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I've been arguing with someone about Machiavelli
Starting here and read the rest from there (I'm Jinal BTW).
Transcript:
Is there any response towards this person?
Re: ZDoom project ideas you have
by Ghastly_dragon » Wed Jun 13, 2012 10:43 pm
Jinal wrote:I think you missed the point that Machiavelli and Immanuel Kant were bourgeois philosophersMachiavelli was a statesman and diplomat in the Renaissance. The proletariat and bourgeoisie, as Marx defined them, didn't exist.
while Karl Marx was making a scientific analysisI read it. There wasn't much that was scientific about it, while Machiavelli cited specific examples with every point he made.
class society uses religion to pacify workers promising them that their suffering here on Earth will be rewarded in HeavenI must've glossed over that part, but that shows that Marx missed the point of Christianity's message entirely. The entire point of Christ's teachings is about treating people right, not shutting-up and doing as you're told. This is the point Machiavelli and Kant were making; an ethical religion like Christianity is necessary for a society in that it gives reason, for example, for someone to keep to his promises, not to backstab one another in dealings (I'm referring to his Discourses on Livy. If you bring up The Prince, I should warn you that that book was specifically with regard to princes dealing with other princes, not ordinary people in society dealing with one another), or not to steal from one another. Without it, and with a full Darwinist, survival-of-the-fittest philosophy, why should we have laws anyway, if nothing here really means anything? If anything a lack of Christian ideals is what contributed to the proletariat situation Marx detailed.
I wholeheartedly agree with Vaecrius' interpretation of the seven-deadly sins and how they can be viewed in our everyday life. As I said, Dante's Divine Comedy is not Biblical canon. Also, for the record, when I talk about Christianity, I mean Christianity in the New Testament. The original source material, not St. Augustine's writings or Milton's poems.
Jinal wrote:I think you missed the point that Machiavelli and Immanuel Kant were bourgeois philosophersMachiavelli was a statesman and diplomat in the Renaissance. The proletariat and bourgeoisie, as Marx defined them, didn't exist.
while Karl Marx was making a scientific analysisI read it. There wasn't much that was scientific about it, while Machiavelli cited specific examples with every point he made.
class society uses religion to pacify workers promising them that their suffering here on Earth will be rewarded in HeavenI must've glossed over that part, but that shows that Marx missed the point of Christianity's message entirely. The entire point of Christ's teachings is about treating people right, not shutting-up and doing as you're told. This is the point Machiavelli and Kant were making; an ethical religion like Christianity is necessary for a society in that it gives reason, for example, for someone to keep to his promises, not to backstab one another in dealings (I'm referring to his Discourses on Livy. If you bring up The Prince, I should warn you that that book was specifically with regard to princes dealing with other princes, not ordinary people in society dealing with one another), or not to steal from one another. Without it, and with a full Darwinist, survival-of-the-fittest philosophy, why should we have laws anyway, if nothing here really means anything? If anything a lack of Christian ideals is what contributed to the proletariat situation Marx detailed.
I wholeheartedly agree with Vaecrius' interpretation of the seven-deadly sins and how they can be viewed in our everyday life. As I said, Dante's Divine Comedy is not Biblical canon. Also, for the record, when I talk about Christianity, I mean Christianity in the New Testament. The original source material, not St. Augustine's writings or Milton's poems.
Jinal wrote:I think your once again missing the point that Machiavelli's philosophy was serving the ruling class due to material conditions at the time (which was Feudalism)Feudalism was declining as the Renaissance was taking hold (that's one of the definitions of Renaissance). The class structure, as Marx defined it, implies there's no mobility between classes. Both of Machiavelli's political works show a lot of mobility. The Discourses on Livy outlines a democratic republic where anyone can be elected if they can do the job. The Prince is a little more rigid, but he says how someone can rise to power.
Jinal wrote:Well have you read the rest of Marx's works? The Manifesto only gave a solution based on his analysis on class society (i.e. capitalism) from his previous works.I read a few essays, most notably The Jewish Problem.
Although you do realize that Communism has never been attempted therefore it has never existed (yet).Sorry, I meant countries that became communist after his manifesto was published actually followed his brand of communism, and none of those countries had a large proletariat that he said was necessary for the transition (Russia had a massive peasant population, but peasants aren't proletarians).
Jinal wrote:Actually Marx got it right that there is no class mobility (for example you can't rise to the top you have to be born into wealth)Machiavelli is proof of class mobility; his father was a middle-class lawyer. In Renaissance Italy, if you had a trade, you could make a comfortable living, get your children better education and they can do even better, if they wanted to. Today, there might be less mobility within a single generation, but if you have good ideas, talent and willingness to work, anybody can make a living enough to give their own children an even better chance. That's big thing people claiming no class mobility miss is that it actually takes time.
Marx was right in that there is no class mobility when he wrote those essays, but it's far different today.
Not to mention Machiavelli also inspired fascism as wellSomething he himself would be kicking himself over. The Prince makes sense in the context of Renaissance Italy (Where the Italian military was basically unreliable mercenaries, and the whole country was being fought over by by the Spanish, Holy Roman Empire and French), but he argued that a republic would be far better in general. An interesting difference is that Fascists kept working for more socialist ideas while Machiavelli's Prince argued a more conservative standpoint. The final point of the Prince is that it's intended as a guidebook to unite and ensure the security of Italy, then they can get the republic outlined in his Discourses.
Jinal wrote:Well actually it's because Marx originally intended to have the revolution to take place in industrial societies like Germany/Britain/etc unlike Russia which was a feudal agricultural society which was where Lenin screwed up.THANK YOU for saying that! That's something a lot of people who quote Marx miss entirely.
I can give it a go.
It doesn't matter what Christianity presents itself as. In practice, it is used to justify the genocide and submission of the masses.
More stupid "Well, where would people get their morals from?" crap. There are no eternal truths, there are only class-specific morals.
No true Scotsman, but I personally wouldn't go with the "Hitler was a Christian" argument because it implies that his religion was what made the Nazi disaster possible, not the material conditions of Germany. Just point out that the ruling-class uses religion to convince people of its legitimacy. Hitler could have called himself Muslim and the result would have been the same.
Ah, this old argument. He's basically trying to make up for the inconsistencies in the bible by saying that the violent parts don't count. Because the Old Testament is mostly violent, that's the part he decides to cut off. This can be countered by a knowledge of the violent and bigoted passages in the New Testament. I'm not particularly knowledgeable on the bible, but I've seen them before. I'm pretty sure there's some passages condemning Jews and lesbians in Romans, isn't there?
I don't get this shit. Marx only presented his analysis of the proletarian being the truly revolution force that will lead the socialist society which is spawned out of capitalism's inner-contradictions. I don't think this person actually knows a lot about communism. The communist countries adapted to their material conditions. They didn't make a conscious choice to reject Marx (And this isn't even touching on the fact that his vision of what a post-capitalist society would be was vague).
Now he's just talking about abstract theological arguments that mean nothing to anybody.
Keep going. Press on the fact that the ruling class uses religion as a tool. Religion is spawned from the material conditions, not the other way around. Christianity is just another set of ideals that is manhandled by the exploiters to justify their privileges, as has most religion been in the past.
EDIT: I missed a few points.
He was a forerunner of bourgeois thought, I'm pretty sure. Proto-bourgeoisie, if you will.
Bullshit. This person obviously has no clue what he's talking about if he thinks citing "specific examples" is all one needs to be scientific. Marx analyzed capitalism and made accurate predictions based on the way it works. I'm guessing he's only read the Communist Manifesto, which was a lighter work intended to get people pumped about communism. Tell him to read the deeper stuff, like Das Kapital.
Double post, but I want to talk about some things he said on the fifth page of the argument.
Total misunderstanding of the Marxist conception of how society words, and a mangling of Marx's own words. There's plenty of mobility between classes. Sections of the bourgeois become proletarian all the time. Not so much vice versa, but it happens occasionally. Besides, the fall of feudalism wasn't merely a case of class mobility. The structure of society was torn apart, and entirely new classes emerged. And it doesn't matter what this-or-that paper says about democratic institutes, we know that in capitalist society, the class who owns the means of production are the ones who rule. Also, The Prince was intended to satirize a system of government that Machiavelli was opposed to.
Marx did not have a "brand" of communism.
Shit, so all we needed was time! Nevermind the global trends of decreasing wealth, the exploitation of the proletariat, the fact that the capitalists need to exploit workers in order to extract surplus-value. Give people enough time, and we'll all become rich.
Fascists were not socialist in the Marxist sense at all. Fascism is spawned from capitalist, it is the domination of finance capital. It is capitalism taken to its extremes. Something your friend probably wouldn't understand since he seems to be taking the idealist approach.
Thanks for the advice honestly I don't know where to start or make a reply reqouting them which would tedious work since their all from different posts. Maybe I could just Copy and Paste (and slightly rewording some) your entire message or maybe I should make a link to here although I don't think it would be a good idea however. Or maybe should I cease arguing? Since I have a feeling it's not going to go anywhere anyway but I'll make up my mind later.
Last edited by Hexen; 14th June 2012 at 18:58.
So I've decided to post the message got a PM from that forum...
Any response?
To be honest, I'm having some difficulty understanding what he's even saying. He seems to be clinging to the argument that people that don't follow his ideal of Christianity aren't true Christians, therefore he's not responsible for their actions. Aside from this being irrelevant to the main point, which is that Christianity is no more than propaganda, the equivalent of saying America is the greatest place on earth, what he's saying is still false.
There's no rules stopping people from using Christianity as a tool for conquest. If this person was the only one on earth who followed Christ's rules while everyone else was a fanatic, it wouldn't make any difference. What makes his version of Christianity any more valid than a televangelist's? The thing about following Christ's rigid rules are just his opinion. Millions of people call themselves Christian without following them. What makes him correct and them wrong? If there's nothing stopping people from mangling the supposed Word of God as they do, then your opponent may as well give up.
I would tell him his own personal opinion on what makes someone a Christian does not matter, as it still does not stop religion from being an accessory to imperialist crimes that manages to convince people that the most heinous acts are moral, which is the reason leftists oppose it. By asking what makes someone a "true" Christian, he's merely dodging the point.
Update:
He then says this:
He's just running around in circles. Trying to use bad logic to confuse you. Don't let him.
Say; your definition of Christianity is someone who follows Christ's teachings to the letter, and you claim that the likes of Hitler were doing Christianity wrong and no Christian that followed Christ would do that, hence, no true scotsman. If you really must have a definition in order to use no true scotsman, then use yours, and realize what you're doing. And besides, you're still dodging the issue, which is religion is nothing more than a tool for the ruling class. It doesn't matter what Christianity is, itt has changed, it will keep changing with age, it will always reflect the current economic time period and the interests of the ruling class. The Christianity of feudalism is not the Christianity of capitalism, and to say that one everlasting form of religion is "true" and all the others have merely gone astray, and we could have avoided all the bloodshed if only people had believed in the "true" religion, is nothing short of historical ignorance (I wouldn't use "ignorance" if you want to keep the debate civil, though. Try "nothing short of utopianism.")
EDIT: I would also ask him about his feelings on other religions. If religion serves the use he's describing, of keeping society morally healthy, how does he feel about differing religion? Are they incorrect, or will anything work as long as it's "moral" enough? If any religion works as long as it's peaceful enough, then why should anyone convert to Christianity? If Christianity is the only one that works, then how did those societies adopt the "wrong" religion?
Last edited by Questionable; 15th June 2012 at 21:30.
Did that but he responded....
Update:
I'm about to tear my hair off.
Last edited by Hexen; 15th June 2012 at 23:36.
I would stop wasting my time. He's just being stupid at this point. In his own view, he's following true Christianity, which hasn't changed at all with history (Ignorance), and people like Hitler don't count. He's a moron if he can't understand that it doesn't matter what makes a Christian and what does it. He can harp on for years and years about it, it won't change a thing about the fact that Christianity is a malleable tool of the ruling class. Since he's now being rude to you, tell him if he's too moronic to understand even the basics of history, then Christianity suits him just fine.
EDIT: Have you really been arguing "Christianity doesn't mean anything" as he's saying, or is he twisting your words around? I never said Christianity doesn't mean anything, quite the contrary. It just means whatever the ruling class wants it to mean. Does he really think the US imperialists give two shits about what Christ said about killing? They still use religion to justify their violent occupation of other countries, and like I said before, it doesn't matter if your opponent is the last true Christian in the world, if he can't stop people from using his holy scripture for violent purposes, he's totally useless and may as well give up. Your opponent is trying to put the ball in your court with this semantics crap, but he still has yet to prove that religion is beneficial to society, which was his original point. I would abandon this junk about no true Scotsman because he's basically insisting "But it doesn't count because I AM the true Scotsman! Prove me wrong!" Get back to the essence of the argument, which that religion is used as propaganda for murder and genocide. As I've been saying, even if he's somehow the only true Christian in the world, unless he can think of a way to liberate Christianity from its position as status quo propaganda, he may as well surrender his arguments and keep his faith to himself.
To summarize what your position should be; it doesn't matter who's a real Christian and who's not, it doesn't matter what Christ may have said two-thousand years ago, what matters is TODAY religion is used to convince the masses that the position that capitalist occupy in our social hierarchy is justified, and not one based on oppression. If your friend is the only one left in the world who's Christ-like, great for him, but that doesn't mean shit for his original argument about religion being useful to insure a society's morals. If he admits that religion is used for widespread ill-intentions but states that it's only because they're not "true" Christians or they're not following Christ's teachings or whatever, then he's lost the entire argument, which was based around whether a society needed religion for its morals. Religion, whether it's the word of Christ or Allah or Ronald McDonald, is used to prop up the status quo, and that's the bottom line. If politicians can so easily twist the message of Christ around to mean what they want, then isn't it a better bet to say we should have a society based on truth and rationality than one where a dead man's words can be manipulated to mean anything?
Last edited by Questionable; 16th June 2012 at 01:19.
To fully understand what's going on...
Disclaimer: Apologies if I was using your own words (while rewording them to direct at him) although some of them are my one (mostly the shorter ones) but I wish I could have used mine own words though (although I thought you said it better than myself) but here is the full transcript to understand the situation.
Here's some thoughts I had, although I read all of that kind of fast.
First of all, Marx DID use specific examples in history as evidence, and he did so quite a bit. You shouldn't have conceded this point. As an example, The Civil War in France is an analysis of the Paris Commune.
Furthermore, you should consider that Marx was not a dogmatist. His views changed and so did his theories. Early Marx is a bit different from later Marx, but to use the same example, after the Paris Commune, there's that 10 point program in the communist manifesto that Marx and Engels more or less admit was a mistake.
http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx...to/preface.htm
Another problem I see is that you don't exactly hold Marxism to the same standards as Christianity. If you argue that the word of Christianity doesn't count, only how it is practiced, then you set yourself up for the counter argument that the word of Marxism doesn't count only how it is practiced i.e. Stalinism etc.
A better argument is the same as I have previously stated, that Marxism is not based on dogmatism, that it is indeed scientific, and it is based on empirical evidence. Christianity is not. At best, Christianity (or what the other individual argues as ethical religion) is based on axiomatic principles of morality that are for the most part subjective. In short, while there are people who choose to focus on the ethical justifications of communism, i believe that the correct interpretation of Marx's work as a whole should be seen as a materialist, scientific endeavor, based on empirical evidence, and not really driven by ethics.
As to your opponent's argument about the no true scotsman, I believe he/she may actually be right. However, he/she does shoot himself/herself in the foot when he/she says that the standards haven't changed. This is the fundamental difference between Marxism (undogmatic) and Christianity (dogmatic). Since the standards haven't changed with Christianity, he/she can't use the different standards argument when pointing out obvious sexism in the bible.
On the other hand, when people point out racist remarks written by Marx, you can say that indeed, standards were different back then, but more importantly, Marx has sometimes been wrong. After all, we communists don't make any pretensions about Marx being the son of God or anything, whereas Christians...well you get the idea.
Hope this helps more than it hurts.
EDIT: Furthermore, I would like to point out that through empirical observation, we can pinpoint objectively exactly where Marx was right and where he was wrong. On the other hand, when discussing Christian morality, morality based mostly on subjective or contextual standards, you can't really base your argument on anything objective, in which case you are just cherry picking.
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