Italian anarchists are very irritable because they are very conceited. Their longstanding conviction that they’re oracles of revealed revolutionary truth has become “monstrous” ever since the Socialist Party, through the influence of the Russian Revolution and Bolshevik…
I agree that anarchists are often conceited, but do we really have to take the exact opposite position to them, and decree that because an oppressive proletarian State is in the interest of the proletariat, that we should not try and dissolve the state at all? Is limiting ourselves to the short-term desires of the proletarian class, not even considering what kind of class structures that could form in the future, really the best way forward?
This reads a strange form of vulgar Marxism to me, a kind of reaction to the idea of anarchism that arises when you criticize it from gut opposition at their “arrogance” rather than the actual issues with it. I’m not saying the article is actually saying this, but what it is saying is dangerously compatible with such a viewpoint.
I am a Marxist because I believe that the struggle of the proletariat has the greatest chance to end the constant class struggle of human society, not because I think that the state is a necessary or even remotely “ok” methods of human organization. It is only justifiable as a form of self-defense for the proletariat (which the dictatorship of the proletariat should fundamentally be viewed as). Anything more than that isn’t just bad from some abstract moral opinion, but because it’s completely pointless to the revolutionary struggle.
Marx was very clear regarding the fact that a proletarian state under the dictatorship of the proletariat would be necessary to replace the existing capitalist state. Marxist idea is not that the state can be dissolved spontaneously, but rather that the state withers away as society internalizes new socialist relations. It’s also quite obviously not possible to do away with the state while capitalism is the dominant ideology in the world and capitalist states actively work to destroy socialist ones.
But that is what I am saying.
The article seems to miss the fact that the ultimate point of instating a dictatorship of the proletariat is to protect the creation of a mode of production that doesn’t need a State at all.
If the Anarchist says they are against the existence of the State, then that makes their desire ultimately the same as ours - a communist mode of production. The flaw of anarchist ideology seems to be this idea that the State is not justifiable even if it’s purpose is to destroy itself, which seems like a simple example of not reading about the tolerance paradox to me.
The arguments in the article just seem inefficient.
The article focuses on the immediate task of organizing the working class to carry out a revolution. That’s a pretty important context that you’re ignoring. In order for a socialist state to wither away, it actually has to be created first. That’s the task the article is discussing, and that’s the task before the western left today. Only after a socialist state has been established is there any point to discuss how it will evolve and whether it will wither away.
That’s not how convincing people works, though. Their concern might be silly in the short term but telling them it’s stupid is going to get people rightfully angry at you
When you point out that the goal is to have the state wither away, it’s a lot easier to convince someone to side with you then just going “states good actually 4head”
My experience is that focusing on convincing anarchists of anything is a waste of time. Anarchists are difficult to convince because they’ve already formed strongly held beliefs, and they’re typically actively antagonistic towards communists. Meanwhile, both anarchists and communists combined represent a tiny fraction of the population.
The real focus should be on convincing people in the mainstream who are becoming disillusioned with the capitalist system, but haven’t yet formed strong political opinions. These people are much easier to convince and there are a lot more of them. This is the demographic that the messaging needs to be tailored to.
What Gramsci argues might not be terribly helpful for convincing anarchists, but it is a useful argument to explain why communist approach is the one that can achieve tangible results to people who haven’t yet formed strong opinions of their own.
In my experience, young anarchists in person can be reasoned with, but if you’re a full on adult and still believe in anarchism, you’re probably too far gone.
pretty much yeah
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Sure, that’s an important point as well. It’s always important to recognize where the person you’re talking with at and to tailor the messaging accordingly. I’m mainly just cautioning against spending a lot of time on trying to convince people who don’t want to be convinced. It’s easy to get sucked down the rabbit hole of arguing with them endlessly while that time can be spent better talking to people who are actually receptive to what you’re saying.
I had to learn that the hard way. Some people just like to argue for arguments sake.
This is a very sad picture you are painting. It is like saying that if someone doesn’t know about cars and this is the first time buying you can convince them to buy a Chevy, but if they already know about cars and have had a few they will never buy one. Alternatively if they have a BMW why trade it for a Daewoo?
No, I’d say you have to look at it more like eating habbits. You won’t convince someone who’s in his 50ies and all his life only ever ate fastfood to eat healthy. It’s objectively better for them, deep down they might even know it, but the force of habbit is just to strong.
There is a best choice, but not everyone want’s to hear it. You can’t convince everyone and have to pick your battles.
Is the object of the revolutionary to tell people what they prefer to hear or what it is actually right, scintifically supported that is as a choice?
They don’t want what we want. We want a highly efficient, industrialized, centrally administered society, but without “special bodies of armed men” and without class oppression.
I want bullet trains, I don’t want to barter for dubious insulin.
The first word, I, is wrong, when the preceeding sentence is we. Why is a fast train preferred over a slow train, why the rush? Ask your average sporty cyclist, above 16kph(10mph) the effort needed to maintain speed or accelerate increases exponentially due to wind resistance. Same for any vehicle, land, sea, air. On whose clock are you running? The capitalist clock where time is money and money is time?
What you want and what society needs may be in contradiction. Who decides what society needs? Popular vote, majority rule, experts, politicans, scientists, … everyone?
We most definitely do not need fast trains, planes, or automobiles. The reason they are available is because they are profitable to someone(s).
The world better slow down or it is burning itself up
This is a really long-winded way of saying “diabetics should die from bathtub insulin”.
Do you have any clue that in an international political forum your neighborhood’s slang and idioms are just nonsensical waste of bandwidth?
Oof, I’m wounded, what happened to that code of conduct? Are you swimming in the muck with me as a punk now?
I’m saying that you’ve written a lot of meaningless words (long-winded) that say diabetics should die from poorly homemade (bathtub) insulin.
You’re arguing for a low-tech, Anarchist, society. This amounts to eugenics for people who rely on a high-tech, organized society to live.
Hold on. Fuck you. You skipped the meat of the comment to snip at my use of “I” in the end.
Argue against the argument or fuck off.
you have spoken like a true “communist” … ??
And what the fuck have you spoken like? Does dithering about my use of “I” make you a true idealist?
It makes you an I-dealist.
No there is a code of conduct among true proletarians and then there is lumpen proletariat that behave like punks and thugs, anti-social and a disgrace among proletarians.
It has nothing to do with idealism, it has to do with the ability of hiding behind a terminal and anonymity to act as a bully and some tough guy. Not the proletarian way, definitely the petty bourgeois way.
Some people believe that Marxism and anarchism are based on the same principles and that the disagreements between them concern only tactics, so that, in the opinion of these people, it is quite impossible to draw a contrast between these two trends.
This is a great mistake.
We believe that the Anarchists are real enemies of Marxism. Accordingly, we also hold that a real struggle must be waged against real enemies. Therefore, it is necessary to examine the “doctrine” of the Anarchists from beginning to end and weigh it up thoroughly from all aspects.
The point is that Marxism and anarchism are built up on entirely different principles, in spite of the fact that both come into the arena of the struggle under the flag of socialism. The cornerstone of anarchism is the individual, whose emancipation, according to its tenets, is the principal condition for the emancipation of the masses, the collective body. According to the tenets of anarchism, the emancipation of the masses is impossible until the individual is emancipated. Accordingly, its slogan is: “Everything for the individual.” The cornerstone of Marxism, however, is the masses, whose emancipation, according to its tenets, is the principal condition for the emancipation of the individual. That is to say, according to the tenets of Marxism, the emancipation of the individual is impossible until the masses are emancipated. Accordingly, its slogan is: “Everything for the masses.”
Stalin. “Anarchism Or Socialism?”
Which, again, this is a completely false definition of Anarchism’s proposed slogan and is mostly made up.
I wish there was an actual anarchist here to describe things, I have more familiarity with anarchism than most but I’m definitely not able to communicate that familiarity well.
No it’s not.
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@Vertraumir> We believe that the Anarchists are real enemies of Marxism. Accordingly, we also hold that a real struggle must be waged against real enemies. Therefore, it is necessary to examine the “doctrine” of the Anarchists from beginning to end and weigh it up thoroughly from all aspects.
I don’t know who “we” is in this sentence and under which organization the goal is to “protect Marxism” from its enemies, when the enemy is capitalism. The process we refer to as revolution, the total destruction of capitalism, must be maintained as the core goal under which organization exists, to defend Marxism ideologically against other ideologies would have been secondary.
In terms of tactics, there have been factions of m-l organization that consider the possibility of improving relations with anarchist/libertarian groups as well as other revolutionaries (Trots…somethings) in order to improve the chances of successful transition, then use and deal with adversaries at a later stage.
On the other hand reformist Marxists are tactically more dangerous and need to be dealt with as adversaries, if not outright enemies of the dictatorship of the proletariat than revolutionaries are. Therefore the issue is not as simple as some people rush to laugh and clap about, or try to collectively convince themselves as superior.
In any case, within revolutionary anti-capitalism within 150y of friction, there had better been a synthesis than a preservation of antithesis and avoidance. For the m-l movement to be reduced to a tiny elite and the anarcho-communist/liberarian-communist periodically to be exploding with dynamic presence, especially among working class youth, students, unemployed, etc. in many corners of the globe, a logical group would have to sit down and rethink, at least tactics, before it throws up a party of superiority triumph.
So, what would happen in the 6th International has yet to be thought about.
https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/stalin/works/1906/12/x01.htm
There are more MLs in China than anarchists in the whole world. Anarchists are almost entirely petit-bourge western crackers, and Anarchism as a movement is wholly irrelevant.