Class Enemies

[The Feral Underclass]

Of course it appears to be all relative, which makes the debate rather complicated but I would like to understand what people define as a class enemy.

I understand reformism as a failed system of politics which only leads to moderation of capitalism, rather than the creation of a new society. Reformism does not allow the working class to smash their exploitation and oppression, but changes slightly the conditions of that exploitation.

For me, any person, system of politics or belief which distinctly rejects the working class overthrow of capitalism and the creation of a classless society can be defined as a class enemy.

Reformism, Fascism, Religion, the State/tools of the state are all class enemies.

[Clarksist]

For me, any person, system of politics or belief which distinctly rejects the working class overthrow of capitalism and the creation of a classless society can be defined as a class enemy.


Well yeah. But their are also other class enemies. Those who wish to become the new bourgeois once the old bourgeois are conquered are class enemies as well. (Leninists, Maoists, and Stalinists I'm looking at you.)

Any hierarchy could be defined as a class enemy, as they wish to control.

[El-Bortukali]

Originally posted by [email protected] 13 2005, 09:09 PM

For me, any person, system of politics or belief which distinctly rejects the working class overthrow of capitalism and the creation of a classless society can be defined as a class enemy.


Well yeah. But their are also other class enemies. Those who wish to become the new bourgeois once the old bourgeois are conquered are class enemies as well. (Leninists, Maoists, and Stalinists I'm looking at you.)

Any hierarchy could be defined as a class enemy, as they wish to control.
you do ofcourse understand that any trotskist can be refered to as an bourgeois wannabe don't you?

Or do you honestly think that only the Leninists/Stalinists/Maoists can be sell out's?

[Anarchist Freedom]

Clarkists said it best. One of the biggest class enemies are the ones without our own movement who wish to re instate a new ruling class.

[Holocaustpulp]

I agree with your assertion that all against the working class are class enemies. However, these people are not necessarily political enemies. That is, heeding Lenin's argument, we can open the movement to everyone - when revolution we will know specifically who the class enemies are; now we only have generalizing guidelines, but enough of a sense of who we can oppose and interest.

- HP

[Entrails Konfetti]

Religion as an enemy ?

What about those anarcho-christians and anarchists w ho are budhist ? Can't someone be a marxist as well as a christian ?

[viva le revolution]

WAITING FOR UTOPIA?

[viva le revolution]

Allow me to elaborate. Religion in itself as a personal belief is not the enemy, but the religious establishment as a whole and religiously-motivated politics.

[Clarksist]

you do ofcourse understand that any trotskist can be refered to as an bourgeois wannabe don't you?

Or do you honestly think that only the Leninists/Stalinists/Maoists can be sell out's?


Well of course Trotskyists can be sell outs to their class. I just pointed out the "big three" so-to-speak.


Religion as an enemy ?

What about those anarcho-christians and anarchists w ho are budhist ? Can't someone be a marxist as well as a christian ?


No, religion is not the enemy, the Church is. Anarcho-Christians and Anarcho-Buddhists are kidding themselves. Either they want a Theocracy, or they don't believe in organized Religion. One of the two.

[Paradox]

Basically, anyone who wants to f#*@ over the working class. Fake Commies, the cappies, of course, and anyone else who resists the peoples' movements toward Socialism/Communism. I don't think you can put much simpler than that.

[Holocaustpulp]

Religion is not the enemy. In most areas, it is associated with the majority of the people we are trying to influence. To stomp out religious presence (but not promotion) is to stomp out the movement concerning contemporary conditions. Taking religion under our wing and associating it with the movement indicates true revolutionary work and organization, and our capability to impact the masses.

- HP

[Paradox]

Religion is not the enemy.

Perhaps if you solved the hostility between religions. Or its hostility towards those who do not believe, the so-called "infidels." And if you stopped its influence on politics, such as the abortion issue. And perhaps if you got religion to where people acted on things now instead of doing nothing and saying "God will take care of it in the end." Maybe then. But I doubt that will happen.

And how could one call themselves religious, a true believer, if they support the "murder" that is abortion, or the "sin" that is gay marriage? And how can a good civilized christian person respect the pagan beliefs and traditions of my Native American ancestors? Or those voodoo priests? SATAN WORSHIPERS!!!

You see where this is going?

[Clarksist]

Originally posted by [email protected] 13 2005, 10:54 PM
Religion is not the enemy. In most areas, it is associated with the majority of the people we are trying to influence. To stomp out religious presence (but not promotion) is to stomp out the movement concerning contemporary conditions. Taking religion under our wing and associating it with the movement indicates true revolutionary work and organization, and our capability to impact the masses.

- HP
If we destroy the Church, we destroy exploitation. It is just a ruling class based on divinity. That is all that the clergy is. Saying that we shouldn't stomp out Religion is one thing, but if you also mean to not stomp out the Church because it is popular, is to say that you shouldn't stomp out capitalism because it is popular.

[redstar2000]

It is continually astonishing to me how often this subject comes up...


Originally posted by Holocaustpulp
Taking religion under our wing and associating it with the movement indicates true revolutionary work and organization, and our capability to impact the masses.

And how, pray tell, is this "miracle" to be accomplished?

1. Well, we could just lie...pick out a few scraps from each "holy book" and "interpret" them in a pro-communist "sense".

Just like the old CPUSA tried to get away with a slogan like "Communism is 20th Century Americanism".

They didn't fool anybody. Neither would we.

2. We could just ignore the matter and refuse to discuss it; e.g., we don't care what you think about the cosmos as long as you are "for" communism.

Only to find out later that what we mean by communism is something very different from what the superstitious mean. Their version of "communism", for example, includes an enormously powerful and immensely wealthy Church which, among other things, takes over the "education" of the young.

The proposition that revolutionaries can "take under their wings" a reactionary ideology and its proponents simply makes no sense!

http://www.websmileys.com/sm/cool/123.gif

[Le People]

I say that reliogion is not the enemy. The enemy is this holy rollers who try to influence the system. We don't have to ban them, kill them, or exile them. Just tax as a political group. Those cheap bastards never give a dime, so they start preaching and not camgping.

[El-Bortukali]

Originally posted by [email protected] 13 2005, 10:43 PM

you do ofcourse understand that any trotskist can be refered to as an bourgeois wannabe don't you?

Or do you honestly think that only the Leninists/Stalinists/Maoists can be sell out's?


Well of course Trotskyists can be sell outs to their class. I just pointed out the "big three" so-to-speak.

oh so Leninsts/Stalinists and Maoists are the "big three" sell outs of the working class and trotskists are the only "enlighted" true dedicated revolutionaries that only a few of them can sell out?

Sorry mate but i think that is true sectarian bulshit, trotskism, as stalinism, leninism and maoism is just a theory, it's the people that count, in myself know some Stalinists that are more dedicated and true to the movement than many trotskists, it is not a mather of ideology, it is a mather of truth and honesty, and that cannot be based on the ideological origins but on the personal qualities or defects of the persons in question...

[Warren Peace]

The best definition of the Class Enemy you will ever find is in the anarchist Book of Resistance under Value 14 (http://socialnerve.org/resist/). I don't agree with everything else in the Book, though.


The Class Enemy is the total opposite of me. It is a small, petty, segregated group of individuals who hold nothing sacred except for money. The Class Enemy is the one who makes billions while the workers barely make enough to feed themselves. The Class Enemy is the being that brings drugs and prostitution to our streets, it sends us war, it humiliates and degrades our existence. The Class Enemy is always the capitalist the government, the police and the secret police, the teachers, the bankers, the military, and the ones in power. The Class Enemy has only one goal: to enslave as many as possible, to destroy as much as possible, to turn the world into a police state, to always be at war. The Class Enemy holds nothing sacred, it doesn't respect itself or its people. Its pleasure is momentary, its existence is a burden on the rest of the world. It cannot be bargained with. It only understands violence and war. The Class Enemy only knows how to produce and consume, and it will produce the rope with which we shall hang them! The Class Enemy is my eternal enemy. Because of it I must watch my mother work herself to death, I must watch my father dig his own grave, I must watch my brother's and my sister's youth fly past them because of war, poverty, and a wasted society. In their names I will resist the enemy till death. In the names of my loved ones I will pick up the sword of justice and behead the Class Enemy! The enemy of the working class deserves total, universal, merciless destruction. It will be ripped out by the root and nothing will be left. Of all this I am certain.

[Warren Peace]

Sorry mate but i think that is true sectarian bulshit, trotskism, as stalinism, leninism and maoism is just a theory, it's the people that count, in myself know some Stalinists that are more dedicated and true to the movement than many trotskists, it is not a mather of ideology, it is a mather of truth and honesty, and that cannot be based on the ideological origins but on the personal qualities or defects of the persons in question...

I completley agree, that's why I strongly support a United Front of all the communist/anarchist ideologies. Even though I oppose Stalinism, Stalinists are still my comrades in the revolution.

[Donnie]

What about those anarcho-christians and anarchists w ho are budhist ? Can't someone be a marxist as well as a christian ?
Religion is the opiate of the masses. If you truly want the liberation of humanity from oppression and exploitation then you must let go of religion because in religion god is portrayed as everything and man nothing.
As an anarchist I believe that religion is used to prop up the idea of a state for example I read in a book somewhere that in the bible it said “give unto Ceaser that which is Ceasers”. Also in religion it portrays this god as the supreme being and so we should submit to him and recognize is authority. Bollocks I say.
Also when I studied medieval England I came across the idea of “Divine right of Kings” what this idea meant in the middle ages was that the king held the land from god and that all the land was not the peoples but gods and that they should work the land for god and for their king. Yet again I say bollocks to that theory!

What would I define as class enemies? Well anyone who is against the idea of the emancipation of the working class. So this obviously includes as some people said; religion, state and the ruling class.

[anomaly]

As far as religion goes as a 'class-enemy', I'd say that organized religion is the only problem. For example, Catholicism openly supports a conservative agenda, but I know quite a few Catholics who don't care much about the Pope, and are leftists. The problem is the Church, and the Church only. Any revolutionary struggle should be secular in nature, but still tolerant of religious beliefs. Under no circumstances should we be tolerant of the 'bourgeoisie' of various religions, in short, the Church.

As far as the State goes as a class enemy, I suppose socialists would argue that the State is a tool, not an enemy. If the working class can truly control the State, then I'll support them. But, in the current situation, the State most definitely is an enemy, along with all forms of official hierarchy, as Clarksist correctly notes. I leave it up to the socialists to change the current status of the State.

[Black Dagger]

What about those anarcho-christians and anarchists w ho are budhist ?

Most are pacifists, soft'-anarchists at best, reformists at worst.



the teachers,

Teachers are the 'class enemy'?

[werewolf]

Teachers around here are dirt poor. In fact, as soon as they found out that I was a Socialist, I suddenly became one of their favorite students. Teachers are not the enemy, teachers are VICTIMS.

[Severian]

Originally posted by El-Bortukali+Jul 13 2005, 03:20 PM--> (El-Bortukali @ Jul 13 2005, 03:20 PM)
[email protected] 13 2005, 09:09 PM

For me, any person, system of politics or belief which distinctly rejects the working class overthrow of capitalism and the creation of a classless society can be defined as a class enemy.


Well yeah. But their are also other class enemies. Those who wish to become the new bourgeois once the old bourgeois are conquered are class enemies as well. (Leninists, Maoists, and Stalinists I'm looking at you.)

Any hierarchy could be defined as a class enemy, as they wish to control.
you do ofcourse understand that any trotskist can be refered to as an bourgeois wannabe don't you?

Or do you honestly think that only the Leninists/Stalinists/Maoists can be sell out's? [/b]
Which takes things to the logical conclusion: anyone who disagrees with me or has bad ideas is a class enemy.

And illustrates why this whole approach is fundamentally flawed. For one thing, it's idealist.....membership in the working class does not depend on holding correct ideas.

Most of all, those who use this definition have not thought things through.

If someone can sell out, they ain't a class enemy....nobody speaks of Bush or Kerry selling out to the bosses...nobody with any sense anyway....Similarly, there would be no sense in referring to reformists as "class-collaborationists", as revolutionaries traditionally have, if they were simply part of the enemy class.

Reformists (social democrats, the former pro-Moscow parties, union officials, etc.) are not bosses. They are servants of the bosses within the working-class movement, "labor lieutenants of the capitalist class" to borrow a phrase from DeLeon.

Enemies within the working-class movement must be treated very differently than enemies outside it; the task is to discredit them in the eyes of the workers and remove their influence over the workers. This can't be done simply by bopping them over the head; on the contrary workers are likely to (correctly) regard this as an assault on the right of the workers to freely choose their leaders and therefore an attack on the workers' movement.

(Consider, for example, the attacks of Shining Path on unions in Peru.)

It's not surprising that anarchists would be mixed up on this, as on so many things. But people who call themselves communists should know better....

Consider why the Bolsheviks called for "All Power to the Soviets" at a time when they were headed by Mensheviks and Narodniks....were they calling for "All Power to the class enemies"? Why did the Bolsheviks say "Down with the Ten Capitalist Ministers", implying they should be replaced with reformist "socialist" ministers?

It's not because they loved the Mensheviks and SRs so much, but because they recognized that the labor lieutenants of the bosses have to be combatted differently than the bosses themselves....

Some people rhetorically and in symbolic tiny street fights play the theatrical role of revolutionaries...the Bolsheviks led a revolution.

And then they summed up the experience of how they did so, including how to fight enemies within the workers' movement, in Lenin's booklet on Ultraleft Communism among other places. (http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1920/lwc/index.htm)

On the other hand it can be argued that the British Labour Party, for example, should no longer be regarded as a reformist workers' party but as more comparable to the U.S. Democratic Party. (http://www.themilitant.com/2004/6848/684836.html)

But that question of how one or another party should be defined doesn't change the fundamentals of how reformism should be dealt with. (For another example; if the French Socialist Party is arguably no longer a reformist workers' party, the French Communist Party definitely is.)

[Vanguard1917]

And this was of course the logic behind the vanguard party. The party, according to Lenin, should not be a mass party because this would bring in bourgeois elements into the party. The party should purely be made up of the most advanced and politically conscious sections of the working class, which must then take on the work of leading the rest of the working class towards revolution. It's not that less conscious workers are enemies of the working class movement, it's that their ideas, and those from which they got those ideas (i.e. the ruling class), must be defeated - and for this to happen, we cannot have bourgeois elements within the revolutionary party. It's the dialectical process: the ideas are defeated as the ruling class is defeated. We can't separate one work from the other: defeating the ruling class also means defeating the ideas of the ruling class - i.e. winning workers over to revolutionary ideas.

For example, take strikes. Say you have a thousand workers in a factory who all receive the same wages and work under the same conditions. Objectively, this must mean that the strike for better wages and better working conditions is in the common interests of all thousand workers. Yet 300 of them decide to break the strike and cross the picket line, weakening the strike. In this sense, these scab workers become 'enemies' of the strike, as they choose to side with the employer rather than with the striking workers. They have sided with the employer because the employer has been able to convince these workers that the strike is not in their best interest - and, on the other hand, the leaders of the strike have been unable to convince these workers as to the importance of striking.

The leaders of the strike can do two things. They can say, 'fuck 'em, these people are born scabs and we can do without them'. But 300 of a workforce of a thousand crossing a picket line is no joke: it means that the employer can keep the factory open and running. This approach is therefore defeatist and lazy.

The alternative approach is to confront the scab workers. This means argument after argument, debate after debate, fight after fight. Because bourgeois ideas do not only exist within the heads of the bourgeoisie. Even in times of high levels of industrial action, significant sections of the working class are won over to bourgeois ideas. If the most militant sections of the working class are unable counter the impact that bourgeois political forces has on the working class, the number of scab workers grows and that of militant workers diminishes. 200 of those striking workers were militant, organised and disciplined, and they managed to convince 500 of their fellow workers that strike action was necessary. But they failed to convince the remaining 300. The solution: they have to be more militant, more organised and more disciplined. This is the only way to defeat 'enemy' elements within the working class itself.