Introduction

[Ouroboros]

I'm from Croatia, 40+, I'm for military communism. I was anarchist for some time, but then I gone back to communism, because of conclusion that evil is in individual and not in organizations.

[Intifada]

Welcome to RevLeft!

I hope you stick round.

[Lord Testicles]

Welcome and what is "military communism"

[FreePalestine-SmashIsrael]

welcome indeed, one less anarchist running around

Welcome comrade, and join the fight

[somebodywhowantedtoleaveandnotcomeback]

Welcome comrade
"When you have given everything, you have everything to gain."

Teach and learn, comrade :hammer:

Do you mean "military communism" as in "stalinism" ? :huh:

[Tekun]

Welcome brother, may ur stay be long and informed

[Ouroboros]

Thank you comrades.

By military communism I mean society that resembles army. Also, 1918-21 period of Soviet regime characterised by command economy, replaced by NEP.

[Lord Testicles]

Originally posted by [email protected] 23 2005, 05:19 PM
By military communism I mean society that resembles army.
You really want a society that has a hierachy, hmmm i dont belive you can call that communism.

[Stam]

I'm from Croatia, too, from Osijek, and i hope, comunism will rule once again.

SMRT FAŠIZMU,
SLOBODA NARODU

[Stam]

I have nothing against anarchy, I was anarchist too, but I decided for comunism

[somebodywhowantedtoleaveandnotcomeback]

Society as an army? So you are a Stalinist...

[sovietsniper]

Greetings comrade
In this army society how would one get promoted?

[Ouroboros]

Promotion?

Like in any well functioning army, factory, hospital, university ... Basically, it must ensured that

(1) decisions are made by best people
(2) those who make decisions do that in public and not in private interest

These two goals are partly in contradiction, and it is matter of technique how to find the optimum. Simplified, elite is usually good in (1) and poor in (2); democracy is poor in (1) and excelent in (2). Optimum is somewhere in between, dependently of a problem and people ... just for example, I guess that in Sweden, optimal hierarchy is "sharper" than in Nigeria, because corruption is less probable ...

Of course, I do not percieve myself as Stalinist.

[Organic Revolution]

hmm.. you went from an anarchist to a 'communist' who believes heavily in heirarchy.. that makes zero sense.

[Correa]

I think what he means is a society in which people keep themselves heavily armed. Like one huge guerilla society. I don't think he implies Stalinism. Can you clarify? Regardless any leftist is better than a capitalist pig!

[Ouroboros]

When I said society that resembles army I think on equality, solidarity, ascetism, reduction of the individual freedoms and privacy, hierarchycal structure, goal of the serving to collective, discipline etc. All these are very present in army life. Not accidentally, army is the organization designed to survive in very hard conditions, in which people literaly sacrifice alot, even their lives for other people.

If times are not that hard for survival, one might doubt whether such a severe restrictions are needed. I think that princip of the solidarity dictates that times are *always* hard, i.e. there are always some people who are sick or dying, in poor mental or family condition, i.e. who cannot satisfy their basic needs, and they could if society resources are spend on the satisfaction of the basic needs instead of any kind of luxury. If not people, there are animals who need help. ...

Restriction of the individual freedoms is something people dislike to hear, especially because it is related with, for example, stalinism. however, I think freedom reduction is unavodiable consequence of the progress in humanity; i.e. we progress through agreements, and each agreement is reduction of the individual freedoms.We cannot have freedom to chose side of the street to drive and low number of traffic accidents. We cannot save dogs from dog fights and in the same time preserve individual freedom of organizing dog fights ... so, what is that freedom advocated by anarchists and liberals, really?

[Correa]

When I am asked "which is more important individual freedom or the common good"? I always say that not everybody gets free under individual freedom. So obviously the common good is the answer. Anyone who says individual freedom is a selfish SOB.

[Lamanov]

It's so-called "war communism".

I don't think you understand the concept of freedom.


Originally posted by Organic Revolution
hmm.. you went from an anarchist to a 'communist' who believes heavily in heirarchy.. that makes zero sense.

With zero knowledge everything is possible :lol:

[Ouroboros]

DJ TC, I guess you are aware that there is no single "concept of freedom." And I have not idea which is your concept of freedom.

[Correa]

In a nutshell individual freedom = capitalism / common good = socialism

Again in a nutshell.

[Ouroboros]

Correa, I agree with way you defined that difference in few words.

And even modern capitalist states have significant amount of "common good" - for example, owner of the land has no right to stop TV broadcasting because electromagnetic waves cross over his land. Instead, state negotiate for acceptable amount of electromagnetic radiation on whole terriotry, having - in theory - common good as a goal. It is clear example how technical progress increases the contrast between individual freedom and common good and force humanity toward common good. Quite in Marx's spirit.

[Lamanov]

Originally posted by Correa+Nov 25 2005, 07:17 PM--> (Correa @ Nov 25 2005, 07:17 PM) In a nutshell individual freedom = capitalism / common good = socialism

Again in a nutshell. [/b]
In a nutshell - that's BS.


So called "individual freedom" in capitalism is no more then the expression of the individual economic freedom and security of the bourgeois as a propriated singularity within the capitalist system. The whole proposition of bourgeois "individual freedom" is a construction which aims at the preservation of nothing less then the individual private properity itself. This capitalist "individual freedom" of the mere citizen you are using as the model for the real individual freedom of the total individual human being - as opposed to mere civilian, an unimportant singularity of the capitalist system. This too is wholly wrong and unacceptable.

The so called "common good" you are referring to next with "socialism" is also nothing more than a class construction of the ruling caste within a so-called "socialist" system. That is - a state oligarchy class sets forth an idea by which we all are to give up our individuality for the "common good" - when in reality we are supposed to bow to them as the masters of the "common good" - which is nothing more and nothing less then the "socialist" state itslef and its class masters.

Again - bullshit.

The only way to achieve real common good is not by restriction of the individual freedom -- (in general) not just in a bourgeois sense. The role of communism in history is to provide every individual with a chance to reach their self-actualisation. The only way to reach self-actualisation by which each individual is able to reach and develop its every potential to the socially highest level is not achieved through restriction of the individual freedom - but on the contrary - through full and compromiseless manner of appliance of freedom in totality.

So common good should be nothing more then the expression of the emancipated individual within the emancipated collective.


Ouroboros
It is clear example how technical progress increases the contrast between individual freedom and common good and force humanity toward common good. Quite in Marx's spirit.

Marx asserts that material progress is counterposed to individual emancipation because it's chained within the individual-propriated relations in production.

It does not mean we must revoke individual freedom - we must revoke individual appropriation in order to achieve individual freedom.

____________________

Counterposing common good to individual freedom is pure ignorance.

[Correa]

I agree with you on the definition of individual freedom in a capitalist system which is precisely why I linked the two. However what makes you think that when I say "common good" I was suggesting Leninism? I'm quite perplexed. :huh:

[Lamanov]

Originally posted by [email protected] 26 2005, 02:34 AM
I agree with you on the definition of individual freedom in a capitalist system which is precisely why I linked the two. However what makes you think that when I say "common good" I was suggesting Leninism? I'm quite perplexed. :huh:

Because every time when individual freedom is counterposed to some invisible force we like to call "common good" exactly these class-genetic propositions are used in comparison. Civilian (bourgeois) and human individual freedoms are two different things.

Individual and common good should be put together in an indispensable complementation. That's the point of communism.

[Correa]

I agree again. Perhaps I should refrain from "nutshell" analysis in order to avoid confusion. :D

[Ouroboros]

Individual freedom and common good cannot be maximized together, simply impossible, because these two are not the same thing.

Problems are not nearly limited on the class nature of the society and they cannot be philosophied away, they require exact answers. Would you allow people to drive with unlimited speed or not? This question is simple, real and requires YES or NO answer.

If your answer is yes, you decided to sacrifice the safety. If your answer is no, you sacrifice individual freedom. There is simply no way out of that.


Individual and common good should be put together in an indispensable complementation. That's the point of communism.

Bullshit. EVERY understaning of common good attempts to"put together" common and individual GOOD. It is very notion of common good. If anything is "point of the communism", it is that the goal of the whole society is satisfaction of the human NEEDS, and real question is whether maximal possible satisfaction of human needs is compatible with maximal possible individual freedom. No, it is not, by pure physical impossiblity. Communims cannot satisfy my need to come home safely and someones FREEDOM to drive his car 200 km/h.

I have passed that path many times. It leeds you to intensive redefinition of the notion of the human freedom, so human is finally free, "really free" not only when he can drive 200 km/h, but also when he understand that he should not drive that fast etc. Such orwellian distortions of the notion of freedom result in misunderstanding at the best, and in society in which people are "liberated" against their own will to their death.

[Lamanov]

Originally posted by Ouroboros
Individual freedom and common good cannot be maximized together, simply impossible, because these two are not the same thing.
[...]
No, it is not, by pure physical impossiblity. Communims cannot satisfy my need to come home safely and someones FREEDOM to drive his car 200 km/h.
[...]
Such orwellian distortions of the notion of freedom result in misunderstanding at the best, and in society in which people are "liberated" against their own will to their death.


Obviously, you misunderstood me because you don't understand the concept of freedom. If you think freedom is the ability to perform crazy traffic rampage then you're not really that deep into the essence of things. Especially not from the philosophical standpoint.

Individual freedom in the communist sense is the self-genetic product of the annihilation of social alienation through revolutionary change which revokes the soul material standpoint of all social antagonism - the private property and the exploitation of one man from another. That is the practical revolutionary expression of the ultimate need - freedom from alienation and the freedom of self-actualization. Orwelian "liberation" you speak of, on the contrary, is something quite different. It is the "liberation" for the "common good" set from above, which is contrary to the simple but brilliant assertion that freedom can only come from within the social change through the practice of the one who is to be liberated - not from outside of it.

Observing the process from the category of totality, since the proletarian revolution is the ultimate challenge to the private property, alienation and exploitation, the whole class itself as a protagonist, the subjective force of the revolutionary change - which it becomes through qualitative change of itself as the expression of the need of every conscious individual who, complementary to his historical essence, is driven to it - has the ability and the need - followed by the automatic realization of it - to create that indispensable complementation of individual and the collective. Individual in the process of emancipation, he himself makes it a reality.

Let me rephrase myself: it's not that it should be put in an indispensable complementation - it will be!


Problems are not nearly limited on the class nature of the society [...]

You assume that because your notion of "real freedom" is driving a car 200 m/h. Freedom, in fact, from its class-root, is the ultimate NEED of every individual, as the social confirmation of humanity through his/her final action which annihilates alienation from the society by making him/her a part if it. The only way society accieves "common good" (and by this, as any leftist, I assume we're talking about civilized classless society) is through the revolutionary implementation of the individual freedom, direct-democracy and self-activity, and not through "ascetism, reduction of the individual freedoms and privacy, hierarchycal structure, goal of the serving to collective, discipline".

When you stop to think like a petty-bourgeois authoritarian barracks-socialist maybe you'll get somewhere some day.

[Ouroboros]

:unsure: This remainds me on my university professors Kangrga and Petrovic for years. You speak like you also listened them, did you?


Freedom, in fact, from its class-root, is the ultimate NEED of every individual, as the social confirmation of humanity through his/her final action which annihilates allieanation from the society by making him/her a part if it.


Individual freedom in the communist sense is the self-genetic product of the anihilation of social allienation through revolutionary change which revokes the soul material standpoint of all social antagonism - the private properity and the exploatation of one man from another. That is the practical revolutionary expression of the ultimate need - freedom from allienation and the freedom of self-actualization.

Word freedom is typically used in a much simpler meaning. For example, "one is free if he is not prevented from doing what he decided." no matter if what is decided is good or evil. When people say, "pedophile is still free" they really do not want to say anything about his annihilated allienation, they simply want to say that he is still not in jail; that noone will prevent him from doing what he decided. When people say they want less freedom for ex pedophiles, they say that their moving should be restricted, not that they should be more annihilated ...

That is haw I use the word freedom when I say "communism requires reductions of freedoms" and that is the claim I defend. I do not say anything about relation between communism and freedom in the meaning "self genetic product of the annihiliation of social allienation... "

[Got Marx?]

Hello, I am also am new to this forum. I have nothing profound to say at the present, but I'm sure i will at some point.

[ScottishSocialist13]

Originally posted by Got [email protected] 28 2005, 07:32 PM
Hello, I am also am new to this forum. I have nothing profound to say at the present, but I'm sure i will at some point.
Hullo. Read the board, then form your own opinion!

Welcome Comrade! :)

[Lamanov]

Originally posted by [email protected] 28 2005, 07:26 PM
:unsure: This remainds me on my university professors Kangrga and Petrovic for years. You speak like you also listened them, did you?

Hm. :( No, unfortunately, I did not.

I am reading some of their translations. Kangrga translates Lukacs, for example. They are the former Praxis group, right? Are they still lecturing?


Word freedom is typically used in a much simpler meaning. [...]

Be advised: alot of members of this forum are very theoretically educated people, so using terms in simple meaning is very unproductive.


That is haw I use the word freedom when I say "communism requires reductions of freedoms" and that is the claim I defend. I do not say anything about relation between communism and freedom in the meaning "self genetic product of the annihiliation of social allienation... "

Even if you did not speak of "that" freedom, you still don't need "ascetism, reduction of the individual freedoms and privacy, hierarchycal structure, goal of the serving to collective, discipline". On the contrary, insisting on this can only be counter-productive and leads you to allienation from the class itself.

You are talking about something entirely different (crime), but you assert that reduction of freedom through authoritarian means is the solution. It's not - au contraire.

Complete individual freedom is limited by the social barrier of the same needs for that individual freedom, in which we can include necesity for cooperation between individuals withing the colective. In fact, if it's self-generated - it's also self-restricting to the socially-needed barrier - barrier democraticaly drawn by the colective. Direct-democracy, self-activity, destruction and elimination of up-down authority is the key for legal protection and establishment of cooperation and coexistence between economicaly emancipated individuals.

Are you saying that humans (proletarians, that is) are not capable of performing this without hierarchy?


I doubt it. Somehow it seems that it's completely opposite.
In fact, I can be sure of it.

[Lamanov]

Originally posted by Got [email protected] 28 2005, 07:32 PM
Hello, I am also am new to this forum. I have nothing profound to say at the present, but I'm sure i will at some point.
Cool nickname :P

Welcome. :hammer:

[Ouroboros]

Originally posted by [email protected] 28 2005, 07:26 PM
:Hm. :( No, unfortunately, I did not. I am reading some of their translations. Kangrga translates Lukacs, for example. They are the former Praxis group, right? Are they still lecturing?

Oh, they were interesting people, I liked them. Petrovic died in 1990 or so, due to lung cancer I think, Kangrga is retired, but he is still alive, writes books, still on TV from time to time and speaks that capitalism is the worst of all systems. Some younger from that group, Veljak and Burger are still teaching on University. They were heavily into allienation, Lukacs, Bloch, Adorno etc ... with time, I however, concluded that they are not analytical enough. Except Burger. He lectured "Introduction to Marx's thought" and it was great, simple, concise and up to the point. .



Even if you did not speak of "that" freedom, you still don't need "ascetism, reduction of the individual freedoms and privacy, hierarchycal structure, goal of the serving to collective, discipline". .

For example ascetism. As long as society cannot satisfy even basic needs of some of its members, resources should not be spent on sophisticated needs or even only wishes of some other members of the society, right? There is no point that I have color TV and someone else is hungry. Usual answer on that is that in communis society, all basic needs of the people will be satisfied, hence we can allow ourself some luctury. Unfortunately, it is wrong, as long as we are mortals, our basic needs will not be satisfied. There are always some pople who are dying or suffering - and who wouldn't die or suffer if we invested more resources into medical research or increased safety .... hence we need to give up from all luxury. Yap, the price of the communism is very high ...but we have to pay it.


Are you saying that humans (proletarians, that is) are not capable of performing this without hierarchy?

I believe they are capable, but I do not believe that such organization can satisfy more human needs than some more-less usual hierarchical organization.

[Lamanov]

Dying and suffering of the people next to the over-luxury are caused not by incapability and issuficiency of the productional forces and the means of production, but due to individual appropriation and the intrest of capital. At least, that's how alot of us see it by observing reality.

I beleve that if the means of production are not well developed - there should
yet be no advocature for the revolutionary transition. But the fact is that they are, and it's clear as day.

Proletariat will take the revolutionary course against the necesity of wage-slavery ascetism as the downside of the capitalist expoitation. It's not the other way arround - and it makes no sense that way.

I just can't agree with you. You have - in my opinion - reversed propostions in your theory.

I will now retire from this discourse.

[Ouroboros]

Proletariat will take the revolutionary course against the necesity of wage-slavery ascetism as the downside of the capitalist expoitation. It's not the other way arround - and it makes no sense that way.


I agree - but it does not help much. Because what would human, free, communist society do when the following problem will be imposed: "we have million of man-hour of works to invest this year, should we invest them into luxury or into medical research?" Jewelry for some people or life for others? Unfortunately, neither communism can make that 1000 000 =2*1 000 000. If you want yewelry, someone must die for it.


You underestimate the problems of building of communism. You think that one good, "real" revolution - and problems are solved. Hell no, even the perfect revolution, is only the ticket so we can start building society based on solidarity instead of a greed. Each step forward will be very hard, soul searching action.