A Critique of the Communist Manifesto. - Politics Forum.org | PoFo

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#14830092
Saeko wrote:The reason they aren't responding is because this critique is terrible. It reads like a highschool student is regurgitating the anti-communist propaganda he got from his teachers.


You think you could do better?

It doesn't use pretentiously obtuse language, but it covers and refutes all the main errors in Marx's wonky logic. If that is something that any high schooler can do then what does that make Marx fanboys something akin to pre-schoolers?
#14830095
SolarCross wrote:You think you could do better?


Yes. I could do MUCH better.

It doesn't use pretentiously obtuse language, but it covers and refutes all the main errors in Marx's wonky logic. If that is something that any high schooler can do then what does that make Marx fanboys something akin to pre-schoolers?


No doubt this was made by a free-market retard. This is no critique. He completely misrepresents/misunderstands Marxism, and rather than criticizing the reasoning, he is using it as a sounding board to promote his own ideology.
#14830097
SolarCross wrote:It doesn't use pretentiously obtuse language, but it covers and refutes all the main errors in Marx's wonky logic.


I don't think saeko is correct about why people aren't responding. You are asking people to give an opinion to an essay on another website without giving your own opinion to it first. I have given it a quick read and agree with most of it. Someone who doesn't wouldn't read past the first paragraph unless you address the essay first. That is how PoFo usually works.
#14830100
Saeko wrote:Yes. I could do MUCH better.


Okay let's see it.

Saeko wrote:No doubt this was made by a free-market retard. This is no critique. He completely misrepresents/misunderstands Marxism, and rather than criticizing the reasoning, he is using it as a sounding board to promote his own ideology.


From this and his other writings the author appears to be comfortable with government playing a role providing or managing security, law enforcement and major infrastructure. He is a Keynesian rather than a Rothbardian. His political economy is rather conventional.

I don't see any validity in your accusation that he is misrepresenting or misunderstanding Marxism.
#14830101
Yeah I stopped reading pretty quickly, it wasn't worth my time.

Besides the painful design choices the criticisms are pretty superficial and treat a lot of his own beliefs and assumptions as inherently true and not in need of any defense. When making a critique you can't just assert your own political opinions as damning evidence.

At one point he counters Marx's point about the alienation of labor of by simply asserting that he feels pride when he sees products on store shelves. That's not a logical argument and rather misses the point.
#14830108
Saeko wrote:I actually read the whole thing.


But you're not a Marxist. You're a fascist. I doubt Marx would have approved of Stalin or Soviet Russia in the name of Communism. The manifesto was really created to address equality for workers and a share of wealth in the industrial age when workers rights was none existent and poverty was high.
#14830216
B0ycey wrote:But you're not a Marxist. You're a fascist. I doubt Marx would have approved of Stalin or Soviet Russia in the name of Communism. The manifesto was really created to address equality for workers and a share of wealth in the industrial age when workers rights was none existent and poverty was high.


Marx would have disapproved of Stalin only because Stalin did not go far enough, Stalin's fault was that he was a relative moderate.

Also I think it is a naive reading of the manifesto to say it was "created to address equality for workers and a share of wealth in the industrial age when workers rights was none existent and poverty was high."

The likes of Marx were just attempting to decieve the workers into being their (unpaid) zealot army that would put them into control. You should read Marx with the same cynicism you would have while reading Ron Hubbard, Joseph Smith junior or Mohammad.
#14830263
SolarCross wrote:Marx would have disapproved of Stalin only because Stalin did not go far enough, Stalin's fault was that he was a relative moderate.


In historic terms Marx does get a raw deal actually. He was more a philosopher and a political predictor rather than a revolutionist. He was born in an era that being part of a new movement was deemed cool. A impressionist for the working class perhaps.

Nonetheless being a stateless German why wouldn't the 'League of the just' or Communist League' appeal to him? A stateless society that regarded everyone equal regardless of class during a period of history where money was to be made and workers could be replaced by machines. Marx, just like anyone, was looking for his own personal interests. And that was for a new order.

Also I think it is a naive reading of the manifesto to say it was "created to address equality for workers and a share of wealth in the industrial age when workers rights was none existent and poverty was high."


Naive? What else could it be? The manifesto was a pamphlet of a new idea that could be distributed throughout the continent. Its purpose was to appeal to the working class because they were the numbers. Many people have analysed the manifesto and made their own interpretations of what it stood for. To me it was created to bring down the establishment through the uprising of the poor and unite Europe into one entity. And this would have been in Marx's interests. So in order to do this he had to dangle a carrot in front of the working class. And that was a society of total equality and the removal of poverty by eliminating capital and giving it to the state to share out fairly.

The likes of Marx were just attempting to decieve the workers into being their (unpaid) zealot army that would put them into control. You should read Marx with the same cynicism you would have while reading Ron Hubbard, Joseph Smith junior or Mohammad.


Communism (and by this I mean real Communism not the bullshit that Soviet Russia created) is flawed for three reasons. Two of which were addressed by your link. Firstly it goes against human nature. Humans natually look for self interests before that of others. You are asking people to defy human instinct. Two, Communism doesn't reward. And this too goes against human instinct. Who in their right mind is going to invest in progress or new ideas for no reward? More importantly who is going to do more difficult or challeging work when someone else does less work but has equal benefits? And three, the power goes to the state. And unfortunately would go corrupt without any form of competition. As proven over and over again with dictator governments throughout history.

Marx's has already been proven wrong. Capitalism still exists today and will never be removed unless there is a major catastrophe (WWIII or a meteorite hitting the earth for example). The way money works, it's value only decreases during a financial crisis and adjusts to fit its new climate. It is forever resetting itself. The capital model is quite efficient actually in terms of longevity but it will always create bubbles due to it being a model of imaginary wealth. But not only that, another thing Capitalism has going for it to keep it alive is it is a reward based system and this goes with human instinct.
#14830267
More importantly who is going to do more difficult or challeging work when someone else does less work but has equal benefits?


Plenty of people do sadly, all working class people in the UK do more work than all desk sitting southern office swine and they do it for less pay than the office swine get, you are describing capitalism not socialism.

It is capitalism that does not reward hard work, people who do nothing (landlords capitalists etc) get the most money, people do do very little get a fair amount of money (office swine) and people who do the back breaking labour that keeps the world going get min wage (working class people).
#14830278
Decky wrote:Plenty of people do sadly, all working class people in the UK do more work than all desk sitting southern office swine and they do it for less pay than the office swine get, you are describing capitalism not socialism.

It is capitalism that does not reward hard work, people who do nothing (landlords capitalists etc) get the most money, people do do very little get a fair amount of money (office swine) and people who do the back breaking labour that keeps the world going get min wage (working class people).


I was describing a flaw in Communism not Capitalism. But do you regard the value of a man's Labour by the physicality of the job? Is the job of someone who packs computer software into a box to ship out more valued than the programmer who made the software to begin with because he doesn't sit by a desk?
Naturally both jobs are needed so both jobs have some value to them but few would have the ability to create the software - but to ship out most could do it with ease. So you need to reward the programmer for the years of training he needs to go through to become a programmer. If you make both jobs equal, he would perhaps endorse programming as a pastime and also become a packer for ease resulting in no social progress in the long run.

What the poor need is what we in Europe already have (I know the US are backward here). Tax breaks for the poor and subsidies for low pay, free education to give every member the chance to progress in society and universal health care. Capitalism doesn't prevent any of this. It is not capitalists that are destroying the lives of working class US citizens, it is American policy. Every single President apart from Obama is more interested in lining their own pockets and that of corporations than policies to share out wealth to lower levels. And that is down to US mentality.
#14830501
I was describing a flaw in Communism not Capitalism.


You were definitely not, it is capitalism where hard work is not rewarded not communism. Communism rewards work and those who do not work are sent to the gulag.

Why are we paid less than this parasite?

Image

Or this one?

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Or these scum?

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Capitalism is most definitely a system where those who work get very little and those who do nothing enjoy great wealth. Why are you pretending this is describing a socialist society when it perfectly describes the society we already live in?
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