mind images of death camps, dictators, genocide and war, which makes it effective political profanity to throw at strong-arm politicians or repressive policies. But for all the noise around whether Trump is – or could become – a fascist, there's startlingly little discussion about a broader question: What is fascism?

To some, fascism is just a greatest-hits collection of authoritarian traits – extreme nationalism, political repression, rigged elections, etc. Others focus on fascist dictators, like Mussolini and Hitler, and the crowds of people following them supposedly because of their charisma as leaders. While these features existed in fascist regimes, they don't really tell us anything unique. After all, you can find all of these practices in some form in every capitalist country, including the United States.

If we want to understand fascism, we have to go beyond the surface-level horrors. Why did these regimes exist? Who benefited from them? And what is their relationship to 'democracy' and capitalism?

We're often told that fascism is something different and opposed to 'democracies' like the U.S. and Britain, but this simply isn't the case. The state – laws, government institutions, courts, police and the military – exists for one class to dominate another class and rule society. In a capitalist system, the state is a dictatorship of banks and corporations, who control the economy and exploit the working class for their own profit. Their dictatorship can take a variety of forms, from welfare states (Sweden) to liberal democracies (United States) to Germany under the Nazi’s. But whether they hold elections or not, every capitalist state is a class dictatorship of the 1%.

Fascist regimes are also class dictatorships ruled by monopoly capitalists – not by one, all-powerful charismatic leader. Unlike other forms of capitalist dictatorship, however, they enforce their rule through open terrorist violence against the working class, extreme racism and imperialist military aggression against oppressed nations. Simply put, fascism is terrorist rule of the 1%, by the 1%, for the 1%.

The ruling class may prefer one form of government over another depending on time, place and conditions. Such is the case with fascism. The countries that became fascist after World War I experienced deep economic crises and mass civil unrest led by workers and peasants. Banks and big business saw their profits drop due to rising wages, inflation and taxes used to fund public education and social programs. To insure their continued rule, something had to change. Their top priority became imposing harsh austerity measures on the working class - banning unions, rolling back labor laws, slashing important government programs, etc. – at all costs and by any means.

It's more difficult for the 1% to impose their agenda if unions, mass movements and opposition parties have legal rights to fight back. But under a non-democratic arrangement, the ruling class can simply destroy the opposition by force and impose whatever agenda it wants on the people.

That's exactly why Italian big business planned and bankrolled Mussolini's infamous March on Rome in 1922, which brought the Fascists to power. Similarly, German President Paul von Hindenburg – another politician of the 1% – appointed Hitler as chancellor in 1933 with the full backing of German industry and finance. In both cases, the ruling class sidestepped the formality of elections and installed fascism from above.

Part of fascism's appeal to the monopoly capitalists is its ability to mobilize a mass base to support its agenda. Importantly, however, fascist movements never won any substantial support from the working class in Germany, Italy, Austria or any other country, despite their best efforts. Instead, they drew their supporters from struggling 'middle class' elements, like small business owners and unemployed professionals. A large segment of former military officers, scarred from the battlefield and unable to find jobs, also gravitated towards fascist politics, along with street gangs and violent criminals.

Fascism accomplished this by presenting itself as radical, 'anti-establishment', and sometimes even critical of big business. They played on real economic hardships and promised to deliver radical 'new' solutions, which turned out to only favor the 1%. This fascist populism was completely cynical, of course. But in a time of deep political and economic crisis, like the post-WWI period and the Great Depression, these movements and parties diverted 'middle class' anger away from the system and directed it against workers, unions, oppressed people and other nations.

Using its base, fascism delivers an army of shock troops for the monopoly capitalists to terrorize the working class. After World War I, Italian workers and peasants launched a wave of strikes, factory occupations and land-takings that shook the power of the ruling class. This revolutionary upsurge, dubbed the 'Red Years', scared the big landowners of the south into hiring Mussolini's paramilitary death squads, the fasci di combattimento, to roam the countryside – burning villages, murdering militants and revolutionaries, and terrorizing peasants. The major industrialists of the north took note and recruited fascist gangs to break strikes, burn union halls, close newspapers and destroy socialist and communist party headquarters.

The same was true in Germany, where Nazi Stormtroopers battled communists and union workers in the streets long before 1933, when Hitler came to power. Similarly in the U.S., plantation owners in the South hired the Ku Klux Klan to repress African Americans after the defeat Radical Reconstruction. Their terrorist methods – lynchings, show trials before all-white juries, and burning crosses – are well-known, even though we seldom hear the U.S. media refer to the KKK as 'fascist'.

Trade unions are among the first targets of fascist terror. Organized labor faces attacks in every capitalist country – fascist or not – because it poses a threat the profits of the 1% and their tyranny in the workplace. However, fascism unleashes open violence and dismantles unions by force on behalf of the ruling class. The Nazis, for instance, shut down all German trade unions less than two months after taking power. Stormtroopers raided union halls and offices, seized their funds and arrested their leaders. Militant workers and communists faced torture and execution, and many were shipped off to die in Hitler's concentration camps.

Although fascist movements developed a mass following among small business owners and professionals, they turned on those same groups after coming to power. Both Mussolini and Hitler oversaw the takeover of small businesses by large corporations in order to further consolidate the wealth of the monopoly capitalists. In Germany, Jewish businesses – particularly retail outlets – were the first targets of Nazi monopolization, which they accomplished through 'legal' decrees as well as outright criminal theft. While German small businesses initially supported these anti-Semitic measures to drive out competitors, they found themselves taken over by monopolies and their wealth doled out to big business and Nazi officials.

Fascism and war go hand in hand. Under monopoly capitalism, also called imperialism, the 1% dominates entire nations and exploits their labor and resources for profit. Military conflicts, like World War I, break out between rival imperialist powers for control of these colonies. Both Italy and Germany had fewer colonies than the U.S., Britain and France after WW I, and with most of the world already colonized, the only way to expand their weak empires was through war. To this end, fascism used its open violence and internal repression to mobilize the country for aggressive military expansion on behalf of monopoly capitalism.

Using fascist ideology and national chauvinism as justifications, Hitler looked towards Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union for lebensraum, or 'living space' for German colonial settlers. At first, the ruling class in the U.S. and Britain maintained an uneasy neutrality towards Hitler, hoping he would attack their common enemy – the socialist Soviet Union – first. However, war broke out between these rival imperialist powers when Nazi Germany annexed Poland and began expanding westward into Europe.

At the root of World War II sits imperialist profit and colonial rivalries – not some clash between U.S. 'democracy' and German 'tyranny'. Banks and corporations run all imperialist countries, and whatever conflicts emerge over who-gets-to-exploit-what-nation, their goals and even methods aren't as different as we often hear in movies and media. After all, Hitler based his genocidal designs on the U.S. extermination of indigenous people, which took place in a so-called 'constitutional democratic' country.

Donald Trump's right-wing populism and open racism poses a real danger to the people of the U.S. and the world. However, it's not a fascist danger at this time. The ruling class has yet to line up behind Trump. Nor yet has the Trump campaign developed actual organization capable of winning a presidential election, let alone carrying out fascist terrorism. While Trump supporters have reacted violently towards protesters at rallies, it's not on the same level or scale as the barbaric terror committed by Mussolini's Blackshirts or Hitler's Stormtroopers.

As we consider Trump's racist right-wing populism and the history of fascism, we need to remember that imperialism – whether it's fascist or 'democratic' – is the cause of wars and poverty around the world. Workers and oppressed people defeated fascist imperialism in World War II. Nearly 70 years later, it will take a united front of workers and oppressed people from all nations to defeat imperialism and create a better world.

Read more News and Views from the Peoples Struggle at http://www.fightbacknews.org. You can write to us at [email protected]

Radical Atom

26th July 2016, 15:35

I don't know if it has been posted on this site, but this feels appropriate for the discussion
Wow... that was... a side of Iglesias I hadn't seen, and I've watched some of his debate shows online (Fort Apache, La Tuerka), thanks for the interesting watch; In very much contrast of the sheepish and decaffeinated rhetoric of last elections.
Doesn't mean I agree on everything or that he isn't saying this for opportunistic reasons rather than conviction but at least now I kind off figure out where he's coming from when it comes to his political strategy and that there might be more to him than a sold out activist. Their ambiguity and appeals to patriotism keep rubbing me the wrong way though.

ckaihatsu

26th July 2016, 19:33

http://www.legitgov.org/#breaking_news

http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-election-dnc-statement-idUSKCN1052BN

Politics | Mon Jul 25, 2016 11:40pm EDT Related: ELECTION 2016, POLITICS

Democratic National Committee apologizes to Sanders over emails

The Democratic National Committee apologized to Senator Bernie Sanders on Monday after leaked emails suggested the party's leadership had worked to sabotage Sanders' presidential campaign.

"On behalf of everyone at the DNC, we want to offer a deep and sincere apology to Senator Sanders, his supporters, and the entire Democratic Party for the inexcusable remarks made over email," the DNC said in a statement released on the opening day of the party's convention in Philadelphia.

It said the emails did not reflect the committee's "steadfast commitment to neutrality during the nominating process."

(Reporting by Eric Beech in Washington)

Red Terror Dr.

8th August 2016, 19:34

Bernie has betrayed the cause by supporting Clinton. Lenin would never do that!!!

http://www.marxist.com/bernies-betrayal-the-fight-for-socialism-continues.htm

Radical Atom

18th August 2016, 10:14

Slavoj ŽiŽek: The hillary clinton consensus is damaging democracy

The need to defeat Trump is a breeding a homogeneous movement that lacks principle.Alfred Hitchcock once said that a film is as good as its villain—does this mean that the forthcoming U.S. elections will be good since the “bad guy” (Donald Trump) is an almost ideal villain? Yes, but in a very problematic sense. For the liberal majority, the 2016 elections represent a clear-cut choice: the figure of Trump is a ridiculous excess, vulgar and exploiting our worst racist and sexist prejudices, a male chauvinist so lacking in decency so that even Republican big names are abandoning him in droves. If Trump remains the Republican candidate, we will get a true “feelgood election”—in spite of all our problems and petty squabbles, when there is a real threat we can all come together in defence of our basic democratic values, like France did after the Charlie Hebdo attacks in January 2015.
But this cosy democratic consensus is not healthy for politics and the Left. We need to take a step back and turn the gaze on ourselves: what is the exact nature of this all-embracing democratic unity? Everybody is in there, from Wall Street to Bernie Sanders supporters to what remains of the Occupy movement, from big business to trade unions, from army veterans to LGBT+, from ecologists horrified by Trump’s denial of global warming and feminists delighted by the prospect of the first woman-president, to the “decent” Republican establishment figures terrified by Trump’s inconsistencies and irresponsible “demagogic” proposals.But what disappears in this apparently all-embracing conglomerate? The popular rage which gave birth to Trump also gave birth to Sanders, and while they both express widespread social and political discontent, they do it in the opposite sense, the one engaging in Rightist populism and the other opting for the Leftist call for justice. And here comes the trick: the Leftist call for justice tends to be combined with struggles for women’s and gay rights, for multiculturalism and against discrimination including racism. The strategic aim of the Clinton consensus is to dissociate all these struggles from the Leftist call for justice, which is why the living symbol of this consensus is Tim Cook, the CEO of Apple who proudly signed the pro-LGBT letter and who can now easily forget about hundreds of thousands of Foxconn workers in China assembling Apple products in slave conditions—he made his big gesture of solidarity with the underprivileged, demanding the abolition of gender segregation.
This same stance was brought to the extreme with the U.S.’s first female secretary of state Madeleine Albright, a big Clinton supporter who served in her husband’s administration from 1997 to 2001. On CBS's 60 Minutes (May 12, 1996), Albright was asked about that year’s cruise missile strikes on Iraq known as Operation Desert Strike: “We have heard that half a million children have died. I mean, that's more children than died in Hiroshima. And, you know, is the price worth it?" Albright calmly replied: “I think this is a very hard choice, but the price—we think the price is worth it.” Let’s ignore all the questions that this reply raises and focus on one aspect: can we imagine all the hell that would break out if the same answer would be given by somebody like Putin or the Chinese President Xi? Would they not be immediately denounced in western newspapers as cold and ruthless barbarians? Campaigning for Hillary, Albright said: “There’s a special place in hell for women who don’t help each other!” (Meaning: who will vote for Sanders instead of Clinton.) Maybe we should amend this statement: there is a special place in hell for women (and men) who think half a million dead children is an affordable price for a military intervention that ruins a country, while wholeheartedly supporting women’s and gay rights at home.
Trump is not the dirty water that should be thrown out to keep safe the healthy baby of U.S. democracy, he is himself the dirty baby who should be thrown out in order to shine a light on the uneasy nature of the Hillary consensus. The message of this consensus to the Leftists is: you can get everything, we just want to keep the essentials, the unencumbered functioning of the global capital. President Obama’s “Yes, we can!” acquires now a new meaning: yes, we can concede to all your cultural demands without endangering the global market economy—so there is no need for radical economic measures. Or, as Todd McGowan, professor of film theory and history at the University of Vermont, put it (in a private communication): “The consensus of ‘right-thinking people’ opposed to Trump is frightening. It is as if his excess licenses the real global capitalist consensus to emerge and to congratulate themselves on their openness.”
And what about poor Bernie Sanders? Unfortunately, Trump hit the mark when he compared his endorsement of Hillary to an Occupy partisan endorsing Lehman Brothers. Sanders should just withdraw and retain a dignified silence so that his absence would weight heavily over the Hillary celebrations, reminding us what is missing and, in this way, keep the space open for more radical alternatives in future.

Ben Weissman

23rd August 2016, 14:53

I'm an anarcho-communist, but I'd much rather have FDR-style socialism than $hillary or the Don combined.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Molotov1848

23rd August 2016, 15:36

I'm an anarcho-communist, but I'd much rather have FDR-style socialism
Are you fucking serious?

Ben Weissman

24th August 2016, 14:26

Are you fucking serious?

Yes. I'd rather have him than Hillary.

Molotov1848

24th August 2016, 15:09

Yes. I'd rather have him than Hillary.

The "FDR-style socialism" part, there are so many things wrong with that. I hate to break this to you but you've always had your Keynesian capitalism.

Ben Weissman

24th August 2016, 16:51

The "FDR-style socialism" part, there are so many things wrong with that. I hate to break this to you but you've always had your Keynesian capitalism.

I oppose Keynesian capitalism. However, if the "liberals" embraced it over trickle-down, the world would be a better place. Bernie Sanders is genuine and is trying to make the world a better place, but his constraints make him unable to fight the basic framework of capitalism. Not all politicians are bad people, but too many are.

ckaihatsu

24th August 2016, 17:07

I'm an anarcho-communist, but I'd much rather have FDR-style socialism

I'm noticing with the electioneering season that practically all of the political discourse is diverted to pop- / national culture, and to election culture, while the underlying empirical realities of capitalism go unaddressed, particularly the empire's ongoing, unending warfare, and developed countries' sovereign debt now being at junk-bond status.

Sanders -- as is now incontrovertible -- was never a revolutionary-minded candidate practicing entryism as a tactic. He was a left prop for the establishment, sowing a confidence trick on those millions who are genuinely disaffected and looking for a mainstream expression of their revolt-minded politics.

To think that Sanders was remotely serious -- at *this* point, now that he's thrown support to Clinton -- is a wanton exercise in self-delusion and/or the continued *projection* of the now-obvious Sanders duplicity.

The "FDR-style socialism" part, there are so many things wrong with that. I hate to break this to you but you've always had your Keynesian capitalism.

As world economic growth (GDP) has slowed to a standstill, the reviled Keynesian deficit-spending strategy ('quantitative easing') is now common practice (especially to fund the military), but without any significant effect on the actual economy.

Class still determines, now more than ever, which interests benefit from such government spending -- the system of finance itself, basically, or else the entire economic paradigm would collapse as it almost did in '08-'09 before being bailed-out by taxpayer dollars.

Radical Atom

25th August 2016, 07:44

Holy shit, FDR? Seriously? The man responsible for THIS?:

President Theodore Roosevelt signed the Act, officially "An Act To regulate the immigration of aliens into the United States" [...] It codified previous immigration law and added four inadmissible classes: anarchists, people with epilepsy, beggars, and importers of prostitutes.
FDR-style "socialism" my ass, he was a particularly disgusting capitalist.
Keynesianism is capitalism.
And yes, I know what you were trying to say but damn, you need to know what you are using as an example.

ChangeAndChance

25th August 2016, 14:00

Sanders just announced the formation of a new lobbying group advocating for the same old centre-left crap. It's name? "Our Revolution." L-O-fucking-L.

Absolutely sick and tired of Sandernistas using the term "political revolution" to describe electing a weak-tea social democrat to the presidency. It's an absolute joke.

(A)

25th August 2016, 23:17

Well at least it is normalizing the word lol.

I have complained on every "our revolution" post I could find about how it is not a revolution unless it overthrows the government and the capitalist system.

Full Metal Bolshevik

25th August 2016, 23:41

It just devalues the word, such as overusing "amazing", "awesome", "fascist".

Kamaradas

26th August 2016, 00:40

It just devalues the word, such as overusing "amazing", "awesome", "fascist".
Agreed.

The word is also used by the Trump campaign and was used by the Obama campaign, and many others. Popularising it as a simple word that people can shout out in order to appeal to others, for any cause, could be a nuisance. That said, 'our revolution' is particularly offensive, as it's quite domesticising and wants to restrict a 'revolution,' and is in a way even more moderate than Sanders who usually drew on more radical elements and refused to condemn them until the ending stretch. You could say they broke down under pressure, being too moderate for 'their' movement, rather than that they were always keen to shut down people who went further than them.

Maybe they're a conduit for 'Glee'?

(A)

26th August 2016, 01:21

Or maybe a lot of things are amazing & awesome and that there are more fascists then you would think.