It’s important to be aware of the context of how Muslims are treated in the West. The issue isn’t burning a religious text, it’s that allowing these far-right rituals just fuels the irrational hatred of Muslim people, especially refugees
I used to think religion itself was the problem, but becoming a communist has changed my perspective on this. Capitalism creates unjustifiable hierarchies that allow religion to weild immense power within our society. This can be prevented under socialism, turning religion into just another part of our culture.
did u happen to forget that religion has exists as it does today and in even more oppressive forms for thousands before capitalism came around? the idea that capitalism is making something that has been bad long before capitalism even exists bad is straight up a historical.
yeah and in plenty of those societies religion WAS the hierarchy. how could we ever even eliminated class society while also preserving organizations and ideologies to which hierarchy is inherent.
I think any reasonable communist thinks that religious theocracies are terrible. You can have religion in any type of society, but not have it be the dominating factor of the society.
You might be right. My perspective on the matter is that we should take that anti-religion energy and focus it on class struggle instead. Once we, the proletariat, control the state, we can suppress the power that religion holds over society.
All religions so far have been the expression of historical stages of development of individual peoples or groups of peoples. But communism is the stage of historical development which makes all existing religions superfluous and brings about their disappearance.
The mirrors my perspective above in that if we focus on class struggle in order to bring about communism, religion will take a new form in either shifting to focus on simply the “spirituality” aspect or disappear entirely.
My intention is not to “defend religion” as you say. I’m simply stating that I think attacking religion is counter productive or at the very least, will not accomplish anything. I have no love for religion myself, but it’s important to remember that many of our comrades do. Hakim is a good example and a much more developed Marxist than myself and many others on this platform.
Did religion provide the hierarchy or the relations of production? I imagine there’s quite a strong dialectical relationship as I see religion as adaptable to material conditions. E.g. Catholicism mapped perfectly to feudal society. Then Christians needed a new form for the capitalist era. And in comes Protestantism with is work ethic and whatever the fuck those fundamentalists in the US do where the Christians screech for war, refuse to help the poor, and deny medical care to each other.
I’m not saying this to say that religion can survive without hierarchy. Maybe there are theories about that. Only to ask whether there’s an order to this. If religion provides the hierarchy does that make it part of the base? And if religion no longer provides the hierarchy, would it now be part of the superstructure? Or was it always part of the superstructure? (Recognising, still, that the base-superstructure is shorthand for something that is more flexible in practice than in some vulgar theory.)
First hierarchies in class society were (as always) based on production mode but their ideology was religious, look at the origins of sumerian city states and ancient Egypt.
Don’t you think this type of thinking is reductive? Does it not give credit to those who claim communism doesn’t work because the USSR tried it? It completely ignores the specific material conditions of the time and place.
Excuse me i didn’t wrote a 50 pages dissertation about that, i assumed you know this never happened anywhere where religious organizations had any significant power.
What is REALLY reductive (and also historically proven incorrect) is writing “Capitalism creates unjustifiable hierarchies that allow religion to weild immense power within our society.”* and “This can be prevented under socialism, turning religion into just another part of our culture.”
*EDIT: while theoretically correct, it does that, all systems of class society before did the same, so it’s not sole fault of capitalism. Hell, even socialist countries didn’t liquidated those hierarchies.
My apologies if my comment came of as cententious. I think this is an interesting conversation and I’m interested in learning more and gaining insight into the different the perspectives of other comrades on the topic.
this never happened anywhere where religious organizations had any significant power.
Admitted, I’m pretty niave on the history of both of these, but what are your thoughts on this in relation to Tibet and Xinjiang? In Tibet, they banished the Dalai Lama, but not religious practice. And in Xinjiang, I believe I read there’s more mosques there than anywhere else in the world. It seems education has been the key in reducing religious extremism in the region as opposed to outright banning religion.
Not sure about Xinjiang exactly, but decentralised and autonomous nature of muslim religious authorities usually cause them to not have much political power when under non-muslim government, religious influence in such conditions usually results in what they did, extremist minority.
Tibet is even worse example, now its more or less cooperative, but clergy literally got deposed from power hard, expropriated nearly entirely and since then watched carefully. PRC even directly interfere with their religious hierarchy, look what they did to panchen lama and when current dalai lama dies the tibetan buddhism can very well split because it, which will increase state influence over it. And it’s far from only thing.
I won’t even mention what happened when Falun Gong overstepped.
outright banning religion.
You do know than beween kissing bishop ring and “outright banning religion” there is a lot of other options?
You do know than beween kissing bishop ring and “outright banning religion” there is a lot of other options?
I think this is where our discussion got off track. There’s another thread in here that mentions the distinction between religious institutions and religious practice. I’m certainly in favour of placing heavy restrictions on religious institutions. I think we need to be open minded when it comes to allowing others the right to their religious practice.
As I said in my original comment, consider the context. There is no noteworthy discrimination against followers of Heinlein, if such people exist, and as far as I know it’s not a religion recognized by any country. There is extreme discrimination against Muslims in the West. There’s also discrimination against Jews. For Buddhists, it would likely be less of a problem since it’s not a prominent religion in the West, but it could also lead to further escalation.
Even if we analyze this without context, what kind of expression is the state silencing by not allowing public book burning? We’re not talking about someone burning a Quran in their home, where nobody else can see it. Do you believe it should be legal to stand in a public place and shout ethnic slurs into a megaphone?
It’s important to be aware of the context of how Muslims are treated in the West. The issue isn’t burning a religious text, it’s that allowing these far-right rituals just fuels the irrational hatred of Muslim people, especially refugees
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I used to think religion itself was the problem, but becoming a communist has changed my perspective on this. Capitalism creates unjustifiable hierarchies that allow religion to weild immense power within our society. This can be prevented under socialism, turning religion into just another part of our culture.
did u happen to forget that religion has exists as it does today and in even more oppressive forms for thousands before capitalism came around? the idea that capitalism is making something that has been bad long before capitalism even exists bad is straight up a historical.
That’s true, but it’s always been under class society where some form of these hierarchies exist.
yeah and in plenty of those societies religion WAS the hierarchy. how could we ever even eliminated class society while also preserving organizations and ideologies to which hierarchy is inherent.
I think any reasonable communist thinks that religious theocracies are terrible. You can have religion in any type of society, but not have it be the dominating factor of the society.
it is not the dominating factor in most capitalists societies right now and its terrible enough as is.
You might be right. My perspective on the matter is that we should take that anti-religion energy and focus it on class struggle instead. Once we, the proletariat, control the state, we can suppress the power that religion holds over society.
In “The Principles of Communism” Engles writes:
The mirrors my perspective above in that if we focus on class struggle in order to bring about communism, religion will take a new form in either shifting to focus on simply the “spirituality” aspect or disappear entirely.
using that quote to defend religion is like defending the state by quoting the “Paris Commune” if that supports any view its mine.
My intention is not to “defend religion” as you say. I’m simply stating that I think attacking religion is counter productive or at the very least, will not accomplish anything. I have no love for religion myself, but it’s important to remember that many of our comrades do. Hakim is a good example and a much more developed Marxist than myself and many others on this platform.
Does o_d defend religion? That’s not quite how I interpreted what they said.
Did religion provide the hierarchy or the relations of production? I imagine there’s quite a strong dialectical relationship as I see religion as adaptable to material conditions. E.g. Catholicism mapped perfectly to feudal society. Then Christians needed a new form for the capitalist era. And in comes Protestantism with is work ethic and whatever the fuck those fundamentalists in the US do where the Christians screech for war, refuse to help the poor, and deny medical care to each other.
I’m not saying this to say that religion can survive without hierarchy. Maybe there are theories about that. Only to ask whether there’s an order to this. If religion provides the hierarchy does that make it part of the base? And if religion no longer provides the hierarchy, would it now be part of the superstructure? Or was it always part of the superstructure? (Recognising, still, that the base-superstructure is shorthand for something that is more flexible in practice than in some vulgar theory.)
First hierarchies in class society were (as always) based on production mode but their ideology was religious, look at the origins of sumerian city states and ancient Egypt.
You know who tried? Socialist Poland for example.
Don’t you think this type of thinking is reductive? Does it not give credit to those who claim communism doesn’t work because the USSR tried it? It completely ignores the specific material conditions of the time and place.
Excuse me i didn’t wrote a 50 pages dissertation about that, i assumed you know this never happened anywhere where religious organizations had any significant power.
What is REALLY reductive (and also historically proven incorrect) is writing “Capitalism creates unjustifiable hierarchies that allow religion to weild immense power within our society.”* and “This can be prevented under socialism, turning religion into just another part of our culture.”
*EDIT: while theoretically correct, it does that, all systems of class society before did the same, so it’s not sole fault of capitalism. Hell, even socialist countries didn’t liquidated those hierarchies.
My apologies if my comment came of as cententious. I think this is an interesting conversation and I’m interested in learning more and gaining insight into the different the perspectives of other comrades on the topic.
Admitted, I’m pretty niave on the history of both of these, but what are your thoughts on this in relation to Tibet and Xinjiang? In Tibet, they banished the Dalai Lama, but not religious practice. And in Xinjiang, I believe I read there’s more mosques there than anywhere else in the world. It seems education has been the key in reducing religious extremism in the region as opposed to outright banning religion.
Not sure about Xinjiang exactly, but decentralised and autonomous nature of muslim religious authorities usually cause them to not have much political power when under non-muslim government, religious influence in such conditions usually results in what they did, extremist minority.
Tibet is even worse example, now its more or less cooperative, but clergy literally got deposed from power hard, expropriated nearly entirely and since then watched carefully. PRC even directly interfere with their religious hierarchy, look what they did to panchen lama and when current dalai lama dies the tibetan buddhism can very well split because it, which will increase state influence over it. And it’s far from only thing.
I won’t even mention what happened when Falun Gong overstepped.
You do know than beween kissing bishop ring and “outright banning religion” there is a lot of other options?
I think this is where our discussion got off track. There’s another thread in here that mentions the distinction between religious institutions and religious practice. I’m certainly in favour of placing heavy restrictions on religious institutions. I think we need to be open minded when it comes to allowing others the right to their religious practice.
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complete freedom of expression doesn’t exist anywhere, there are always limits and some are more reasonable than others
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As I said in my original comment, consider the context. There is no noteworthy discrimination against followers of Heinlein, if such people exist, and as far as I know it’s not a religion recognized by any country. There is extreme discrimination against Muslims in the West. There’s also discrimination against Jews. For Buddhists, it would likely be less of a problem since it’s not a prominent religion in the West, but it could also lead to further escalation.
Even if we analyze this without context, what kind of expression is the state silencing by not allowing public book burning? We’re not talking about someone burning a Quran in their home, where nobody else can see it. Do you believe it should be legal to stand in a public place and shout ethnic slurs into a megaphone?