You think I’m a pompous liberal dickhead. I think you’re a sincere idiot who’s helping the left shoot itself in the foot.
We both want the left to win. Our ideas of how that happens differs. So long as we’re at each other’s throats instead of arm in arm against the real enemy, they win.
Can we please cut this bourgeois ideological crap and get back to materialist dialectics?
Can we please cut this bourgeois ideological crap and get back to materialist dialectics?
Do you think that’s what you’re doing?
From skimming your comment, I believe you said you could cite theory to back up your “vote blue no matter who” position. So please do so. I don’t believe I’ve ever seen anyone do this, it’s always just, “it’s obvious” while shutting down any closer examination. Because it is just passively absorbed, unexamined, ruling class ideology.
the era of bourgeois parliamentarianism is over, and the era of the proletarian dictatorship has begun. That is incontestable. But world history is counted in decades. Ten or twenty years earlier or later makes no difference when measured with the yardstick of world history; from the standpoint of world history it is a trifle that cannot be considered even approximately. But for that very reason, it is a glaring theoretical error to apply the yardstick of world history to practical politics.
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but—and that is the whole point—we must not regard what is obsolete to us as something obsolete to a class, to the masses. Here again we find that the “Lefts” do not know how to reason, do not know how to act as the party of a class, as the party of the masses.
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You are in duty bound to call their bourgeois-democratic and parliamentary prejudices what they are—prejudices. But at the same time you must soberly follow the actual state of the class-consciousness and preparedness of the entire class (not only of its communist vanguard), and of all the working people (not only of their advanced elements).
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Whilst you lack the strength to do away with bourgeois parliaments and every other type of reactionary institution, you must work within them because it is there that you will still find workers who are duped by the priests and stultified by the conditions of rural life; otherwise you risk turning into nothing but windbags.
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The conclusion which follows from this is absolutely incontrovertible: it has been proved that, far from causing harm to the revolutionary proletariat, participation in a bourgeois-democratic parliament, even a few weeks before the victory of a Soviet republic and even after such a victory, actually helps that proletariat to prove to the backward masses why such parliaments deserve to be done away with; it facilitates their successful dissolution, and helps to make bourgeois parliamentarianism “politically obsolete”.
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Certainly, without a revolutionary mood among the masses, and without conditions facilitating the growth of this mood, revolutionary tactics will never develop into action.
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revolutionary tactics cannot be built on a revolutionary mood alone. Tactics must be based on a sober and strictly objective appraisal of all the class forces in a particular state (and of the states that surround it, and of all states the world over) as well as of the experience of revolutionary movements. It is very easy to show one’s “revolutionary” temper merely by hurling abuse at parliamentary opportunism, or merely by repudiating participation in parliaments; its very ease, however, cannot turn this into a solution of a difficult, a very difficult, problem.
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To attempt to “circumvent” this difficulty by “skipping” the arduous job of utilising reactionary parliaments for revolutionary purposes is absolutely childish.
Sounds like exactly what I’m on about. Voting is a useful tool, use it intelligently.
So, you don’t have any theory to support your position, and have instead chosen to take bits of mine out of context to pretend they mean something completely different.
Yes, Lenin argued for participation in bourgeois parliaments… in a revolutionary communist party. Which the Democratic Party is very much not.
The German “Lefts” complain of bad “leaders” in their party, give way to despair, and even arrive at a ridiculous “negation” of “leaders”. But in conditions in which it is often necessary to hide “leaders” underground, the evolution of good “leaders”, reliable, tested and authoritative, is a very difficult matter; these difficulties cannot be successfully overcome without combining legal and illegal work, and without testing the “leaders”, among other ways, in parliaments. Criticism—the most keen, ruthless and uncompromising criticism—should be directed, not against parliamentarianism or parliamentary activities, but against those leaders who are unable—and still more against those who are unwilling—to utilise parliamentary elections and the parliamentary rostrum in a revolutionary and communist manner. Only such criticism—combined, of course, with the dismissal of incapable leaders and their replacement by capable ones—will constitute useful and fruitful revolutionary work that will simultaneously train the “leaders” to be worthy of the working class and of all working people, and train the masses to be able properly to understand the political situation and the often very complicated and intricate tasks that spring from that situation.
Huh! So, if we were to pretend that he’s talking about something like the Democratic party, then in that case he says we should direct “the most keen, ruthless, and uncompromising criticism” at any leader in said party that is unwilling to use their position “in a revolutionary and communist manner,” and that they should “of course” be dismissed and replaced. It is impossible to read these words in good faith and think that he’s supporting your “blue no matter who” position.
Lenin’s position was, as his positions often were, nuanced, striking a balance between competing ideas. In this case, he is fiercely critical of both complete absentation of the left communists and anarchists, and of opportunism and tailism of the social democrats. You’ve chosen to focus singularly on his criticism of absentation (which tbf is something he focuses on here), as if abstaining from the election was my position, which it isn’t. My position is participation in bourgeois parliaments through a revolutionary communist party with the aim of prioritizing non-electoral strategies, i.e. the thing that he very clearly and explicitly argues for in place of absentation.
So, you don’t have any theory to support your position, and have instead chosen to take bits of mine out of context to pretend they mean something completely different
Yours? Our theory, comrade. And I’m not a chapter-and-verse kinda guy. That’s not very Marxist. Marxism is explicitly founded upon the Hegelian dialectic: thesis, antithesis, synthesis. I don’t read theory to prop up my views with the authority of century-old quotations. I read theory to analyze the argument, and synthesize it into my general worldview. Good ideas aren’t good because you like the person that said them, they stand up by the virtue of their reasoning.
Heck, this might have been the exact thing I read to bring me to this particular position. Who knows, I read a lot.
And not sure how I could’ve taken anything out of context, I literally copied and pasted direct quotes.
Yes, Lenin argued for participation in bourgeois parliaments… in a revolutionary communist party. Which the Democratic Party is very much not.
That’s not what this piece says though. If you want to make that point, you should have used a piece that supports it. This piece very specifically says, in what I consider the most crucial words of the whole thing:
you must soberly follow the actual state of the class-consciousness and preparedness of the entire class (not only of its communist vanguard)
The American people do not have the class consciousness or preparedness to support a revolutionary communist party. A sober evaluation of the actual state demonstrates that quite clearly.
Criticism—the most keen, ruthless and uncompromising criticism—should be directed, not against parliamentarianism or parliamentary activities, but against those leaders who are unable—and still more against those who are unwilling—to utilise parliamentary elections and the parliamentary rostrum in a revolutionary and communist manner. Only such criticism—combined, of course, with the dismissal of incapable leaders and their replacement by capable ones—will constitute useful and fruitful revolutionary work that will simultaneously train the “leaders” to be worthy of the working class and of all working people, and train the masses to be able properly to understand the political situation and the often very complicated and intricate tasks that spring from that situation.
Huh! So, if we were to pretend that he’s talking about something like the Democratic party, then in that case he says we should direct “the most keen, ruthless, and uncompromising criticism” at any leader in said party that is unwilling to use their position “in a revolutionary and communist manner,” and that they should “of course” be dismissed and replaced.
Of course! Direct your criticisms to the leaders of the Democratic party, not my parliamentary activities. Note, however, that he doesn’t say that trying to dismiss and replace them is somehow valuable in itself, and you’d really need to massage the context to endorse doing so when it results in an even more uncommunist replacement.
Lenin’s position was, as his positions often were, nuanced, striking a balance between competing ideas.
An admirable twit and true to the Hegelian influence.
You’ve chosen to focus singularly on his criticism of absentation (which tbf is something he focuses on here), as if abstaining from the election was my position, which it isn’t. My position is participation in bourgeois parliaments through a revolutionary communist party with the aim of prioritizing non-electoral strategies, i.e. the thing that he very clearly and explicitly argues for in place of absentation.
Then you probably should have chosen a different tract. This one is pretty clear: don’t delude yourself with your ideologies, don’t judge the whole population by the communist vanguard, suit your actions to your circumstances.
Until, by a sober evaluation, we can say that the American people have the class-consciousness and preparedness for a revolutionary communist party, trying to force one at the expense of greater losses is not suitable.
And not sure how I could’ve taken anything out of context, I literally copied and pasted direct quotes.
You’ve never heard of proof-texting?
The American people do not have the class consciousness or preparedness to support a revolutionary communist party. A sober evaluation of the actual state demonstrates that quite clearly.
This is literally the exact opposite of his position. You’re saying that you shouldn’t run as a communist until the proletariat is sufficiently radicalized, when Lenin is saying that you should run as a communist specifically in order to radicalize the proletariat when they are not radicalized. His whole argument is that it is because the proletariat is not radicalized that participation in bourgeois politics is worthwhile.
Winning elections is not the point, the point is promoting the message, and if you happen to win a couple elections along the way and get a few representatives in, cool, that can be useful, but that always takes a backseat to other priorities:
action by the masses, a big strike, for instance, is more important than parliamentary activity at all times, and not only during a revolution or in a revolutionary situation.
Lenin even makes reference to still persuing a revolutionary communist party, not only when it is not electorally viable, but when it is actually illegal:
But in conditions in which it is often necessary to hide “leaders” underground, the evolution of good “leaders”, reliable, tested and authoritative, is a very difficult matter...
The part immediately proceeding what you quoted reads:
You must not sink to the level of the masses, to the level of the backward strata of the class. That is incontestable. You must tell them the bitter truth. You are duty bound tocall their bourgeois-democratic and parliamentary prejudices what they are—prejudices.
The position that you are arguing for, that communists should adopt reactionary/liberal stances to appease or ingratiate ourselves to a reactionary/liberal population, is known as tailism. The person who coined that term is the same person who wrote this text, Lenin, and he coined it while harshly criticizing it, it is absolutely not his position by any stretch of the imagination. We must “follow the actual state of class-consciousness” only in the sense that we must be aware of it, and plan around it, not in the sense of following their lead. Being aware that most people are not prepared for armed revolution, he says, we should participate in bourgeois electoralism because that is the spectacle they are invested in, and the way in which we should participate is as part of a revolutionary communist party uncompromisingly “telling them the bitter truth” and ultimately trying to turn people away from such processes altogether.
Note, however, that he doesn’t say that trying to dismiss and replace them is somehow valuable in itself, and you’d really need to massage the context to endorse doing so when it results in an even more uncommunist replacement.
Naturally, if a party can not or will not replace a leader within the party who refuses to persues the supposed revolutionary communist goals of the party, then you should consider whether the party is actually committed to those goals or whether it’s time to start a new party or move to another one that does. Obviously, if replacing an anti-communist leader means someone even more anti-communist will lead the party, then you are not in a communist party and it is time to leave.
He is very clearly talking about leaders within the party, who are always within the party’s power to replace, with whoever they choose, relatively effortlessly. The situation you describe is a contradiction, you’ve already messed up if you’re choosing the lesser evil anticommunist to lead your party or if you can only “try” to replace an anti-communist leader, and obviously this has nothing to do with “voting Democrat to stop the Republicans” as you’re attempting to project onto it, since it’s in the context of internal workings of a revolutionary communist party, not a competition between two bourgeois parties.
Until, by a sober evaluation, we can say that the American people have the class-consciousness and preparedness for a revolutionary communist party, trying to force one at the expense of greater losses is not suitable.
And you genuinely, truly believe that that is consistent with Vladimir Lenin’s position in this text?
Again, I don’t really prop my arguments up on the reputation of long dead men, the whole prospect feels pretty cringey and authoritarian just in principle. I don’t see why you would want to base contemporary political strategy on the ideals of a man who died 100 years ago, in a very different country with different material conditions.
You know what Lenin had to say about furthering communism under the threat of fascism? Nothing! He died before fascism became a thing, or Fox News, or Facebook algorithm pipelines. He had no way of conceptualizing the scope of propaganda in the modern world.
Why is he sacrosanct when developing strategy? His USSR never even got to the communist part. It lasted 70 years before being divided up by oligarchs into even more egregious capitalism. Not only are his ideas outdated, they apparently weren’t all that resilient either.
That’s quite the pivot! You were just arguing that I should listen to him because he supported your position, the second that it’s established that he did not, I should throw out everything he said.
It’s like, at the center of your universe is the concept, “You should vote for Harris” and all other propositions rotate around that immovable point. Lenin can be worth listening to, as long as that point doesn’t move, the moment he tries to move that point, he’s out. This is entirely backwards from how it’s supposed to work, voting for Harris is a conclusion that is predicated on a particular set of premises, the premises are supposed to be the rock solid foundation, and the conclusion (whatever it may be) the least stable and most flexible point.
I do not blindly follow whatever Lenin says. I think it’s important, however, to understand what he did and did not argue for, factually speaking, as is true of any other theorist. In this case, it’s just that I find his arguments compelling and think his strategy makes sense, even in present conditions - I do not necessarily envision an open revolution in the same vein of conventional warfare, but I would argue the same principles apply if “revolutionary action” looks less like that and more like mass strikes.
Earlier, you claimed to be able to support your position theoretically. You still haven’t provided any, and, having failed to piggyback off my own source, you now seem to be arguing against the relevance of theory altogether. Again, premises flipping from on to the other, revolving around a central conclusion.
tl;dr.
You think I’m a pompous liberal dickhead. I think you’re a sincere idiot who’s helping the left shoot itself in the foot.
We both want the left to win. Our ideas of how that happens differs. So long as we’re at each other’s throats instead of arm in arm against the real enemy, they win.
Can we please cut this bourgeois ideological crap and get back to materialist dialectics?
Do you think that’s what you’re doing?
From skimming your comment, I believe you said you could cite theory to back up your “vote blue no matter who” position. So please do so. I don’t believe I’ve ever seen anyone do this, it’s always just, “it’s obvious” while shutting down any closer examination. Because it is just passively absorbed, unexamined, ruling class ideology.
For the record, my position is largely inspired by Lenin’s “Should We Participate in Bourgeois Parliaments?”
Ooh, there are some good bits in there:
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Sounds like exactly what I’m on about. Voting is a useful tool, use it intelligently.
So, you don’t have any theory to support your position, and have instead chosen to take bits of mine out of context to pretend they mean something completely different.
Yes, Lenin argued for participation in bourgeois parliaments… in a revolutionary communist party. Which the Democratic Party is very much not.
Huh! So, if we were to pretend that he’s talking about something like the Democratic party, then in that case he says we should direct “the most keen, ruthless, and uncompromising criticism” at any leader in said party that is unwilling to use their position “in a revolutionary and communist manner,” and that they should “of course” be dismissed and replaced. It is impossible to read these words in good faith and think that he’s supporting your “blue no matter who” position.
Lenin’s position was, as his positions often were, nuanced, striking a balance between competing ideas. In this case, he is fiercely critical of both complete absentation of the left communists and anarchists, and of opportunism and tailism of the social democrats. You’ve chosen to focus singularly on his criticism of absentation (which tbf is something he focuses on here), as if abstaining from the election was my position, which it isn’t. My position is participation in bourgeois parliaments through a revolutionary communist party with the aim of prioritizing non-electoral strategies, i.e. the thing that he very clearly and explicitly argues for in place of absentation.
Yours? Our theory, comrade. And I’m not a chapter-and-verse kinda guy. That’s not very Marxist. Marxism is explicitly founded upon the Hegelian dialectic: thesis, antithesis, synthesis. I don’t read theory to prop up my views with the authority of century-old quotations. I read theory to analyze the argument, and synthesize it into my general worldview. Good ideas aren’t good because you like the person that said them, they stand up by the virtue of their reasoning.
Heck, this might have been the exact thing I read to bring me to this particular position. Who knows, I read a lot.
And not sure how I could’ve taken anything out of context, I literally copied and pasted direct quotes.
That’s not what this piece says though. If you want to make that point, you should have used a piece that supports it. This piece very specifically says, in what I consider the most crucial words of the whole thing:
The American people do not have the class consciousness or preparedness to support a revolutionary communist party. A sober evaluation of the actual state demonstrates that quite clearly.
Of course! Direct your criticisms to the leaders of the Democratic party, not my parliamentary activities. Note, however, that he doesn’t say that trying to dismiss and replace them is somehow valuable in itself, and you’d really need to massage the context to endorse doing so when it results in an even more uncommunist replacement.
An admirable twit and true to the Hegelian influence.
Then you probably should have chosen a different tract. This one is pretty clear: don’t delude yourself with your ideologies, don’t judge the whole population by the communist vanguard, suit your actions to your circumstances.
Until, by a sober evaluation, we can say that the American people have the class-consciousness and preparedness for a revolutionary communist party, trying to force one at the expense of greater losses is not suitable.
You’ve never heard of proof-texting?
This is literally the exact opposite of his position. You’re saying that you shouldn’t run as a communist until the proletariat is sufficiently radicalized, when Lenin is saying that you should run as a communist specifically in order to radicalize the proletariat when they are not radicalized. His whole argument is that it is because the proletariat is not radicalized that participation in bourgeois politics is worthwhile.
Winning elections is not the point, the point is promoting the message, and if you happen to win a couple elections along the way and get a few representatives in, cool, that can be useful, but that always takes a backseat to other priorities:
action by the masses, a big strike, for instance, is more important than parliamentary activity at all times, and not only during a revolution or in a revolutionary situation.Lenin even makes reference to still persuing a revolutionary communist party, not only when it is not electorally viable, but when it is actually illegal:
But in conditions in which it is often necessary to hide “leaders” underground, the evolution of good “leaders”, reliable, tested and authoritative, is a very difficult matter...The part immediately proceeding what you quoted reads:
You must not sink to the level of the masses, to the level of the backward strata of the class. That is incontestable. You must tell them the bitter truth. You are duty bound to call their bourgeois-democratic and parliamentary prejudices what they are—prejudices.The position that you are arguing for, that communists should adopt reactionary/liberal stances to appease or ingratiate ourselves to a reactionary/liberal population, is known as tailism. The person who coined that term is the same person who wrote this text, Lenin, and he coined it while harshly criticizing it, it is absolutely not his position by any stretch of the imagination. We must “follow the actual state of class-consciousness” only in the sense that we must be aware of it, and plan around it, not in the sense of following their lead. Being aware that most people are not prepared for armed revolution, he says, we should participate in bourgeois electoralism because that is the spectacle they are invested in, and the way in which we should participate is as part of a revolutionary communist party uncompromisingly “telling them the bitter truth” and ultimately trying to turn people away from such processes altogether.
Naturally, if a party can not or will not replace a leader within the party who refuses to persues the supposed revolutionary communist goals of the party, then you should consider whether the party is actually committed to those goals or whether it’s time to start a new party or move to another one that does. Obviously, if replacing an anti-communist leader means someone even more anti-communist will lead the party, then you are not in a communist party and it is time to leave.
He is very clearly talking about leaders within the party, who are always within the party’s power to replace, with whoever they choose, relatively effortlessly. The situation you describe is a contradiction, you’ve already messed up if you’re choosing the lesser evil anticommunist to lead your party or if you can only “try” to replace an anti-communist leader, and obviously this has nothing to do with “voting Democrat to stop the Republicans” as you’re attempting to project onto it, since it’s in the context of internal workings of a revolutionary communist party, not a competition between two bourgeois parties.
And you genuinely, truly believe that that is consistent with Vladimir Lenin’s position in this text?
I weep for our education system.
Again, I don’t really prop my arguments up on the reputation of long dead men, the whole prospect feels pretty cringey and authoritarian just in principle. I don’t see why you would want to base contemporary political strategy on the ideals of a man who died 100 years ago, in a very different country with different material conditions.
You know what Lenin had to say about furthering communism under the threat of fascism? Nothing! He died before fascism became a thing, or Fox News, or Facebook algorithm pipelines. He had no way of conceptualizing the scope of propaganda in the modern world.
Why is he sacrosanct when developing strategy? His USSR never even got to the communist part. It lasted 70 years before being divided up by oligarchs into even more egregious capitalism. Not only are his ideas outdated, they apparently weren’t all that resilient either.
That’s quite the pivot! You were just arguing that I should listen to him because he supported your position, the second that it’s established that he did not, I should throw out everything he said.
It’s like, at the center of your universe is the concept, “You should vote for Harris” and all other propositions rotate around that immovable point. Lenin can be worth listening to, as long as that point doesn’t move, the moment he tries to move that point, he’s out. This is entirely backwards from how it’s supposed to work, voting for Harris is a conclusion that is predicated on a particular set of premises, the premises are supposed to be the rock solid foundation, and the conclusion (whatever it may be) the least stable and most flexible point.
I do not blindly follow whatever Lenin says. I think it’s important, however, to understand what he did and did not argue for, factually speaking, as is true of any other theorist. In this case, it’s just that I find his arguments compelling and think his strategy makes sense, even in present conditions - I do not necessarily envision an open revolution in the same vein of conventional warfare, but I would argue the same principles apply if “revolutionary action” looks less like that and more like mass strikes.
Earlier, you claimed to be able to support your position theoretically. You still haven’t provided any, and, having failed to piggyback off my own source, you now seem to be arguing against the relevance of theory altogether. Again, premises flipping from on to the other, revolving around a central conclusion.