Can I find what I look for in communism? [Archive]

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SeekingFreedom

23rd May 2008, 11:42

Hey there, I'm a new one :)

Short introduction: I'm 18 and I feel like there is a lot in this world that needs to be fixed. I just know there is one goal that can be worked towards, that needs every building stone it can get, and I have a lot of stones to give.

I can't help but feel that democracy isn't it.

I live in a democratic European country, one that has a lot of flaws in it's system. It's apparant (with the majority of our politics being Christian, no offense to Christians) the healthcare system has some terrible scandals hidden. I hear about old people who wait to be found in their own shit. Who get washed by a new guy every day, who have to expose their bodies to a new stranger every day (or to nobody at all, resulting in them having to dress themselves). I hear about hospitals who systematically ignore health procedures, causing hundreds of people to risk HIV infection. Thankfully nobody got ill, but it remains a shameful fact.

And most of all, the education system. I hold some pretty anarchistic ideas towards conventional schools. I have only 5 weeks to go in here, after 7 years of having to go to high school. 2 years were a weak extension of it. And I know what my life will look like: HAVING to go to an activity center for autists. HAVING to live in the apartment of an autist institution. HAVING to have people get into my life where they do not belong! And I don't have the financial power to resist it. Very probably, I will not even have the right by law to emancipate myself from this bullshit.

Facing these and many other things in my life, in this world, that I consider harmful, unethical, unfair, I'm starting to think maybe democracy isn't the answer. Maybe it lies in communism, and maybe it's not as bad as I think.

Because -feel free to throw a virtual tomato- I have a pretty bad impression of communism and the way communist nations are ruled and the lives people live in there. I hear about human right violations, totalitarian states, military police forces controlling the people, poverty, no individual freedoms. And I oppose things like that.

But after stumbling upon this site and looking around, I decided that I want an unbiased, unadulterated, TRUTHFUL insight from communists or those that approve of it.

I seek freedom, tolerance, wildly living individuals, the complete lack of control and opression. And if it does lie in communism, then by God, communism will have all my stones!

Care to enlighten a young woman who doesn't know where to turn?

TheDevil'sApprentice

23rd May 2008, 13:03

SeekingFreedom

23rd May 2008, 13:07

Welcome.

www geocities.com/CapitolHill/1931/
Start here. (I've got too few posts for me to post links, so its with spaces)

What they had in the USSR and its ilk was capitalism draped in a red flag - and you are right to hate it. In order to set up their system the bolsheviks had to fight a bloody war against those who took communism seriously. Nothing has damaged the cause of communism more than the belief that the USSR was communist.
Very good point. I feel ashamed now that when thinking about communism, I had USSR scenario's popping up in my head. That's why I want to hear such a neutral, no-nonsense outlook on communism and what it TRULY represents. What I've heard here about communism did not click with the USSR and other such totalitarian governments. It's getting me very confused. One side accuses the western media of slander and lies. The other side goes on about human rights and censorship, and the importance of truth. I can't help but feeling a little conflicted.

Thank you for the link, I'll check it out right now.

23rd May 2008, 13:39

Hey there, I'm a new one :)
Welcome!

Short introduction: I'm 18 and I feel like there is a lot in this world that needs to be fixed. I just know there is one goal that can be worked towards, that needs every building stone it can get, and I have a lot of stones to give.
I'm glad to hear such enthusiasm :)

I can't help but feel that democracy isn't it.
"Democracy" in the capitalist world is in fact not democratic at all. You elect "representatives" once every 4 or 5 years and they can do just about anything in that time, only to hand out some symbolic gestures when the elections are up again. The real power in parliament is with the lobbyists from big business and thusly this democracy is best typified as a capitalist or bourgeois democracy, as it is the bourgeoisie that holds power with the mask of democracy.

Socialism is also about democracy, a direct democracy. Instead of having the bourgeoisie in power, there is the working class that holds power. Because the working class is about 90% of the population in most western countries, this is obviously far more democratic. Workplaces and neighborhoods are run completely democratic, representatives for citywide, regional, national and international level are chosen and can be recalled at any given time by the people that chose him or her. Representatives also only earn a normal workers wage, not the extravagant bribes parliamentarians get today!

I live in a democratic European country, one that has a lot of flaws in it's system. It's apparant (with the majority of our politics being Christian, no offense to Christians) the healthcare system has some terrible scandals hidden. I hear about old people who wait to be found in their own shit. Who get washed by a new guy every day, who have to expose their bodies to a new stranger every day (or to nobody at all, resulting in them having to dress themselves). I hear about hospitals who systematically ignore health procedures, causing hundreds of people to risk HIV infection. Thankfully nobody got ill, but it remains a shameful fact.
Awful indeed. Healthcare should be free to anyone and under control of the people that work there and patients that get treated. A for-profit health sector will cause these kinds of practices you describe.

And most of all, the education system. I hold some pretty anarchistic ideas towards conventional schools. I have only 5 weeks to go in here, after 7 years of having to go to high school. 2 years were a weak extension of it. And I know what my life will look like: HAVING to go to an activity center for autists. HAVING to live in the apartment of an autist institution. HAVING to have people get into my life where they do not belong! And I don't have the financial power to resist it. Very probably, I will not even have the right by law to emancipate myself from this bullshit.
This sounds terrible! Could you perhaps explain more about your situation in this?

Facing these and many other things in my life, in this world, that I consider harmful, unethical, unfair, I'm starting to think maybe democracy isn't the answer. Maybe it lies in communism, and maybe it's not as bad as I think.
Communism is the society socialism strives for. A society with an superabundance in material goods, an economy that serves in the needs of all. This releases all social chains that prevent people from developing and emancipating themselves as they please.

Because -feel free to throw a virtual tomato- I have a pretty bad impression of communism and the way communist nations are ruled and the lives people live in there. I hear about human right violations, totalitarian states, military police forces controlling the people, poverty, no individual freedoms. And I oppose things like that.
The Russian Revolution of 1917 was the first revolution where the working class seized power over the bourgeoisie. Sadly, the Revolution got isolated in Russia in a backward feudal country and a society that was almost completely destroyed after 7 years of war (WWI from 1914-1917 and civil war 1918-1921). The Revolution barely survived the invasion of 21 imperialist armies, but the backwardness of the country, the low cultural level and the fact that most educated working class people died by 1921, caused a bureaucratic stratum to rise up and kill off the Soviet democracy within a few years to replace it with a totalitarian dictatorship by the end of the 1920's.

The "communist" states in Eastern Europe, China and elsewhere never knew a working class revolution, but either had Stalinism "imported" after WW2 or knew a peasant/guerrilla uprising where in a small leadership took control and modeled the country after Stalinist ideals.

Mind that TheDevil'sApprentice's link point out an anarchist critique on the Stalinist/Maoist states. Whereas I try to point out a Trotskyist critique. "Trotskyists" was initially a calling name from the Stalinists, but eventually we used it to point out we where different from the Stalinists (as both lay claim on Marx's and Lenin's ideas). I'm a member of the Committee for a Workers' International which is active in about 40 countries worldwide (of which a lot are in Europe) and we try to build up a revolutionary mass workers party, much like in the fashion of the Bolsheviks: along democratic lines, freedom of discussion, a cadre organisation which is active in neighborhoods and strikes.

If you want to read more about our views and what we stand for, you can read our international website (http://socialistworld.net/) or a website of one of our national sections (http://socialistworld.net/area/areas.html).

But after stumbling upon this site and looking around, I decided that I want an unbiased, unadulterated, TRUTHFUL insight from communists or those that approve of it.
You have to understand there are a lot of leftists on this forum: Anarchists, Left-communists, Trotskyists and Stalinists are all represented.

I seek freedom, tolerance, wildly living individuals, the complete lack of control and opression. And if it does lie in communism, then by God, communism will have all my stones!
I would like to welcome your stones then! :)

Care to enlighten a young woman who doesn't know where to turn?
I hope I gave some pointers, feel free to ask more.

SeekingFreedom

23rd May 2008, 13:55

Thanks for the warm welcome :D

This sounds terrible! Could you perhaps explain more about your situation in this?
I am autistic, I was diagnosed with PDD-NOS and ADHD at age 6/7, and ever since have gone to 'special schools', taken medication, taken to psychologists etc. Thank God I could stop taking that poisonous filth one and a half year ago, but 10 years of mandatory drugging can't be reversed.

I love my parents and I wholeheartedly believe they want me to be happy, but I secretely think they'd rather have me happy in a life they find good for me. So: working in a work/training institution for autists, for a minimal wellfare wage. It's only 500 EUR a month, but will rise gradually to 1000 EUR a month when I am 23. Considering how fucking expensive houses are in this country, I can't live on my own with that kind of stuff. Unless it's in a special institution. It's not the small apartments that bother me, nor the fact that they ARE apartments owned by the building and whoever owns that.

I protest the fact that I HAVE to be under the wing and roof of 'autism specialists' YET again. I've already been doing 7 years of time in one of those, because my school (surprise, also specialised) is quite a drive away from home. In 5 weeks school will be over, and I probably won't even get a diploma, because I have no motivation or ambition. Whatever I had of that is pretty much mindraped out of me. You don't even need drugs or special schools for that. Just schools. I'm pretty sure you understand my stance on the education system and how it takes all desire to learn and discover from a child, until he is properly moulded into an automatic, good little citizen.

I'd rather live in a one-roomed shack with an outhouse that I own myself, than living in a mansion owned by a specialised institution. And these apartments are no mansions, let me tell you that. Doesn't matter anyways. It's not about the space. It's about the situation I am in, one that will keep me from being out there on my own and experiencing life.

I will most probably be able to move in with a good friend of mine and his wife, as soon as they move to England. I'd hate to leave behind everything I know, but if I can, I will. My English is not the problem at all.

gla22

23rd May 2008, 14:03

#FF0000

23rd May 2008, 14:12

Nothing you get here is going to be completely unbiased. You're just getting the perspective of a bunch of different types of socialists. Keep that in mind!

Now, onto my own view.

I think you'd be most fond of anarchism, like TheDevil'sApprentice suggested, as state socialism cannot really provide the freedom you're looking for.

I see state socialism as really not much more than a "new boss, same as old boss" situation. Instead of CEOs and their rich politicos, you get bureaucrats and leaders who are just as capable as being authoritarian as any capitalist, as you've seen in the past, with socialist countries adopting fiercely authoritarian and repressive policies claiming that they are protecting themselves from class enemies and . This, however, is not a problem with the principle of public ownership of the means of production or the labor theory of value. Rather, the problem lies in the idea that the State is needed to fight secure power for the workers, and that it will wither away once it is no longer needed, leaving a stateless and classless society: communism.

This, however, doesn't happen. It can't happen. A state ends up simply becoming an end in itself. There is a quote from a prominent anarchist theorist, Mikhail Bakunin, that deals with this.

[The Marxists] say that [a] state yoke, [a] dictatorship, is a necessary transitional device for achieving the total liberation of the people: anarchy, or freedom, is the goal, and the state, or dictatorship, is the means . . . We [the Anarchists] reply that no dictatorship can have any other objective than to perpetuate itself, and that it can engender and nurture only slavery in the people who endure it. Liberty can be created only by liberty, by an insurrection of all the people and the voluntary organisation of the workers from below upwards." [Statism and Anarchy, p. 179]

Anarchism, instead of taking power from capitalists and giving it to bureaucrats, are for dismantling all hierarchy as well as private property (that which produces wealth: factories, farms, land...etc). For more detail, drop me a PM and I can go a little more in-depth on Anarchism. You can also browse through the Anarchist FAQ (http://www.infoshop.org/faq/index.html)

Hope this helped!

eyedrop

23rd May 2008, 14:35

sorry if i am ignorant,
You guys sound like smart intelligent people and very capable so why do you go to special schools. I taught an autistic kid once and he couldn't talk at all really.

Don't worry about all the negative stuff you hear about the USSR. They betrayed the revolution and weren't really communist.

I've worked with several autistics and people with aspbergers and there are wast differences in how they are affected.

The closest thing we have came to a working anarcho-communist society is Spain 1936, to my knowledge. I recommend reading The Anarchist Collectives, by Sam Dolgoff since it has many first hand accounts of how it felt to live there. http://www.amazon.com/Anarchist-Collectives-Workers-Self-Management-1936-39/dp/0919618219/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1211549815&sr=8-1
Quite expensive but worth it.

Dros

23rd May 2008, 15:33

If you are new to all of this, I suggest you start reading. Everyone is going to recommend their own sect to you.

However, if you really want to better your own understanding of the world, you have to do the leg work. There's no magic word that I can say or that anyone else can say that is going to open the door for you (and if there were such a word, it wouldn't be "anarcho-communism":lol::lol::lol:).

I suggest you start reading in two areas: theory and history. In terms of theory, start with Marx and Engels (or Bakunin if you must). If you like that, you can try some Lenin. After that, read some Stalin and some Trotsky (just so you know what he said!:D) and some Mao. Generally, it's good to familiarize yourself with a lot of ideas.

Once you do that, you'll clearly become a Maoist!:lol::lol::lol:

It's also a good idea to reexamine your (mis-)conceptions of history. Try reading more diverse accounts of the USSR and PRC. I suggest you read "Stalin's Industrial Revolution", "Best Sons of the Fatherland", "Another View of Stalin", "The Chinese Cultural Revolution", and "Fanshen".

This is obviously going to be rather overwhelming. Left politics is extremely broad.

Check out Wikipedia. That can give you a fair idea of what certain individuals contributed in the realm of theory. I wouldn't necessarily trust it in terms of history.

A lot of these books are available on line for free here (http://marxists.org/) and here (http://www.marx2mao.com/).

Kwisatz Haderach

23rd May 2008, 16:03

There are many different types of revolutionary leftists on this forum - most are either Marxists or anarchists (or various subtypes of these two main tendencies), and it seems anarchists have been over-represented in the replies to this particular topic so far. ;) I myself am a Marxist.

What we all have in common is the belief in a society based on equality, public property over productive goods, and freedom from oppression and exploitation. Our main disagreements revolve around the question of how to achieve such a society.

Now, a quick overview of the issues surrounding Soviet-style societies:

The popular image of communism is that of the Soviet Union and other similar countries in Eastern Europe and elsewhere. And this popular image includes things like you describe - human right violations, totalitarian states, military police forces controlling the people, poverty, no individual freedoms. But hardly anyone actually supports this popular image. Communist opinions on Soviet-style societies can be divided in two categories:

1. Some of us support those societies but believe that the popular image we have of them is a product of Western propaganda. People in this category usually call themselves "Anti-revisionists" and are called "Stalinists" by those who oppose them.

2. Others among us believe that the popular image of Soviet-style societies is broadly correct, though its negative aspects have indeed been greatly exaggerated by capitalist propaganda. People in this category argue that Soviet-style societies represent a perversion of communism - a perversion which happened for a number of historical reasons, including the fact that the young Soviet Union was isolated, and the long years of war crippled its economy and eroded its early democratic institutions. Communists who hold such views usually call themselves "Trotskyists."

Now, personally, I used to be a Trotskyist, but now I fall somewhere in between the two camps. The dispute between them is largely one of purely historical interest. Communists in both camps agree about the kind of society we want in the future. And we all agree that oppression and poverty are bad - the only source of disagreement is the question of whether Soviet-style societies did or did not have oppression and poverty.

On another note, the Marxists Internet Archive - www.marxists.org - is a great place to find original Marxist writings: books, essays, manifestos and so on. They pretty much have every significant Marxist text ever written, available to be read online.

And on the subject of free books, I always recommend Towards a New Socialism (http://www.ecn.wfu.edu/~cottrell/socialism_book/) to people interested in learning how a socialist economy and society might work. It is available to download for free as a pdf.

Incidentally, the difference between socialism and communism - in the sense those words are used by Marxists - is that communism is the end goal, a moneyless, propertyless and stateless society we aim to achieve in the more-or-less distant future; and socialism is the immediate goal, a society based on a democratic state-run economy and increasing social and economic equality, which we aim to achieve as soon as possible.

SeekingFreedom

23rd May 2008, 18:36

This all sounds very interesting. I feel especially intrigued with anarchism and the idea that everyone who contributes to society should receive credit for it all the same. Nobody should be on the streets dying of poverty, and nobody should usurp the wealth of the world and live in humongous mansions.

I can't help but find it unfair how money is divided in the world.

The New Manifesto

23rd May 2008, 19:53

#FF0000

23rd May 2008, 19:59

If the post above is true, then the Ideaology for you is not Anarchism, but Communism.

Anarchist-Communism, yes. I don't think state-socialism into communism is what she'd be looking for, however.

SeekingFreedom

23rd May 2008, 20:23

If the post above is true, then the Ideaology for you is not Anarchism, but Communism.
I think it might be a combination of all those elements. I know for sure that an anarchastic society would work for me, and there are many things about communism that have started to interest me.

Kwisatz Haderach

23rd May 2008, 21:21

The main communist objection to anarchism is that its goals are unrealistic; that a society such as the one the anarchists propose cannot be created while there are powerful capitalist governments and corporations out there ready and willing to use military force to crush any such society, and it cannot be created with people who have been educated within the capitalist system. Communists sympathise with anarchist goals but believe they can only be implemented in the distant future, after global capitalism has been defeated and after people have changed their attitudes towards work.

Anarchists rightfully ask us how we expect to transition from socialism to communism - how we expect a socialist state to "wither away." My answer is that we expect ever-increasing democratic participation in the affairs of the state, and we expect state power to be dispersed among an increasingly large number of people, until we reach the point where there is no longer any difference between the "state" as an entity and the general population. When all people have equal power in matters of state, then the state has been abolished.

GeistDerRevolution

23rd May 2008, 23:09

Welcome.

Anarchist-communism is where its at.
www geocities.com/CapitolHill/1931/
Start here. (I've got too few posts for me to post links, so its with spaces)

What they had in the USSR and its ilk was capitalism draped in a red flag - and you are right to hate it. In order to set up their system the bolsheviks had to fight a bloody war against those who took communism seriously. Nothing has damaged the cause of communism more than the belief that the USSR and its ilk were communist.

I've spent the large part of my life in East Germany - under what you call "capitalism wrapped in a red flag" - and you're just wrong. You're accusing the eastern bloc of semi-capitalism just because they were forced to live in (relative) poverty compared to the capitalists due to the foreign-induced isolation. Before the unification we all had the basic necessities, and nobody was obscenely rich. Now we have obscenely rich criminals who steal from the state, a horde of hungry unemployed, and a "social state" that only works to attract more foreign immigrants to slave for the capitalists. The communist/socialist countries that existed/exist were the first stepping stone to a socialist paradise. On a world stage, a country that claims to be socialistic is far more important than a truly socialist-oriented party that doesn't stand a chance of ever getting elected.

Dros

23rd May 2008, 23:25

I've spent the large part of my life in East Germany - under what you call "capitalism wrapped in a red flag" - and you're just wrong. You're accusing the eastern bloc of semi-capitalism just because they were forced to live in (relative) poverty compared to the capitalists due to the foreign-induced isolation. Before the unification we all had the basic necessities, and nobody was obscenely rich. Now we have obscenely rich criminals who steal from the state, a horde of hungry unemployed, and a "social state" that only works to attract more foreign immigrants to slave for the capitalists. The communist/socialist countries that existed/exist were the first stepping stone to a socialist paradise. On a world stage, a country that claims to be socialistic is far more important than a truly socialist-oriented party that doesn't stand a chance of ever getting elected.

Most leftists recognize that revisionism or state capitalism (as in the Eastern Bloc) is generally better for the masses of people. That does not make it real socialism as it existed in the USSR between 1918 and 1953 or as it did in the PRC between 1949 and 1975. Socialism is an objectively discernible and definite set of production relations that simply did not exist in the GDR. That does not mean that the standard of living didn't go down after the reunification.

And we do not care about electoral politics. We support revolutionary methods of struggle to bring about a socialist mode of production.

TheDevil'sApprentice

24th May 2008, 14:46

I've spent the large part of my life in East Germany - under what you call "capitalism wrapped in a red flag" - and you're just wrong. You're accusing the eastern bloc of semi-capitalism just because they were forced to live in (relative) poverty compared to the capitalists due to the foreign-induced isolation. Before the unification we all had the basic necessities, and nobody was obscenely rich. Now we have obscenely rich criminals who steal from the state, a horde of hungry unemployed, and a "social state" that only works to attract more foreign immigrants to slave for the capitalists. The communist/socialist countries that existed/exist were the first stepping stone to a socialist paradise. On a world stage, a country that claims to be socialistic is far more important than a truly socialist-oriented party that doesn't stand a chance of ever getting elected.The word Capitalism is not just an insult. It refers to a society in which the primary social relation between the ruling and working classes is wage labour. That was the case in east germany - the rulling class being the state burocracy. State-capitalism may in many cases make for a much nicer place to live than market-capitalism (cuba vs the rest of south america for example), but it is capitalism none the less.

I have to disagree about it beeing important or a stepping stone. East germany didn't lead to real socialism, did it? And the berlin wall was perhaps the most widely used symbol of the opressive nature of the eastern bloc. This has, by association, damaged socailism enormously in the eyes of the global working class.

I don't advocate a party or participation in parliamentary politics.

Schrödinger's Cat

24th May 2008, 18:36

Welcome to the forum.

As others have said, the best way for you to find out whether or not socialism is for you is to research the topic from all sides. We are all struggling for a society that maximizes efficiency, pleasure, and freedom. As an end point, we all stress free association, but I don't think you'll find many people here who will be overly supportive of one's "freedom to kill." ;)

al8

25th May 2008, 03:06

I recomend your read through an archive of papers by Redstar2000, a poster on various leftist internet forums, who sufferd a stroke recently, paralizing one half side of his body. Rs2k’s papers reflect a kind of down-to-earth marxism. And the author does not talk with heavy lingo, but more like one would just normally talk. So its communism in daily speach and easily acessable. The papers where what lead me to this site. link;
http://rs2kpapers.awardspace.com/

(the site tends to have some dead links, so you might want to download the entire archive in .rar format; here (http://users.pandora.be/sint-michiel/rs2k/RS2k.rar))

Digitalism

25th May 2008, 05:01

you've GOT to love it when people talk shit about a country they haven't lived in. Amazingly ignorant accusations is all I hear.

Digitalism

25th May 2008, 05:04

I've spent the large part of my life in East Germany - under what you call "capitalism wrapped in a red flag" - and you're just wrong. You're accusing the eastern bloc of semi-capitalism just because they were forced to live in (relative) poverty compared to the capitalists due to the foreign-induced isolation. Before the unification we all had the basic necessities, and nobody was obscenely rich. Now we have obscenely rich criminals who steal from the state, a horde of hungry unemployed, and a "social state" that only works to attract more foreign immigrants to slave for the capitalists. The communist/socialist countries that existed/exist were the first stepping stone to a socialist paradise. On a world stage, a country that claims to be socialistic is far more important than a truly socialist-oriented party that doesn't stand a chance of ever getting elected.

Thank you, thank you for speaking out.

advice to the original poster. Be cautious when you hear accusations of USSR being "capitalist" this is all ignorant bullshit I hear these social-democrats spew, that they basically have no IDEA about. Since none of them have lived in the actual socialist state.

AK-1917

25th May 2008, 14:06

This about the Bolsheviks fighting real communists is not true. This overly-idealistic Anarchism. To learn more about what happened to the USSR, you should Trotsky's The Revolution Betrayed. It is a very important work all revolutionaries should read. And about terrible, rights-violating regimes, there are many reasons this happened which communists have spent the last 70 years examining. But the world entered a revolutionary period in the 20th century, and this led to many complex material situations, some of which were handled well, and many of which weren't. And if you talk to any former citizens of the USSR, they'll tell you it was a pretty decent place to live in the 1960s and 1970s. In the 1950s it was recovering from a war that destroyed major cities, killed millions of civilians, and just ruined every facet of their lives. In the 1940s it was fighting that war. In the 1930s it was building an economy from a historically screwed country. And in the 1980s it was ruined by Gorbachev who had- he admitted- made his goal to destroy the USSR.

You'll find soon that communism is not militarist, stolid, uniformed anti-individualism. It's a lot more friendly than that :)

TheDevil'sApprentice

25th May 2008, 16:27

This about the Bolsheviks fighting real communists is not true.
Sure it is. The makhnovists in the ukraine and the sailors at kronstadt for example.

http: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kronstadt_rebellion

To learn more about what happened to the USSR, you should Trotsky's The Revolution Betrayed.
Wouldn't a historian be better? The bolshevik regime was terrible and violated human rights from the start. When trotsky was number two and long before stalin became important. Lenin set up the cheka, his secret police, in 1917 and it engaged in torture, terror and murder from its inception - its first target being the anarchist-communists. In ukraine alone they murdered over 200'000 civilians before 1921.

http: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cheka

25th May 2008, 20:10

Sure it is. The makhnovists in the ukraine and the sailors at kronstadt for example.

http: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kronstadt_rebellion
Yeah, wikipedia is a completely objective source for leftist matters...
I won't get too deep into these right now, but if by "real communists" you mean people like Makhno and his companions that had decrees like "all orders of Makhno must be followed, unless he's drunk", then sure they were. I find them more hilarious than consider them to be serious, but ok, if you say so.

Also, the Kronstadt rebellion had a complex history, but the core of the matter is this: would Kronstadt fall into imperialist power, the revolution would have been lost.

More sources on Kronstadt:
Source 1 (http://www.marxists.org/history/etol/writers/wright/1938/02/kronstadt.htm)
Source 2 (http://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1938/01/kronstadt.htm)
Source 3 (http://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1938/07/kronstadt2.htm)

Wouldn't a historian be better?
Because historians give an unbiased representation of what happened? Think again.

The bolshevik regime was terrible and violated human rights from the start. When trotsky was number two and long before stalin became important. Lenin set up the cheka, his secret police, in 1917 and it engaged in torture, terror and murder from its inception - its first target being the anarchist-communists. In ukraine alone they murdered over 200'000 civilians before 1921.

http: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cheka
I call you to come up with more legit sources than wikipedia on this one.
What you fail to mention for example is that the Cheka was started for a very practical reason: the civil war. And the objective of the Cheka was not to murder anarchists, as you say, but to find and eliminate bourgeois elements. I agree that this wasn't the most brightest idea, in hindsight, but it was a necessary measure given the knowledge and situation of that time.

It seems your only goal here is to discredit others without any serious argumentation. If you have nothing useful to add, stay out with your trolling.

TheDevil'sApprentice

25th May 2008, 20:55

"all orders of Makhno must be followed, unless he's drunk"
Evidence? Makhno hated alcohol. The stuff about him being a drunkard was propaganda smears

Also, the Kronstadt rebellion had a complex history, but the core of the matter is this: would Kronstadt fall into imperialist power, the revolution would have been lost.
Kronstadt was never in danger of 'falling to imperialist power'. You honestly believe it was? :lol::lol::lol:

Because historians give an unbiased representation of what happened?
No one gives unbiased representations. But historians are generally better than people with a vested interest in the matter. Trotsky was extreemely dishonest. See his writings on makhno, for example (at the bottom):
www nestormakhno.info/english/index.htm

I call you to come up with more legit sources than wikipedia on this one.
Any historians account of the revolution will go into detail. Skirdas biography of makhno goes into detail about the red army-cheka repressions against the ukranian peasantry.

From a quick search heres lots of primary sources on cheka terror:
www spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/RUSterror.htm

Exactly which claim of mine do you want sourcing? I'm busy now, but when my exams are over I'll provide detailed sources should you wish.

What you fail to mention for example is that the Cheka was started for a very practical reason: the civil war.
That was the justification. Wars have been fought without secret police forces.

And the objective of the Cheka was not to murder anarchists, as you say, but to find and eliminate bourgeois elements.
Its objective was to do both.

Svante

25th May 2008, 22:00

The main communist objection to anarchism is that its goals are unrealistic; that a society such as the one the anarchists propose cannot be created while there are powerful capitalist governments and corporations out there ready and willing to use military force to crush any such society, and it cannot be created with people who have been educated within the capitalist system. Communists sympathise with anarchist goals but believe they can only be implemented in the distant future, after global capitalism has been defeated and after people have changed their attitudes towards work.

beau vou s parlez. no,i dont want t o be educated i n capitalist system becuase this is n o real eeducation. so it is time t o begin the true education systems.i dont want t o get stuck i n Mcgill or Wilfrid Laurier.

R_P_A_S

25th May 2008, 22:06

Welcome!

I'm glad to hear such enthusiasm :)

"Democracy" in the capitalist world is in fact not democratic at all. You elect "representatives" once every 4 or 5 years and they can do just about anything in that time, only to hand out some symbolic gestures when the elections are up again. The real power in parliament is with the lobbyists from big business and thusly this democracy is best typified as a capitalist or bourgeois democracy, as it is the bourgeoisie that holds power with the mask of democracy.

Socialism is also about democracy, a direct democracy. Instead of having the bourgeoisie in power, there is the working class that holds power. Because the working class is about 90% of the population in most western countries, this is obviously far more democratic. Workplaces and neighborhoods are run completely democratic, representatives for citywide, regional, national and international level are chosen and can be recalled at any given time by the people that chose him or her. Representatives also only earn a normal workers wage, not the extravagant bribes parliamentarians get today!

Awful indeed. Healthcare should be free to anyone and under control of the people that work there and patients that get treated. A for-profit health sector will cause these kinds of practices you describe.

This sounds terrible! Could you perhaps explain more about your situation in this?

Communism is the society socialism strives for. A society with an superabundance in material goods, an economy that serves in the needs of all. This releases all social chains that prevent people from developing and emancipating themselves as they please.

The Russian Revolution of 1917 was the first revolution where the working class seized power over the bourgeoisie. Sadly, the Revolution got isolated in Russia in a backward feudal country and a society that was almost completely destroyed after 7 years of war (WWI from 1914-1917 and civil war 1918-1921). The Revolution barely survived the invasion of 21 imperialist armies, but the backwardness of the country, the low cultural level and the fact that most educated working class people died by 1921, caused a bureaucratic stratum to rise up and kill off the Soviet democracy within a few years to replace it with a totalitarian dictatorship by the end of the 1920's.

The "communist" states in Eastern Europe, China and elsewhere never knew a working class revolution, but either had Stalinism "imported" after WW2 or knew a peasant/guerrilla uprising where in a small leadership took control and modeled the country after Stalinist ideals.

Mind that TheDevil'sApprentice's link point out an anarchist critique on the Stalinist/Maoist states. Whereas I try to point out a Trotskyist critique. "Trotskyists" was initially a calling name from the Stalinists, but eventually we used it to point out we where different from the Stalinists (as both lay claim on Marx's and Lenin's ideas). I'm a member of the Committee for a Workers' International which is active in about 40 countries worldwide (of which a lot are in Europe) and we try to build up a revolutionary mass workers party, much like in the fashion of the Bolsheviks: along democratic lines, freedom of discussion, a cadre organisation which is active in neighborhoods and strikes.

If you want to read more about our views and what we stand for, you can read our international website (http://socialistworld.net/) or a website of one of our national sections (http://socialistworld.net/area/areas.html).

You have to understand there are a lot of leftists on this forum: Anarchists, Left-communists, Trotskyists and Stalinists are all represented.

I would like to welcome your stones then! :)

I hope I gave some pointers, feel free to ask more.

wow.. great reply! i enjoyed the read!

25th May 2008, 22:13

wow.. great reply! i enjoyed the read!
I'm happy you enjoyed it!

I guess I should stop feeding trolls (my previous post) and concentrate more on writing informative and constructive posts.

To what political current do you identify yourself with btw, if I may ask? :)