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#15093867
Julian658 wrote:
We are going around in circles and (as always) I have issues with the feasibility of your proposal. Marx made a brilliant diagnosis, but no one knows what is the most effective therapy. The Utopic last stage of communism sounds very much like a metaphysical state. This is a bit like talking to Plato who believed that an ideal state should be built under the principles of justice. In his opinion, justice assumes that, firstly, the interests of the whole (state) are more important and higher than the interests of the individual. Plato was also an elitist that believed only smart people should rule for the good of society. And lastly, he had this concept of beauty and perfection (see below);

[img]https://static.wixstatic.com/media/7b93c2_87b9ed2076f6483ab8b66b748f27972d~mv2.jpg/v1/fill/w_638,h_479/7b93c2_87b9ed2076f6483ab8b66b748f27972d~mv2.jpg[img]



Well, personally, I'm not that much interested in 'justice' -- many others are worse-off than I am, thanks to capitalism and imperialism, and have more of an interest in justice than I do.


Julian658 wrote:
When I hear you describe communism you are incredibly Platonic. You are having a romantic interest with a near impossibility. And that is the root of my hesitancy. It truly sounds too good to be true. The imperfection of capitalism is so obvious that many seek an alternative, particularly those that have an open to experience personality. You keep saying there is no need for wealth. And that is a stumbling block for me. The only way wealth is not an issue is when wealth becomes redundant.



Your philosophizing here is off-the-mark -- the *point* of a socialist politics, is workers-of-the-world socialism. Such has nothing to do with me personally, except for whatever involvement I may have, such as here at PoFo, at protests, etc.

You're *correct* to say that Plato was an elitist since his proposal resembles Stalinism, or bureaucratic-elitism, from an elite.

You're not understanding that the *point* of an economy is to *produce* -- the remaining political question is who gets to *consume* from that prodution, and what, exactly, and why.

*Wealth* is just 'dead labor', meaning past productivity from labor. The accumulations of *capital* are *irrelevant* to the working class since what's important going-forward is the *capacity* for productivity, which lies in the means of mass industrial production, or 'infrastructure'. A proletarian revolution would turn *all* wealth / capital / exchange values / finance into nothingness, and would control all factories and workplaces, for the sake of human-need social production.


Julian658 wrote:
Like American farmers throwing away crops, milks, and even killing pigs because there is simply too much food. IN fact, one of the penalties of living in a wealthy capitalist nation is the abundance of food. Everyday i have to struggle by not indulging in overeating. AT the office the kitchen is packed with food 24/7 and my wife loves to cook.



Okay, thanks for acknowledging the social ills of capitalism's overproduction.


Julian658 wrote:
You are platonic in your view. You are stuck in the green circle:
[img]https://i.pinimg.com/originals/f4/20/d0/f420d0529790de16417f4f10d3d7f6f9.png[img]



My understanding is that idealism and dualism are *synonymous* since they both posit a realm of causes-and-effects that are *not* based in material reality.

As far as *social reality* goes, I prefer my own 'worldview':


Worldview Diagram

Spoiler: show
Image



---


Julian658 wrote:
It lacks the demands of the market and centralized planning is limited and unidirectional. Very little room to think out of the box. The planners are not vested in the system so they procrastinate and plan poorly. Why dedicate time and effort?



Again you're showing that you're intellectually *beholden* to historical vagaries, namely Stalinism. Stalinism was *not* workers-of-the-world socialism.

Your opinion-making here is ill-founded and erroneous. You're not a socialist.


---


ckaihatsu wrote:
Instead of government bailing-out this middleman mechanism of 'the markets', why doesn't the government just *ask* what people need, and then coordinate production to fulfill these human needs *directly*? It would basically be Stalinism -- an *improvement* over capitalism's chaos -- until the workers can take control of their workplaces themselves.



Julian658 wrote:
Stalin killed or sent farm owners to Siberia and took over farming. The immediate effects of forced collectivization were reduced grain output and almost halved livestock numbers, thus creating major famines throughout the USSR. The implementation of the Utopia is rather difficult.



No one here is calling for a *utopia* -- such would be an *example* of dualism / idealism, since it would be *imaginings* without any regard to how the world actually works.

I'm pleased to say that I've hashed-out many of the theoretical issues and problems involved in a *feasible* realization of workers-of-the-world socialism, which you may want to take a look at sometime, only if so that you can break with your bad habit of imputing *Stalinism* for the *actual* politics that I advocate:


labor credits framework for 'communist supply & demand'

Spoiler: show
Image


https://www.revleft.space/vb/threads/20 ... ost2889338


---


Julian658 wrote:
You need to look up the Kansas City school experiment of the 1990s. IN some instances they spent 40k per student and GOT ZERO in return. It is not the money. Ché Guevara taught peasants how to read under a tree in the forest. What education needs is strict discipline and not wishy washy pink liberalism.



Well, whatever -- these days everyone has the Internet.


---


ckahatsu wrote:
You mentioned how all work is *alienating*, which is a Marxist concept, and now you don't want to *follow-up* on this topic at all?



Julian658 wrote:
Even a King or a Queen get bored. It is human nature. The other side of the coin is doing NOTHING and getting something in return. Is that any better?



Wow -- you really take every opportunity you can get to be a shithead, don't you?

We both referenced Marx's 'alienation', but you'd prefer to go off on tangents. 'Alienation' is *not* simply 'boredom'. It's more about *exploitation*.

'Doing nothing' is the *goal*, which can only happen once we've fully enslaved our machinery to our own purposes. The theory is that such is *impossible* under capitalism, because the system *requires* some form of human labor in order to create capital valuations, so as to perpetuate the system of elitism.

This is *why* we can't just wait-around and expect capitalism to magically turn into socialism -- *that's* dualism / idealism, by the way. If the workers of the world don't *intentionally* *end* capitalism, so as to implement full automation, then it will never happen and capitalism will persist indefinitely.


Julian658 wrote:
I do not disagree. We will get there one day, but it will take some time. Or maybe much less than 200 years. IN this era changes developed from decade to decade rather than from century to century (as in the old days).



(See the previous.)
#15093919
ckaihatsu wrote:Well, personally, I'm not that much interested in 'justice' -- many others are worse-off than I am, thanks to capitalism and imperialism, and have more of an interest in justice than I do.

Your philosophizing here is off-the-mark -- the *point* of a socialist politics, is workers-of-the-world socialism. Such has nothing to do with me personally, except for whatever involvement I may have, such as here at PoFo, at protests, etc.

You're *correct* to say that Plato was an elitist since his proposal resembles Stalinism, or bureaucratic-elitism, from an elite.

You're not understanding that the *point* of an economy is to *produce* -- the remaining political question is who gets to *consume* from that prodution, and what, exactly, and why.

*Wealth* is just 'dead labor', meaning past productivity from labor. The accumulations of *capital* are *irrelevant* to the working class since what's important going-forward is the *capacity* for productivity, which lies in the means of mass industrial production, or 'infrastructure'. A proletarian revolution would turn *all* wealth / capital / exchange values / finance into nothingness, and would control all factories and workplaces, for the sake of human-need social production.

Okay, thanks for acknowledging the social ills of capitalism's overproduction.

My understanding is that idealism and dualism are *synonymous* since they both posit a realm of causes-and-effects that are *not* based in material reality.

As far as *social reality* goes, I prefer my own 'worldview':
Worldview Diagram

Spoiler: show
Image


Again you're showing that you're intellectually *beholden* to historical vagaries, namely Stalinism. Stalinism was *not* workers-of-the-world socialism.

Your opinion-making here is ill-founded and erroneous. You're not a socialist.

No one here is calling for a *utopia* -- such would be an *example* of dualism / idealism, since it would be *imaginings* without any regard to how the world actually works.

I'm pleased to say that I've hashed-out many of the theoretical issues and problems involved in a *feasible* realization of workers-of-the-world socialism, which you may want to take a look at sometime, only if so that you can break with your bad habit of imputing *Stalinism* for the *actual* politics that I advocate:


labor credits framework for 'communist supply & demand'

Spoiler: show
Image


https://www.revleft.space/vb/threads/20 ... ost2889338
Well, whatever -- these days everyone has the Internet.

Wow -- you really take every opportunity you can get to be a shithead, don't you?

We both referenced Marx's 'alienation', but you'd prefer to go off on tangents. 'Alienation' is *not* simply 'boredom'. It's more about *exploitation*.

'Doing nothing' is the *goal*, which can only happen once we've fully enslaved our machinery to our own purposes. The theory is that such is *impossible* under capitalism, because the system *requires* some form of human labor in order to create capital valuations, so as to perpetuate the system of elitism.

This is *why* we can't just wait-around and expect capitalism to magically turn into socialism -- *that's* dualism / idealism, by the way. If the workers of the world don't *intentionally* *end* capitalism, so as to implement full automation, then it will never happen and capitalism will persist indefinitely.

(See the previous.)


I am trying hard to see your point regarding a communist worker. I ran across these definition. Is this in your sight?

The Ideal Communist Worker
Within a communist society, people are expected to act in the interest of the Communist Party and the majority of society. Specifically, the individual is expected to work and act to promote the betterment of the community. Chairman Mao Zedong elaborates, “At no time and in no circumstances should a Communist place his personal interests first; he should subordinate to the interests of the nation and the masses. Hence selfishness, slacking, corruption, seeking the limelight are most contemptible, while ... working with all one’s energy, whole hearted devotion to public duty, and quiet hard work will command respect.” Hence, communists are expected to work diligently and thoughtfully in order to ensure he or she provides the most benefit to society. As a result, any worker in the computer field is expected to manufacture computer products without the wish for acknowledgment or excessive monetary reward.
Most importantly, communists are expected to surrender their own personal interests when they are in conflict with those of the Communist Party. The most fundamental philosophy of work in communism is expressed in a quote from the 2nd Chairman of the People’s Republic of China, Liu Shaoqi. He writes, “[The ideal communist] is the first to worry and the last to enjoy himself.” Communists, in this regard, must become selfless in providing for society. When one’s individual interests contradict those of the public, the individual is expected to yield. Most importantly, this means that individuals can not refuse a work assignment due to personal reasons. However, this does not mean that the Party is blind to one’s abilities or strengths. Shaoqi continues, “Naturally, in assigning work to members, the Party organization and the responsible Party comrade should, as far as possible, take their individual inclination and aptitude into consideration, develop their strong points and stimulate their zeal to go forward.” Hence, work ethic and motivation, regardless of profession, comes from one’s duty to better benefit the communal community without question or hesitation.


https://cs.stanford.edu/people/eroberts ... ethic.html

Is this in agreement with your proposed system?
#15094036
Julian658 wrote:
I am trying hard to see your point regarding a communist worker. I ran across these definition. Is this in your sight?

The Ideal Communist Worker
Within a communist society, people are expected to act in the interest of the Communist Party and the majority of society. Specifically, the individual is expected to work and act to promote the betterment of the community. Chairman Mao Zedong elaborates, “At no time and in no circumstances should a Communist place his personal interests first; he should subordinate to the interests of the nation and the masses. Hence selfishness, slacking, corruption, seeking the limelight are most contemptible, while ... working with all one’s energy, whole hearted devotion to public duty, and quiet hard work will command respect.” Hence, communists are expected to work diligently and thoughtfully in order to ensure he or she provides the most benefit to society. As a result, any worker in the computer field is expected to manufacture computer products without the wish for acknowledgment or excessive monetary reward.
Most importantly, communists are expected to surrender their own personal interests when they are in conflict with those of the Communist Party. The most fundamental philosophy of work in communism is expressed in a quote from the 2nd Chairman of the People’s Republic of China, Liu Shaoqi. He writes, “[The ideal communist] is the first to worry and the last to enjoy himself.” Communists, in this regard, must become selfless in providing for society. When one’s individual interests contradict those of the public, the individual is expected to yield. Most importantly, this means that individuals can not refuse a work assignment due to personal reasons. However, this does not mean that the Party is blind to one’s abilities or strengths. Shaoqi continues, “Naturally, in assigning work to members, the Party organization and the responsible Party comrade should, as far as possible, take their individual inclination and aptitude into consideration, develop their strong points and stimulate their zeal to go forward.” Hence, work ethic and motivation, regardless of profession, comes from one’s duty to better benefit the communal community without question or hesitation.


https://cs.stanford.edu/people/eroberts ... ethic.html

Is this in agreement with your proposed system?



No, not at all -- this is *Maoism*, or a *revisionism* of the original Marx and Engels -- you'd be better off starting with The Communist Manifesto.

I'd be glad to pick this essay / entry apart, if you'd like more detail. Seriously, go read the Communist Manifesto -- it's just a pamphlet and is where it all started.
#15094055
Okay, here's a quick rundown of that period, from Harman's book:



Official Chinese propaganda glossed over the class divisions in the country and the extreme hardship in which most of its people lived.

On taking control of China’s great cities in 1949 the leaders of the People’s Liberation Army had followed a policy of uniting all classes, including a section of capitalists, behind a programme aimed at economic reconstruction. In the early 1950s this gave way to a programme of industrialisation, loosely modelled on that pursued by Stalin in Russia and likewise aimed at accomplishing what capitalism had done in the West. Many industries had been state-owned under the Kuomintang regime or been confiscated from their former Japanese owners.

The state now took over most of the rest, but paid their old owners fixed dividends (so there were still millionaires in ‘Red’ China). The apparatus of state control was staffed, in the main, by members of the educated middle classes, with most of the officials of the Kuomintang period left in place.There was land reform in regions dominated by landlords, but the better-off peasants were left untouched. The condition of the mass of workers remained much as before.

These measures produced considerable economic growth—12 percent a year according to official figures for the years 1954-57. But this did not get anywhere near the official aim of catching the advanced industrial countries, and a section of the Chinese leadership around Mao Zedong began to fear that unless desperate steps were taken China would subside into being one more stagnating Third World country. In 1958, against the opposition of other leaders such as the president Liu Shoqi and Deng Xiaoping, they launched a ‘Great Leap Forward’ aimed at ultra-rapid industrialisation.

Heavy industry was to be made to grow much faster than before by every district setting out to make its own iron and steel. Millions of new industrial workers were to be fed by removing individual plots from the peasants and forcing people into huge ‘People’s Communes’. In 1958 and 1959 it seemed the ‘leap’ was being made successfully. The official industrial growth rate was almost 30 percent a year, and across the world enthusiasts for Chinese Communism hailed the ‘communes’ as the dawn of a new era. In 1960 reality struck home. China did not have the technical equipment to make the communes viable, and merely herding the peasants together could not overcome centuries-old traditions which set one family against another. Grain output dropped catastrophically and many millions died in famines. The new locally-based industries were of a low technical level, extremely inefficient and damaged the overall economy by using up resources. The Great Leap Forward turned into a disaster for which the mass of people paid a terrible price. Willpower alone could not overcome centuries of stagnation and the de-industrialisation caused by imperialism.

The leadership reacted by shunting Mao away from the levers of power and returning to a more measured approach towards industrialisation. But this policy was hardly a great success. Industrial output was lower in 1965 than in 1960. While the labour force grew by 15 million a year, the number of new jobs grew by only half a million, and the 23 million college graduates found it hard to find meaningful employment.291

As the problems accumulated, the group in the leadership around Mao Zedong once more felt that only urgent action could break the impasse. This time they believed they had found an agency to carry it through—the vast numbers of young people whose hopes were frustrated. In 1966 Mao and a coterie of supporters, including his wife Jiang Qing and defence minister Lin Biao, proclaimed the ‘Proletarian Cultural Revolution’.

China, they said, was being held back by the ‘culture’ of those running the structures of the party and the country. These people had become soft and lazy. Such tendencies had already led Russia ‘down the capitalist road’ of de-Stalinisation, and they could drag China back to its old ‘Confucian’ ways. It was the task of youth to stop this by mass criticism of those obstructing Mao’s policies. The Mao group shut down all education institutions for six months and encouraged 11 million college and high school students to carry the criticism from one region to another on free rail transport.

The ‘Proletarian Cultural Revolution’ was in no sense proletarian and in no sense a revolution. The workers were expected to keep working while the students staged mass rallies and travelled the country. Indeed, part of the message of the ‘Cultural Revolution’ was that workers should abandon ‘capitalistic’ worries like bonus rates and health and safety issues, since these were ‘economistic’, and ‘Mao Zedong thought’ was sufficient motivation for anyone. At the same time the students were instructed not to interfere with the functioning of the military and police apparatus. This was a ‘revolution’ intended to avoid turning the state upside down!

The student ‘Red Guards’ were encouraged to unleash their frustrations not at institutions, but against individuals who were deemed to have shown insufficient revolutionary zeal. At the top this meant targeting those who had disagreed with Mao at the time of the Great Leap Forward. Liu Shaoqi, Deng Xiaoping and others were forced from office. At the local level it meant scapegoating low level figures of minimal authority who were thought somehow to embody ‘old ways’—schoolteachers, writers, journalists, clerks or actors. The atmosphere of irrational persecution is conveyed vividly in the memoirs of former ‘Red Guard’ Jung Chang, in Wild Swans, in scenes in the film Farewell, My Concubine about an Beijing opera performer and victim of the Cultural Revolution, and in the novel about a group of intellectuals, Stones of the Wall, by Dai Houying.

But the Cultural Revolution was not just an irrational outburst. The frustrations which Mao exploited were real enough. And, because of this, Mao could not keep control of the movement he had initiated.



Harman, _People's History of the World_, pp. 573-575




Yet in 1972, as more US bombers hit targets in Vietnam than ever before, Mao greeted US president Nixon in Beijing, and by 1977, under Deng, China was beginning to embrace the market more furiously than Russia under Stalin’s successors.

The Western media saw such twists and turns as a result of wild irrationality. By the late 1970s many of those on the left who had identified with Maoism in the 1960s agreed, and turned their backs on socialism. A whole school of ex-Maoist ‘New Philosophers’ emerged in France, who taught that revolution automatically leads to tyranny and that the revolutionary left are as bad as the fascist right. Yet there is a simple, rational explanation for the apparently irrational course of Chinese history over a quarter of a century. China simply did not have the internal resources to pursue the Stalinist path of forced industrialisation successfully, however much its rulers starved the peasants and squeezed the workers. But there were no other easy options after a century of imperialist plundering. Unable to find rational solutions, the country’s rulers were tempted by irrational ones.



Harman, _People's History of the World_, p. 576
#15094065
ckaihatsu wrote:No, not at all -- this is *Maoism*, or a *revisionism* of the original Marx and Engels -- you'd be better off starting with The Communist Manifesto.

I'd be glad to pick this essay / entry apart, if you'd like more detail. Seriously, go read the Communist Manifesto -- it's just a pamphlet and is where it all started.

I studied the manifesto in university eons ago. My professor was a Marxist which was not uncommon in the Social Sciences department. Today the number of Marxists in universities is much higher. There are universities that heavily emphasize social justice.

The history of all hitherto existing society†
is the history of class struggles.
Freeman and slave, patrician and plebeian, lord and serf, guild-master‡
and journeyman, in a
word, oppressor and oppressed, stood in constant opposition to one another, carried on an
uninterrupted, now hidden, now open fight, a fight that each time ended, either in a revolutionary
reconstitution of society at large, or in the common ruin of the contending classes.
In the earlier epochs of history, we find almost everywhere a complicated arrangement of society
into various orders, a manifold gradation of social rank. In ancient Rome we have patricians,
knights, plebeians, slaves; in the Middle Ages, feudal lords, vassals, guild-masters, journeymen,
apprentices, serfs; in almost all of these classes, again, subordinate gradations.
The modern bourgeois society that has sprouted from the ruins of feudal society has not done
away with class antagonisms. It has but established new classes, new conditions of oppression,
new forms of struggle in place of the old ones.


This is well known----------In fact also present in Mesopotamia:
Image

Note how those on top are a small number.

Society as a whole is more and more splitting up into two great
hostile camps, into two great classes directly facing each other – Bourgeoisie and Proletariat.


This is what we see today, however it seems the number of people that live a slave type existence is much less. In the West one could say the number of petite Bourgeoisie is larger.

Modern industry has established the world market, for which the discovery of America paved the
way. This market has given an immense development to commerce, to navigation, to
communication by land. This development has, in its turn, reacted on the extension of industry;
and in proportion as industry, commerce, navigation, railways extended, in the same proportion
the bourgeoisie developed, increased its capital, and pushed into the background every class
handed down from the Middle Ages.
We see, therefore, how the modern bourgeoisie is itself the product of a long course of
development, of a series of revolutions in the modes of production and of exchange.


Nothing new here-----this was expected.

The bourgeoisie, wherever it has got the upper hand, has put an end to all feudal, patriarchal,
idyllic relations. It has pitilessly torn asunder the motley feudal ties that bound man to his
“natural superiors”, and has left remaining no other nexus between man and man than naked self interest,


Self interest, yes.

A pause here. When I read the paragraph of so-called Maoism it sounded very much like religion. Religion not associated with a deity, but religious fervor to a very strict set of rules. It truly sounds like the cult of all cults and hence destined to fail. Not even the NAZIs or the Italian fascist were that cultish.

The remaining paragraphs of the first section describes the bourgeoisie in great detail.

This organisation of the proletarians into a class, and, consequently into a political party, is
continually being upset again by the competition between the workers themselves. But it ever
rises up again, stronger, firmer, mightier. It compels legislative recognition of particular interests
of the workers, by taking advantage of the divisions among the bourgeoisie itself


I assume the interest in communism peaked decades ago. Once communist regimes failed in the 20th century the university elite professors seem less enthusiastic to teach revolution. Furthermore, they change the words of the tune. Instead of bourgeoisie versus the proletariat they now teach difference in skin color as the hallmark of the class difference and oppression. I have the sensation that the enthusiasm for socialism is coming back as socialism is always very compelling to the young in every generation.

I will write more later.
#15094070
Julian658 wrote:
I studied the manifesto in university eons ago. My professor was a Marxist which was not uncommon in the Social Sciences department. Today the number of Marxists in universities is much higher. There are universities that heavily emphasize social justice.



This is well known----------In fact also present in Mesopotamia:
[img]https://image.slidesharecdn.com/mesopotamiancivilization-110129140158-phpapp02/95/mesopotamian-civilization-9-728.jpg?cb=1296310210[img]

Note how those on top are a small number.



This is what we see today, however it seems the number of people that live a slave type existence is much less. In the West one could say the number of petite Bourgeoisie is larger.



Nothing new here-----this was expected.



Self interest, yes.



Okay on all of that.


Julian658 wrote:
A pause here. When I read the paragraph of so-called Maoism it sounded very much like religion. Religion not associated with a deity, but religious fervor to a very strict set of rules. It truly sounds like the cult of all cults and hence destined to fail. Not even the NAZIs or the Italian fascist were that cultish.



Yup, that's what happens when revolutions turn *inward*, for whatever reason -- a cult of personality and all of the accompanying bullshit is *inevitable*, because there's no longer an aim to outwardly *change the world*, literally, as with general labor strikes and such.

I think the *easy* way to spot this kind of thing is to ask if the movement is *political*, or *cultural*. Politics is about *power*, and how society produces and disposes of its surplus, while culture really *isn't* about power and how-productivity-gets-done. Cultural distractions allow for the *status quo* power relations to go on unimpeded, as we saw with Maoism, as Harman notes.

Here's my simple 'politics-logistics-lifestyle' framework again, as a guide:


‭History, Macro-Micro -- politics-logistics-lifestyle

Spoiler: show
Image



---


Julian658 wrote:
The remaining paragraphs of the first section describes the bourgeoisie in great detail.



I assume the interest in communism peaked decades ago. Once communist regimes failed in the 20th century the university elite professors seem less enthusiastic to teach revolution. Furthermore, they change the words of the tune. Instead of bourgeoisie versus the proletariat they now teach difference in skin color as the hallmark of the class difference and oppression. I have the sensation that the enthusiasm for socialism is coming back as socialism is always very compelling to the young in every generation.

I will write more later.



Yup -- the actual *class conflict*, or tension / dynamic, never goes away under class society, so sooner or later the proletariat will become *more conscious* of its position in society, which is a class-interest-motivation to collectively rebel, revolt, and reshape society in its *own* interests:


Build rank-and-file factory and workplace committees to prevent transmission of the COVID-19 virus and save lives!

https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2020/0 ... s-m21.html


On that racialism topic, you may be interested in the following exposé:


American Historical Review publishes letter on 1619 Project by Tom Mackaman and David North

https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2020/0 ... r-a20.html
#15094113
ckaihatsu wrote:Okay on all of that.

Yup, that's what happens when revolutions turn *inward*, for whatever reason -- a cult of personality and all of the accompanying bullshit is *inevitable*, because there's no longer an aim to outwardly *change the world*, literally, as with general labor strikes and such.

I think the *easy* way to spot this kind of thing is to ask if the movement is *political*, or *cultural*. Politics is about *power*, and how society produces and disposes of its surplus, while culture really *isn't* about power and how-productivity-gets-done. Cultural distractions allow for the *status quo* power relations to go on unimpeded, as we saw with Maoism, as Harman notes.



Here's my simple 'politics-logistics-lifestyle' framework again, as a guide:



I recently watched some WWII shows and it is uncanny how the Germans used the name of Hitler saluting each other. However, Fidel Castro has that sort of aura. Your diagrams are beautiful, but I cannot see the small print.

Cultural distractions allow for the *status quo* power relations to go on unimpeded

Do you have an example of that in America?


Yup -- the actual *class conflict*, or tension / dynamic, never goes away under class society, so sooner or later the proletariat will become *more conscious* of its position in society, which is a class-interest-motivation to collectively rebel, revolt, and reshape society in its *own* interests:


Neoliberal capitalists, the Hillary Clinton of Joe Biden types know this. They patronize and pander to the oppressed and before you know it they are adored by those that would likely revolt. I think it is terrible]y condescending, but I have many democrat friends that do not see it that way. And then you have the Europeans that suffer from massive white guilt. The prime minister of New Zealand even dressed up as a Muslim woman and she was praised-----meanwhile I thought she was condescending.


Build rank-and-file factory and workplace committees to prevent transmission of the COVID-19 virus and save lives!


Yeas, the basic workers that cannot work from home are massively exposed.

On that racialism topic, you may be interested in the following exposé:

American Historical Review publishes letter on 1619 Project by Tom Mackaman and David North

https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2020/0 ... r-a20.html


I have heard a bit about that 1619 project. There are many in the black community that are dedicated to revive the sordid past of slavery 24/7. I have even seen black crowds burst into cheers and applauses when the speaker brings on the topic of slavery and suffering. I think it is unhealthy to constantly revive the painful past. Everyone knows it was evil------but no one does anything meaningful. This era requires a new paradigm other than worn out platitudes.

The Communists are distinguished from the other working-class parties by this only: 1. In the
national struggles of the proletarians of the different countries, they point out and bring to the
front the common interests of the entire proletariat, independently of all nationality. 2. In the
various stages of development which the struggle of the working class against the bourgeoisie has
to pass through, they always and everywhere represent the interests of the movement as a whole.

The immediate aim of the Communists is the same as that of all other proletarian parties:
formation of the proletariat into a class, overthrow of the bourgeois supremacy, conquest of
political power by the proletariat.
The theoretical conclusions of the Communists are in no way based on ideas or principles that
have been invented, or discovered, by this or that would-be universal reformer.
They merely express, in general terms, actual relations springing from an existing class struggle,
from a historical movement going on under our very eyes. The abolition of existing property
relations is not at all a distinctive feature of communism.


You always talk about this--------And I always assume it is an unlikely possibility. However, with the Internet, and massive travel between continents it is quite possible to create areas without borders. Nevertheless, there are great cultural differences and this will always be an obstacle. OTOH, it is easy and simple to have socialism in small groups where there is kinship and a monoculture. If I was a dedicated communist I would start small--------even smaller than Cuba.

To be a capitalist, is to have not only a purely personal, but a social status in production. Capital
is a collective product, and only by the united action of many members, nay, in the last resort,
only by the united action of all members of society, can it be set in motion.
Capital is therefore not only personal; it is a social power.

The average price of wage-labour is the minimum wage, i.e., that quantum of the means of
subsistence which is absolutely requisite to keep the labourer in bare existence as a labourer.
What, therefore, the wage-labourer appropriates by means of his labour, merely suffices to
prolong and reproduce a bare existence. We by no means intend to abolish this personal
appropriation of the products of labour, an appropriation that is made for the maintenance and
reproduction of human life, and that leaves no surplus wherewith to command the labour of
others. All that we want to do away with is the miserable character of this appropriation, under
which the labourer lives merely to increase capital, and is allowed to live only in so far as the
interest of the ruling class requires it.


The issue with the above paragraph is that capitalists are very resourceful and may figure out a way to be capitalists without hiring workers. In this instance the wealth was not created by the worker. If you write a great novel and sell a billion copies for 10.00 USD each you make 10 billion dollars. You will say the book is not only my creation. Printers, and book factory workers bound the book. IN addition it was transported and sold in stores by countless of workers. However, you could directly publish your book online and simply charge for the download of the book.

I know what you are thinking. The book should be published for free. Actually many books are free. However others are so popular that people are willing to pay. And when they pay for the book the estimated the pleasure they receive justifies the price.
#15094117
Julian658 wrote:
I recently watched some WWII shows and it is uncanny how the Germans used the name of Hitler saluting each other. However, Fidel Castro has that sort of aura. Your diagrams are beautiful, but I cannot see the small print.



Well, please be careful in comparing far-left to far-right, or better yet, just don't do it. It's wildly inaccurate and inappropriate.

This part, from Harman, even *speaks* to how this common misconception *became* commonplace:



Yet in 1972, as more US bombers hit targets in Vietnam than ever before, Mao greeted US president Nixon in Beijing, and by 1977, under Deng, China was beginning to embrace the market more furiously than Russia under Stalin’s successors.

The Western media saw such twists and turns as a result of wild irrationality. By the late 1970s many of those on the left who had identified with Maoism in the 1960s agreed, and turned their backs on socialism. A whole school of ex-Maoist ‘New Philosophers’ emerged in France, who taught that revolution automatically leads to tyranny and that the revolutionary left are as bad as the fascist right. Yet there is a simple, rational explanation for the apparently irrational course of Chinese history over a quarter of a century. China simply did not have the internal resources to pursue the Stalinist path of forced industrialisation successfully, however much its rulers starved the peasants and squeezed the workers. But there were no other easy options after a century of imperialist plundering. Unable to find rational solutions, the country’s rulers were tempted by irrational ones.



Harman, _People's History of the World_, p. 576



Also, I even made a diagram (of course) to illustrate this dynamic of the far-left always being out-of-phase with the far-right, as long as the bourgeois nationalist status quo exists to keep it all *spinning* that way:


Ideologies & Operations -- Left Centrifugalism

Spoiler: show
Image



Again, you have to download the graphic at the original size and then pan and zoom on it to see what you want to see.


---


ckaihatsu wrote:
Cultural distractions allow for the *status quo* power relations to go on unimpeded



Julian658 wrote:
Do you have an example of that in America?



People often point to the corporate media.


Julian658 wrote:
Neoliberal capitalists, the Hillary Clinton of Joe Biden types know this. They patronize and pander to the oppressed and before you know it they are adored by those that would likely revolt. I think it is terrible]y condescending, but I have many democrat friends that do not see it that way. And then you have the Europeans that suffer from massive white guilt. The prime minister of New Zealand even dressed up as a Muslim woman and she was praised-----meanwhile I thought she was condescending.



So are you a fascist? You're definitely *sounding* like one here.


Julian658 wrote:
Yeas, the basic workers that cannot work from home are massively exposed.



And popularly supported.


Julian658 wrote:
I have heard a bit about that 1619 project. There are many in the black community that are dedicated to revive the sordid past of slavery 24/7. I have even seen black crowds burst into cheers and applauses when the speaker brings on the topic of slavery and suffering. I think it is unhealthy to constantly revive the painful past. Everyone knows it was evil------but no one does anything meaningful. This era requires a new paradigm other than worn out platitudes.



We can't *ignore* the relevant past, either -- slave labor is what *built* this country, and others, early-on. The public monuments for enslaved black people, and their contributions to the U.S. (etc.) should really *outnumber* the public monuments for Confederate generals.


Julian658 wrote:
You always talk about this--------And I always assume it is an unlikely possibility. However, with the Internet, and massive travel between continents it is quite possible to create areas without borders. Nevertheless, there are great cultural differences and this will always be an obstacle. OTOH, it is easy and simple to have socialism in small groups where there is kinship and a monoculture. If I was a dedicated communist I would start small--------even smaller than Cuba.



Julian, you're getting *worse* in your modality of discussion -- I thought you're here at PoFo for a *conversation*, and, at *times* you are, but here you're certainly *not*. You're just repeating past talking points without bothering to update your understanding.

Are you *afraid* of history, both in general, and also your *own* *personal* history? It certainly *looks* that way since you're not remembering that we've covered this, and other points, already. I don't like repeating myself.

Again, the *problem* with circumscribing socialism is that you wind up like Stalin, thinking it can grow successfully within the borders of just one country. We all know what happened with *that* idea.


Julian658 wrote:
The issue with the above paragraph is that capitalists are very resourceful and may figure out a way to be capitalists without hiring workers. In this instance the wealth was not created by the worker. If you write a great novel and sell a billion copies for 10.00 USD each you make 10 billion dollars. You will say the book is not only my creation. Printers, and book factory workers bound the book. IN addition it was transported and sold in stores by countless of workers. However, you could directly publish your book online and simply charge for the download of the book.

I know what you are thinking. The book should be published for free. Actually many books are free. However others are so popular that people are willing to pay. And when they pay for the book the estimated the pleasure they receive justifies the price.



I *get* it now -- you really value *money*, and you think that money trumps the popular will, or the 'second superpower'.

If capitalists were to implement *full automation* within capitalism, they'd be as exposed as service workers are today in the context of COVID-19 -- do you really think that capitalism would operate 'normally', and that such singular capitalists would become titans on the social landscape? You yourself said that without jobs people would have no money to make purchases from these monopolists.
#15094147
ckaihatsu wrote:Well, please be careful in comparing far-left to far-right, or better yet, just don't do it. It's wildly inaccurate and inappropriate.

This part, from Harman, even *speaks* to how this common misconception *became* commonplace:


For the average person an American looks just like a Canadian. And fascism and communism are seen as authoritarian states with a different orientation. For the enlightened the difference may be huge, but they share some areas.

Far right is not always fascism. In fact, it is almost always capitalist, conservative, and libertarian.

People often point to the corporate media.


I do agree, the media tries to run the show. But, according to the Manifesto the media would be the State in a communist society and I suspect they would also try to influence opinion.

So are you a fascist? You're definitely *sounding* like one here.


I have always been a centrist with libertarian tendencies. I also like the concept of doing my own thing, but I have a heart. I will never be a social justice warrior which is 99% of the left in the forum. They are the ones that keep minorities down with condescending racism.

We can't *ignore* the relevant past, either -- slave labor is what *built* this country, and others, early-on. The public monuments for enslaved black people, and their contributions to the U.S. (etc.) should really *outnumber* the public monuments for Confederate generals.


I agree with the latter, but not with the former. Canada did not have slavery and is quite similar to America. BTW, Germany was very late in the colonization game. At best they had a few colonies from 1884 till the end of WWI. What little they had was taken away by the other European powers. Many other western nations had no slaves or colonies and did fine. This idea that the USA was built entirely on slavery is too hyped. However, slavery had a significant economic impact on the South. Which by the way has never been as enlightened as the Northeast. The other unforgivable tragedy was the massacre of natives.

Julian, you're getting *worse* in your modality of discussion -- I thought you're here at PoFo for a *conversation*, and, at *times* you are, but here you're certainly *not*. You're just repeating past talking points without bothering to update your understanding.

Are you *afraid* of history, both in general, and also your *own* *personal* history? It certainly *looks* that way since you're not remembering that we've covered this, and other points, already. I don't like repeating myself.


I think it is worth repeating because you have a dream that cannot be achieved. This worldwide phenomenon will not happen anytime soon. You are tackling this with too much religious fervor, but at the same time I admire that.

Again, the *problem* with circumscribing socialism is that you wind up like Stalin, thinking it can grow successfully within the borders of just one country. We all know what happened with *that* idea.


A new paradigm is needed. The same "old one" will not work. The next guy thinks he will do better, but the plan is the same! :eek:

In bourgeois society, therefore, the past dominates the present; in Communist society, the present
dominates the past. In bourgeois society capital is independent and has individuality, while the
living person is dependent and has no individuality.
And the abolition of this state of things is called by the bourgeois, abolition of individuality and
freedom! And rightly so. The abolition of bourgeois individuality, bourgeois independence, and
bourgeois freedom is undoubtedly aimed at.


Do you realize how brutal those above words are? We are not ants in a colony.

No wonder Ayn Rand who experienced communist Russia wrote this lines:


Self-sacrifice—which means; self-immolation, self-abnegation, self-denial, self-destruction—which means: the self as a standard of evil, the selfless as a standard of the good.

The issue is whether the need of others is the first mortgage on your life and the moral purpose of your existence. The issue is whether man is to be regarded as a sacrificial animal. Any man of self-esteem will answer: “No.”


Do you blame her. She had some horror stories of her own while living in Russia.


I *get* it now -- you really value *money*, and you think that money trumps the popular will, or the 'second superpower'.


I tell you something. I do not like to touch money or deal with economic transactions of any kind. I let my wife do near 100% of the economy in my household. If i need something buy it and will be ashmedif the item is pricey. I cannot even return a defective item to the store, my wife takes care of that.

If capitalists were to implement *full automation* within capitalism, they'd be as exposed as service workers are today in the context of COVID-19 -- do you really think that capitalism would operate 'normally', and that such singular capitalists would become titans on the social landscape? You yourself said that without jobs people would have no money to make purchases from these monopolists.


We covered that. And we are heading that way.

By the way, watch this video of people that do not want to work and rather receive a government check which is often more than their salary. That was the Democratic party trying to buy votes.


BTW, the women is supposed to have a college degree and yet she works at a bowling alley doing a chore that an uneducated immigrant could do. This woman had no business going to college. She would have done better by learning a trade in a tech school.
#15094188
Julian658 wrote:
For the average person an American looks just like a Canadian. And fascism and communism are seen as authoritarian states with a different orientation. For the enlightened the difference may be huge, but they share some areas.



No, this is just vague unfounded conjecture on your part -- you have to look at the actual *politics*, since these are political categories.

You're *not* distinguishing workers-of-the-world socialism, from Stalinism, and now you're not distinguishing communism from fascism.

You seem more like a political *chameleon* at this point, than anything else. Always ready to be all things to all people, huh, Julian?


Julian658 wrote:
Far right is not always fascism. In fact, it is almost always capitalist, conservative, and libertarian.



No, the far right *is* fascism, and those types are ready to commit acts of *violence* on social minorities as an integral part of their scapegoating.


Julian658 wrote:
I do agree, the media tries to run the show. But, according to the Manifesto the media would be the State in a communist society and I suspect they would also try to influence opinion.



You're slighting *Stalinism* here -- you may want to start using this term, in order to be accurate. You even *quoted* parts of the original Communist Manifesto, yet you're still not getting that that's *not* Stalinism.


Julian658 wrote:
I have always been a centrist with libertarian tendencies. I also like the concept of doing my own thing, but I have a heart. I will never be a social justice warrior which is 99% of the left in the forum. They are the ones that keep minorities down with condescending racism.



Hmmm, you're sounding like a fascist again. If you want to critique the soft-left, you could start with a treatment on the Democratic Party. I happened to find one at this page:

https://libcom.org/library/links-pdfs-9 ... wing-books


Julian658 wrote:
I agree with the latter, but not with the former. Canada did not have slavery and is quite similar to America. BTW, Germany was very late in the colonization game. At best they had a few colonies from 1884 till the end of WWI. What little they had was taken away by the other European powers. Many other western nations had no slaves or colonies and did fine. This idea that the USA was built entirely on slavery is too hyped. However, slavery had a significant economic impact on the South. Which by the way has never been as enlightened as the Northeast. The other unforgivable tragedy was the massacre of natives.



Well, until there was industrialization, particularly in the South, what other motive force *was* there, except for slave labor?

It's difficult to tell where you're coming from because these points of yours are *all over the place*. You're covering *several* topics at once but you're not expressing any coherent politics that are *your own*.

Are you striving to be a *textbook*?


Julian658 wrote:
I think it is worth repeating because you have a dream that cannot be achieved. This worldwide phenomenon will not happen anytime soon. You are tackling this with too much religious fervor, but at the same time I admire that.



Oh, okay, crystal-ball-guy is back, and his opinions about the future are better than cash.

Yeah, right, whatever, Julian -- you've just admitted that you're not a socialist, so maybe how about *don't* pretend like you're wearing socialist-future-vision-goggles.

To *clarify*, it's not a 'dream', because it's not about any *individual* -- it's about *class forces*, which can either be analyzed *correctly* or *incorrectly*.

Also, I'm not religious, and never have been.


---


ckaihatsu wrote:
Again, the *problem* with circumscribing socialism is that you wind up like Stalin, thinking it can grow successfully within the borders of just one country. We all know what happened with *that* idea.



Julian658 wrote:
A new paradigm is needed. The same "old one" will not work. The next guy thinks he will do better, but the plan is the same! :eek:



Again, it's not about the *individual*, not even me. If you want to see *my* contribution, go take a look at my 'labor credits' framework model. Beyond that, keep up with the news and look for *mass mobilization* developments like general strikes -- *that's* politics.


---


Julian658 wrote:
Do you realize how brutal those above words are? We are not ants in a colony.

No wonder Ayn Rand who experienced communist Russia wrote this lines:


Self-sacrifice—which means; self-immolation, self-abnegation, self-denial, self-destruction—which means: the self as a standard of evil, the selfless as a standard of the good.

The issue is whether the need of others is the first mortgage on your life and the moral purpose of your existence. The issue is whether man is to be regarded as a sacrificial animal. Any man of self-esteem will answer: “No.”


Do you blame her. She had some horror stories of her own while living in Russia.



Are you for Stalinism or are you for capitalism, Julian? You keep flip-flopping. Do we need to *change* the status quo, or should we *retain* it?

Is alienated atomized individualism within capitalism's commodity production *sufficient*, or are there *large scale* issues like the coronavirus and global warming that need *large-scale* approaches and solutions?


Julian658 wrote:
I tell you something. I do not like to touch money or deal with economic transactions of any kind. I let my wife do near 100% of the economy in my household. If i need something buy it and will be ashmedif the item is pricey. I cannot even return a defective item to the store, my wife takes care of that.



I don't mean *your lifestyle*, I mean your *political sentiment* -- you seem far more enamored with *exchange values*, than with *use values*. As I asked you before, would you rather see social production for those who can *pay* for commodities, or social production directed towards those who have the most *need* for those produced items?


---


ckaihatsu wrote:
If capitalists were to implement *full automation* within capitalism, they'd be as exposed as service workers are today in the context of COVID-19 -- do you really think that capitalism would operate 'normally', and that such singular capitalists would become titans on the social landscape? You yourself said that without jobs people would have no money to make purchases from these monopolists.



Julian658 wrote:
We covered that. And we are heading that way.



But again you're not *following through*, and you're being *evasive* on the topic at-hand -- you'd rather *flit about* various topics than follow-through to some solid understandings, topic-by-topic. You often go off on *tangents*, instead of *sticking* to a topic.

On this one, what do *you* think would happen if capitalists implemented *full automation*?


Julian658 wrote:
By the way, watch this video of people that do not want to work and rather receive a government check which is often more than their salary. That was the Democratic party trying to buy votes.
zGaFg9A7Wkk



I'll get to it when I can, but you have to understand that the world is now in a *special* situation, with around 100,000 dead in the U.S. itself, due to the coronavirus. The regular workday is *not* a healthy option for anyone, *demonstrably*.

Can you give *another*, perhaps more *historical* illustration of the Democratic Party patronage machine?


Julian658 wrote:
BTW, the women is supposed to have a college degree and yet she works at a bowling alley doing a chore that an uneducated immigrant could do. This woman had no business going to college. She would have done better by learning a trade in a tech school.



And here you're *blaming* the individual / victim, for the mechanics of the *economy*. You're implicitly championing the *market mechanism*, and saying that it can do no wrong, so you'd obviously rather scapegoat the *individual* for not being "appropriately" heroically individualistic enough.

Missing the forest for the trees again, Julian.
#15094199
ckaihatsu wrote:No, this is just vague unfounded conjecture on your part -- you have to look at the actual *politics*, since these are political categories.

You're *not* distinguishing workers-of-the-world socialism, from Stalinism, and now you're not distinguishing communism from fascism.

You seem more like a political *chameleon* at this point, than anything else. Always ready to be all things to all people, huh, Julian?


I have said many times I am in the center and see some good in some right and left wing positions. This must be disturbing for those that expect one side or the other. That is what I am---and when I say the unexpected the run of the mill lefties think i am trolling them. The thing about being far right or far left is that one can predict what the other side will say 99% of the time. The question that begs an answer is why do people in each side of the political spectrum feel compelled to agree with all the left or right wing tenets. I think itis extremely boring to be like that.

No, the far right *is* fascism, and those types are ready to commit acts of *violence* on social minorities as an integral part of their scapegoating.


Fascism is just a name people use to describe right wing nationalism. If you go to Cuba or Venezuela they are also nationalists. The so-called fascists emphasize nationality or ethnicity and the left wing emphasize the proletariat. I am certain those on the left see themselves as more virtuous.

By the way Ayn Rand is highly critical of nationalism and racism:

Like every other form of collectivism, racism is a quest for the unearned. It is a quest for automatic knowledge—for an automatic evaluation of men’s characters that bypasses the responsibility of exercising rational or moral judgment—and, above all, a quest for an automatic self-esteem (or pseudo-self-esteem).


As I said before: Judging a person as an individual eliminates racism, but that will not happen in a communist state.

The notion that one’s culture is superior to all others solely because it represents the traditions of one’s ancestors, is regarded as chauvinism if claimed by a majority—but as “ethnic” pride if claimed by a minority.


She is also quite sarcastic!

You're slighting *Stalinism* here -- you may want to start using this term, in order to be accurate. You even *quoted* parts of the original Communist Manifesto, yet you're still not getting that that's *not* Stalinism.



From what I see: Stalin wanted to do something similar to what China is doing now, but he could not envision private property as China has.


Hmmm, you're sounding like a fascist again. If you want to critique the soft-left, you could start with a treatment on the Democratic Party. I happened to find one at this page:


I am not a nationalist. I live in North America and i am from Latin America. Nationalism makes me sick-----however, I see some value in group identity. I have taken political inclination tests and I am mostly a libertarian.

https://libcom.org/library/links-pdfs-96-left-wing-books


Saw the first book on the list: "The New Jim Crow". God only knows the last thing Black America needs is another victimhood book! I new paradign is needed.



It's difficult to tell where you're coming from because these points of yours are *all over the place*. You're covering *several* topics at once but you're not expressing any coherent politics that are *your own*.

Are you striving to be a *textbook*?


I am a centrist. I am even willing to closely look at anything in the far left. However, there are some issues with the extreme left that are a bit bothersome. In some circles the more left you are the more virtuous you are. There is no limit into how far left you can be. No one will ever say to you: "You cannot go there dude". Meanwhile there are healthy barriers on the extreme right. Anyone that touches White ethnocentrism is immediately dismissed---and rightfully so.


Are you for Stalinism or are you for capitalism, Julian? You keep flip-flopping. Do we need to *change* the status quo, or should we *retain* it?

I am a capitalist that realizes capitalism has to culminate in socialism. It is a natural process and not forced (we covered this).

Is alienated atomized individualism within capitalism's commodity production *sufficient*, or are there *large scale* issues like the coronavirus and global warming that need *large-scale* approaches and solutions?


The market will eventually take care of those issues. Poverty should be eliminated in the next 50-100 years.


I don't mean *your lifestyle*, I mean your *political sentiment* -- you seem far more enamored with *exchange values*, than with *use values*. As I asked you before, would you rather see social production for those who can *pay* for commodities, or social production directed towards those who have the most *need* for those produced items?


Ideally capitalism takes care of the needs of people. It is uneven, unfair and not perfect. However, it eventually gets the job done. I understand why some that want more complain, I get it.



On this one, what do *you* think would happen if capitalists implemented *full automation*?


That is the 64K question! I don't really know. My hunch is UBI and a dystopia with "have and have nots". This is very complex, but one thing is certain. This is the most prosperous time in world history.


Can you give *another*, perhaps more *historical* illustration of the Democratic Party patronage machine?


When I came to America I was supposed to be a minority. I was so naive I thought they were talking about young people. Then, I realize it was condescending racism of low expectations. That was a bitter pill to swallow. Then I noted that Latin Americans born and raised in America were OK with that. OTOH, Latin Americans born and raised abroad felt the term was condescending.
#15094219
Julian658 wrote:
I have said many times I am in the center and see some good in some right and left wing positions. This must be disturbing for those that expect one side or the other. That is what I am---and when I say the unexpected the run of the mill lefties think i am trolling them. The thing about being far right or far left is that one can predict what the other side will say 99% of the time. The question that begs an answer is why do people in each side of the political spectrum feel compelled to agree with all the left or right wing tenets. I think itis extremely boring to be like that.



What *are* you, the People Magazine commentary on politics?

You continue to spout off these glib superficial opinions of yours about stuff you know *nothing* about -- tell me straight, did you *wander into* PoFo by mistake?


Julian658 wrote:
Fascism is just a name people use to describe right wing nationalism. If you go to Cuba or Venezuela they are also nationalists. The so-called fascists emphasize nationality or ethnicity and the left wing emphasize the proletariat. I am certain those on the left see themselves as more virtuous.



No, fascism is a *lack* of systematic analysis, similar to what *you* do, so as to victimize *social minorities*, like Muslims, for the failings of the system. Like you, there's no criticism of the *market mechanism*, so racial and ethnic minorities take the white-nationalist-tribalist blame for a falling capitalist economy.

It's *not* like Cuba or Venezuela, because there's no *scapegoating* there -- there *is* some graft / corruption, but at least both countries are *anti-imperialist*. Fascists are *imperialists*.


Julian658 wrote:
By the way Ayn Rand is highly critical of nationalism and racism:


Julian658 wrote:
As I said before: Judging a person as an individual eliminates racism, but that will not happen in a communist state.



Racism isn't so much an *individual* thing as it is a *societal*, and *class* thing:



Ethnocentrism and proto-racism

Bernard Lewis has cited the Greek philosopher Aristotle who, in his discussion of slavery, stated that while Greeks are free by nature, "barbarians" (non-Greeks) are slaves by nature, in that it is in their nature to be more willing to submit to a despotic government.[107] Though Aristotle does not specify any particular races, he argues that people from nations outside Greece are more prone to the burden of slavery than those from Greece.[108] While Aristotle makes remarks about the most natural slaves being those with strong bodies and slave souls (unfit for rule, unintelligent) which would seem to imply a physical basis for discrimination, he also explicitly states that the right kind of souls and bodies don't always go together, implying that the greatest determinate for inferiority and natural slaves versus natural masters is the soul, not the body.[109] This proto-racism is seen as an important precursor to modern racism by classicist Benjamin Isaac.

Such proto-racism and ethnocentrism must be looked at within context, because a modern understanding of racism based on hereditary inferiority (with modern racism based on eugenics and scientific racism) was not yet developed and it is unclear whether Aristotle believed the natural inferiority of Barbarians was caused by environment and climate (like many of his contemporaries) or by birth.[110]

Historian Dante A. Puzzo, in his discussion of Aristotle, racism, and the ancient world writes that:

Racism rests on two basic assumptions: that a correlation exists between physical characteristics and moral qualities; that mankind is divisible into superior and inferior stocks. Racism, thus defined, is a modern conception, for prior to the XVIth century there was virtually nothing in the life and thought of the West that can be described as racist. To prevent misunderstanding a clear distinction must be made between racism and ethnocentrism ... The Ancient Hebrews, in referring to all who were not Hebrews as Gentiles, were indulging in ethnocentrism, not in racism. ... So it was with the Hellenes who denominated all non-Hellenes—whether the wild Scythians or the Egyptians whom they acknowledged as their mentors in the arts of civilization—Barbarians, the term denoting that which was strange or foreign.[111]



https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Racism#History




Institutional racism (also known as systemic racism) is a form of racism expressed in the practice of social and political institutions. It is reflected in disparities regarding wealth, income, criminal justice, employment, housing, health care, political power and education, among other factors.

The term "institutional racism" was coined and first used in 1967 by Stokely Carmichael (later known as Kwame Ture) and Charles V. Hamilton in Black Power: The Politics of Liberation.[1] Carmichael and Hamilton wrote that while individual racism is often identifiable because of its overt nature, institutional racism is less perceptible because of its "less overt, far more subtle" nature. Institutional racism "originates in the operation of established and respected forces in the society, and thus receives far less public condemnation than [individual racism]".[2] They gave examples.

"When white terrorists bomb a black church and kill five black children, that is an act of individual racism, widely deplored by most segments of the society. But when in that same city – Birmingham, Alabama – five hundred black babies die each year because of the lack of proper food, shelter and medical facilities, and thousands more are destroyed and maimed physically, emotionally and intellectually because of conditions of poverty and discrimination in the black community, that is a function of institutional racism. When a black family moves into a home in a white neighborhood and is stoned, burned or routed out, they are victims of an overt act of individual racism which most people will condemn. But it is institutional racism that keeps black people locked in dilapidated slum tenements, subject to the daily prey of exploitative slumlords, merchants, loan sharks and discriminatory real estate agents. The society either pretends it does not know of this latter situation, or is in fact incapable of doing anything meaningful about it."[3][4]



https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Institutional_racism



And, remember this -- ?


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Redlining


---



The notion that one’s culture is superior to all others solely because it represents the traditions of one’s ancestors, is regarded as chauvinism if claimed by a majority—but as “ethnic” pride if claimed by a minority.



Julian658 wrote:
She is also quite sarcastic!



You mean 'wry'. (She's being serious.)


Julian658 wrote:
From what I see: Stalin wanted to do something similar to what China is doing now, but he could not envision private property as China has.



Stalin wasn't pro-private-property, as you're erroneously alleging.


Julian658 wrote:
I am not a nationalist. I live in North America and i am from Latin America. Nationalism makes me sick-----however, I see some value in group identity. I have taken political inclination tests and I am mostly a libertarian.



So where do you stand on *identity politics*, then?

Here's this 'political spectrum' graphic:


Ideologies & Operations -- Fundamentals

Spoiler: show
Image



---


Julian658 wrote:
Saw the first book on the list: "The New Jim Crow". God only knows the last thing Black America needs is another victimhood book! I new paradign is needed.



You'd rather *ignore* the legacy of slavery in the world -- that much is clear about you.


Julian658 wrote:
I am a centrist. I am even willing to closely look at anything in the far left. However, there are some issues with the extreme left that are a bit bothersome. In some circles the more left you are the more virtuous you are. There is no limit into how far left you can be. No one will ever say to you: "You cannot go there dude". Meanwhile there are healthy barriers on the extreme right. Anyone that touches White ethnocentrism is immediately dismissed---and rightfully so.



Good, so you *are* able to make the political and moral distinction.

Do you know *why* those on the far left are more socially 'virtuous' -- ?

It's because the further left you go, the more *content* you have to take-up, and also know about, in a historically-*progressive* direction. A 'centrist' like yourself doesn't have to know *shit*, and it shows -- your status-quo privilege leads you to pontificate and opinionate without having to take on any real issues to any real depth. Consequently you're not a leftist, nor do you have anything *constructive* or progressive to say about society or politics.


Julian658 wrote:
I am a capitalist that realizes capitalism has to culminate in socialism. It is a natural process and not forced (we covered this).



No, *you* keep repeating this blithe and misleading talking-point -- capitalism is about class *elitism*, and socialism is about classless, stateless *egalitarianism*, particularly over social production. One does not spontaneously 'morph' into the other on its own accord -- it has to be the mass *conscious* action of the exploited and oppressed *working class* itself.


---


ckaihatsu wrote:
Is alienated atomized individualism within capitalism's commodity production *sufficient*, or are there *large scale* issues like the coronavirus and global warming that need *large-scale* approaches and solutions?



Julian658 wrote:
The market will eventually take care of those issues. Poverty should be eliminated in the next 50-100 years.



And you recommend *what* -- that we start *sitting on our hands* to get there -- ?

Let me make this easier for myself -- I'm just going to call you a 'market supremacist' from now on. I think that's fitting.


Julian658 wrote:
Ideally capitalism takes care of the needs of people. It is uneven, unfair and not perfect. However, it eventually gets the job done. I understand why some that want more complain, I get it.



Do you want to entertain 'complaints' from the 100,000 who have died from the coronavirus in the past couple months? Oh, that's right -- they *can't* 'complain' because they're no longer living. That's 'convenient', along with being 'uneven', 'unfair', and 'not perfect'.

Shithead.


---


ckaihatsu wrote:
On this one, what do *you* think would happen if capitalists implemented *full automation*?



Julian658 wrote:
That is the 64K question! I don't really know. My hunch is UBI and a dystopia with "have and have nots". This is very complex, but one thing is certain. This is the most prosperous time in world history.



Since you acknowledge the class divide, do you think that working-class interests, as embodied in the workers of the world, should be so *passive*? If the class divide is to be eliminated / transcended, shouldn't the exploited and oppressed class, the *working* class, be encouraged to be more *proactive* since *it's* the class that can potentially *overthrow* the bourgeois *ruling* class -- ?

Why does your preferred 'politics' feature so much *waiting* -- ??


Julian658 wrote:
When I came to America I was supposed to be a minority. I was so naive I thought they were talking about young people. Then, I realize it was condescending racism of low expectations. That was a bitter pill to swallow. Then I noted that Latin Americans born and raised in America were OK with that. OTOH, Latin Americans born and raised abroad felt the term was condescending.



And who *decides* what's 'okay' for the individual, and what's not? The *market* -- ??

You're a *market supremacist*.
#15094237
ckaihatsu wrote:What *are* you, the People Magazine commentary on politics?

You continue to spout off these glib superficial opinions of yours about stuff you know *nothing* about -- tell me straight, did you *wander into* PoFo by mistake?


After reading you I would say I know more about socialism tham what you will ever know about basic human nature, biology, and evolution. And to that you can add common sense. You are unable to leave the echo chamber and you are in shock when you learn other people are open minded about both the right and the left.

No, fascism is a *lack* of systematic analysis, similar to what *you* do, so as to victimize *social minorities*, like Muslims, for the failings of the system. Like you, there's no criticism of the *market mechanism*, so racial and ethnic minorities take the white-nationalist-tribalist blame for a falling capitalist economy.

Why are Muslims a social minority. Since when a religion is a protected group? Will you afford that status to Catholics and Jews?

It's *not* like Cuba or Venezuela, because there's no *scapegoating* there -- there *is* some graft / corruption, but at least both countries are *anti-imperialist*. Fascists are *imperialists*.


Shallow perception of history. I have mentioned to you more than once that domination of one group by another is the history of the human civilization. You are blinded by your ideology and cannot see that the answer you seek is IMPOSSIBLE. I gave you my impression on how to get there, but that is not good enough. Yo want to impose a dictatorship where individuality is not tolerated. That is a RELIGIOUS belief system and your scriptures are the Manifesto.

Racism isn't so much an *individual* thing as it is a *societal*, and *class* thing:


There is only way way to end racism. Show others that you are as good or better. Begging others not to be racist does not work. At most you are treated with condescending racism. Victimhood mentality, does not work, just ask any psychologist. Ask the Koreans if they continue to feel like a victim when dealing with the Japanese.

And, remember this -- ?


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Redlining



All true, but what do you propose? At least I have a plan that is likely to work.

So where do you stand on *identity politics*, then?


Identity politics is racism. It means that a person is judged by the group they belong to. IP leads to division, tribalism, and ultimately violence.




You'd rather *ignore* the legacy of slavery in the world -- that much is clear about you.


Slavery was always a part of human history. We have eliminated slavery and now it is time to do reparations and move on. There is no sense in promoting victimhood to the new generations.

Do you know *why* those on the far left are more socially 'virtuous' -- ?


Those on the far left as as capable or murder as Hitler. That is a problem.

It's because the further left you go, the more *content* you have to take-up, and also know about, in a historically-*progressive* direction. A 'centrist' like yourself doesn't have to know *shit*, and it shows -- your status-quo privilege leads you to pontificate and opinionate without having to take on any real issues to any real depth. Consequently you're not a leftist, nor do you have anything *constructive* or progressive to say about society or politics.


Yes, I take care of myself and my family. And I want a better world for others too. And lefties like you do more damage than good. Let the centrists run the world for a better future. The extremes are doomed to fail. And do not talk revolution when people in commie nations cannot revolt against the massive oppression of communism.

Do you ever wonder why South Korea offers a better lifestyle than North Korea? Or why it was better to live in West Germany than in East Germany? Or why the commie nations did not allow their citizens to travel abroad?

I know what you will say. The commie nations failed because of the West.

No, *you* keep repeating this blithe and misleading talking-point -- capitalism is about class *elitism*, and socialism is about classless, stateless *egalitarianism*, particularly over social production. One does not spontaneously 'morph' into the other on its own accord -- it has to be the mass *conscious* action of the exploited and oppressed *working class* itself.


Classless/stateless equals intoxication with Kool Aid. There is no EQUALITY.


Do you want to entertain 'complaints' from the 100,000 who have died from the coronavirus in the past couple months? Oh, that's right -- they *can't* 'complain' because they're no longer living. That's 'convenient', along with being 'uneven', 'unfair', and 'not perfect'.

Shithead.


Epidemics kill people. That is a lame SJW type comment dude.

Since you acknowledge the class divide, do you think that working-class interests, as embodied in the workers of the world, should be so *passive*? If the class divide is to be eliminated / transcended, shouldn't the exploited and oppressed class, the *working* class, be encouraged to be more *proactive* since *it's* the class that can potentially *overthrow* the bourgeois *ruling* class -- ?

Why does your preferred 'politics' feature so much *waiting* -- ??


You are late to the party. This is not the 19th century. Pretty soon there will be NO WORKERS. Machines will do all the work.

And who *decides* what's 'okay' for the individual, and what's not? The *market* -- ??

You're a *market supremacist*.


The market reflects what people want.
#15094244
Pants-of-dog wrote:@Julian658

No, Latin Americans from abroad do not find the term “minority” to be condescending.

Are you dictating me what I am suppose to feel? Is this Identity politics?

Where are you from? It would be interesting to provide you with a bit of history about how capitalism has affected your country.


Latin America would be great if we never had any outside interference. We would be like the Indians in the Amazon forest. Is that what you want?
#15094245
Pants-of-dog wrote:@Julian658

I see you are ignoring my questions.

Usually, you assume that I am uncomfortable about the questions if I do not answer them quickly enough.

Can we then assume that my questions make you uncomfortable?

POD, don't be insecure. ;)
#15094249
Julian658 wrote:Are you dictating me what I am suppose to feel? Is this Identity politics?


You literally just dictated how all Latin Americans supposedly feel about a word. So, you are allowed to engage in identity politics, but no one else is?

Latin America would be great if we never had any outside interference. We would be like the Indians in the Amazon forest. Is that what you want?


You are evading the question.

What country are you from?

You might be insecure about this question.
#15094252
Julian658 wrote:
After reading you I would say I know more about socialism tham what you will ever know about basic human nature, biology, and evolution. And to that you can add common sense. You are unable to leave the echo chamber and you are in shock when you learn other people are open minded about both the right and the left.



I'm 'shocked' by the echo chamber -- ?

Whaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa????

Attempts at pithiness don't become you -- your opinionating on politics is so abstract as to be *meaningless*. I think you're *used* to covering *celebrity* culture.


Julian658 wrote:
Why are Muslims a social minority. Since when a religion is a protected group? Will you afford that status to Catholics and Jews?



Bruh.

I think they *all* need protection from your market supremacism. Jeeez, who's The Borg now -- ! Gave up your Magic cards for Bitcoin, huh -- ?

x D


Julian658 wrote:
Shallow perception of history. I have mentioned to you more than once that domination of one group by another is the history of the human civilization. You are blinded by your ideology and cannot see that the answer you seek is IMPOSSIBLE. I gave you my impression on how to get there, but that is not good enough. Yo want to impose a dictatorship where individuality is not tolerated. That is a RELIGIOUS belief system and your scriptures are the Manifesto.



Nope -- this is your People Magazine version of the Communist Manifesto, and predictably *erroneous*, too. You keep forgetting that there was a *pre*-civilization, with *no* social hierarchies.

No, *you're* the Borg.


Julian658 wrote:
There is only way way to end racism. Show others that you are as good or better. Begging others not to be racist does not work. At most you are treated with condescending racism. Victimhood mentality, does not work, just ask any psychologist. Ask the Koreans if they continue to feel like a victim when dealing with the Japanese.



You *do* think that racism is *biologically* determined, don't you? Here's that Harman quote again -- maybe it'll sink in this time.



[T]he planters recognised that far from white and black automatically hating each other, there was a likelihood of some whites establishing close relations with the slaves—and the colonial authorities sought to stamp this out by giving slave owners the power of life and death. It was now that racism began to develop as an ideology.

The prevalence of racism today leads people to think it has always existed, arising from an innate aversion of people from one ethnic background for those from another. Slavery is then seen as a byproduct of racism, rather than the other way round.

Yet in the ancient and medieval worlds, people did not regard skin colour as any more significant than, say, height, hair colour or eye colour. Tomb paintings from ancient Egypt show fairly random mixtures of light, brown and black figures. Many important figures in Roman history came from north Africa, including at least one emperor; no text bothers to mention whether they were light or dark skinned. In Dutch paintings of the early 16th century, black and white people are shown as mixing freely—as, for instance, in Jordaen’s painting ‘Moses and Zipporah’, which shows Moses’ wife as black.45



Harman, _People's History of the World_, p. 252



---


Julian658 wrote:
All true, but what do you propose? At least I have a plan that is likely to work.



No, you don't. More-of-the-same-shit is *not* a 'plan'.


Julian658 wrote:
Identity politics is racism. It means that a person is judged by the group they belong to. IP leads to division, tribalism, and ultimately violence.



* Surprise *

It's actually a *double-edged sword* -- compared to market supremacists like you, identity politics is relatively *progressive* because such outspoken social minorities *won't* kowtow to the market-as-social-arbiter, but compared to a workers collectivism over social production those identity types are far too egocentric and fractious.


Julian658 wrote:
Slavery was always a part of human history. We have eliminated slavery and now it is time to do reparations and move on. There is no sense in promoting victimhood to the new generations.



Nope, slavery has *not* always been part of human history -- it parallels the rise of *commodity production*, or modern capitalism, since slaves were effectively labor-personified-and-commodified:



Slavery was not invented in the 17th and 18th centuries, of course. It had persisted in small pockets in different parts of Europe and the Middle East through the Middle Ages—as a way of manning the naval galleys of the Mediterranean states, for instance. But it was a marginal phenomenon at a time when serfdom was the main form of exploitation, and the slavery which did exist was not associated with black people more than any other group. Whites could be galley slaves, and the word for slave is derived from ‘Slav’. As Patrick Manning writes, ‘In 1500, Africans or persons of African descent were a clear minority of the world’s slave population; but by 1700, the majority’.35



Harman, _People's History of the World_, pp. 249-250



---


Julian658 wrote:
Those on the far left as as capable or murder as Hitler. That is a problem.



No, this is a *spurious* and *inappropriate* comparison, because you're not looking at these political categories *politically* -- you keep wanting to *personalize* and *culturize* the realm of politics, which is simply a *bad* approach to analyzing it.

If you look at these things *politically* you'll have to address *political motive*, which you're *not* doing here. Maybe start with the Red Army:



The Workers' and Peasants' Red Army,[a] frequently shortened to Red Army,[b] was the army and the air force of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic and, after 1922, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. The army was established immediately after the 1917 October Revolution. The Bolsheviks raised an army to oppose the military confederations (especially the various groups collectively known as the White Army) of their adversaries during the Russian Civil War. Beginning in February 1946, the Red Army, along with the Soviet Navy, embodied the main component of the Soviet Armed Forces; taking the official name of "Soviet Army", until its dissolution in December 1991.

The Red Army provided the largest land force in the Allied victory in the European theatre of World War II, and its invasion of Manchuria assisted the unconditional surrender of Imperial Japan. During operations on the Eastern Front, it accounted for 75–80% of casualties the Wehrmacht and Waffen-SS suffered during the war and ultimately captured the Nazi German capital, Berlin.[1]



https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Army



---


Julian658 wrote:
Yes, I take care of myself and my family. And I want a better world for others too. And lefties like you do more damage than good. Let the centrists run the world for a better future. The extremes are doomed to fail. And do not talk revolution when people in commie nations cannot revolt against the massive oppression of communism.

Do you ever wonder why South Korea offers a better lifestyle than North Korea? Or why it was better to live in West Germany than in East Germany? Or why the commie nations did not allow their citizens to travel abroad?

I know what you will say. The commie nations failed because of the West.



Actually, there would have *been* no 'commie nations' if it hadn't been for Western imperialism -- the force of the Whites intervention caused a *stagnation* that allowed nationalism to take over, in the person of Stalin.

Here's the link for that. You're welcome.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allied_in ... _Civil_War


Julian658 wrote:
Classless/stateless equals intoxication with Kool Aid. There is no EQUALITY.



And yet there *was* classless and stateless society, historically:


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet_(council)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet_democracy


Julian658 wrote:
Epidemics kill people. That is a lame SJW type comment dude.



You're no longer my *bro*, dude. I un-bro you.


= D


Only *assholes* pretend that society doesn't exist, and that we're all 'at the mercy' of whatever happens to us, like helpless passive victims -- oh, look, it's *you* who portrays humanity as a passive victim.


Julian658 wrote:
You are late to the party. This is not the 19th century. Pretty soon there will be NO WORKERS. Machines will do all the work.



You're still sidestepping the *political* question here -- if capitalism's technological juggernaut brings us to a capitalism without workers -- and a global population without jobs or income -- with fully automated machinery owned / consolidated to a few corporate monopolists (think 'robber barons'), what will the *political* outcome of that be, do you think?


Julian658 wrote:
The market reflects what people want.



No, the market reflects what people *with money* want, and the more money, the more wealth-oriented *production* there is, too, as with skyscrapers and luxury goods.
#15094404
ckaihatsu wrote:
I think they *all* need protection from your market supremacism. Jeeez, who's The Borg now -- ! Gave up your Magic cards for Bitcoin, huh -- ?


What is market supremacism?


Nope -- this is your People Magazine version of the Communist Manifesto, and predictably *erroneous*, too. You keep forgetting that there was a *pre*-civilization, with *no* social hierarchies.


We cannot be hunter and gatherer again. Yes. socialism works great in tiny groups where there is kinship and a monoculture.


You *do* think that racism is *biologically* determined, don't you? Here's that Harman quote again -- maybe it'll sink in this time.


Nope: It is learned, but there is a biological basis. This applies to most human behaviors. The biological impulse is neutralized by the frontal lobe if there is a desire to do so. IS not so much racism, the main issue is tribalism.

But, Sapolsky adds, we resemble our simian counterparts in other ways. For one thing, we are all prone to tribalism — that is, instantaneously sizing up strangers to determine if they’re one of us and therefore to be trusted. For humans, this is the process that underlies racism, political polarization, and any number of prejudices.

“Primates are hardwired for us/them dichotomies,” he said in a telephone interview. “Our brains detect them in less than 100 milliseconds.” While he concedes that this is “depressing as hell,” he notes that we do have one major advantage over monkeys, should we choose to utilize it.

“The key thing about us is that we all belong to multiple tribes,” he said. “Even if we are predisposed into dividing the world into ‘us’ and ‘them,’ it’s incredibly easy to manipulate us as to who is an ‘us’ and who is a ‘them’ at any given moment.”

https://www.independent.com/2018/03/07/ ... tribalism/

It's actually a *double-edged sword* -- compared to market supremacists like you, identity politics is relatively *progressive* because such outspoken social minorities *won't* kowtow to the market-as-social-arbiter, but compared to a workers collectivism over social production those identity types are far too egocentric and fractious.

Leads to tribalism and then violence.

Nope, slavery has *not* always been part of human history -- it parallels the rise of *commodity production*, or modern capitalism, since slaves were effectively labor-personified-and-commodified:


We cannot be hunter and gatherer again.

No, the market reflects what people *with money* want, and the more money, the more wealth-oriented *production* there is, too, as with skyscrapers and luxury goods.

Actually a fair point. People with no money cannot directly create demand in the market.
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