Communism for Dummies

[Bitter Ashes]

It's a very simple concept. You work less and everything's free!

If somebody wanted to ask how that's possible in the most simple way then I'd just say that when all the banks, manager, insurance companies, sales, debt agencies, etc are redundant all those people will join the production labour force. Add onto that the industrialisation of the 3rd world through recycling machinary and abolishing patent laws it's easy to see how having more people in production is possible and would lead to higher productivity, lower working week and a more relaxed working atmosphere with an abundance of products and services available.

[Q]

It's a very simple concept. You work less and everything's free!

If somebody wanted to ask how that's possible in the most simple way then I'd just say that when all the banks, manager, insurance companies, sales, debt agencies, etc are redundant all those people will join the production labour force. Add onto that the industrialisation of the 3rd world through recycling machinary and abolishing patent laws it's easy to see how having more people in production is possible and would lead to higher productivity, lower working week and a more relaxed working atmosphere with an abundance of products and services available.

This post summarizes what is wrong with much of the far left: economism.

The working class will mobilise around economistic themes, this is why trade unions exist: fighting for a better wage, shorter working hours, free healthcare, good education, whatever. The impossibility however comes in is when you try to make that struggle political, the workers go "huh? socialism?" or, if you're lucky, will agree with you in an abstract (and most of the time wrongly understood) sense.

The fight against capitalist exploitation, for a united working class that organises as a class and for working class hegemony - all things that a prerequisites before we can even dream about "building socialism" - is a political struggle, namely a struggle for the most radical democracy we may achieve: actually bringing the majority of the population to power.

To make the concept clear, an example: Many, if not all, far leftist organisations have a position something along the line of "lower the working week to 30 hours, without loss of pay". What is almost always forgotten is to add "... to enable people to have the time to have a real say in the society they live in".

It sounds simple, but is crucial. As communists we are waging a political struggle first and foremostly, in that way economic struggle may help us in our cause to organise the working class. Yet, to make the Marxist adagium of "the liberation of the working class can only be the work of itself" work, they have to be conscious about their historic task of taking power, a political task. And if you actually organise along those lines, you'll find it much easier to organise people as we all can relate to our daily experiences of alienation. The best organisers active in the trade union movement will agree about this.

[Bitter Ashes]

So, what you're saying Q is that we should be putting less emphasis on the end result (socialism) and more on the path to getting there? Maybe I misunderstood.

I am not so sure that most people would be enticed to socialism on the main basis of sacking thier boss. I figured that the prospect of them getting to live like thier boss, without all the bieng a bastard bits attached, is our far better "offer" to workers. I'm trying to be as diplomatic as possible with my post here too because I know that we have a wide variety of socialists here at Revleft who believe in varying levels of libertaranianism.

[Q]

So, what you're saying Q is that we should be putting less emphasis on the end result (socialism) and more on the path to getting there? Maybe I misunderstood.

I guess you could say that. We should get our priorities straight and before we think about socialism/communism, we have to think how the working class can become hegemonic and end capitalism. An additional factor of confusion is that many socialists mix up socialism with democracy.

I am not so sure that most people would be enticed to socialism on the main basis of sacking thier boss. I figured that the prospect of them getting to live like thier boss, without all the bieng a bastard bits attached, is our far better "offer" to workers. I'm trying to be as diplomatic as possible with my post here too because I know that we have a wide variety of socialists here at Revleft who believe in varying levels of libertaranianism.

If your main argument in the movement is that workers can live at a same level as their boss, while still having a boss, you're on your way to reformism, not socialism. You don't question the whole logic of having a boss in the first place.

Let me give a "low level" example of the fight for democracy, which is essentially a fight of workers to get a say in their lives. In the Netherlands the cleaners are currently on strike action, one of their main demands being to get more "respect" for the work they do. Now what does "respect" have to do with anything you may ask? It is the realisation that they are important, that they matter. From there it is a relatively small step to demanding a say on the workfloor, which again is a small step in organising the working class as a class in its own right.

[Bitter Ashes]

If your main argument in the movement is that workers can live at a same level as their boss, while still having a boss, you're on your way to reformism, not socialism. You don't question the whole logic of having a boss in the first place.

Let me give a "low level" example of the fight for democracy, which is essentially a fight of workers to get a say in their lives. In the Netherlands the cleaners are currently on strike action, one of their main demands being to get more "respect" for the work they do. Now what does "respect" have to do with anything you may ask? It is the realisation that they are important, that they matter. From there it is a relatively small step to demanding a say on the workfloor, which again is a small step in organising the working class as a class in its own right.

No-no. Sacking the boss is something that has to be done, as part of the strategy (and an added bonus for some!), but I dont consider it the main objective. It's not a rallying point for most workers. We may dislike our bosses, some more than others, but I see most of them as merely very expensive middle-men/parasites that need removing to get to that point where we can all live comfortably.

Maybe we're just looking at the same thing in different ways. I think we're sacking the bosses as a stepping stone to living comfortably in short, rather than it bieng the ultimate objective. I mean, why would people be in favour of sacking thier bosses if they thought they'd be worse off (which they wouldnt be)?

[mikelepore]

It's a very simple concept. You work less and everything's free!

If somebody wanted to ask how that's possible in the most simple way then I'd just say that when all the banks, manager, insurance companies, sales, debt agencies, etc are redundant all those people will join the production labour force. Add onto that the industrialisation of the 3rd world through recycling machinary and abolishing patent laws it's easy to see how having more people in production is possible and would lead to higher productivity, lower working week and a more relaxed working atmosphere with an abundance of products and services available.

Why would the former bank manager agree to join the labor force if everything is free?

[Bitter Ashes]

Why would the former bank manager agree to join the labor force if everything is free?

That answer varies from ideoligy to ideoligy.

Anarchists would say though that community pressure would do the work there.

[anticap]

Regardless of what one may think of the message (Leninists in particular will hate it), as far as presentation goes I think Alexander Berkman's Now and After (a.k.a. What Is Communist Anarchism?) does it well.

For an example chapter that will piss off the fewest among us, try The Wage System (you'll have to click chapter 2 in the menu, since anonym.to strips anchors from links).

[Stand Your Ground]

Ok this is going to ruffle some egalitarian feathers, but at the risk of an infraction, my rep being devastated and being banished to OI, I'm going to take a shot at this.

We over intellectualise. A lot. And our message is a big pill to swallow, we don't have a very good track record, and theres a lot of misconceptions.

Communism is an ideology of not only workers, but un-oppurtunist intellectuals. Ok, here for the bit thats going to have me run out of town.

People don't give a shit.

Marx is a heavy read. Nobody knows what "proletariat" and "bourgeoise" mean. Most workers don't give a rat's arse, they're content to bumble along as a slave of the system. I don't think anyone here would disagree that those working class people need a wake up call. But the worst kind of wakeup call is one which puts them to sleep.

I'm not saying workers are stupid, but they often neither have the will nor the time or effort to think deeply about class struggle.

My point and suggestion is, its time to dumb it down. Make it very simple, very clear so we can draw in support from the apathetic, tired and disinterested. No big words, clear concise aims. Explain what we're all about, without going on and on and on about lofty theories that don't affect many people in any way they can see, touch, smell, feel.

Lets start making class struggle simple, accessible and easy to understand.

I agree, I start trying to tell people how bad capitalism is and they yawn and walk away.

Edit: When people ask me what communism is, I simplify it into this: 'A classless, stateless, oppression free, exploitation free, direct democratic worldwide society in which the people control the production of goods and distribute them evenly, supplying the needs of all people. Free food, water, healthcare, housing & education.'

Kind of a long run-on sentence but doesn't talk alot to say lol.

[Comrade_Stalin]

Lets's just face it, if communism is about teaching the workers about materialist reasons why thing are done, and why we should change them, we have failed. Most people, could not tell me what are the materialist reasons why theing are done, only the social reason.

[Ravachol]

Lets's just face it, if communism is about teaching the workers about materialist reasons why thing are done, and why we should change them, we have failed. Most people, could not tell me what are the materialist reasons why theing are done, only the social reason.

See, that kind of reasoning is the problem when materialism is considered, no offence. 'We' don't need to teach anybody about 'materialism', materialism speaks for itself in the loudest voice possible, that of the cut wage, the lost job, the increased rent. There isn't much to 'understand' about that apart from experiencing the direct results of the class relation and having the desire to oppose and refuse those results. It is from there that the spark is born not from propaganda. Whilst I highly value pro-revolutionary propaganda we must understand that a mass-led revolution (as opposed to a vanguardist adventure) is born out of materialism NOT idealism.

[Die Neue Zeit]

The impossibility however comes in is when you try to make that struggle political, the workers go "huh? socialism?" or, if you're lucky, will agree with you in an abstract (and most of the time wrongly understood) sense.

The fight against capitalist exploitation, for a united working class that organises as a class and for working class hegemony - all things that a prerequisites before we can even dream about "building socialism" - is a political struggle, namely a struggle for the most radical democracy we may achieve: actually bringing the majority of the population to power.

[...]

An additional factor of confusion is that many socialists mix up socialism with democracy.

May I remind comrades here that the "struggle for socialism" is an economic struggle and not a political one?

http://www.revleft.com/vb/blog.php?b=194

So, what you're saying Q is that we should be putting less emphasis on the end result (socialism) and more on the path to getting there? Maybe I misunderstood.

It depends on the path. There are "bourgeois worker" parties with their sacred cows of reform fetishes and reform coalitions. There are communist outlets with their sacred cows of "revolutionism" (like urban "direct action" protests and rural guerrilla warfare a la Focoism) and especially "mass strike" fetishes. Yet to be formed are proletarian-not-necessarily-communist parties aiming for policy-making and all other ruling-class political power (participatory-democratic parallelism, recallability, average skilled workers' wages, and so on).

Let me give a "low level" example of the fight for democracy, which is essentially a fight of workers to get a say in their lives. In the Netherlands the cleaners are currently on strike action, one of their main demands being to get more "respect" for the work they do. Now what does "respect" have to do with anything you may ask? It is the realisation that they are important, that they matter. From there it is a relatively small step to demanding a say on the workfloor, which again is a small step in organising the working class as a class in its own right.

Thanks for bringing up the social concept of "respect." I hadn't thought about that as being potentially political.

[Comrade_Stalin]

See, that kind of reasoning is the problem when materialism is considered, no offence. 'We' don't need to teach anybody about 'materialism', materialism speaks for itself in the loudest voice possible, that of the cut wage, the lost job, the increased rent. There isn't much to 'understand' about that apart from experiencing the direct results of the class relation and having the desire to oppose and refuse those results. It is from there that the spark is born not from propaganda. Whilst I highly value pro-revolutionary propaganda we must understand that a mass-led revolution (as opposed to a vanguardist adventure) is born out of materialism NOT idealism.

But you just proved my point. People always do thing for materialist reasons. The reason why the mass fight in a revolution is do raise wages, stop job loss and decrease rent. All the rest, are the lies we tell are self to accept that. Here a example, people kill each other in the holy land, in the name of god. But the real reason is tourism, which brings in money. But most people could not tell me taht, they instead would say, I'm killing that other person, because god told me.

[RedLaw]

OP, I must disagree with you.

Many of the workers are stupid. The people, especially the proletariat, are apathetic.


I agree with pretty much everything else you said. We need to get people involved and we need to make it simple for the intellectually oppressed masses to understand.

But more important than that, we need to get them to actually give a shit.

...and that is the hard part.

People in the present society have all been given their pacifiers.
It's the things that keep 'us all' under control,just the way 'they' like it.
As long as the icebox is fully stocked with beer and the latest 'mind-numbing'
reality show or sitcom is beaming into their living rooms it's difficult,to say
the least,for Marx and Engels to compete.
It will probably take a big 'crisis event' and when that hits,suddenly answers
will be demanded and it is then that a vanguard/leadership needs to be in
place and ready to channel and focus the energies of those who,all at once,
find themselves with clear class awareness.(for the first time ever)

[Jazzhands]

I think we don't have to do THAT much. We just have to line the people up in all the right places. Just looking at this thread would probably tell the people all they need to hear to get started.

[Stakhanov1415]

I totally agree with OP.

[tbasherizer]

This area is where I really like the anarchist methods of direct action. If you really look at it, anarchist initiatives (radical community gardens, education initiatives, infoshops, etc.) are all socialist in nature. They just avoid any terminology that people in the West have a lot of negative associations with.

This, in my opinion, is why community gardens have caught on in the mainstream, and some anarchistic principles are taking hold in some obscure corners of the education system. They take away people's negative association with communism/socialism, and they apply on a basic level to peoples' lives. Catalonia in the Spanish Civil War is a good example of leftists taking the initiative and actually doing something.

The entire left movement needs to take up anarchist spontaneity and pragmatism to actually make the initiatives now and theorize later. I've seen too many empty auditoria for lectures about fine points (if that's the correct term, considering his vulgar style)of Slavoj Zizjek or how to interpret Neo-Marxist critiques of post-modernism. I agree with the OP in that we have to appeal to the masses on a base level, but I would add that we need to make that appeal one of direct action, and not of theoretical simplification.

Forgive my structual errors, but I really should be sleeping now.