almost definitely a repost but eh
we don’t “wait” for a revolution nor do we expect it to magically fix anything.
but i guess it’s easier to be ignorant than to at least learn what leftism even is.
we don’t “wait” for a revolution nor do we expect it to magically fix anything.
We do wait for material conditions to align (our own or our community’s). Movements needs a cataclyst. Not every moment is ripe for sweeping change.
And we absolutely expect revolutions to improve life dramatically - often simply by removing the corrupt oligarchs mismanaging the system.
But these are pragmatic approaches to economic management, not magical resolutions to human world events.
but i guess it’s easier to be ignorant than to at least learn what leftism even is.
It’s easier to believe in the End of the World for some people than the End of Capitalism.
you added some nuance.
We do wait for material conditions to align
we do, but we do need a critical mass of people, our interests aligned, and to be prepared to swiftly seize the opportunity. all of that’s easier said, and needs a lot of work.
we absolutely expect revolutions to improve life dramatically
in the medium-long term though, right? I don’t really expect my country to be rebuilt overnight, but i can see how we’d start having something reasonable in the decade post revolution. socialism often has to be born from the ashes of scorched-earth capitalism.
easier to believe in the End of the World for some people than the End of Capitalism
preach. i think it’s one of out biggest obstacles tbh.
There definitely are those that do though I think
And tbh I think the more relevant thing that is pointed out here are those that call anyone doing any sort of electoralism/reformism liberals who are worthless. Which, yea, by itself isn’t gonna fully fix society but I’d at least rather people suffer less in the meantime
electoralism is disencouraged because the game is rigged. often when you really get into it, there is truly not much difference between the candidates policy-wise.
if the ruling class wants fascism, they will bend the rules until they get it. i mean, trump was supposed to be in prison, isn’t he? didn’t he even lose the popular vote in his first term?
i’ve seen it play out in my country over and over again. genuine-sounding people like mamdani eventually gets de-winged, or removed if they flail too much.
you don’t, and that’s good, but that doesn’t make it universal. as for the split between these 2 types, idk so I won’t even guess
true, but it’s ok to take the needed time though. life gets in the way, people work long hours, and helping build a movement is a lot of work.
i’m sure aspiring MLs have this at the back of their minds, because practicing ones are always pretty insistent on telling people to organize and adjust expectations.
Bingo. In my experience people hear “revolution is necessary” and tune out the rest. Expectations need to be grounded, organizing is boring yet necessary.
Nah I’ve studied political science at the graduate level and this is pretty much spot on.
I studied psychology at a graduate level and have decided that you’re schizophrenic
… sarcasm?
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.
The Antichrist walks among us, wearing a spray tan and a toupee. We must use our second amendment rights to throw off our oppressors and create the kingdom of Elohim on earth.
This is literally just almost every terminally online ML lol
that’s why I posted this here lmao
This is besides the point, but in what way is a "lukewarm Christian’ someone who actually makes progress? I’ve only ever heard the term be used in the opposite way.
Leftist rapture is The Singularity.
eh… so far the only ones I’ve seen really perked up about the singularity are techbro libertarians.
No, that’s libertarian tech bro rapture.
Could it be because extremist platforms (like filthy rich preachers, Fox News, or toxic, algorithmic apps) inevitably lead to this?
It’s almost like clergy and retired Silicon Valley royalty and social sciences/social media researchers have been warning of this exact thing, over and over, for decades…
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.
How many would “vote with their dollar” if $==🧨, though? 🤷🏼♂️
The Rapture (or whatever no-effort salvation flavor you prefer) will not be televised.
yOu JuSt hATe tHe WoRkiNG cLaSs!1!
Ivory tower leftists hate nothing more than the working man.
The world is
sinfulanti-democratic backsliding but we just have to wait until theSecond Comingthe Election happens when everything will be magically fixed. Any attempt to make actual progress makes you alukewarm Christiantankie anything less thanthe Apocolypsethe Election (which is definitely fair and free and democratic full of extremely popular and nice politicians) is completely useless. Also consuming certian media or makin certain lifesytle choices issinful and unchristianmakes you a tankie or a rebellious ineffective anarchist or a secret conservative.so democracy bad?
This leftist believes we are already dead and this is hell.
Yeah I’d much rather die in the fast track concentration camps our government is building today than the slow track one our government has us in now.
It’s hell all the way down.
Zen makes no sense and all the sense simultaneously, the more you look/don’t look at it.
Hmm… Floating into the sky which is also where a magical land exists with an all knowing, benevolent supreme being or equality and fair treatment for all peoples… Yeah those are the same.
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.
Well, Marx’ withering away of the state and the rise of Communism was basically the Kingdom of Heaven on Earth.
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.
“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 abd 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 constent reproduction on an expanded scale. 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.
This may be the worst take I’ve ever heard tbh
Both sides same horseshoe isn’t even a new take
Shittiest MadLibs reboot ever.
