almost definitely a repost but eh
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Downvote me father for I have committed bad praxis.
And not a single one is doing anything to actually revolt, just sitting online talking shit on people who are actively doing things because “incrementalism is useless, we need a revolution”.
Sorry creating lemmy isn’t starting the revolution, getting together a small amount of people online to talk about a parallel societal formation isn’t starting a revolution, being civically inactive is not starting a revolution, buying a bunch of guns is not starting a revolution, talking about moving away from corporate tracking tools is not starting a revolution, switching from US to Chinese propaganda is not starting a revolution. As lame as all the gravy seal militias in the US are, they are numerous steps ahead on the starting of a revolution.
This is erasure of orgs like The Party for Socialism and Liberation and Freedom Road Socialist Organization. One of the number one things leftists try to encourage people to do online is to join an org, because sitting around and talking is useless beyond the entertainment of it and perhaps learning more theory. We do organize IRL, I’ve met some wonderful people doing so.
Yeah and I am a member of the two that are in my area. They all subscribe to incrementalism as people on your .ml would put it, though. None of these are preparing a revolution, they would labeled terrorist organizations, and destroyed very quickly if they did anything, actually, radical, like the ALF/ELF, while being so visible.
Most revolutionary orgs don’t outwardly organize for reasons you suggest. Those orgs are still revolutionary.
And these are the behaviors I have seen so many people in online leftist spaces call useless, and incrementalist, as they are not preparing to actually revolt, they are working within the legal framework given to them by the capitalists. It seems you and I have a more closely aligned idea of change than a large amount of people who are on .ml. I also highly doubt most of these people will be able to deal with the violence then wish to incite with a revolution. I know how it is to kill, people, so I don’t tell people they should.
I’m not sure what orgs you’re talking about, because I align more with most people on Lemmy.ml. Maybe you actually do too?
The ones you posted have had their efforts mocked because they operate within the framework capitalists give them, and are not actually revolutionary. I have watched it happen, many there seem to think if there isn’t violence, then nothing is happening. Also, no, I do not apologize for authoritarian governments, regardless of their alignment with capitalism. Nor do I support censorship of criticisms of places because they aren’t aligned with NATO.
No, they are not mocked by users on Lemmy.ml. They are broadly supported by communists. I think you’re inventing something to be mad at.
Revolutionaries don’t say that anything less than revolution is worthless, we just point out how electoralism cannot solve the fundamental problems of capitalist society. We also don’t say that revolution fixes everything overnight, it merely allows us to start building and developing socialism, with all of the difficulties and new problems we face when that happens. We also don’t baselessly say revolution is coming any minute or anything, just that as capitalism decays it grows more and more likely, which is reflected in crisis and more violent reaction, like we are seeing with the Trump admin.
If anyone wants to develop a better understanding of Marxism-Leninism, I made an introductory reading list, feel free to check it out! Even the first 2 works listed will give you a much better understanding of our positions.
Especially over the past few years, this viewpoint seems to dominate over so many leftist spaces, and I believe it’s part of what led to Trump winning the election. I don’t particularly like the Democrats either, but so many refuse to vote for anything other than an impossible overnight jump to socialism.
yOu JuSt hATe tHe WoRkiNG cLaSs!1!
Ivory tower leftists hate nothing more than the working man.
How many would “vote with their dollar” if $==🧨, though? 🤷🏼♂️
The Rapture (or whatever no-effort salvation flavor you prefer) will not be televised.
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You forgot to mention both have accelerationists willing to make people’s lives worse to hasten the
RaptureRevolution.both have accelerationists
Accelerationism isn’t a policy, it’s a coping mechanism.
“Actually, I love that things aren’t going my way, because it’ll all work out in the end” is what you say when you’re down bad with no clear hope of recovery.
And complaining about acceleratism is just scapegoating. You’re not in this position because a secret cabal of extremists is sabotaging your milquetoast efforts because they think losing harder is good.
Accelerationism is definitely also a policy.
A lot of these bastards tacitly favored The Idiot during the 2024 election, essentially on the basis that everyone dying horribly would turn out better in the long run.
Comrade, this time it’s really late stage capitalism comrade, trust me comrade. Revolution is imminent, the workers will rise up. / repeat for 150 years.
Dear God, the Tankies are fundies!
This may be the worst take I’ve ever heard tbh
Both sides same horseshoe isn’t even a new take
Workin’ on the 0.0002% deep in the comments.
I consider myself libertarian, but unlike others, I think my political ideal would be terrible to implement overnight. I see libertarianism more as a direction than an end goal, and we should evaluate how far down that path we want to go.
I’m also Christian and don’t believe in Rapture. Instead, I think that if Christ’s second coming is literal (don’t want to get into a theological debate), any changes will be a process. People won’t evaporate or whatever, instead they’ll be spared in some form from the wider unrest that will end up destroying the “sinners” or whatever. Things just don’t happen all at once like that.
I guess for my personal ideal, the closest would be everyone all of a sudden deciding that their rights are important and worth fighting for?
Those are very reasonable positions to hold.
Out of curiosity, since there aren’t really any libertarians where I live, what makes you think that it’s the best solution, and how do you intend to solve the two problems I percieve to be the big ones: Who else can properly manage public services and how do you prevent corporations eroding rule of law?
what makes you think that it’s the best solution
I believe the ends do not justify the means. The primary goal should be maximizing liberty, with some concessions for practicality.
For example, I believe in UBI, but not because it’s a human right, but because you can’t realistically come back from mistakes or harm from others if there’s no safety net. The options for a safety net are government services (healthcare, food assistance, housing assistance, etc) or cash handouts (UBI or NIT). Government services come with inequity in access (whether you’re approved can be up to discretion), whereas cash is simple and equitable. Outcomes may be worse with cash for some people (maybe they’ll buy drugs or gamble), but that’s because people are free to choose how they use it, and freedom is the ideal here. Ideally we don’t need a social safety net, but because we do, it should be as simple as possible.
I happen to believe that freedom tends to create opportunity and improves outcomes, but that’s not the primary goal.
Who else can properly manage public services?
I absolutely believe government should exist and will have a role to play in this. The goal should be minimal government involvement where competition can exist. Some things cannot be provided ethically by private, competitive companies, such as arrests, but many can.
Some examples:
- electricity (and perhaps water) - generation is private, last mile is public; cities basically buy electricity from suppliers with the goal of reliability and price
- roads - should be funded based on use, meaning vehicle registration taxes, gas taxes, tolls, etc, not subsidized with income taxes; this allows other methods of transportation to compete, like rail
- police - split force into two parts, those that don’t need extra authority (could be privatized) and those that do (cannot be privatized); the former can handle citations, trespass, etc, and can only detain, not arrest, search, taze, shoot, etc; the latter would be the current police system, but with higher pay and expectations
Basically, how can we solve problems with less government/force?
how do you prevent corporations eroding rule of law?
Limit what the legislature can do and push regulations and whatnot to court precedence. I trust juries way more than legislators. The attorney general’s main job should be to sue companies and set regulations by winning cases and setting precedent.
Legislatures want reelection, so campaign donations have a lot of sway, and that may be more effective than actually doing what constituents want. There’s a clear conflict of interest there, so no wonder wealthy companies get their way.
An AG, on the other hand, could be compensated based on winning lawsuits. If they win a lot, they could make a ton of money, perhaps more than whatever the companies they’re suing would be willing to pay. Individuals could also bring their own suit, so a bad AG would just push it onto the private sector, which is a check on the AG. And it’s not just companies that could get sued, but the regulator bodies themselves, so it’s a check on corruption there as well.
The important thing is that regular people decide what’s reasonable, not elected legislators. Legislators should set the big picture (pollution is bad), courts get into specifics (pollution value X is too much), and companies respond by making risk-adjusted decisions (test to make sure pollution is sufficiently under X to avoid lawsuits).
"and if you don’t live by MY interpretation of some dead guy’s beliefs, you are wrong and are worse than the enemy*
Well, Marx’ withering away of the state and the rise of Communism was basically the Kingdom of Heaven on Earth.
“A stateless utopia birthed from the continual consolidation of power in a proletariat dictatorship” gives the same vibes as trickle down economics.
As production and distribution are collectivized, class fades, and along with it the institutions needed to uphold the working class as the ruling class over capitalists, as there would be no capitalists. It doesn’t mean the total erasure of administration and management.
It doesn’t mean the total erasure of administration abd management.
Except they become the new capitalists. They would develop an interest in maintaining their position as administrators and as administrators would have the means even if it conflicts with everyone else’s interests. They’d become the new upper class.
Also, I’m surprised you didn’t point out that the “withering of the state” was Friedrich Engels’ idea technically. Not Marx.
No, they would not become the new capitalists. Collectivized production is based on allocation of labor, means of labor, and distribution of goods and services based on needs and in some cases “labor vouchers.” An administrator in such a system is entitely distinct from a capitalist. Even in capitalism, managers are not capitalists and do not play the same role.
Capitalism is predicated on circulation of commodities, and constant reproduction on an expanded scale with profit as the motivator. Capitalists aren’t capitalists because they manage, but because they use their money, cast it into the market like a net (buying means of labor and labor-power), and return said net with greater sums of money. Such a system is completely incompatible with collectivized production.
As for the withering of the state, Marx came up with the concept. Engels merely came up with the phrase.
I wasn’t saying administrators would become capitalists in the strictest definition, but in the fact that they’d become a class distinct from the rest of the proletariat. You’d still have a state enforced hierarchical structure that has its own interests. It just wont be structured around facilitating various corporations and their profits. You can argue that’s an improvement over capitalism, but to suggest the state will naturally wither away in such a system is naive at best and a manipulative lie at worst.
As for the withering of the state, Marx came up with the concept. Engels merely came up with the phrase.
Where did Marx originally describe the idea?
I’m aware of what you meant. Administration isn’t a class, and is not based on domination of the means of production through ownership, but is merely a necessary part of the production process. Further, the proletariat wouldn’t exist either, proletarians are specifically wage laborers that sell their labor to capitalists, what we are discussing is classless society.
As for Marx and the concept of the state withering, I’m unaware of the first mentionings of it, but the idea can be found all the way back in Economic Manuscripts of 1844:
The first positive abolition of private property — crude communism — is therefore only a manifestation of the vileness of private property trying to establish itself as the positive community.
(2) Communism (a) still of a political nature, democratic or despotic; (b) with the abolition of the state, but still essentially incomplete and influenced by private property — i.e., by the estrangement of man. In both forms, communism already knows itself as the reintegration, or return, of man into himself, the supersession of man’s self-estrangement; but since it has not yet comprehended the positive essence of private property, or understood the human nature of need, it is still held captive and contaminated by private property. True, it has understood its concept, but not yet in essence.
Engels was great at writing and contributed a great deal to the development of Marx’s thought, but even before co-writing Manifesto of the Communist Party Marx had already had a fairly developed conception of the negation of the state, as a student of Hegel.
I’m not much of a fan of Engels, as I noticed of what I’ve read of him that his works or works involving him tend towards subtly implying (or even explicitly stating) top down structures and authoritarianism is initially necessary to achieve communism in the ways he frames his analysis. Something that Marx seemed generally more mixed or neutral on when he wrote independently of Engels depending on how late in his writings you look.
I’m aware of what you meant. Administration isn’t a class, and is not based on domination of the means of production through ownership, but is merely a necessary part of the production process. Further, the proletariat wouldn’t exist either, proletarians are specifically wage laborers that sell their labor to capitalists, what we are discussing is classless society.
Regardless, having access to the controls that gives one power over economic value and the ability to exploit that power, even if its not through ownership its still under their control. For example, someone who runs a non-profit organization but uses all the grant money to build a clubhouse for them and their friends rather than something broadly socially beneficial is exploiting the people who actually generated the value for the grant money in the first place, even if the clubhouse is not the administrator’s by deed.
I work for a non-profit. I know a lot of decisions above me get made because its more beneficial for leadership or even employees rather than the greater community.
Why is a class based society bad? Why is it harmful? My personal answer is that it just results in a generally worse world for people through taking away control over their own lives as they end up largely dictated by capitalists. If the system you aim to replace classes with reproduces many of those same kinds of consequences for the average person but just changes who’s in charge then its not really what I would describe as a meaningfully better world. Its the same shit but with a different color palette.
I’m not convinced a state with its own self interest would ever permit its power to “wither”. That doesn’t mean a state can’t be used for good, or that states are intrinsically evil, but a state given some ideological revolutionary foundation, monopoly on violence, and a “ends justify the means” attitude towards achieving utopia and an indifference towards individuals under its power is going to commit some atrocities and historically has.
Wake me up when they stop the endless tilting at imaginary counter-revolutionary windmills and actually do that. Somehow there’s always some pesky boogeyman that requires benevolent repression. Absolute fantasy that class could ever fade when guns and politicians exist.
“Administrators” are your trickle down “Job Creators”
Class is not administration, and there has never been global socialism to begin with so there hasn’t been a point free from capitalism’s antagonization.
If a group of people calls the shots they have inherent power and form their own class. You write this problem off via a bedrock axiom starting that a vanguard party is and always will be representative of the proletariat masses. That’s fundamentally impossible, humans don’t organize or behave like that on historical time scales.
If a new political force cannot supercede their control and externally correct value drift then your system cannot evolve. If you can’t correct for that other than by saying “better representation will emerge” then you’re flat out anti-revolutionary; a reformist in wolf’s clothing.
Administration in socialist countries is not as simple as “a group of people that call the shots and form their own class.” Administration is economically compelled by large-scale production, and is to be made accountable via robust systems of democracy. Further, in collectivized production, there isn’t the same mechanism built-in for profits and creating whole industries for luxury for the few like there is in capitalism.
To the contrary of your point, systems must evolve, there isn’t a way to stop it. Everything is in motion, and history builds up. There are no static systems, you don’t enter the same river twice, yada yada. It’s not about “better representation emerging,” it’s about deliberately understanding how the structure of the mode of production impacts how society is run.
systems must evolve, there isn’t a way to stop it
What comes after this fabled stateless society? If it isn’t a stable system with no possible need for correction then what prevents the re-emergence of states?
The benefits of states are self evident: your immediate group benefits from the use of force to leverage and exploit others. The benefits of remaining stateless are entirely intangible and abstracted.
When a catastrophic event forces your hand, subjugation of your neighbors may be the only way for your populace to survive. One solar flare or meteor or mega volcano and your carefully plotted administration is in the shitter. It’s survival of the ruthless and we’re off to the races again.
This archaic attempt at dissecting the complexity of human existence into a mathematical and controllable roadmap is absurd. Wake up, it’s not the 19th century; we’ve known better for a while now. Let’s fix the world we have instead of having you spending 12.7k comments naval gazing about ideology and which tin pot dictators need our “critical support”. I pray to God you’re at least cashing a paycheck for that drivel.
Not really, all it means is that as an ecomomy collectivizes and class distinctions fade as ownership of production is equalized, the need for strong institutions to uphold one class and oppress others fades too, as there would be no class.
Hot bubble baths are pretty transcendent. That would be my vote for leftist rapture.
mmm, bubble bath
In the meantime, we still have Bubble’s baths. 🤷🏼♂️
What you’ve got there is a tankie
Shittiest MadLibs reboot ever.
