This seems like a non-sequitur. Anyway, since audiobooks are still too much, let me just give a basic summary:
Marxists are not anarchists or communalists. Marx saw the failure of the Paris Commune and of the Utopian socialists and sought to create a theoretical framework that could be used in conjunction with practical political programs to resolve class struggle over time, which he predicted would ultimately produce a stateless society. This transitional society, to contrast with Marx’s name for liberal capitalism – the dictatorship of the bourgeoisie – is referred to as the dictatorship of the proletariat.
“State communism” is, uh, just made-up as far as I can tell. Marxists support the destruction of dictatorships of the bourgeoisie and their replacement with dictatorships of the proletariat. Generally they would like to see a stateless society one day, but they understand that a simple commune would get steamrolled the instant it became politically important enough, so they are principally concerned with making states democratic in a truer sense of the word than liberal democracy – which is de facto controlled by the rich – in order to end “capitalist encirclement” and make things like communes more viable.
Well you may want to tell the marxists themselves they aren’t anarchists, because they tell me otherwise. And I guess that means Stalin, Pol Pot, and Mao were all Marxists?
Whatever “Marxists” tell you that they are anarchists are fucking morons (or Maoists, which could legitimately be said to be a type of anarchism in a loose sense, but then there’s still a 90% chance they are fucking morons). Actually read Marx or Engels or Lenin, I beg you, this isn’t a “he said, she said” situation.
People quote this too often, but yours is a rare case where it is justified:
All Socialists are agreed that the political state, and with it political authority, will disappear as a result of the coming social revolution, that is, that public functions will lose their political character and will be transformed into the simple administrative functions of watching over the true interests of society. But the anti-authoritarians demand that the political state be abolished at one stroke, even before the social conditions that gave birth to it have been destroyed. They demand that the first act of the social revolution shall be the abolition of authority. Have these gentlemen ever seen a revolution? A revolution is certainly the most authoritarian thing there is; it is the act whereby one part of the population imposes its will upon the other part by means of rifles, bayonets and cannon — authoritarian means, if such there be at all; and if the victorious party does not want to have fought in vain, it must maintain this rule by means of the terror which its arms inspire in the reactionists. Would the Paris Commune have lasted a single day if it had not made use of this authority of the armed people against the bourgeois? Should we not, on the contrary, reproach it for not having used it freely enough?
Therefore, either one of two things: either the anti-authoritarians don’t know what they’re talking about, in which case they are creating nothing but confusion; or they do know, and in that case they are betraying the movement of the proletariat. In either case they serve the reaction.
This is the conclusion of “On Authority” by Engels.
The position of anarchists is the immediate and total lateralization of society, or else whatever government structure they handwave away as being “not real authority”. The position of Marxists, as I already explained at length and you ignored without so much as a comment on its content, is that the matter of achieving such a society requires the creation of a transitional state which must be protected, and socialism brought to the rest of the world to avoid capitalist encirclement.
“State Communism,” again, is something some sniveling “anti-authoritarian” useful idiots made up. Marxists see a current necessity of the state but not an essential or an eternal one. To call their ideology “state communism” is absurd.
That said, in the struggle against western imperialism, anarchists are widely regarded by Marxists within liberal capitalist states as allies (and that view is mostly reciprocated). Perhaps this was your mistake, since I would never reject someone for being an anarchist so long as they weren’t one of those “I disavow the US but believe everything the State Department says about its enemies” types like the internet is fucking filled with for some reason.
And I guess that means Stalin, Pol Pot, and Mao were all Marxists?
Do you see what you are doing here? By trotting out major historical figures in this ridiculous and presumptuous manner, you are essentially arguing with the weight of chauvinism and an endless litany of mostly-bullshit accusations. It would take a book to answer about any of these figures in a half-decent way.
The short answers in order:
Stalin: Yes, though he was human and had both errors of judgement and in some cases deep-seated personal chauvinism; Before you ask, Khrushchev was anti-marxist but still seemingly some kind of leftist that I frankly don’t care enough to diagnose.
Pol Pot: Absolutely not, he was an ultra-leftist and one of the most catastrophic leaders for one’s country in human history, even worse than Gonzalo;
Mao: Yes, though he was human and had both errors in judgement and – especially as he aged – an odd propensity for utopian error which caused serious problems.
But how does conversation advance from me saying this? I feel no shame in endorsing the person who lead the destruction of Nazi Germany, or the one who fought of the colonizers and genociders who subjugated the people of China. You, on the other hand, are unlikely to retain a single new thing about them because whatever I say is just going to be “taboo noise” to you. My guess is that it’s just to reassure yourself that I have nothing worthwhile to say, but that feels a little disingenuous compared to contesting the matter directly.
Here’s an essay I like. Maybe consider reading it. I don’t 100% agree, but it has definitely changed the way I thought about things.
This seems like a non-sequitur. Anyway, since audiobooks are still too much, let me just give a basic summary:
Marxists are not anarchists or communalists. Marx saw the failure of the Paris Commune and of the Utopian socialists and sought to create a theoretical framework that could be used in conjunction with practical political programs to resolve class struggle over time, which he predicted would ultimately produce a stateless society. This transitional society, to contrast with Marx’s name for liberal capitalism – the dictatorship of the bourgeoisie – is referred to as the dictatorship of the proletariat.
“State communism” is, uh, just made-up as far as I can tell. Marxists support the destruction of dictatorships of the bourgeoisie and their replacement with dictatorships of the proletariat. Generally they would like to see a stateless society one day, but they understand that a simple commune would get steamrolled the instant it became politically important enough, so they are principally concerned with making states democratic in a truer sense of the word than liberal democracy – which is de facto controlled by the rich – in order to end “capitalist encirclement” and make things like communes more viable.
Well you may want to tell the marxists themselves they aren’t anarchists, because they tell me otherwise. And I guess that means Stalin, Pol Pot, and Mao were all Marxists?
Whatever “Marxists” tell you that they are anarchists are fucking morons (or Maoists, which could legitimately be said to be a type of anarchism in a loose sense, but then there’s still a 90% chance they are fucking morons). Actually read Marx or Engels or Lenin, I beg you, this isn’t a “he said, she said” situation.
People quote this too often, but yours is a rare case where it is justified:
This is the conclusion of “On Authority” by Engels.
The position of anarchists is the immediate and total lateralization of society, or else whatever government structure they handwave away as being “not real authority”. The position of Marxists, as I already explained at length and you ignored without so much as a comment on its content, is that the matter of achieving such a society requires the creation of a transitional state which must be protected, and socialism brought to the rest of the world to avoid capitalist encirclement.
“State Communism,” again, is something some sniveling “anti-authoritarian” useful idiots made up. Marxists see a current necessity of the state but not an essential or an eternal one. To call their ideology “state communism” is absurd.
That said, in the struggle against western imperialism, anarchists are widely regarded by Marxists within liberal capitalist states as allies (and that view is mostly reciprocated). Perhaps this was your mistake, since I would never reject someone for being an anarchist so long as they weren’t one of those “I disavow the US but believe everything the State Department says about its enemies” types like the internet is fucking filled with for some reason.
Do you see what you are doing here? By trotting out major historical figures in this ridiculous and presumptuous manner, you are essentially arguing with the weight of chauvinism and an endless litany of mostly-bullshit accusations. It would take a book to answer about any of these figures in a half-decent way.
The short answers in order:
Stalin: Yes, though he was human and had both errors of judgement and in some cases deep-seated personal chauvinism; Before you ask, Khrushchev was anti-marxist but still seemingly some kind of leftist that I frankly don’t care enough to diagnose.
Pol Pot: Absolutely not, he was an ultra-leftist and one of the most catastrophic leaders for one’s country in human history, even worse than Gonzalo;
Mao: Yes, though he was human and had both errors in judgement and – especially as he aged – an odd propensity for utopian error which caused serious problems.
But how does conversation advance from me saying this? I feel no shame in endorsing the person who lead the destruction of Nazi Germany, or the one who fought of the colonizers and genociders who subjugated the people of China. You, on the other hand, are unlikely to retain a single new thing about them because whatever I say is just going to be “taboo noise” to you. My guess is that it’s just to reassure yourself that I have nothing worthwhile to say, but that feels a little disingenuous compared to contesting the matter directly.
Here’s an essay I like. Maybe consider reading it. I don’t 100% agree, but it has definitely changed the way I thought about things.