"Communism is the greatest evil unleashed on humanity" (3 Viewers)

[Apey MatrixElf]

i like communism......

but would much prefer a dictatorship -
privided i'm the dictator, that is

 

[melanieeeee.]

Q. can communism work in a particular country indepentantly or does it require world participation.

 

[Zeitgeist308]

Ronin, to begin let me just say that I am disappointed by your critique. I think it is very juvenile and superficial. I would love to know as to where this list summary of "Marxist Dogma" is copy and pasted from. I've seen it before and their are a few points of contention I have with it which I will raise as I go along.

Now, to respond to the content of your criticisms;

#1. Economic class is the most important feature of society.

Let me begin by saying that point 1 here doesn't seem to carry but weight or content and is very simplified. Questions such as what is society, what comprises a “feature" of society, what determines “importance” remain unanswered. This is of course impossible to mention in such a brief summary but are questions which also need to be answered for a more in-depth understanding.

This point of Marxism is probably the saddest assumption that one can come towards. Right here you have admission that Marxism is a materialistic cult that believes economics trumps everything in society. Need I say more?

Onto your response now, which has absolutely no depth or content. All you've managed to do is attempted to mock Marxism as a “materialistic cult that believes economics trumps everything in society” reporting to claim that there is no need to say more. The reality is however that there is lots more to say.


On your allegation of Marxism as a “materialistic cult”, I do not get your point. Are you trying to criticise philosophical materialism? If so you need to elaborate as to why philosophical materialism is not an adequate philosophical position. Flowing from this, are you implying that society is more than the material? If not, why then is materialism an inadequate position from which to analyse it?

#2. All classes are defined as their relationship to means of production

Again I would like as to know as to where you got this definition from. Marxists say that at the most fundamental level class is defined as a group of individuals defined by their relation to the means of production and subsequently, labour. Despite this Marx used the term class to apply to many other groups not defined in this never narrow and simplistic manner. A good article to read on the subject is Marx's Use of Class by Bertell Ollman


Now onto your criticism of this "plank of Marxism". Honestly this is so embarrassing, I don't know where to start, but I'll take a crack.

All of Marx's classes are defined as their relationship to means of production. Not the actual classes as themselves.

How does this even make sense. Basically you've said "Marx defines 'class' in a manner different to how I define 'class', therefore Marx is wrong". What is to say that your definition of "class" is actually referring to the "actual classes themselves"?

This invented concept is false.

Why is it false?
Why does it being an "invented concept" (what ever that means) have any bearing on the discussion at hand?
Aren't mainstream sociological definitions of class equally invented or does the concept of class exist independently of sociological analysis in some platonic realm?

Classes are defined by their role and contribution towards society and in return (or lack thereof) their treatment.

Couldn't I as you have done above retort by saying that: "All of your classes are defined by their role and contribution towards society and in return their treatment, and as a result not the actual classes themselves."


You can define class anyway you want but that doesn't mean it will be any more or less correct than any other definition. Different definitions of class do however have different utility depending on their purpose. Marx, in trying to understand historical development and social revolution defined class in a particular way. Bourgeois sociologists do the same by defining class by means of abstract income brackets with it's use being found in electoral campaigning,the writing up of budgets, the determining of levels of taxation and so on.

In a socialist system people who are not faithful to the system or party are cut short of their potential. [...] Under the communist model the proletariat will never enterprise to own the means of production. Instead they will be brainwashed into believing that everyone owns it, when in reality it's the restrictive and tyrannical single parties that are always signature to all Marxist systems that own everything. Go figure.

Straw Man

In democratic capitalism, people are at liberty to reach their potential (they are also subject to the chaos inherent in the system) and own the means of production.

(Assuming the above for the sake of argument), of course those you fail to do so or have a limited potential (which according to your above postulate comprise the vast majority of the population) are doomed to wage-slavery at the benefit of the employer.

Peasants are stuck in rural idiocy

Once again this is a misrepresentation. Marx's position on the peasantry altered according to circumstance. If you so desire I could quite easily quote some examples of this change in perspective, at the moment I'm pressed for time however, some can be found in Ollman's article I linked to above.

Farmers of the developed world are not stuck in rural 'idiocy'.

This is not true. “Farmers” may fall into one of three classes, with corresponding political potentials.

Firstly their exists the large landowning class who employ labour for the tilling of the land. They are inherently reactionary as a class and form a sort of rural bourgeoisie

Secondly there exist (though on a smaller scale in the real world than ever before) the “small-peasantry” who own their own plot of land and work it by means of their own labour and that of their family (not regularly employing wage labour for the task). This group are not in and of themselves revolutionary or reactionary, concerned more with it's own small plot of land and fluctuating between support for the bourgeoisie and the proletariat.

Finally there are landless peasants or agriculture labourers. These individuals are members of the proletariat proper and are revolutionary as a class. The question how readily this revolutionary potential is realised is another question entirely however.

#4. All History is the history of class struggle, this is known as historical materialism

Again, where did you get this point from? Historical Materialism is much more than simply the recognition of history as a class struggle.

This is Karl Marx's attempt at re-writing history to support his dogma. An actual plausible method of History is apolitical.

Here you show your own ignorance of the topic of which you are speaking. Marx first set down his Materialist Conception of History in the German Ideology at a time when his political views had not reached maturity and Marx was still passing over his political liberalism and abandoning the Young Hegelians. In short, Marx's political conclusions are a product of his conception of history and not the other way round.

Likewise the idea that every subject in history is due to class struggle is just downright stupid.

Something Marxists do not believe, once again showing your complete ignorance on the subject.

According to the materialistic conception of history, the production and reproduction of real life constitutes in the last instance the determining factor of history. Neither Marx nor I ever maintained more. Now when someone comes along and distorts this to mean that the economic factor is the sole determining factor, he is converting the former proposition into a meaningless, abstract and absurd phrase. The economic situation is the basis but the various factors of the superstructure – the political forms of the class struggles and its results – constitutions, etc., established by victorious classes after hard-won battles – legal forms, and even the reflexes of all these real struggles in the brain of the participants, political, jural, philosophical theories, religious conceptions and their further development into systematic dogmas – all these exercize an influence upon the course of historical struggles, and in many cases determine for the most part their form. There is a reciprocity between all these factors in which, finally, through the endless array of contingencies (i.e., of things and events whose inner connection with one another is so remote, or so incapable of proof, that we may neglect it, regarding it as nonexistent) the economic movement asserts itself as necessary. Were this not the case, the application of the history to any given historical period would be easier than the solution of a simple equation of the first degree.​

We ourselves make our own history, but, first of all, under very definite presuppositions and conditions. Among these are the economic, which are finally decisive. But there are also the political, etc. Yes, even the ghostly traditions, which haunt the minds of men play a role albeit not a decisive one. The Prussian state arose and developed also through historical, in the last instance, economic causes. One could hardly, however, assert without pedantry that among the many petty principalities of North Germany, just Brandenburg was determined by economic necessity and not by other factors also (before all, its involvement in virtue of its Prussian possessions, with Poland and therewith international political relations – which were also decisive factors in the creation of the Austrian sovereign power) to become the great power in which was to be embodied the economic, linguistic and, since the Reformation, also the religious differences of North and South. It would be very hard to attempt to explain by economic causes, without making ourselves ridiculous, the existence of every petty German state of the past or present, or the origin of the shifting of consonants in High-German, which reinforced the differences that existed already in virtue of the geographical separating wall formed by the mountains from Sudeten to Taunus.​

[...]​

I should further like to beg of you to study the theory from its original sources and not at second hand. It is really much easier. Marx hardly wrote a thing in which this theory does not play a part. The Eighteenth Brumaire of Bonaparte is an especially remarkable example of its application. There are many relevant passages also in Capital. In addition, permit me to call your attention to my own writings, Herrn E. Dühring’s Umwälzung der Wissenschaft and L. Feuerbach und der Ausgang der klassischen deutschen Philosophie where I give the most comprehensive exposition of historical materialism which to my knowledge exists anywhere.​

Marx and I are partly responsible for the fact that at times our disciples have laid more weight upon the economic factor than belongs to it. We were compelled to emphasize this main principle in opposition; to our opponents who denied it, and there wasn’t always time, place and occasion to do justice to the other factors in the reciprocal interaction. But just as soon as it was a matter of the presentation of an historical chapter, that is to say, of practical application, things became quite different; there, no error was possible. - Engels, Letter to J. Bloch (1890)​

1. By economic relations, which we regard as the determining basis of the history of society, we understand the way in which human beings in a definite society produce their necessities of life and exchange the products among themselves (in so far as division of labor exists). Consequently the whole technique of production and transportation is therein included. According to our conception, this technique determines the character and method of exchange, further, the distribution of the products and therewith, after the dissolution of gentile society, the division into classes, therewith, the relationships of master and slave, therewith, the state, politics, law, etc. Under economic relations are included further, the geographical foundations upon which they develop and actually inherited remains of earlier economic stages of development which have, persisted, often through tradition only or vis inertia, and also, naturally, the external milieu surrounding this social form.​

[...]​

We regard the economic conditions as conditioning, in the last instance, historical development. But race is itself an economic factor. But there are two points here which must not be overlooked.
(a) The political, legal, philosophical, religious, literary, artistic, etc., development rest upon the economic. But they all react upon one another and upon the economic base. It is not the case that the economic situation is the cause, alone active, and everything else only a passive effect. Rather there is a reciprocal interaction with a fundamental economic necessity which in the last instance always asserts itself. The state, e.g., exerts its influence through tariffs, free trade, good or bad taxation. Even that deadly supineness and impotence of the German philistine which arose out of the miserable economic situation of Germany from 1648 to 1830 and which expressed itself first in pietism, then in sentimentalism and crawling servility before prince and noble, were not without their economic effects. They constituted one of the greatest hindrances to an upward movement and were only cleared out of the way by the revolutionary and Napoleonic wars which made the chronic misery acute. Hence, it is not true, as some people here and there conveniently imagine, that economic conditions have an automatic effect. Men make their own history, but in a given, conditioning milieu, upon the basis of actual relations already extant, among which, the economic relations, no matter how much they are influenced by relations of a political and ideological order, are ultimately decisive, constituting a red thread which runs through all the other relations and enabling us to understand them. - Engels, Letter to Starkenburg (1895)

#5. The state is the means whereby the ruling class forcibly maintains its rule over the other classes.

So I guess the communist state is the epitome of this ideal? Where it slaughters it's own subjects to ensure it's generally harsh and unwanted rule? So that explains why these systems require the removal of entire classes? So you can train the young men to be young believers? Sounds like a form of facism to me.

Again you blatantly and unashamedly show off your ignorance of what you are arguing against. Marx and Engels defined the higher stage of communism (the "lower" being subsequently reffered to as socialism) as being stateless as when classes wither away, the state will do the same along side it.


Also, please stop the straw men, all it does is make me think you are desperate to score points without providing any real or relevant arguments.

#6 Early man hunter/gatherer was communist All barbarism was due to the rule of chiefs - Good Society in history was communist All bad society in history can be blamed on not being communist.

All of the above is either incoherent or false.


Early hunter-gatherer society was not communism but what Marx and Engels reffered to as primitive communism due to the social formation's lacking wither economic classes or a state formation.


What does "All barbarism was due to the rule of chiefs" supposed to mean? Where in Marx or Engels do you get this idea from?


Finally your claim that "Good Society in history was communist All bad society in history can be blamed on not being communist." not only makes little sense but is incorrect. For example, Marxists acknowledge capitalism as progressive during the 17th, 18th, 19th and (some) subsequently, even the 20th Century in-so-far as it allowed for the transcendence of feudalism, the creation of a world market and the development of means of production, creating the material basis for communist society.

I don't even need to tell you how wrong this is. It's fabricated bullshit. Pure and simple.

"I'm waiting for the evidence"

I'm also waiting for the evidence that human dynamics from a hunter gather society can directly apply to a settlement society.

They don't necessarily. The fundamental "dynamic" of "settlement society" is the class strugle, a factor absent from primitive society.

#7 Struggles in history are mostly class struggles

Your criticism of this point is null since I've never heard such a thing asserted by any Marxist. See Engels above for more details.

#8 New classes gain power by struggle.

No. Many middle classes in history came about by trade. Lower classes come about as a result consequence, and mostly not from being placed there (tin foil hat theory).

"Middle classes" and "Lower classes" aren't ruling classes (ie. the class that holds power), are they?

In origin, many upper classes gained their place by being the best.

The historical evidence in support of this is....?

Aristocracy literally means rule by the best of.

So you conclude that "upper classes gained their place by being the best" from the etymological origins of the name of a former ruling class?

#9 Capitalism creates the proletariat who have nothing to sell but their labor by bankrupting the artisan classes and the petty bourgeoisie and driving them into the proletariat.

*My emphasis added*


Funny that despite Marx defining a class by means of a relationship to the means of production, the word class can be still be used with reference to artisans.

This is pretty much industrophobia on the part of Marx.

Funny that an “industriophobe” actually supported capitalism in-so-far as it presented a victory over feudalism and other pre-capitalist societies (ie. his critical support British Imperialism in India)

The petty bourgeoisie and artisans are still around. So I mean is Marx's promise like the return of jesus? That is, it's never actually going to come.

Marx's original hypothesis of the disappearance of the petit-bourgeoisie has turned out to be incorrect, but this does not change the origins of capitalism being the proletarianisation of the petit-bourgeoisie and the artisan class.

Marx predicted this would happen in the first world countries FIRST, yet no developed nation has yet turned to Communism/Socialism. Ironically it happened in poor countries first.

Firstly, Marx predicted this as in the his lifetime capitalism was still in the process of development expansion and consolidation. Europe stood as the pinnacle of Capitalist development where in the rest of the world capitalist development if it existed at at all with many people's occupying pre-capitalist economic formations.


The fact that many of the countries which where later be integrated into the capitalist world system remain today (or in the time at which their respective "communist" revolutions occurred) "poor" (ie. third world) is irrelevant.


Further, some elements of Marx's original thought, with the above example being one, have been elaborated upon by subsequent Marxists, the relevant example being Trotsky's theory of Combined and Uneven Development.

#11 Historical materialism is the marxist methodology for interpreting history

That is, find something and somehow give Marxism kudos via it. Not a real history methodology at all but rather a pathetic rhetorical device employed by Marx to lead the gullible and uneducated and generally lame

This isn't even a real criticism of the methodology. Come back when you have a real argument to make.

#12 The main feature of socialism is public ownership of the means of production, distribution and exchange.

And since the party owns public ownership, by default they own everything.

I thought the quality of debate might have improved from the straw men on page 1, tunrs out I once again overestimated the posters of this board.

 

[Zeitgeist308]

Q. can communism work in a particular country indepentantly or does it require world participation.

No. The absolutely essential nature of the revolution and subsequently socialism to grow internationally is at the very centre of Marxist theory. Whilst I could quote innumerable subsequent Marxists on this matter (particularly from the Communist Left), I think it's best to let Marx and Engels speak for themselves:

Will it be possible for this revolution to take place in one country alone?

No. By creating the world market, big industry has already brought all the peoples of the Earth, and especially the civilized peoples, into such close relation with one another that none is independent of what happens to the others.

Further, it has co-ordinated the social development of the civilized countries to such an extent that, in all of them, bourgeoisie and proletariat have become the decisive classes, and the struggle between them the great struggle of the day. It follows that the communist revolution will not merely be a national phenomenon but must take place simultaneously in all civilized countries – that is to say, at least in England, America, France, and Germany.

It will develop in each of the these countries more or less rapidly, according as one country or the other has a more developed industry, greater wealth, a more significant mass of productive forces. Hence, it will go slowest and will meet most obstacles in Germany, most rapidly and with the fewest difficulties in England. It will have a powerful impact on the other countries of the world, and will radically alter the course of development which they have followed up to now, while greatly stepping up its pace.

It is a universal revolution and will, accordingly, have a universal range. - Engels, The Principles of Communism​

 

[zstar]

You say scarcity creates these problems yet I wonder why winona ryder stole from that clothing store several years ago? do you think it was because she lived in an enviroment of scaricity? i wonder why the rothschilds still feel the need to covet the world, when they have enough money to feed half of it? human beings are not dogs, you can never fully extinguish our will to compete. when you feed a dog everyday, he become satisfied, but human beings have this insatiable appetite to aquire more and more stuff we don't need.

 

[44Ronin]

Why does it being an "invented concept" (what ever that means) have any bearing on the discussion at hand?

Historical Materialism is a fundamental of Marxist theory. There's no two ways to it. It's the complete intellectual basis on which Marxism sits. Yet it is the lynchpin on his enthymeme.

An Enthymeme is a type of rhetorical Syllogism. All of Marx's evidence is Enthymeme. This evidence is used to manipulate people into accepting his dogma. He cannot prove anything he claims.

Demonstrating Marx's giant Enthymeme is illustrating 'historical materialism' as a pseudo-scientific attempt at creating a historiographical approach aimed at confiming and approving his various theses. How can one make a serious inquiry in history if the method involves accepting pre-determined values (Marxist values) over logic and reason?

The psuedo-history of Marx merely provides ethos to his Enthymeme. The nonsense that people are equals feeds upon Pathos, the feelgood altruism that Marx claims only communism/socialism can deliver (That is the reward just like the bible's heaven.) Captialism is alikened to hell.

An example of Enthymeme is;

Argumentation :

-We were attacked on Sept. 11(Major premise),

-We were justified to go to war against Iraq (Conclusion)

-Saddam was involved in 9/11 (Unstated Minor Premise)

-Us marxists can illustrate through our constructed historical materialism in regards to virtues, that all the actions/systems that brought about justice have similarity to communism.(Major Premise)

-Therefore, communism is the best system of government (Conclusion)

-Communism shares the virtue of these societies/systems of order. (Unstated Minor Premise)

See how Marxists fall for the trap of rhetoric> just as fools fall into the traps of Bush's rhetoric?

It works because the unstated premise is usually taken by the audience unconsciously. Also people cannot argue against the unstated argument because you have not stated it.

Capitalism has no such constructed Enthymeme. It simply is what it is, nothing less, nothing more. No need to brainwash people. .

 

[44Ronin]

you can never fully extinguish our will to compete. when you feed a dog everyday, he become satisfied, but human beings have this insatiable appetite to aquire more and more stuff we don't need.

You obviously do not have much experience with a large number of dogs. Many of them have the natural instinct to eat until they vomit.

 

[44Ronin]

Communism is the social movement of the working class toward it's liberation from the shackles of wage-labour. Please people, read my sig!

So who is going to work then when the majority of society sits idle out of self interest and apathy?

The communist societies have no method of releasing people from working for their living. In fact it was these very communist societies that pioneered labour camps and five year plans. It's a nonsense.

confused ideology......but then again dodge it and say that it wasn't communism....go on...

 

[Cookie182]

You obviously do not have much experience with a large number of dogs. Many of them have the natural instinct to eat until they vomit.

Agreed. Many Dogs instinctively can not control their wants. This extends beyond eating. I know a dog which enjoys fetching/running. As long as you throw the ball, he will chase it. It is an addiction. The owner needs to stop people throwing the ball as he eventually goes beyond the point of physical exhaustion. Once when he was a puppy, they went to far and he collapsed etc. Same goes for my dog with treats. 1 treat. 2 treat. etc etc They don't know when enough is enough. They will continue to eat, even if they are full, until you stop them.

 

[44Ronin]

Agreed. Many Dogs instinctively can not control their wants. This extends beyond eating. I know a dog which enjoys fetching/running. As long as you throw the ball, he will chase it. It is an addiction. The owner needs to stop people throwing the ball as he eventually goes beyond the point of physical exhaustion. Once when he was a puppy, they went to far and he collapsed etc. Same goes for my dog with treats. 1 treat. 2 treat. etc etc They don't know when enough is enough. They will continue to eat, even if they are full, until you stop them.

There's been confirmed reports where german sheperds have been told to stay, and because of circumstances the handlers didn't come back until weeks later and the dog had been found dead where it was instructed to stay.

 

[Zeitgeist308]

human beings are not dogs, you can never fully extinguish our will to compete. when you feed a dog everyday, he become satisfied, but human beings have this insatiable appetite to aquire more and more stuff we don't need.

Zstar, I'm not interested in your argument any more. All it does it continually return to this same premise: "Humans are greedy" or "Humans are competitive". These points have been dealt with prior, noting both their transitory nature and also their compatibility with communism.

 

[Zeitgeist308]

Ronin, Ronin, Ronin, I'm so disappointed. Of all 12 points to which I responded, you reply to only one. What's the deal? Do you think ignoring them covers up your ignorance? Or do you not know how to reply? Either way I don't much care, I feel you have very little to offer in terms of valuable criticism to offer.

On to your post now:

An Enthymeme is a type of rhetorical Syllogism. All of Marx's evidence is Enthymeme. This evidence is used to manipulate people into accepting his dogma. He cannot prove anything he claims.

Before accusing Marx of inability to prove his claims, prove yours first.

Demonstrating Marx's giant Enthymeme is illustrating 'historical materialism' as a pseudo-scientific attempt at creating a historiographical approach aimed at confiming and approving his various theses. How can one make a serious inquiry in history if the method involves accepting pre-determined values (Marxist values) over logic and reason?

The political conclusions of Marxist theory are a product and not the basis or premise of historical materialism. I have stated this above and you yourself admitted it.

The nonsense that people are equals feeds upon Pathos

Show me where Marx makes such claims about humans being equals!

I know you can not because he did not ever claim as such. Unlike you however I can backup my claim with evidence:

What we have to deal with here is a communist society, not as it has developed on its own foundations, but, on the contrary, just as it emerges from capitalist society; which is thus in every respect, economically, morally, and intellectually, still stamped with the birthmarks of the old society from whose womb it emerges. Accordingly, the individual producer receives back from society -- after the deductions have been made -- exactly what he gives to it. What he has given to it is his individual quantum of labor. For example, the social working day consists of the sum of the individual hours of work; the individual labor time of the individual producer is the part of the social working day contributed by him, his share in it. He receives a certificate from society that he has furnished such-and-such an amount of labor (after deducting his labor for the common funds); and with this certificate, he draws from the social stock of means of consumption as much as the same amount of labor cost. The same amount of labor which he has given to society in one form, he receives back in another.​

Here, obviously, the same principle prevails as that which regulates the exchange of commodities, as far as this is exchange of equal values. Content and form are changed, because under the altered circumstances no one can give anything except his labor, and because, on the other hand, nothing can pass to the ownership of individuals, except individual means of consumption. But as far as the distribution of the latter among the individual producers is concerned, the same principle prevails as in the exchange of commodity equivalents: a given amount of labor in one form is exchanged for an equal amount of labor in another form.​

Hence, equal right here is still in principle -- bourgeois right, although principle and practice are no longer at loggerheads, while the exchange of equivalents in commodity exchange exists only on the average and not in the individual case.​

In spite of this advance, this equal right is still constantly stigmatized by a bourgeois limitation. The right of the producers is proportional to the labor they supply; the equality consists in the fact that measurement is made with an equal standard, labor.​

But one man is superior to another physically, or mentally, and supplies more labor in the same time, or can labor for a longer time; and labor, to serve as a measure, must be defined by its duration or intensity, otherwise it ceases to be a standard of measurement. This equal right is an unequal right for unequal labor. It recognizes no class differences, because everyone is only a worker like everyone else; but it tacitly recognizes unequal individual endowment, and thus productive capacity, as a natural privilege. It is, therefore, a right of inequality, in its content, like every right. Right, by its very nature, can consist only in the application of an equal standard; but unequal individuals (and they would not be different individuals if they were not unequal) are measurable only by an equal standard insofar as they are brought under an equal point of view, are taken from one definite side only -- for instance, in the present case, are regarded only as workers and nothing more is seen in them, everything else being ignored. Further, one worker is married, another is not; one has more children than another, and so on and so forth. Thus, with an equal performance of labor, and hence an equal in the social consumption fund, one will in fact receive more than another, one will be richer than another, and so on. To avoid all these defects, right, instead of being equal, would have to be unequal. - Marx, Critique of the Gotha Programme​

the feelgood altruism that Marx claims only communism/socialism can deliver

Again, where can we find such talk from Marx? Would you care to cite some textual reference for us all? Oh, wait, you can't? Of course you can't, why would we expect anything different from Ronin than ignorance and misrepresentation.

-Us marxists can illustrate through our constructed historical materialism in regards to virtues, that all the actions/systems that brought about justice have similarity to communism.(Major Premise)

Where can I find this premise in Marx? What is this hazy notion of "justice", certainly something of which Marxists do not speak. What is this phrase "similarity to communism" meant to indicate? Surely capitalism was progressive insofar as it presented victory and development of the productive forces of society beyond feudalism but this does not make it any more similar to communism, nor for that manner any more "just".

-Therefore, communism is the best system of government (Conclusion)

Again you have no idea of what you are on about. Communism is not a system of government, it is both a political movement and a hypothetical future mode of production. Nor is communism the "best" mode of production, what ever the hell that means.

Capitalism has no such constructed Enthymeme. It simply is what it is, nothing less, nothing more. No need to brainwash people.

Please Ronin, for your sake and mine, stop posting this nonsense. Not only does it make little sense your ignorance on the matter is embarrassing.

 

[Zeitgeist308]

To all, I will no longer be posting in this thread from Monday. I am now back at school and have no time to contend with this bullshit. I have defended my position for 40+ pages, making over 100 posts in this thread alone, as such my withdrawal is not a forfeit on the basis of my inability to defend my position any longer but rather a forfeit on the basis of exhaustion and inability to waste my time and energy here with complete morons.

For those who have been following this thread I hope my contributions have been of value and have helped answer some of the very common questions and arguments levelled at Marxism.

 

[44Ronin]

To all, I will no longer be posting in this thread from Monday. I am now back at school and have no time to contend with this bullshit. I have defended my position for 40+ pages, making over 100 posts in this thread alone, as such my withdrawal is not a forfeit

Good, you're nothing but a mere denialist who is attached to the cult of Marx. Take your sick and delusional idolatry elsewhere.

:burn:

Marx is scum and his followers are sheep.

Before accusing Marx of inability to prove his claims, prove yours first.

Easy. Marx inspired most of the slaughterers of the 20th century. Far outshadowing even the Nazi cult.

The political conclusions of Marxist theory are a product and not the basis or premise of historical materialism. I have stated this above and you yourself admitted it.

They are a product. PRODUCT PRODUCT PRODUCT of DOGMA. The basis of 'Historical Materialism' is to focus on aspects that are central to Marxist economic/class theory. Like you said it is a product. This is the product of the meek who are idealist and delusional and get taken advantage of. Baa Baa!

Where can I find this premise in Marx? What is this hazy notion of "justice", certainly something of which Marxists do not speak. What is this phrase "similarity to communism" meant to indicate? Surely capitalism was progressive insofar as it presented victory and development of the productive forces of society beyond feudalism but this does not make it any more similar to communism, nor for that manner any more "just".

You can find it throughout the cult of the reds. Historical Materialism is going back to history to find conjeccture to support the dogma. Historical Materialism HAS NO OTHER FUNCTION. That is why people don't take it seriously.

Marx is the champion of fools.





I will come %100 clean here. Since you won't be posting any more (out of spineless cowardice..) I will say this.

I hate you and your kind now and FOREVER. I FUCKING HATE MARXISTS with a passion. Everytime I see the S.A wankers at my university I want to literally spit on them. It's their fucked dogma, It's your fucked dogma. You share it and you blindly follow your fucked up pipedream. Marx endorses violence as the method of social change.

Because of this, by default, you are associated with the scum of the earth who think it is okay to murder children and teachers in cold blood on a regular basis. I am in part Turkish in heritage.

The PKK were started by a Marxist ideology. These scumbags were directly inspired by Marxist readings. The same scumbags who launched a war of terror against the Turkish people. They shot and murdered children and teachers in cold blood.

Marxism has forever earnt my hate for this.

In spite of this advance, this equal right is still constantly stigmatized by a bourgeois limitation

Quit trying to attribute the enemies of Marxism as the 'bourgeois limitation'. Quit waxing lyrical. Marxism in itself, is responsible for causing my hate towards it. Quit the tin foil hat denialism and the high horse mentality. I hate Marxism because I hate Marxism. No rhetoric was fed to me.

So now, why don't you be a good socialist and go run off and fucking wear your Che' Beret thinking it gives you some semblance of intellectual superiority or some kind of badge of virtue.

 

[Silver Persian]

To all, I will no longer be posting in this thread from Monday. I am now back at school and have no time to contend with this bullshit. I have defended my position for 40+ pages, making over 100 posts in this thread alone, as such my withdrawal is not a forfeit on the basis of my inability to defend my position any longer but rather a forfeit on the basis of exhaustion and inability to waste my time and energy here with complete morons.

For those who have been following this thread I hope my contributions have been of value and have helped answer some of the very common questions and arguments levelled at Marxism.

Poor Zeitgeist...you've attempted t leave this thread about three times now, but keep getting dragged back in by people who either can't read or haven't read what appeared on the first five pages...

 

[Zeitgeist308]

Good, you're nothing but a mere denialist who is attached to the cult of Marx. Take your sick and delusional idolatry elsewhere.

The cult of Marx indeed...

Neither of us cares a straw for popularity. A proof of this is for example, that, because of aversion to any personality cult, I have never permitted the numerous expressions of appreciation from various countries with which I was pestered during the existence of the International to reach the realm of publicity, and have never answered them, except occasionally by a rebuke. When Engels and I first joined the secret Communist Society we made it a condition that everything tending to encourage superstitious belief in authority was to be removed from the statutes - Marx, "Against Personality Cults," Letter to W. Blos (1877)
​

Before accusing Marx of inability to prove his claims, prove yours first.

Easy. Marx inspired most of the slaughterers of the 20th century. Far outshadowing even the Nazi cult.

How does that above prove that "All of Marx's evidence is Enthymeme. This evidence is used to manipulate people into accepting his dogma. He cannot prove anything he claims." Maybe you misunderstand what I was asking, or maybe you don't know what you are talking about anymore.

They are a product. PRODUCT PRODUCT PRODUCT of DOGMA. The basis of 'Historical Materialism' is to focus on aspects that are central to Marxist economic/class theory. Like you said it is a product. This is the product of the meek who are idealist and delusional and get taken advantage of. Baa Baa!

You aren't even taking this seriously any more. Grow up and accept that you don't know what you are talking about and stop wasting both my and your own time with this childish stupidity.

Everytime I see the S.A wankers at my university I want to literally spit on them.

Just to repeat, I do not support in any way the Socialist Alliance. I am of the opinion that their politics are in content (not form), bourgeois. However this is a discussion for another time.

It's their fucked dogma, It's your fucked dogma. You share it and you blindly follow your fucked up pipedream.

Obviously you don't realise it but everyone else following this thread does. I am not the dogmatist, the dogmatist is you.
You who copy and pastes a list of inaccurate traits of Marxist theory.
You who labels them "wrong" and "bullshit" without evidence You who are unable to elaborate your criticisms beyond a purely superficial and juvenile level.
You who is constantly swearing, expressing an irrational hatred toward Marxists and making yourself look like a fool by such comments as the above quotation.

I am in part Turkish in heritage.

The PKK were started by a Marxist ideology. These scumbags were directly inspired by Marxist readings. The same scumbags who launched a war of terror against the Turkish people. They shot and murdered children and teachers in cold blood.

Marxism has forever earnt my hate for this.

As a Left-Communist I would also condemn the actions of the PKK. In my opinion they are a nationalist murder gang with nothing to offer the working class. As such it is not at all appropriate that you associate the PKK with my politics.

On a side note I think it inapproprate for you to claim that the PKK were "directly inspired by Marxist readings". The PKK and it's official ideology of Marxist-Leninism is fairly widely accepted to have been merely a means to extract funding from the USSR. Since the subsequent collapse of the USSR, the PKK have dropped most of this cover and now pander more (than ever) to Kurdish nationalism and militant Islamism.

So now, why don't you be a good socialist and go run off and fucking wear your Che' Beret thinking it gives you some semblance of intellectual superiority or some kind of badge of virtue.

My opinion that the Cuban "revolution" was bourgeois and that Che Guervara was anti-working class has been long established.

Funny how you still ignore my challange to respond to your other 11 points from before...

Poor Zeitgeist...you've attempted t leave this thread about three times now, but keep getting dragged back in by people who either can't read or haven't read what appeared on the first five pages...

From Monday onwards, It's for real, no matter what is posted. On that note:

If any of you do have arguments you would like to pose or questions you would like answered, please send me a PM and I'll respond in time.

 

[lionking1191]

Easy. Marx inspired most of the slaughterers of the 20th century. Far outshadowing even the Nazi cult.

so...we should condemn Darwin for eugenics?

 

[lionking1191]

My opinion that the Cuban "revolution" was bourgeois and that Che Guervara was anti-working class has been long established.

it is rather convenient to defend marxist and marxist leninist visions by maintaining that they have never been truly realised in their pure, unblemished form. to be fair, it hasn't. but that leads to the biggest criticism of communism - it is hardly a pragmatic form of social organization on a large, national scale. humans, by nature, are lazy, greedy and self-centred. that is why communism, in strict sense of the term, has never and will never work.

 

[Keepleft]

You obviously do not have much experience with a large number of dogs. Many of them have the natural instinct to eat until they vomit.

In China, IF they get the chance:-
http://animalsaviors.org/index.html

http://animalsaviors.org/haveyoursay.html

* Not for the sensitive or kids.

 

[44Ronin]

The cult of Marx indeed...

Neither of us cares a straw for popularity. A proof of this is for example, that, because of aversion to any personality cult, I have never permitted the numerous expressions of appreciation from various countries with which I was pestered during the existence of the International to reach the realm of publicity, and have never answered them, except occasionally by a rebuke. When Engels and I first joined the secret Communist Society we made it a condition that everything tending to encourage superstitious belief in authority was to be removed from the statutes - Marx, "Against Personality Cults," Letter to W. Blos (1877)​

​

I don't care that you and marx don't care about popularity. The cult of Marx is FACT.
Believing everything Marx did or said is a sign that you are part of that cult.

Cults do not equate to popularity

How does that above prove that "All of Marx's evidence is Enthymeme. This evidence is used to manipulate people into accepting his dogma. He cannot prove anything he claims." Maybe you misunderstand what I was asking, or maybe you don't know what you are talking about anymore.

The unstated premise in the argumentation is something that all of his followers beleive in, that somehow Marx has the key to a progressive future that will benefit society. This premise is false because it can clearly be demonstrated that people who took the lead from Marx have done far more evil than any other groups in the entire history of mankind. Furthermore to prove this, people who Idolise Marx are like the proverbial ostrich with their heads in the sand.......or dorothy from the wizard of oz "theres no place like home theres no place like home". All of their responses are STANDARDISED, Your "true communism has never been implemented' claim is a giant fucking proof of this enthymeme. You've been programmed into this behaviour by the rhetoric.


It's a little hard to understand if you haven't studied classical rhetoric, but I encourage you to think about it. over time....look at it this way, if you read some classical poltics and rhetoric, you'd widen your understandings.

You aren't even taking this seriously any more. Grow up and accept that you don't know what you are talking about and stop wasting both my and your own time with this childish stupidity.

Sure, shrug off and ignore/deny the massive relation between Marxism and Violence. It just proves your delusion.

Just to repeat, I do not support in any way the Socialist Alliance. I am of the opinion that their politics are in content (not form), bourgeois. However this is a discussion for another time.

They are similiar to you, in the fact they think Marx is always right, and like you are staunch denialists. I never made the direct connection, I just said they are your kind. Like a suite of cards, you are the ace and they are the queen. Different, but the same.

Obviously you don't realise it but everyone else following this thread does. I am not the dogmatist, the dogmatist is you.

Oh really? If you aren't a dogmatist then own up that Marx is partly responsible for bloodshed. Quit dodging the issue.

You who labels them "wrong" and "bullshit" without evidence

How many bodies do we need to count?

As a Left-Communist I would also condemn the actions of the PKK. In my opinion they are a nationalist murder gang with nothing to offer the working class. As such it is not at all appropriate that you associate the PKK with my politics.

Thing is, ALL socialist and communist movements are nationalistic. Even the beloved Paris Commune of 1871 was nationalist.

And for that matter, Fuck the working class if they think they can lord it over the best brightest and most cunning of our society, good fucking luck to em'. It's when they start to think they can engineer society, dictate liberty and slaughter is when I will be prepared to take a stand against them with force.

Your words are some sick parody where to proletariat are a dumbed down lynch mob that thinks it will effect some real change. Yeah this change is apparent. Death, suffering and misery.

All the evidence as to the nature of Marxists/Leninists/etc can be found in the suffering the Marx has ultimately been responsible for. Dodge all you want.

On a side note I think it inapproprate for you to claim that the PKK were "directly inspired by Marxist readings". The PKK and it's official ideology of Marxist-Leninism is fairly widely accepted to have been merely a means to extract funding from the USSR. Since the subsequent collapse of the USSR, the PKK have dropped most of this cover and now pander more (than ever) to Kurdish nationalism and militant Islamism.

Err.........no. You fail, the PKK always were 'nationalist', albeit not having a nation. The Marxist faction of the PKK is still around. I remind you that the times when they slaughtered innocent teachers and children was under the direction of Ocalan, the marxist, when he claimed to be Marixst. Before the victory of the collapse of the Soviet Union. Just because Ocalan changed his tune doesn't mean he didn't believe in the original cause.

Actually, when they removed the hammer and sickle in 95' and championed what they defined as ' democracy' they toned down their attacks on civillians, Goes to show.

Funny how you still ignore my challange to respond to your other 11 points from before..

I covered them. Historical Materialism is a pseudo science. The artisan class still exists everywhere. The proletariat hasn't taken over. So on and so forth......if you can't handle simple answers don't claim I did not respond to you. Are you arguing about my method of articulation while ignoring the fact that Marx sown the rotten seed of the 20th century?

Come clean, All you need to do to show virtue is to admit that Marx inspired many evils. Which is a proven fact.

If you cannot acknowledge that then I am fully entitled to call you a delusional denialist.