LWDT IX: Discussing the Left From All Engels

[Fahran]

TFW Stalin is obviously the revisionist

I feel like everyone is a revisionist at this point.

[The New California Republic]

(Image)

This is bar none the most cursed image I've ever seen on NSG.

[Novus America]

TFW Stalin is obviously the revisionist

I feel like everyone is a revisionist at this point.

Sure, and I do not think that is a bad thing, but it is usually the Stalin’s screaming about “revisionists”. Which is quite ironic.

[Cisairse]

TFW Stalin is obviously the revisionist

I feel like everyone is a revisionist at this point.

IMO you'd have to be pretty blind to not be a revisionist.

[West Leas Oros 2]

Ancoms... hoo boy... between them and tankies, they make up most of the vitriolic idiocy I’m talking about.

Yeah. I checked out when I saw a lot of them unironically saying that stealing video games from Wal-Mart is praxis.

I'm convinced that most ancoms, and most tankies for that matter, are too young to vote.

Nothing says "revolution" like theft and random violence! That'll show my dad and that one girl who rejected me those fascists!

[Fahran]

Yeah. I checked out when I saw a lot of them unironically saying that stealing video games from Wal-Mart is praxis.

You can't see it but I'm cringing pretty hard right now.

Good praxis is setting up armed blockades on roads to prevent Walmart from dumping cheap goods into a small rural community so that the local farmers and grocers can continue to earn a decent living. Also, penny auctions. Can we bring back penny auctions?

[Dominioan]

Yeah. I checked out when I saw a lot of them unironically saying that stealing video games from Wal-Mart is praxis.

I'm convinced that most ancoms, and most tankies for that matter, are too young to vote.

Nothing says "revolution" like theft and random violence! That'll show my dad and that one girl who rejected me those fascists!

Let’s burn down a street of minority businesses in the name of “fighting inequality”!

[Lucja]

>when you were basically the founder and commander of the Red Army but some mustachioed man takes it over and tries to kill you.

There are so many things going on in this image it's hard to know where to start.

[West Leas Oros 2]

Nothing says "revolution" like theft and random violence! That'll show my dad and that one girl who rejected me those fascists!

Let’s burn down a street of minority businesses in the name of “fighting inequality”!

*draws circle A on a random guy's garage door and smashes his living room window*

Honestly, I have to wonder if the philosophy was created by people other than bitter criminals who were upset about getting arrested.

[Dominioan]

Let’s burn down a street of minority businesses in the name of “fighting inequality”!

*draws circle A on a random guy's garage door and smashes his living room window*

Honestly, I have to wonder if the philosophy was created by people other than bitter criminals who were upset about getting arrested.

I’m not insulting anarchism, but I’ve never really been a fan.
To all anarchists: don’t get mad, just my opinion

[West Leas Oros 2]

*draws circle A on a random guy's garage door and smashes his living room window*

Honestly, I have to wonder if the philosophy was created by people other than bitter criminals who were upset about getting arrested.

I’m not insulting anarchism, but I’ve never really been a fan.
To all anarchists: don’t get mad, just my opinion

Stating your opinion is a surefire way to make anarchists mad. But it's not censorship! It's completely voluntary! :^)

[Cisairse]

Nothing says "revolution" like theft and random violence! That'll show my dad and that one girl who rejected me those fascists!

Let’s burn down a street of minority businesses in the name of “fighting inequality”!

Keep in mind, this wasn't in context of the riots. This was some time ago, and was basically people saying that shoplifting via hiding PS4 games in your hoodie is praxis.

[West Leas Oros 2]

Let’s burn down a street of minority businesses in the name of “fighting inequality”!

Keep in mind, this wasn't in context of the riots. This was some time ago, and was basically people saying that shoplifting via hiding PS4 games in your hoodie is praxis.

Yeah, I’ve been hearing stupid shit from them for a few years now. Although that said, I myself don’t necessarily see anything inherently wrong with shoplifting PS4 games in your hoodie, but calling it praxis? That’s just dumb.

[West Leas Oros 2]

First day on Nationstates in over a week, already somebody pulled the “Venezuela” card.

[Cisairse]

Keep in mind, this wasn't in context of the riots. This was some time ago, and was basically people saying that shoplifting via hiding PS4 games in your hoodie is praxis.

Yeah, I’ve been hearing stupid shit from them for a few years now. Although that said, I myself don’t necessarily see anything inherently wrong with shoplifting PS4 games in your hoodie, but calling it praxis? That’s just dumb.

I agree. I don't believe it is morally wrong to "steal" from multi-billion dollar global corporations.
But, like, admit that you're stealing because you want to play The Last of Us, not because it's going to eventually lead to the death of capitalism lmao.

[West Leas Oros 2]

Yeah, I’ve been hearing stupid shit from them for a few years now. Although that said, I myself don’t necessarily see anything inherently wrong with shoplifting PS4 games in your hoodie, but calling it praxis? That’s just dumb.

I agree. I don't believe it is morally wrong to "steal" from multi-billion dollar global corporations.
But, like, admit that you're stealing because you want to play The Last of Us, not because it's going to eventually lead to the death of capitalism lmao.

Some people need praxis as a justification for everything. I guess you probably have to if you don’t read any theory.

[Shanghai industrial complex]

Keep in mind, this wasn't in context of the riots. This was some time ago, and was basically people saying that shoplifting via hiding PS4 games in your hoodie is praxis.

Yeah, I’ve been hearing stupid shit from them for a few years now. Although that said, I myself don’t necessarily see anything inherently wrong with shoplifting PS4 games in your hoodie, but calling it praxis? That’s just dumb.

Emmm....What did the shop do wrong? Shoplifting PS4 games obviously wrong.It's no different from stealing penguins from the zoo.

[Kowani]

Yeah, I’ve been hearing stupid shit from them for a few years now. Although that said, I myself don’t necessarily see anything inherently wrong with shoplifting PS4 games in your hoodie, but calling it praxis? That’s just dumb.

Emmm....What did the shop do wrong? Shoplifting PS4 games obviously wrong.It's no different from stealing penguins from the zoo.

Corporations are bad, mate. :^)

[Shanghai industrial complex]

Emmm....What did the shop do wrong? Shoplifting PS4 games obviously wrong.It's no different from stealing penguins from the zoo.

Corporations are bad, mate. :^)

But you need them, and I need them.We need work and money and their services.Most companies don't do anything illegal.It's just cynical.

[Sundiata]

Hi everyone.

I hope that you're all doing well during these especially trying times.

[Dominioan]

I’m not insulting anarchism, but I’ve never really been a fan.
To all anarchists: don’t get mad, just my opinion

Stating your opinion is a surefire way to make anarchists mad. But it's not censorship! It's completely voluntary! :^)

Its just incredibly utopian and highly unlikely to work in the real world.

[Dumb Ideologies]

Stating your opinion is a surefire way to make anarchists mad. But it's not censorship! It's completely voluntary! :^)

Its just incredibly utopian and highly unlikely to work in the real world.

Aside from in very small communities it seems a bit implausible that decisions could always be based on consensus. Likewise with notions that people will always vote against "unjustified social hierarchy" or agree what it is. When the people don't agree you just have regular intimidatory violence that's no less oppressive because it's decentralised or supposedly horizontal. Doesn't do wonders for their critique of democracy.

[Dominioan]

Its just incredibly utopian and highly unlikely to work in the real world.

Aside from in very small communities it seems a bit implausible that decisions could always be based on consensus. Likewise with notions that people will always vote against "unjustified social hierarchy" or agree what it is. When the people don't agree you just have regular intimidatory violence that's no less oppressive because it's decentralised or supposedly horizontal. Doesn't do wonders for their critique of democracy.

And the fact that there will always be people that just be d*cks and use the situation to their advantage, it just doesn't work imo.

[Byeclase]

So, I recently did a bit of lurking around off-site leftist circles online, and I realized something. I’m starting to feel upset. About leftism. I’m starting to feel ashamed that I’ve joined a community that has, at least in my time as a part of it, been either hopelessly idealistic, or vengeful and petty, or both. I recognize that most leftists aren’t like that. I’m not like that, most of you aren’t like that, but there are those who are. I’ve realized something I should have known since the start. We’re radicals. That isn’t necessary a bad thing, but it’s what we are. At the very least, it’s what we socialists and communists are. I find myself drifting back into social democracy, albeit a much more pessimistic version than the social democracy I supported before. I’m questioning my beliefs, and I’m starting to see why leftism has a stigma around it. Why people give you weird looks when you call yourself a socialist. On more than one occasion, I heard people go so far as to defend real, actual, rioting, destruction and violence. And I don’t mean against the bourgeoisie. I mean against regular people. Against proletarians. Given the recent police shooting that happened in my home state, it’s hitting closer to home than ever.

Being radical means addressing to the root of the problem. It's good.

Marxism is against idealism... but in online communities you can find anything, you may see they post angry frustrations and wishes from what they have to face (like the desires of revenge), I wouldn't give it more importance.

A lot of violence against regular people is a way to drive them far from leftism, that's the contrary of achieving leftism. These people who have these kind of theories are individual, insurrectionary and post-left anarchists (few more that don't have impact like communizers and Mao-Spontex). Then there's also the so called left adventurism from ML, from the pro-Hoxha view maoism and guevarism would be two of its tendencies which wouldn't take into account the material circumstances and delay the revolution, arising from the petit-bourgeoisie... including Pol-Potism and its massacre. It's also said that anarchism arises when petit-bourgeois businesses are in crisis and decadence starts, these people start to riot, to destroy and kill seeing that their businesses are lost, without the guidance of the advanced class.
But since anarchism doesn't have just an individual tendency, but a social one, the only valid criticism I see is how the delayed consciousness of the proletariat would be addressed without purges when revolution is won (since a lot of people aren't educated in the depths of socialism) and how they'd defend without organized hierarchy and monopoly of violence (state) against external invaders.

To be successful, insurrection must rely not upon conspiracy and not upon a party, but upon the advanced class. That is the first point. Insurrection must rely upon a revolutionary upsurge of the people. That is the second point. Insurrection must rely upon that turning-point in the history of the growing revolution when the activity of the advanced ranks of the people is at its height, and when the vacillations in the ranks of the enemy and in the ranks of the weak, half-hearted and irresolute friends of the revolution are strongest. That is the third point. And these three conditions for raising the question of insurrection distinguish Marxism from Blanquism.

Source: Marxism and insurrection by Lenin. https://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/ ... sep/13.htm

But let's not be tricked by the right, this is just a tiny fraction compared to the countless lies that they show to the people against communism and they've been denounced as petit-bourgeois. Socdems very easily exceed the death toll everyday killing with imperialism and betraying the working class in their own country.

Trotsky joined the bolsheviks just in the time of the revolution, before he was a menshevik. Stalin was struggling and agitating much before, even assaulted a bank.

*lurks in
Exactly what happened to me. Used to be hardcore commie, then democratic socialist, now I’m identifying closer to socdem. See the pattern?

I'm on the reversed way. But since hardcore commie is already democratic, replace democratic socialism with anarchism in my case.

I’m not denying that the Right doesn’t have its own things to be ashamed of. Far from it, they probably have more skeletons in their closet than us, but I’m not trying to reform the right wing. I feel ashamed because I want leftism to be better.

Check out this little old propaganda image.

And that's not even counting war deaths and how the Black Book is a farce in comparison which even includes Pol Pot.

I've mostly settled with being a demsoc Wobblyist because unlike basically everyone else on the far-left, the Wobblies actually get shit done and have a reasonable expectation of success in the event they suddenly see a huge group of people ideologically allied with them.

Isn't the IWW anarcho-syndicalist?

Ancoms... hoo boy... between them and tankies, they make up most of the vitriolic idiocy I’m talking about.

Tankie as word doesn't exist in my language, but I see it's used and thrown online to mean anything which has to do with a defense of non western countries or the defense of the Soviet Union, more focused on the figure of Stalin. I reject these two usages as contradictory, a Dengist isn't a ML. Then, I avoid it not because I am against insults, but because it isn't accurate and it leads to confusion.

Policy will always be a compromise between the way things ought to be and the way things are. Social democracy is achievable and sustainable, so is a good aim for national governments. More radical ideas are better pursued at a more local level, where they can directly engage with people and remain out of the hands of capitalists.

Social democrats in Europe have been betraying the working class for decades already and it doesn't work, we can just check what happened with Greece and how the fake trots (socdems) weren't able to fight the European Union. The case of Roosevelt in the United States was possible since they were pushed by the USSR for temporary welfare, in a similar way (and being a rightist), Bismarck created the first welfare system because he was pushed by socialists (we give them reform or they organize a revolution). Then, about sustainability... we have to look at Venezuela, the bourgeois are in permanent revolt against the government and inflation is rampant, I don't think it's working as expected.

Ancoms... hoo boy... between them and tankies, they make up most of the vitriolic idiocy I’m talking about.

Full-blown tankies are relatively rare though.

I think a lot of times the ML label is a farce and it's populism containing figures who declared themselves communist.

Also hoo boy there's some real mental gymnastics involved with having a "people's army" as an "anti-revisionist" position, seeing as it was Stalin himself who opposed such a thing and Trotsky who originally supported it.

True, Stalin did not support the “people’s army” concept and obviously took a radically different approach than Hoxha to defense. Stalin brought back military ranks, professional officers and a conventionally organized military....

Albania came from a partisan war, conditions change and also what they have to do. Yet they had a military apart from the trained people. More or less equipped another debate that we already talked before.
In the case of the USSR they had to prepare for a war which would be also offensive, not merely defensive, the fascists had to be conquered.
Lenin already proposed the idea of arming the people in "The April theses" but in the time of the revolution:

"Abolition of the police, the army and the bureaucracy."
"[1] i.e. the standing army to be replaced by the arming of the whole people.—Lenin".

https://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/ ... apr/04.htm

Sure, and I do not think that is a bad thing, but it is usually the Stalin’s screaming about “revisionists”. Which is quite ironic.

Because Lenin coined the word "revisionist" to classify those who distorted marxism and claimed they debunked it intellectually. And those who defend Stalin claim the legacy of Lenin (except trots but they falsify anyways).

But you need them, and I need them.We need work and money and their services.Most companies don't do anything illegal.It's just cynical.

Some businesses may have problems and even their owners make sacrifices in their personal lives. But others don't, and you can see the high positions of the enterprise having many luxuries. The big ones try to lobby for lower regulations and underpay their workers. People need jobs now, but in socialism with a nationalized economy they aren't needed at all.

[Novus America]

Trotsky never claimed to intellectually debunk Marx or Lenin (although by that definition there is nothing wrong with revisionism, both Marx and Lenin had obviously had some stupid ideas that did not work as advertised in practice even if they were correct on some things they were very wrong on others, and Lenin although not claiming to did contradict with Marx) and in fact Trotsky (who was no hero) was closer to Lenin.

Yes Lenin called for the abolition of professional military and police, but they continued de facto to some degree under him, and Stalin made a professionally lead military in the standard modern western style for the most part and built a formal police state (although Lenin started this too, Lenin did not always practice what he preached. Admittedly the Soviets always called the regular western style professional police they had “militia” but the name changes nothing.

Point remains Stalin did deviate from and distort Lenin in many ways (although he did stick to Leninism in some other ways) and even Lenin changed dramatically, especially after the disaster in Poland (causes in part by the infighting between Trotsky and Stalin).

Also people starved under Stalin. A lot did.
Obviously the current “capitalist” order is deeply flawed but Marxist Leninism is no alternative.

Very few people starve or die from easily curable disease (and the deaths vary from place to place) in a well developed social democracy. Many countries today are FAR better than others, none are perfect of course but none will be. Some people will always starve, preventable death will happen, the realistic goal is to reduce it as mulch as feasible, not entirely eliminate it.

But see you contradict yourself. You say you are not an idealist but claim we can reach an ideal were no one starves or dies preventable deaths?

Though this is not going to go anywhere, your views are based on dogma so it really does not matter what we say to contradict them, they are a matter of faith to you it appears.