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 Not only are his ideas outdated, they apparently weren’t all that resilient either.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.
You were just arguing that I should listen to him because he supported your position
I believe if you actually read what I wrote, I did not. I believe my exact words were “Ooh, there are some interesting bits in there”.
In fact, I then went on to specify that I don’t prop my arguments up of the reputations of dead men. I found it funny that your own snippet of theory was substantially more supportive of my position, but I did not, and do not base my arguments on theory citations. They are based on reason, informed by history and theory, but not blindly.
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.
Correct. My rock solid point is not “Demonstrate ideological purity and ability to cite theory” as yours seems to be. My foundation is “Achieve stable, enduring communism as quickly and bloodlessly as possible”. I work backwards from there, broadly to socialism, then to market socialism, then to unions, etc., until I get to the present day.
We’re not going to have a successful communist revolution tomorrow, nor a socialist one. That means part of that pathway involves voting strategically to secure the most favorable conditions possible for the development of the vanguard. In the 2024 election, that meant keeping the Project 2025 fascists out of office. The only way to do that, at that particular time, was to vote Harris.
That doesn’t have anything to do with my actions outside of the ballot box, except in that it helps increase the likelihood of success of those actions.
I do not blindly follow whatever Lenin says.
I belive you. Your foundation is demonstrating ideological purity, so if Lenin says something detrimental to that purity, you are compelled to selectively choose only that which supports purity.
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.
He said himself in this very text that conditions in Russia were not the same as in Western Europe and America. That is proof enough that even if you consider his strategy well suited to the task in Russia, which given the eventual corruption and dissolution of the USSR is itself a very tenuous claim, we should question the efficacy of this strategy in America and Western Europe.
Earlier, you claimed to be able to support your position theoretically. You still haven’t provided any, a>!!<nd, 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 coynclusion.
I could, but again I don’t think it’s a valuable pursuit. I can also belch the alphabet. My basis is reason, not theory. An argument isn’t “valid” because a famous theorist wrote it down 100 years ago. I never claimed otherwise, there is no flip, you just don’t understand the concept of favoring reason to theory.
And that’s why the whole ML movement I see here is doomed. Everyone who questions your favored theorist is a “liberal” and must be shamed. You’ve elevated ancient theory to sacred scripture, and perverted the rational pursuit for political efficacy into a religious devotion. As Lenin said:
It is obvious that the “Lefts” in Germany have mistaken their desire, their politico-ideological attitude, for objective reality. That is a most dangerous mistake for revolutionaries to make.
I regularly interact with the general public, offline. I can say with utmost confidence that I am staunchly to the left of, at minimum, 99% of the population. If I’m too far right to you, you have no people. A handful of terminally online theory-junkies, sure, but nothing remotely close to the consent of the masses necessary for even non-violent revolutionary tactics (a general strike, for example).
We need time to educate them. That’s a lot easier to do when fascists aren’t disappearing our organizers to Salvadorian death camps. Lenin’s strategy was tailored to material conditions in Russia in the early 20th century, before the advent of fascism and modern propaganda, before billionaires (there was one, John D. Rockefeller, but he was the only one and he barely edged over the $1B mark at the end of Lenin’s life). And, again, his strategies weren’t even effective at securing stable communism. It was never actually communism, and it destabilized in under a century. So not only are his techniques unsuitable for modern use, they weren’t even effective at the time.
The world he strategized in was fundamentally different from ours in many ways. Deifying century-dead thinkers is like using a steam engine repair manual to try to remove a virus from your computer. So long as your methods remain buried in the past, so will any leftist success. Adapt or die.
I found it funny that your own snippet of theory was substantially more supportive of my position
Which, to be clear, was not even remotely true, as I demonstrated. No that I have spent time demonstrating that you are objectively wrong about Lenin’s historical positions, you are now accusing me of blinding following them, when all I’ve done is clarify what they are, against you absurd attempts to misconstrue and twist around his words.
They are based on reason, informed by history and theory, but not blindly.
My rock solid point is not “Demonstrate ideological purity and ability to cite theory” as yours seems to be.
Your foundation is demonstrating ideological purity, so if Lenin says something detrimental to that purity, you are compelled to selectively choose only that which supports purity.
An argument isn’t “valid” because a famous theorist wrote it down 100 years ago. I never claimed otherwise, there is no flip, you just don’t understand the concept of favoring reason to theory.
And that’s why the whole ML movement I see here is doomed. Everyone who questions your favored theorist is a “liberal” and must be shamed. You’ve elevated ancient theory to sacred scripture, and perverted the rational pursuit for political efficacy into a religious devotion.
Literally every word of this is just baseless nonsense, over and over again.
I cited Lenin for a couple specific purposes, first, to establish that my positions are part of a broader leftist intellectual tradition, second, because I personally find his arguments compelling and relevant.
For the third time, I will point out that you claimed that you could support your positions with theory, which you have not done, and have now flipped to saying that theory is irrelevant, accusing me of “blindly following it” merely for citing and referencing it - after you asked me to, by the way! When I said that I had read theory and could defend my positions in the context of it, you called me out for not having done so, when I then did so, you called me out for doing so. It’s absolutely absurd.
It’s obvious that you are no operating on any kind of rational basis, but rather blind loyalty to the Democratic party.
I cited Lenin for a couple specific purposes, first, to establish that my positions are part of a broader leftist intellectual tradition, second, because I personally find his arguments compelling and relevant.
Yes, the leftist tradition of deifying outdated theorists. That is a tradition I’m happy to abandon.
I will point out that you claimed that you could support your positions with theory, which you have not done, and have now flipped to saying that theory is irrelevant, accusing me of “blindly following it”
I could. Gramsci, Bernstein, Kautsky, and every other shade of reformist who quite correctly pointed out the dangers of premature revolution, including the inherent instability and susceptibility to dictatorship, and highlighted the necessity to favorably shift the cultural hegemony before trying direct political action. I don’t need to cite theory for this, history shows it quite clearly. But I could, I just don’t think appeals to authority are reasonable arguments.
If you find the arguments, suited to a population fresh from revolution in transitional parliamentary government less than 5 years old, to be compelling strategy for a deeply propagandized population in an established 250 year old parliamentary government, you’re not suited to disseminate strategic opinions. You’re better suited to academia, where you can opine about historical theories with other theory-junkies.
But hey, keep trying to fix your computer with steam engine manuals. I’m sure alienating the leftists who try to save you, and everyone else, from your myopic ideological mistakes will shift the American cultural hegemony to revolution. Who cares about dialectics anyway?
I suppose that virtually every academic or scientific paper in history is guilty of “deification” because they cite other works. I guess I’m “deifying” you too, because I’ve quoted things you’ve said.
Nothing I believe is on the basis of, “because Lenin said so.” Nor do I believe in blindly applying his strategies regardless of material conditions. These are entirely baseless accusations, and there is nothing I’ve said that you can point to as evidence of them. I agree with Lenin’s perspective to an extent, from a reasoned, critical position. But it seems that anything short of blind rejection of everything he said counts as “blindly following” by your standards.
We haven’t even really begun to examine the questions of whether his ideas were correct or whether they are applicable to today. All I’ve done is present what they are and refuted your nonsensical attempts to twist his words around.
I suppose that virtually every academic or scientific paper in history is guilty of “deification” because they cite other works.
Uh, what? That’s a bad joke, right? You know that’s not how academic citations work, right? Forget what I said about academia, that’s not for you either.
These are entirely baseless accusations
Mr. “Everyone who criticizes me is a liberal” is against base**less accusations now? Spare me your crocodile tears.
and there is nothing I’ve said that you can point me as evidence of them.
We haven’t even really begun to examine the questions of whether his ideas were correct or whether they are applicable to today.
You know the neat thing about text based conversations is you can go back for receipts, right?
because I personally find his arguments compelling and relevant.
And you keep saying I pressed you on theory, which is completely backwards. That was all you champ.
For example, the fact that I’ve read leftist theory and can cite it to support my positions
For someone who claims to read so much theory, your reading comprehension is not good.
But we’ve passed the point that I feel like entertaining your bad faith projection. We’re done here.
Great! I knew this wasn’t going to go anywhere from the start, as I said. You haven’t said a single thing worth reading in this whole conversation, or in any other comment I’ve ever seen you make. So this seems like a good a time as any to simply block you.
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.
I believe if you actually read what I wrote, I did not. I believe my exact words were “Ooh, there are some interesting bits in there”.
In fact, I then went on to specify that I don’t prop my arguments up of the reputations of dead men. I found it funny that your own snippet of theory was substantially more supportive of my position, but I did not, and do not base my arguments on theory citations. They are based on reason, informed by history and theory, but not blindly.
Correct. My rock solid point is not “Demonstrate ideological purity and ability to cite theory” as yours seems to be. My foundation is “Achieve stable, enduring communism as quickly and bloodlessly as possible”. I work backwards from there, broadly to socialism, then to market socialism, then to unions, etc., until I get to the present day.
We’re not going to have a successful communist revolution tomorrow, nor a socialist one. That means part of that pathway involves voting strategically to secure the most favorable conditions possible for the development of the vanguard. In the 2024 election, that meant keeping the Project 2025 fascists out of office. The only way to do that, at that particular time, was to vote Harris.
That doesn’t have anything to do with my actions outside of the ballot box, except in that it helps increase the likelihood of success of those actions.
I belive you. Your foundation is demonstrating ideological purity, so if Lenin says something detrimental to that purity, you are compelled to selectively choose only that which supports purity.
He said himself in this very text that conditions in Russia were not the same as in Western Europe and America. That is proof enough that even if you consider his strategy well suited to the task in Russia, which given the eventual corruption and dissolution of the USSR is itself a very tenuous claim, we should question the efficacy of this strategy in America and Western Europe.
I could, but again I don’t think it’s a valuable pursuit. I can also belch the alphabet. My basis is reason, not theory. An argument isn’t “valid” because a famous theorist wrote it down 100 years ago. I never claimed otherwise, there is no flip, you just don’t understand the concept of favoring reason to theory.
And that’s why the whole ML movement I see here is doomed. Everyone who questions your favored theorist is a “liberal” and must be shamed. You’ve elevated ancient theory to sacred scripture, and perverted the rational pursuit for political efficacy into a religious devotion. As Lenin said:
I regularly interact with the general public, offline. I can say with utmost confidence that I am staunchly to the left of, at minimum, 99% of the population. If I’m too far right to you, you have no people. A handful of terminally online theory-junkies, sure, but nothing remotely close to the consent of the masses necessary for even non-violent revolutionary tactics (a general strike, for example).
We need time to educate them. That’s a lot easier to do when fascists aren’t disappearing our organizers to Salvadorian death camps. Lenin’s strategy was tailored to material conditions in Russia in the early 20th century, before the advent of fascism and modern propaganda, before billionaires (there was one, John D. Rockefeller, but he was the only one and he barely edged over the $1B mark at the end of Lenin’s life). And, again, his strategies weren’t even effective at securing stable communism. It was never actually communism, and it destabilized in under a century. So not only are his techniques unsuitable for modern use, they weren’t even effective at the time.
The world he strategized in was fundamentally different from ours in many ways. Deifying century-dead thinkers is like using a steam engine repair manual to try to remove a virus from your computer. So long as your methods remain buried in the past, so will any leftist success. Adapt or die.
Which, to be clear, was not even remotely true, as I demonstrated. No that I have spent time demonstrating that you are objectively wrong about Lenin’s historical positions, you are now accusing me of blinding following them, when all I’ve done is clarify what they are, against you absurd attempts to misconstrue and twist around his words.
Literally every word of this is just baseless nonsense, over and over again.
I cited Lenin for a couple specific purposes, first, to establish that my positions are part of a broader leftist intellectual tradition, second, because I personally find his arguments compelling and relevant.
For the third time, I will point out that you claimed that you could support your positions with theory, which you have not done, and have now flipped to saying that theory is irrelevant, accusing me of “blindly following it” merely for citing and referencing it - after you asked me to, by the way! When I said that I had read theory and could defend my positions in the context of it, you called me out for not having done so, when I then did so, you called me out for doing so. It’s absolutely absurd.
It’s obvious that you are no operating on any kind of rational basis, but rather blind loyalty to the Democratic party.
Yes, the leftist tradition of deifying outdated theorists. That is a tradition I’m happy to abandon.
I could. Gramsci, Bernstein, Kautsky, and every other shade of reformist who quite correctly pointed out the dangers of premature revolution, including the inherent instability and susceptibility to dictatorship, and highlighted the necessity to favorably shift the cultural hegemony before trying direct political action. I don’t need to cite theory for this, history shows it quite clearly. But I could, I just don’t think appeals to authority are reasonable arguments.
If you find the arguments, suited to a population fresh from revolution in transitional parliamentary government less than 5 years old, to be compelling strategy for a deeply propagandized population in an established 250 year old parliamentary government, you’re not suited to disseminate strategic opinions. You’re better suited to academia, where you can opine about historical theories with other theory-junkies.
But hey, keep trying to fix your computer with steam engine manuals. I’m sure alienating the leftists who try to save you, and everyone else, from your myopic ideological mistakes will shift the American cultural hegemony to revolution. Who cares about dialectics anyway?
I suppose that virtually every academic or scientific paper in history is guilty of “deification” because they cite other works. I guess I’m “deifying” you too, because I’ve quoted things you’ve said.
Nothing I believe is on the basis of, “because Lenin said so.” Nor do I believe in blindly applying his strategies regardless of material conditions. These are entirely baseless accusations, and there is nothing I’ve said that you can point to as evidence of them. I agree with Lenin’s perspective to an extent, from a reasoned, critical position. But it seems that anything short of blind rejection of everything he said counts as “blindly following” by your standards.
We haven’t even really begun to examine the questions of whether his ideas were correct or whether they are applicable to today. All I’ve done is present what they are and refuted your nonsensical attempts to twist his words around.
Uh, what? That’s a bad joke, right? You know that’s not how academic citations work, right? Forget what I said about academia, that’s not for you either.
Mr. “Everyone who criticizes me is a liberal” is against base**less accusations now? Spare me your crocodile tears.
You know the neat thing about text based conversations is you can go back for receipts, right?
And you keep saying I pressed you on theory, which is completely backwards. That was all you champ.
For someone who claims to read so much theory, your reading comprehension is not good.
But we’ve passed the point that I feel like entertaining your bad faith projection. We’re done here.
Great! I knew this wasn’t going to go anywhere from the start, as I said. You haven’t said a single thing worth reading in this whole conversation, or in any other comment I’ve ever seen you make. So this seems like a good a time as any to simply block you.