What do you think of Communism

[Duvniask]

It never ceases to amaze how all this ideological grandstanding of yours comes down to defending a dead terror regime with substandard health care, substandard housing, store queues, arbitrary arrests by secret police, environmental destruction in the name of "progress", corporations run by tyrannical managers exactly like in the West - a system so bound up in the self preservation of its own stagnant impotence that it let vital technical information be held secret from the people who needed to know it most, resulting in the world's worst nuclear disaster.

It is these types of conclusions that make you look so utterly childish and uninformed, or should I say in denial.



Look into the mirror, please. That's you right there, as it made clear by:


Social democracy, but with extra democracy^TM. It's all there, with the traditional welfare state demands and a syrupy layer of democracy for the, now completely petit-bourgeois as you would have it, working people to decide for themselves how they want to be enslaved by the bottom line (capital).

Some of these are not even "policy", they are just names of concepts that imply nothing concrete.

Lol side by side with 'abolition of the class system' she has 'worker ownership of the means of production', as if workers aren't a class unto themselves. The proper communist demand is social ownership of the means of production, since under communism the division of labour has been superseded, leaving only free individuals. The whole point of communism is that these individuals aren't constrained within social roles like 'worker' anymore. The division of labour has been abolished.

Not to mention the fact that she tries to smuggle the state, nations, money and 'governance' in too.

The response you would get is "I'm not a communist" - which only underscores the ridiculousness of all this grandstanding, which has the superficial appearance of, say, Marxist-Leninism, but isn't even bold enough to call itself that.

On a side note, the term "social ownership of the means of production" is inconvenient, because people use it to mean exactly this, cooperative economy or even nationalization. It's what allows them to advance arguments in the form of "well how could the Soviet Union be capitalist if the state owned the industry" and other such triteness.

[Alexiandra]

Lol side by side with 'abolition of the class system' she has 'worker ownership of the means of production', as if workers aren't a class unto themselves. The proper communist demand is social ownership of the means of production, since under communism the division of labour has been superseded, leaving only free individuals. The whole point of communism is that these individuals aren't constrained within social roles like 'worker' anymore. The division of labour has been abolished.

Not to mention the fact that she tries to smuggle the state, nations, money and 'governance' in too.

The response you would get is "I'm not a communist" - which only underscores the ridiculousness of all this grandstanding, which has the superficial appearance of, say, Marxist-Leninism, but isn't even bold enough to call itself that.

On a side note, the term "social ownership of the means of production" is inconvenient, because people use it to mean exactly this, cooperative economy or even nationalization. It's what allows them to advance arguments in the form of "well how could the Soviet Union be capitalist if the state owned the industry" and other such triteness.

Well, it just goes to show that however clear the expression, you can always find someone incompetent or opportunistic enough to distort it. There's really no arrangement of words you can use that will preclude misrepresentation by such people.

[Hispida]

Wrong about what in particular? Marxism as a philosophical tradition has been constantly challenging itself and growing to respond to new changes. Marxism-Leninism itself (which I assume you're referring to) arose as a response to conditions that were wildly different from what Marx and Engels could have foreseen.

And except for perhaps some developing countries it's fairly outdated now, imo.

well, yes. that's why it was synthesized alongside mao's contributions to marxism-leninism-maoism into marxism-leninism-maoism in the late 60's and early 70's by abimael guzman; and of course, this is not final --- just the highest stage of understanding we have right now, in the same vein as, to quite nilo, our understanding of physics. marxism is a science, and science evolves and becomes more advanced as time goes on.

[Alexiandra]

And except for perhaps some developing countries it's fairly outdated now, imo.

well, yes. that's why it was synthesized alongside mao's contributions to marxism-leninism-maoism into marxism-leninism-maoism in the late 60's and early 70's by abimael guzman; and of course, this is not final --- just the highest stage of understanding we have right now, in the same vein as, to quite nilo, our understanding of physics. marxism is a science, and science evolves and becomes more advanced as time goes on.

Lol what exactly do you understand Mao's contribution to have been? What do you think he and Guzman added that Marx missed?

[Hispida]

well, yes. that's why it was synthesized alongside mao's contributions to marxism-leninism-maoism into marxism-leninism-maoism in the late 60's and early 70's by abimael guzman; and of course, this is not final --- just the highest stage of understanding we have right now, in the same vein as, to quite nilo, our understanding of physics. marxism is a science, and science evolves and becomes more advanced as time goes on.

Lol what exactly do you understand Mao's contribution to have been? What do you think he and Guzman added that Marx missed?

the theories of contradiction, new democracy, the mass line, the idea of a great proletarian cultural revolution, protracted people's warfare, the rectification campaign of criticism and self-criticism, and environmentalism (to an extent, never really formally theorized but it's a big part of maoist movements across the world). just to name a few, of course

[Kubra]

Lol what exactly do you understand Mao's contribution to have been? What do you think he and Guzman added that Marx missed?

the theories of contradiction, new democracy, the mass line, the idea of a great proletarian cultural revolution, protracted people's warfare, the rectification campaign of criticism and self-criticism, and environmentalism (to an extent, never really formally theorized but it's a big part of maoist movements across the world). just to name a few, of course

a national bourgeoisie, a national bourgeoisie, my kingdom for a national bourgeoisie!

[El Lazaro]

well, yes. that's why it was synthesized alongside mao's contributions to marxism-leninism-maoism into marxism-leninism-maoism in the late 60's and early 70's by abimael guzman; and of course, this is not final --- just the highest stage of understanding we have right now, in the same vein as, to quite nilo, our understanding of physics. marxism is a science, and science evolves and becomes more advanced as time goes on.

Lol what exactly do you understand Mao's contribution to have been? What do you think he and Guzman added that Marx missed?

Communism clearly can only be achieved through terrorism, stoning homosexuals, and beheading journalists. We must synthesize Comrade bin Laden’s praxis in order to achieve socialism in the 3rd world.

[Alexiandra]

Lol what exactly do you understand Mao's contribution to have been? What do you think he and Guzman added that Marx missed?

the theories of contradiction, new democracy, the mass line, the idea of a great proletarian cultural revolution, protracted people's warfare, the rectification campaign of criticism and self-criticism, and environmentalism (to an extent, never really formally theorized but it's a big part of maoist movements across the world). just to name a few, of course

1. The 'theories of contradiction' are philosophical garbage with no relevance to communism. The whole idea of 'primary contradiction, secondary contradiction', etc. is just an excuse for the proletariat to resort to the basest nationalism. It enables opportunists to say: 'capitalism isn't the primary contradiction, national oppression is!' and so mobilise people on the basis of nation, i.e. abandon the class standpoint altogether. It's a nice toy for petty-bourgeois intellectuals to play around with - they can convince themselves that they have discovered something profound when they describe a phenomenon in terms of contradiction, negation, etc. It is of no use scientifically, because to think correctly already means to think dialectically; you do not need any prior knowledge of 'dialectics' as a special discipline. Did Darwin require the 'theories of contradiction' to study evolution, did Newton require them to elucidate thermodynamics?

2. 'New democracy' is the same - nationalist tripe. The whole notion of the 'Bloc of Four Classes' is totally antithetical to communism. Instead of attempting to secure proletarian dominance over government, as Lenin had done in Russia, Mao invited bourgeois into the government and openly described the state as a dictatorship not only of the proletariat and peasantry, but of the bourgeoisie as well. Far from trying to go beyond the bounds of the bourgeois revolution in China, Mao sought to restrain whatever proletarian tendencies existed by tethering them, organisationally and theoretically, to the bourgeoisie - which was bound to turn hostile as soon as the bourgeois revolution had been completed. He utterly failed - or rather never even attempted - to safeguard the independence of the proletariat during its struggle for revolutionary democracy. He was content to let it dissolve in the 'people's democracy'. Lenin considered such dissolution a defeat, something to be avoided, whereas Mao actively championed it:

'If the bourgeoisie succeeds in frustrating the Russian revolution by coming to terms with tsarism, Social-Democracy will find its hands actually tied in the fight against the inconsistent bourgeoisie; Social-Democracy will find itself dissolved “in bourgeois democracy” in the sense that the proletariat will not succeed in putting its clear imprint on the revolution, will not succeed in settling accounts with tsarism in the proletarian or, as Marx once said, “in the plebeian” way. ... In a word, in order to avoid finding itself with its hands tied in the struggle against the inconsistent bourgeois democrats, the proletariat must be sufficiently class conscious and strong to rouse the peasantry to revolutionary consciousness, to direct its attack, and thereby to pursue the line of consistent proletarian democratism independently.'

'Independently' is absolutely crucial here. It is precisely this class independence that Mao flouted. If you doubt this, consider the following excerpt from this article by the ICP:

'As Trotsky pointed out, the fusion of the Communist Party of China with the nationalist party had nothing to do with the tactics of temporary alliances which Marx considered acceptable during a bourgeois democratic revolution and which had been used by the Bolsheviks in Russia. It was a case of a merger on principle, renewed by Mao Tse-tung at every "stage" of the Chinese revolution even after the defeat and destruction of the Kuomintang. Indeed in 1945, in his report "On Coalition Government" he would declare:

"These views of ours are completely in accord with the revolutionary views of Dr. Sun Yat-sen... struggle against foreign feudal oppression to deliver the Chinese people from their miserable colonial, semi-colonial and semi-feudal plight and establish a proletarian-led, new-democratic China, whose main task is the liberation of the peasantry, a China of the revolutionary Three People's Principles of Dr. Sun Yat-sen, a China which is independent, free, democratic, united, prosperous and powerful. This is what we have actually been doing"'

Even in theory, Mao declared his complete alignment with the bourgeoisie and it's 'People's Principles' - including after the defeat of the Kuomintang. He really imagined that he was constructing a 'joint dictatorship of several revolutionary classes'. Contrast this with Lenin, who understood that only the proletariat, leading the peasantry, was capable of consistent democratism, and never dreamed of passively ceding the dictatorship to the national bourgeoisie.

3. 'The idea of a great proletarian cultural revolution' - of what value is this? Marx had already explained that culture is determined by the mode of production, hence that the victory of the proletariat over capital would usher in a new culture. Mao tried to put the cart before the horse and simply pretend that China had achieved the victory of the workers over the bourgeoisie. We saw how that worked out!

4. Protracted people's warfare - this amounts merely to a military strategy, one that had already been carried out under different names many times in the past. Mao didn't invent this, nor was communism in need of it. It is the natural weapon of peasant insurgencies, not those of the industrial proletariat.

5. 'The rectification campaign of criticism and self-criticism'. Hmm, I seem to recall Dr Marx saying something about 'ruthless criticism of all that exists'...

6. Environmentalism? You yourself say that this was 'never really formally theorised' by Mao or Guzman. Marx had already written in Capital that: '[c]apitalist production, therefore, develops technology, and the combining together of various processes into a social whole, only by sapping the original sources of all wealth — the soil and the labourer.' By soil, as he elaborates elsewhere, he means the natural environment, natural resources.

[Duvniask]

3. 'The idea of a great proletarian cultural revolution' - of what value is this? Marx had already explained that culture is determined by the mode of production, hence that the victory of the proletariat over capital would usher in a new culture. Mao tried to put the cart before the horse and simply pretend that China had achieved the victory of the workers over the bourgeoisie. We saw how that worked out!

Let's be real, it's not even an "idea"; it was never more than a movement for sowing mass chaos and purging the CCP of political opponents, who were rightfully critical of Mao due to the failures of his retarded policies.

[Alexiandra]

3. 'The idea of a great proletarian cultural revolution' - of what value is this? Marx had already explained that culture is determined by the mode of production, hence that the victory of the proletariat over capital would usher in a new culture. Mao tried to put the cart before the horse and simply pretend that China had achieved the victory of the workers over the bourgeoisie. We saw how that worked out!

Let's be real, it's not even an "idea"; it was never more than a movement for sowing mass chaos and purging the CCP of political opponents, who were rightfully critical of Mao due to the failures of his retarded policies.

You have to at least humour Maoists, else they go home in a sulk and take the ball with them.

[Sordhau]

It never ceases to amaze how all this ideological grandstanding of yours comes down to defending a dead terror regime with substandard health care, substandard housing, store queues, arbitrary arrests by secret police, environmental destruction in the name of "progress", corporations run by tyrannical managers exactly like in the West - a system so bound up in the self preservation of its own stagnant impotence that it let vital technical information be held secret from the people who needed to know it most, resulting in the world's worst nuclear disaster.

It is these types of conclusions that make you look so utterly childish and uninformed, or should I say in denial.



Look into the mirror, please. That's you right there, as it made clear by:


Social democracy, but with extra democracy^TM. It's all there, with the traditional welfare state demands and a syrupy layer of democracy for the, now completely petit-bourgeois as you would have it, working people to decide for themselves how they want to be enslaved by the bottom line (capital).

Some of these are not even "policy", they are just names of concepts that imply nothing concrete.

Lol side by side with 'abolition of the class system' she has 'worker ownership of the means of production', as if workers aren't a class unto themselves. The proper communist demand is social ownership of the means of production, since under communism the division of labour has been superseded, leaving only free individuals. The whole point of communism is that these individuals aren't constrained within social roles like 'worker' anymore. The division of labour has been abolished.

Pedantry. When the class system is abolished 'the people' and 'the workers' become synonymous.

Not to mention the fact that she tries to smuggle the state,

The state can be weakened but I don't believe for a moment it will ever be abolished, let alone 'wither away'. Global Communism seems more like pipe dream than anything.

nations,

Nations aren't going anywhere without mass genocide. To suggest otherwise is pure naivete.

money

I'm talking short term. In the long term currency will be rendered irrelevant and thus obsolete, but as Lenin found out the hard way trying to straight-up abolish currency doesn't work right off the bat.

and 'governance' in too.

It's the mark of a completely delusional mind to suggest that we can do away with leadership entirely. Hierarchy? Yes. Government? No.

Anarchism is an ignorant and juvenile worldview.

[Alexiandra]

Pedantry. When the class system is abolished 'the people' and 'the workers' become synonymous.

Well, no, the workers cease to be workers. The economic category of 'worker', which lies at the root of the working class, ceases to exist. There are only free individuals, free producers.

The state can be weakened but I don't believe for a moment it will ever be abolished, let alone 'wither away'. Global Communism seems more like pipe dream than anything.

Well then you're not a communist. Why pretend to be one?

Nations aren't going anywhere without mass genocide. To suggest otherwise is pure naivete.

'In place of the old local and national seclusion and self-sufficiency, we have intercourse in every direction, universal inter-dependence of nations. And as in material, so also in intellectual production. The intellectual creations of individual nations become common property. National one-sidedness and narrow-mindedness become more and more impossible, and from the numerous national and local literatures, there arises a world literature. ... The proletarian is without property; his relation to his wife and children has no longer anything in common with the bourgeois family relations; modern industry labour, modern subjection to capital, the same in England as in France, in America as in Germany, has stripped him of every trace of national character. ... National differences and antagonism between peoples are daily more and more vanishing, owing to the development of the bourgeoisie, to freedom of commerce, to the world market, to uniformity in the mode of production and in the conditions of life corresponding thereto. The supremacy of the proletariat will cause them to vanish still faster.'

All this from the Communist Manifesto, the most elementary of communist texts. Why do you pretend to be a communist?

I'm talking short term. In the long term currency will be rendered irrelevant and thus obsolete, but as Lenin found out the hard way trying to straight-up abolish currency doesn't work right off the bat.

In the short term, communists aim to abolish exchange and replace it with an arrangement under which the producer 'receives a certificate from society that he has furnished such-and-such an amount of labor (after deducting his labor for the common funds); and with this certificate, he draws from the social stock of means of consumption as much as the same amount of labor cost.' This is the first, or lower, stage of communist society. Anything less is just capitalism daubed in red.

It's the mark of a completely delusional mind to suggest that we can do away with leadership entirely. Hierarchy? Yes. Government? No.

Anarchism is an ignorant and juvenile worldview.

To speak of 'governance' is to speak of the governing and the governed, i.e. to speak of a class divide. It is, in a word, to speak of the state. This is why Marx describes the proletarian state as the use of 'governmental means' in his Conspectus of Bakunin's Statism and Anarchy.

[Sordhau]

Pedantry. When the class system is abolished 'the people' and 'the workers' become synonymous.

Well, no, the workers cease to be workers. The economic category of 'worker', which lies at the root of the working class, ceases to exist. There are only free individuals, free producers.

Again: pedantry. The language doesn't matter; the reality is the same.

Well then you're not a communist. Why pretend to be one?

I don't. I'm a Socialist, not a Communist. They are not the same thing.

'In place of the old local and national seclusion and self-sufficiency, we have intercourse in every direction, universal inter-dependence of nations. And as in material, so also in intellectual production. The intellectual creations of individual nations become common property. National one-sidedness and narrow-mindedness become more and more impossible, and from the numerous national and local literatures, there arises a world literature. ... The proletarian is without property; his relation to his wife and children has no longer anything in common with the bourgeois family relations; modern industry labour, modern subjection to capital, the same in England as in France, in America as in Germany, has stripped him of every trace of national character. ... National differences and antagonism between peoples are daily more and more vanishing, owing to the development of the bourgeoisie, to freedom of commerce, to the world market, to uniformity in the mode of production and in the conditions of life corresponding thereto. The supremacy of the proletariat will cause them to vanish still faster.'

All this from the Communist Manifesto, the most elementary of communist texts. Why do you pretend to be a communist?

Again: not a Communist, never claimed to be. I don't agree with Marx on everything. I'm not a Marxist.

In the short term, communists aim to abolish exchange and replace it with an arrangement under which the producer 'receives a certificate from society that he has furnished such-and-such an amount of labor (after deducting his labor for the common funds); and with this certificate, he draws from the social stock of means of consumption as much as the same amount of labor cost.' This is the first, or lower, stage of communist society.

And attempts to abolish exchange failed spectacularly, as again Lenin found out the hard way. When your methods fail to produce the desired results you don't keeping doing it and the vain hope it magically corrects itself, you change your approach.

Anything less is just capitalism daubed in red.

Horseshit.

To speak of 'governance' is to speak of the governing and the governed, i.e. to speak of a class divide. It is, in a word, to speak of the state. This is why Marx describes the proletarian state as the use of 'governmental means' in his Conspectus of Bakunin's Statism and Anarchy.

Government can exist independent of class.

[Duvniask]

I'm talking short term. In the long term currency will be rendered irrelevant and thus obsolete,

The short term of what? If the proletariat has seized power internationally, in the most developed nations, they have every interest in as quickly as possible abolishing production for exchange in favor of production for use. The existence of socialism cannot be enacted without it.

but as Lenin found out the hard way trying to straight-up abolish currency doesn't work right off the bat.

Yes, in a country that had not even entered a mature stage of capitalist development, with primitive peasant and familial production widespread, you couldn't just abolish currency without instead falling backwards into barter. What a great example! Almost like the material conditions of Soviet Russia were not adequate for socialism and there was a need to introduce a... new economic policy... an NEP, to develop the country

[Duvniask]

Anything less is just capitalism daubed in red.

Horseshit.

Oh, just try, try for once to argue this point. Far as I know you have never even tried coming up with excuses for your denial. It really all comes down to you thinking socialism is when the we create The People's Capital^TM.

[Valiraisia]

its basically impossible to have true communism.

[Informed Consent]

its basically impossible to have true communism.

It has always bemused me how people ever thought they could engineer a society, particularly the globe spanning arbitrarily amalgamated monstrosities some envision, without most of the fundamental mechanics required to engineer a society.

[Alexiandra]

Again: pedantry. The language doesn't matter; the reality is the same.

It's not just language. The word 'worker' is expressive of a category of pre-capitalist economy. Not only the word, but the thing it describes changes under communism.

I don't. I'm a Socialist, not a Communist. They are not the same thing.

You have a fucking hammer and sickle in your signature! Do you know what connotations that symbol has? Clearly not. In any case, your being a socialist makes this whole incoherent mess a little more incomprehensible. As always, Marx is instructive, and you should recognise yourself here:

'Petty bourgeois socialism, socialism par excellence, is distinct from this bourgeois socialism, to which, as to every variety of socialism, sections of the workers and petty bourgeois naturally rally. Capital hounds this class chiefly as its creditor, so it demands credit institutions; capital crushes it by competition, so it demands associations supported by the state; capital overwhelms it by concentration, so it demands progressive taxes, limitations on inheritance, taking over of large construction projects by the state, and other measures that forcibly stem the growth of capital.'

Again: not a Communist, never claimed to be. I don't agree with Marx on everything. I'm not a Marxist.

That doesn't really matter. What Marx and Engels are describing here is an objective, empirically observable process taking place before our eyes. It is the necessary tendency of capitalist society.

And attempts to abolish exchange failed spectacularly, as again Lenin found out the hard way. When your methods fail to produce the desired results you don't keeping doing it and the vain hope it magically corrects itself, you change your approach.

As another poster pointed out, the objective conditions in Russia were unsuitable for communism unless the revolution succeeded in spreading to the west, which it did not. This was recognised by communists at the time, including Lenin.

Horseshit.

Lol, you want to keep commodity production and exchange, as well as money, but think that you can abolish capitalism on this basis? Utter nonsense.

Government can exist independent of class.

This isn't an argument, you're just asserting things. Who would be the governed under communism? Who the governors? You can play with the definition of 'government' all you want, but clearly whatever government existed would be completely different in content from government today. Political rule, government, would lose its content, it would become something else. It would become mere administration. In your original post, you refer to 'governance' by 'workers' councils', which suggests, again, that workers still exist as a social category, hence that communism has not yet been achieved.

[Suriyanakhon]

there was a need to introduce a... new economic policy... an NEP, to develop the country

Hold it right there Bukharin.

[The Greenlandic Socialist Party]

I have found communism good. Stalinism is better communism. Need I say more?

[Sordhau]

Again: pedantry. The language doesn't matter; the reality is the same.

It's not just language. The word 'worker' is expressive of a category of pre-capitalist economy. Not only the word, but the thing it describes changes under communism.

I am aware. Your putting a narrow focus on poor wording when it really doesn't matter.

You have a fucking hammer and sickle in your signature! Do you know what connotations that symbol has? Clearly not.

It represents the unity of the proletariat and the peasantry.

In any case, your being a socialist makes this whole incoherent mess a little more incomprehensible. As always, Marx is instructive, and you should recognise yourself here:

'Petty bourgeois socialism, socialism par excellence, is distinct from this bourgeois socialism, to which, as to every variety of socialism, sections of the workers and petty bourgeois naturally rally. Capital hounds this class chiefly as its creditor, so it demands credit institutions; capital crushes it by competition, so it demands associations supported by the state; capital overwhelms it by concentration, so it demands progressive taxes, limitations on inheritance, taking over of large construction projects by the state, and other measures that forcibly stem the growth of capital.'

This is a transitionary state, not a permanent social fixture.

That doesn't really matter. What Marx and Engels are describing here is an objective, empirically observable process taking place before our eyes. It is the necessary tendency of capitalist society.

I didn't say it wasn't happening, I'm denying the feasibility of demolishing nations without genocide.

As another poster pointed out, the objective conditions in Russia were unsuitable for communism unless the revolution succeeded in spreading to the west, which it did not. This was recognised by communists at the time, including Lenin.

I am aware that Feudal Russia did not meet the requirements for a successful Socialist system to be implemented; that is irrelevant. The issue of regarding the abolition of exchange would have existed in the West as well.

Lol, you want to keep commodity production and exchange, as well as money, but think that you can abolish capitalism on this basis? Utter nonsense.

What exactly do you think a "commodity" is if you believe the production and exchange of such can just be done away with? Every good in the economy is a commodity. Food is a commodity, fuel is a commodity, fucking pain pills are a commodity. Are we to forage berries in the woods if we want to eat? Pray to God to heal us when we have heart burn? How the fuck do you expect a society to function without commodities? Commodities are literally just resources.

Exchange and money at least can and should be withered away into obsolescence gradually but commodities aren't going anywhere unless you want the human race to return to a Hunter-Gatherer society.

This isn't an argument, you're just asserting things. Who would be the governed under communism? Who the governors?

The people would be the governed, and the people would be the governors. The people would govern themselves.

You can play with the definition of 'government' all you want, but clearly whatever government existed would be completely different in content from government today. Political rule, government, would lose its content, it would become something else. It would become mere administration.

Call it whatever you like. It's the same shit either way.

In your original post, you refer to 'governance' by 'workers' councils', which suggests, again, that workers still exist as a social category, hence that communism has not yet been achieved.

More pedantry. As I said before: workers and people become synonymous under Socialism. The people work, and are therefor workers. This is just semantic nitpicking.

[Alexiandra]

It represents the unity of the proletariat and the peasantry.

Which was the revolutionary slogan of... that's right, the Russian communists.

This is a transitionary state, not a permanent social fixture.

What is, socialism? If so, what do you consider it to be transitioning towards? You've already said you're not a communist.

I didn't say it wasn't happening, I'm denying the feasibility of demolishing nations without genocide.

Lol so you think that what Marx and Engels are describing here - the erosion of national differences through world commerce and intercourse as well as the agency of the proletariat - is happening, but also think that the erosion of national differences isn't possible without genocide? Make it make sense.

I am aware that Feudal Russia did not meet the requirements for a successful Socialist system to be implemented; that is irrelevant. The issue of regarding the abolition of exchange would have existed in the West as well.

And why is that?

What exactly do you think a "commodity" is if you believe the production and exchange of such can just be done away with? Every good in the economy is a commodity. Food is a commodity, fuel is a commodity, fucking pain pills are a commodity. Are we to forage berries in the woods if we want to eat? Pray to God to heal us when we have heart burn? How the fuck do you expect a society to function without commodities? Commodities are literally just resources.

Have you ever read literally any communist literature? A commodity is a product which possesses both a use-value - i.e. the ability to satisfy a human want - and, crucially, an exchange-value. In bourgeois society, that is to say capitalist society, virtually all products are commodities, possessed of an exchange-value in addition to their use-value. By identifying commodities with products per se, you merely reveal the fact that you are unable to conceive of any economy but the bourgeois economy, and that you take bourgeois relations to be general relations of human history. There were products before there were commodities, and will be products after commodities have been abolished.

The people would be the governed, and the people would be the governors. The people would govern themselves.

In that case, why do you mention governance by workers' councils? Workers constitute part of the population, and under communism they will disappear as a fixed social role entirely.

More pedantry. As I said before: workers and people become synonymous under Socialism. The people work, and are therefor workers. This is just semantic nitpicking.

You seem to think that calling something 'pedantry' excuses you from actually arguing against it. I'm afraid this isn't the case. You don't seem to know what pedantry is. Under communism, the people work, but they are not reproduced merely as workers. Working is just one of their many activities; it does not define them. Rather, their wealth is measured by the amount of leisure time at their disposal. In capitalist society, workers are reproduced only insofar as they work, because they rely on wages to survive. Their whole essence consists of working, of the fact that they are maintained as a source of alien labour for capital. They reproduce themselves in one specificity, not as free individuals developing their individuality. That is why they are workers, while the individuals of communist society are just that - individuals.

[Mackiland]

I really like communism. Only when others do it and I do capitalism myself.

[Sordhau]

It represents the unity of the proletariat and the peasantry.

Which was the revolutionary slogan of... that's right, the Russian communists.

Irrelevant.

What is, socialism? If so, what do you consider it to be transitioning towards? You've already said you're not a communist.

I didn't say Socialism itself was transitionary; that's the Marxist view.

Lol so you think that what Marx and Engels are describing here - the erosion of national differences through world commerce and intercourse as well as the agency of the proletariat - is happening, but also think that the erosion of national differences isn't possible without genocide? Make it make sense.

Yes and no. The world has become a smaller place, and the people in it closer to one another and more alike. But this does not represent the end of diversity. Culture will endure, traditions will endure, values will endure. They will have to change to survive, some will be lost, new ones will develop, but the human race will never be monocultural. Distance, time, ancestry, experience, environment, and so on will always preserve old and create new ways. Nations will exist no matter what. The nation-state may cease to be, but the nations will endure. They will not resemble the nations we know today but they will still exist.

And why is that?

Because you cannot force any kind of change without resorting to tyranny, and this includes transitioning from a Capitalist society to a Socialist society.

Have you ever read literally any communist literature?

Not all of us have the luxury of having the time, energy, and patience to sit down a read thousands of pages worth of Marxist works. I have to work for a living and don't like sitting still.

A commodity is a product which possesses both a use-value - i.e. the ability to satisfy a human want - and, crucially, an exchange-value. In bourgeois society, that is to say capitalist society, virtually all products are commodities, possessed of an exchange-value in addition to their use-value. By identifying commodities with products per se, you merely reveal the fact that you are unable to conceive of any economy but the bourgeois economy, and that you take bourgeois relations to be general relations of human history. There were products before there were commodities, and will be products after commodities have been abolished.

You basically just described a luxury, and I don't understand why you couldn't just use that term seeing as it's in common parlance and the Marxist definition of a commodity is not.

In that case, why do you mention governance by workers' councils? Workers constitute part of the population, and under communism they will disappear as a fixed social role entirely.

You seem to think that calling something 'pedantry' excuses you from actually arguing against it. I'm afraid this isn't the case. You don't seem to know what pedantry is. Under communism, the people work, but they are not reproduced merely as workers. Working is just one of their many activities; it does not define them. Rather, their wealth is measured by the amount of leisure time at their disposal. In capitalist society, workers are reproduced only insofar as they work, because they rely on wages to survive. Their whole essence consists of working, of the fact that they are maintained as a source of alien labour for capital. They reproduce themselves in one specificity, not as free individuals developing their individuality. That is why they are workers, while the individuals of communist society are just that - individuals.

I'm not going to repeat myself again. Stop making a big deal out of a syntax error for fucks sake.

[The Anime society]

For me, Communism is underrated, coming from a democratic guy, No matter what their party Communist, Liberal, etc they shall be equal to others, I know I sound like the Founding Fathers but it's true. Most people think Communism = Non-American, but there are some countries that are Communist that give aid to western nations. I'm not trying to say I support dictatorships, I am trying to say that I don't care whether your Communist or Liberal, I will still be friends with you. People think that I'm Communist when I'm not, I'm gonna admit this, I like Russia, and people are still friends with me, honestly no one cares that your Communist, Liberal, Socialist whatever, your shoes or party doesn't matter. You are treated based on what you did, not your race, religion, party, etc. That's my personal opinion.