Help with this

[Drace]

One thing I typically reject with Communism is the Marxist interpretation of historical events - that class consciousness and strife were the driving force behind war and revolution. The idea that the economy is some sort of self-imposed evolution also is asking a great deal of humanity. But that's fine as long as everything else is cogent - but it isn't.
What's funny is that Marxist Communism still needs people who make decision. Communism is also completely incompatible with any other economic system - especially if one rejects the idea of a commune leadership.
Marxism also relies heavily upon certain presuppositions about the human condition - and those suppositions are pretty major and seem very unsound. Far better than Communism is a Capitalist-Socialist hybrid (which the U.S. and other countries are operating under).

Asked him to elaborate...


All I was saying earlier is that the major premise behind Marxism is patently false - the cause of strife and rebellion throughout history is not class struggle. Even after class consciousness developed, it is far too simple to say that this was the primary cause of anything happening!
So, even if Communism does create a Utopian classless society, it still won't solve the problems that Marx and Engels set out to solve.


The primary objective of Communism is to stop the violence and revolution that have been the defining points of history. If Marx and Engels were right, then eliminating class would eliminate political and social upheaval. Unfortunately, they were wrong.
We can talk all day about which economic system is better, but ultimately Communism cannot achieve the goals it is setting out to do. I think it's a very neat idea and an important point in analyzing economic systems, but a Utopian society it is not.

I'm not very knowledgeable about Marxism so if someone will answer this for me.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Drace, the problem with these 'criticisms' is that they are very vague.

Moreover, your correspondent just denies that strife, for example, is caused by the class struggle. He does not explain why he says this, nor does he seem to know that Marx never claimed that it was.

What he said was:


The history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles.

http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/communist-manifesto/ch01.htm

Taking a few specific examples of what this critic alleged:


What's funny is that Marxist Communism still needs people who make decision.

Now, only a fool would think that 'decisions' are not made by human beings. Nothing in Marx suggests he thought otherwise. What he did say was this:


Men make their own history, but they do not make it as they please; they do not make it under self-selected circumstances, but under circumstances existing already, given and transmitted from the past. The tradition of all dead generations weighs like a nightmare on the brains of the living. And just as they seem to be occupied with revolutionizing themselves and things, creating something that did not exist before, precisely in such epochs of revolutionary crisis they anxiously conjure up the spirits of the past to their service, borrowing from them names, battle slogans, and costumes in order to present this new scene in world history in time-honored disguise and borrowed language.

http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1852/18th-brumaire/ch01.htm

Human beings are not robots; so, they make decisions. But they are not 'gods' either. They are constrained by the past and by their class position, and that affects the things they decide upon.


Marxism also relies heavily upon certain presuppositions about the human condition - and those suppositions are pretty major and seem very unsound. Far better than Communism is a Capitalist-Socialist hybrid (which the U.S. and other countries are operating under).

This is rather vague; the critic does not say what these 'presuppositions' are nor why they are mistaken.

And, as Marx noted, not even he was above history; indeed, all of us approach the world with certain 'presuppositions'. But, in this case, Marx's can be and have been defended. Can this critic defend his own presuppositions? If the above is anything to go by, one would think not.

As for the 'hybrid' he speaks of, again he is vague. Which ones are these? And how does he know they are 'superior'?


Even after class consciousness developed, it is far too simple to say that this was the primary cause of anything happening!

Once more, the class struggle is not the primary cause of everything/anything that has happened; but it is the prime motor of historical development. And we do not just say this, we can in fact show it to be so from the record.


The primary objective of Communism is to stop the violence and revolution that have been the defining points of history. If Marx and Engels were right, then eliminating class would eliminate political and social upheaval. Unfortunately, they were wrong.

Once more: vague. What is 'he' referring to here?

Nowhere does Marx say that the end of class society will end strife. What will end is the systematic violence that the class war brings in its train. Since society will be ruled by the vast majority on behalf of the vast majority, any pockets of strife that might remain will be up to us all to put right, not a minority who will only do so if it serves their interests (and in ways that consolidate their power).

Moreover, since class division will have ended, there will be no more causes of war.

Now, this critic might be looking at the former USSR (etc.) as his excuse for saying that Marxism has failed. He should know that Marxists regard the former USSR in many different ways. Speaking for myself, I would argue that the failure of such regimes was a failure of Stalinism, not Marxism.

More details here:

http://www.marxists.de/statecap/harman/revlost.htm

Hope that helps!

[GPDP]

Wow, can that guy be any more vague and patronizing?

He assumes away the best solutions, without bothering to explain why they are the best, or even to show why communism is not. All he says is "it's bad because it's bad".

Follow what Rosa said, and while you're at it, demand that he properly justify his assertions.

[Drace]

Rosa, his response:


I seem to have been straw-manned, but that's okay. Let me go over a few points again.


Nowhere does Marx say that the end of class society will end strife. What will end is the systematic violence that the class war brings in its train.
This is the very idea to which I object. This Marxist interpretation of historical events simply isn't cogent. Certainly if you look through the annals of history with Marxist colored glasses you can see this presupposed class struggle everywhere. But I could also argue that historical struggle is caused by potatoes or alcohol. When you go through history looking for one specific cause, you're bound to find evidence that supports your claim; what Marx does is ignore the piles of evidence against his claim.


Moreover, since class division will have ended, there will be no more causes of war.
Again, there are plenty of causes of war beyond class, and it is very naive to think that ending classes will end war. There was no class-consciousness at all until around the Industrial Revolution - even a Marxist must concede such a point.
The gestalt here is that even if I concede that class consciousness existed before industrialization, it is still clear that the cohesiveness of this class ends at an economic delineation. I don't have anything at all in common with the other members of middle class America than my income bracket. People are far too diverse for such a blanket interpretation of people and motives. Even trying to narrow it down to people who are culturally unified - say 2nd generation Greeks - doesn't mean you're going to have any common interests.
By the presuppositions about the human condition that I was referring to, I mean ideas about human nature. That competitiveness was brought about by capitalism simply isn't true and so again we have Marx trying to eliminate the cause of something - when it really isn't the cause.
All of this is from a purely academic and mostly historic standpoint. I cannot argue for the fundamental economic principles or against them - although it does seem strange to view economics as a consciously maintained evolution of ideas. Perhaps Communism would be a better economic system if the right steps were taken to ensure that power could not be concentrated with just a few people. All I am trying to do is demonstrate that the fundamentals behind Communist ideologies are fallacious.

[zimmerwald1915]

Again, there are plenty of causes of war beyond class, and it is very naive to think that ending classes will end war. There was no class-consciousness at all until around the Industrial Revolution - even a Marxist must concede such a point.
What is class consciousness? Certainly, while it may not be limited to this, it has a great deal to do with cognizance of one's interests, cognizance of the fact that one shares similar interests with others, and the will to collude with those others in achieving those interests? While it is absolutely correct to say that there was no such thing as proletarian class consciousness before the industrial revolution, it is equally correct to say that the proletariat as such did not and could not exist before said revolution. The landowner class possessed class consciousness, the Roman elite posessed class consciousness, and, to use an example farther afield, the Indian Brahmins possessed class consciousness. We do not know whether or not, for the most part, the lower classes in these societies posessed any sort of class consciousness, if only because of the lack of literacy. What we do know is that in periods of social revolt in pre-capitalist societies (for example in sixteenth-century Germany), we do see an element of class consciousness, but it is impossible to project that into periods of social contentment.

What is impossible to say was that there was no such thing as class consciousness before the industrial revolution. Such a statement is easily proven wrong--even by one instance of class consciousness by one person.


The gestalt here is that even if I concede that class consciousness existed before industrialization, it is still clear that the cohesiveness of this class ends at an economic delineation. I don't have anything at all in common with the other members of middle class America than my income bracket. People are far too diverse for such a blanket interpretation of people and motives. Even trying to narrow it down to people who are culturally unified - say 2nd generation Greeks - doesn't mean you're going to have any common interests.
Thanks for arguing against nationalism, good reactionary sir. It saves me the trouble. Also, the fact that you personally don't possess class consciousness does nothing to refute the concept as such, unless you're some sort of omniscient god who can pick up the thoughts of everybody else like a television arial (for what it's worth this metaphor will become obsolete in a bare few months).


By the presuppositions about the human condition that I was referring to, I mean ideas about human nature. That competitiveness was brought about by capitalism simply isn't true and so again we have Marx trying to eliminate the cause of something - when it really isn't the cause.
All of this is from a purely academic and mostly historic standpoint. I cannot argue for the fundamental economic principles or against them - although it does seem strange to view economics as a consciously maintained evolution of ideas. Perhaps Communism would be a better economic system if the right steps were taken to ensure that power could not be concentrated with just a few people. All I am trying to do is demonstrate that the fundamentals behind Communist ideologies are fallacious.
The second bit is him pleading ignorance, so I'm just going to go along with him and agree that he's ignorant. How clever am I?

However, the first bit is again a misquotation. Marx never said competitiveness was brought about by capitalism. What he said was that exploitation is the necessity to the maintenence of any class society. He also said that capitalism tends to do away with social relations other than those of production and exchange. What this has to do with the "spirit of competition" (something which I suspect Marx would have dismissed as a Hegelian mystification of reality) is not exactly clear to me.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Drace, I have absolutely no desire to debate with this character through you, so after this, I will respond no more.

He once again relies on vague assertions and generalisations.

For example:


Again, there are plenty of causes of war beyond class, and it is very naive to think that ending classes will end war. There was no class-consciousness at all until around the Industrial Revolution - even a Marxist must concede such a point.

He gives not one single example! And he has confused class with class consciousness, something Marx was keen to distinguish.

And this is of course ridiculous:


This Marxist interpretation of historical events simply isn't cogent. Certainly if you look through the annals of history with Marxist colored glasses you can see this presupposed class struggle everywhere. But I could also argue that historical struggle is caused by potatoes or alcohol. When you go through history looking for one specific cause, you're bound to find evidence that supports your claim; what Marx does is ignore the piles of evidence against his claim.

Yet more vagueness and lack of detail. What 'piles of evidence' is this? We are not told.

There is however one 'attempt' here to construct an argument:


But I could also argue that historical struggle is caused by potatoes or alcohol.

In his ignorant state of mind he once again confuses the class war with [I]the sole cause of struggle, even though that had been denied! For Marx, material reality is just as much a cause of struggle as class is.

This character has obviously read a very short and rather poor and misleading attempt to 'summarise' Marx's ideas (probably in a right-wing book, blog, magazine, or newspaper), and has never bothered to read Marx's work himself.

My advice is to leave this bozo to wallow in his ignorance.