Occasionally people in left circles will suggest instead of striving to make things better for people around us we instead strive to make things worse. Now, they rarely say it quite so plainly but they’ll say things like. “The people aren’t mad enough yet” or “It hasn’t gotten bad enough for people to care” or “The police haven’t been violent enough for people to rise up” Then they will suggest supporting policies that hurt regular people since supporting policies that help people might involve being in coalition with ideological enemies like liberals or becoming too entwined with the mainstream political parties.
  • @some_random_commie
    12•4 years ago

    This essay is fairly confused. “Accelerationism” is an ill-defined concept that can mean anything to anybody, some concepts attributed to it may be correct or incorrect, as far as revolutionaries are concerned.

    The idea though, that there is no revolution unless the masses are ready for it is not false, this is basic Leninism. To quote him:

    To the Marxist it is indisputable that a revolution is impossible without a revolutionary situation; furthermore, it is not every revolutionary situation that leads to revolution. What, generally speaking, are the symptoms of a revolutionary situation? We shall certainly not be mistaken if we indicate the following three major symptoms: (1) when it is impossible for the ruling classes to maintain their rule without any change; when there is a crisis, in one form or another, among the “upper classes”, a crisis in the policy of the ruling class, leading to a fissure through which the discontent and indignation of the oppressed classes burst forth. For a revolution to take place, it is usually insufficient for “the lower classes not to want” to live in the old way; it is also necessary that “the upper classes should be unable” to live in the old way; (2) when the suffering and want of the oppressed classes have grown more acute than usual; (3) when, as a consequence of the above causes, there is a considerable increase in the activity of the masses, who uncomplainingly allow themselves to be robbed in “peace time”, but, in turbulent times, are drawn both by all the circumstances of the crisis and by the “upper classes” themselves into independent historical action.

    The key point here is the independent activity of the masses. In the “American” context, this means people are doing things without the Democratic ‘Party’ and its “Left” fringes egging them on. Is this the case right now? While it is the clear the Democrats have tried to benefit from the protests in one form or another, it does not seem to me it is completely driven by them. My experience at major protests like OWS is that, when it is clearly controlled by Democrats, all they do is continuously stress that “non-violence” Gene Sharp crap, as if they’re only worried about looking bad in front of their handlers when they have to go back and make a report to them. It seems unthinkable to me the Democratic ‘Party’ and the “Left” they have under their thumb is encouraging setting buildings on fire, so it must be other forces at work, people who genuinely want to see the bourgeois state up in flames.

    Lenin remarks in other places that, during the 1905 revolutionary situation, the masses themselves were even in front of the Bolsheviks. This, even with Lenin telling people to pour acid on the police. When the masses don’t even need to be told now is the time for revolutionary violence, this is when a revolutionary organization can step in and lead the people into a decisive confrontation with the state. Are we there yet? I don’t think so, but it does appear that things could change, especially if there is a lot of anger after the elections, in which both sides are already preparing narratives that the election is just a farce (which, of course, it is).

    Talk of “accelerationism” throws a blanket of confusion over theoretical discussion about revolution. IMO, it should simply be avoided, as it is not a useful term, and whatever kernels of truth contained in someone’s ideas about what “accelerationism” is will only be obscured by other conceptions that contain a bunch of nonsense.

    • ☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆OP
      6•4 years ago

      I agree that accelerationaism is not a well defined concept, but I do see it thrown around which means that it is worth addressing. I agree with all your points, and I think the key point in the article is that it’s important to craft the message in a way that will appeal to the masses.

    • @SovietIntl
      3•4 years ago

      Right a thing about what you said is that I remember seeing a video of the anarcho communist YouTuber Re-education talking about how some leftists were calling for civil war and in the video he proceeded to describe brutal things that happened in the Yugoslav wars. What I was thinking is it’s the masses that decide when they want to be violent, all the party does is organize the masses’ violence towards specific points. The thing is a lot of leftists are probably not aggressive enough and the ones who call for violence do not call for it out of blind hatred but through an analysis of contradictions that cannot be reconciled peacefully.

      Watching that video made me question his aversion to Revolutionary violence as if Communists could even call for war without mass support. Right now in the United States we already have the opposition willingly targeting protestors and this guy would have us sit tight hunker down and expect relief from a source that does not exist, because “leftists don’t know how harsh war is.”