this post was submitted on 14 Aug 2024
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chapotraphouse
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Wasn't that one of Stalin's rare L's though? Social democrats can move in either direction, some of them shot rosa, some of them fought nazis and joined in the post ww2 socialist coalition governments and were integrated with the communists. (Czechoslovakia comes to mind) How many hexbears started out as social democrats during Bernie 2016?
You're looking at it as though it's Calvinism. Stalin's statement is about where the ideology of social democracy fits into the framework of class struggle, not about how everyone who at any point identifies as socdem has the soul of a fascist and has never and will never do anything worthwhile. The point of his statement is that the purpose social democracy serves is the maintenance of capitalism and therefore that people working towards social-democratic ends are working on maintaining capitalism (which is also the job of fascism and fascists, though they accomplish it differently and under different circumstances).
That individual socdems radicalized or fought in self-defense or whatever has no bearing on the statement. What matters for it is that the socdem organization of the SPD, on the eve of revolution, chose to protect capitalism (even though many of its own members objected), demonstrating how even those smol bean well-meaning SPD members who just didn't appreciate Rosa's message until her corpse was dumped in the river nonetheless had been working towards the benefit and promotion of just the organization responsible for it.
Stalin joining the allies also has no bearing on this. It fails to comprehend the difference between ideological conflict and political conflict. What Stalin was drawing were the lines of ideological conflict, which is vindicated a thousand times over by the US, Britain, etc. materially supporting Nazi Germany up until the latter's expansionism put it and the various liberal states into political conflict. Because of this political conflict, it made sense to ally in the war with these liberal states, but that by no means made them somehow fellow-travelers, as demonstrated by how the US didn't even wait until the end of the war to start making barbaric plays in the interest of checking the power of the Soviet Union.
This exactly. As I've indicated in other parts of the thread, the primary problem of the moment is that of political education. This whole thread is an absolute testament to that. Everybody is so excited to share the good news of communism without having a complex understanding of a non-memyfied version of it. People mistake entertainment (especially shit-postimg) for education.
Perhaps I am a dour nerd in a corner on this, but I am fine with that, it won't be the first or last time.
The important thing is to use it as an opportunity to educate and not just bemoan lacking education (not that you did that, I saw some of you talking about things constructively).
Appreciate the check for sure.
TBF folks are out here being Calvinists in this thread to individual succdems.
But yeah, I agree, don't join social democratic orgs. But DSA isn't a social democrat org, it sure is contested by them, but the majority of the NPC is a mixture of communists of varying levels of good.
Then it's a good thing I would never equate Stalin, for whatever faults he might have had, with a bunch of memelords on a shitposting website.
It absolutely is. A few individual self-identified communists in leadership positions of an org founded on social democracy with explicitly anticommunist bylaws that historically and currently pursues an exclusively social democratic strategy don't change the character of the organization. The character of the organization is determined by the actions it takes.
There's a huge difference between personal politics and organizational politics. There's massive inertia and the fact that it's by definition a democratic socialist organization.
There's value in joining if there's no other org you can be a part of, or maybe to poach people, but you'll never drive them significantly left.
There is massive inertia, and the NPC is currently minority social democrat. The problem is Trotskyists with shitty third camp opinions making up the deciding votes, which is a better situation than a previously social democrat led org, and you know, those folks can be further pushed as they see the consequences of their actions not work out as they hoped. They're not mustache twirling villians, they're just wrong.
And if you are still a social democrat after the 2020 election cycle, you either weren't paying attention, and shouldn't be trusted, or you are hopelessly naive, and shouldn't be trusted.
Fuck socdems, but I feel like you're ignoring that not everyone is in your age cohort and experiencing things with the context you were. Also, like, politically disengaged people absolutely should be a target of agitation, what the hell are you talking about?
That doesn't mean I need to caucus with them or consider them my allies, like people in the DSA often do.
idk, I can totally see DSA members becoming disengaged just like I can see Dem voters becoming disengaged (but I repeat myself). It's a natural reaction to putting effort in and not getting anywhere, and the DSA has a long history of not getting anywhere and just diverting energy into the Democratic machine or whatever. I think my original statement stands.
Fair enough. My original statements are incorrect then. But my opinion on the DSA and engaging politically with the DSA remains unchanged.
I think that's pretty fair; it's a systemically bad org.
What percent of the US population is currently beyond social democrat? We don't have to win over most people, but we have to win over some people to socialism. Like, IDK, a couple percent? I trust them less if they learn now than if they learned a while ago, but it is still worth educating folks. I've seen some folks really change for the better in the time I've been in DSA.
Then win them over in an actual communist organization while improving your own understanding of revolutionary theory? Join the PSL. Trying to convince comrades who are not currently active in political organizations to salt the DSA is a massive waste of time. This is bad theory.
If you are already in the DSA and already have connections there, then there is little harm in trying to push them further left, but you should ALSO be seeking a party that is ACTUALLY in line with your ACTUAL values. You are literally fighting against senior members and an anti-communist culture with decades of entrenchment, and to believe that you can change that is also hopelessly naive. The DSA is not a bottom-up organization, the bottom is purposefully disorganized.
THE PSL isn't capable of doing demcent or scientific socialism if this is correct? https://archive.org/details/party-for-socialism-and-liberation-psl-constitution-2022/page/6/mode/2up
The central committee being able to select up to 40 percent of delegates means it's going to be inflexible and less capable of developing in the long term, even if it starting from a better ideological position.
We are not at the point where flexibility is needed, we are at a point where incredibly basic political education is needed. You are literally making excuses not to join an actual communist organization, when the DSA does not, and can never, actually resemble a communist organization.
I am more concerned about long term development- not having democracy isn't conducive to scientific socialism, and you aren't demcent without the dem.
Idk what exactly your line of thinking on this is. It seems like you are creating arbitrary purity tests that the whole 'Join the DSA' schtick fails to pass muster.
If you are concerned with long term development, then maybe your time would be better spent working within an already existing communist organization that consistently has good opinions to open up to more demcent practices, than an anti-communist organization (which also doesn't practice demcent organization or scientific socialism) to not only adopt those practices, but ALSO adopt consistently anti-imperialist politics.
Then join another group that better represents your vision of demcent policy and scientific socialism, or fuck, make your own party. My point is that the DSA is not worth a comrades who are not already established members within its time.
I really don't see how "hey, your org very clearly isn't democratic" is a purity test. PSL straight up isn't democratic in internal structure, internal democratic structure is actually important for a party to function in a healthy way.
"join a sect or form another sect" is a deeply unserious suggestion. Like the whole argument here is "there are better orgs out there" and there really isn't if you actually want to do work with a critical mass.
Most of the actually existing demcent parties weren't 'very democratic' by liberal standards. There was usually political education that was required for even basic entry (outside of provisional) unless you were engaged in direct militancy and then on top of that you were still usually beholden to the party bureaucratic structuring, that would affect how votes were cast. Organizations aren't perfect, they're people.
Context matters, when you are attempting maintain an anti-imperialist leftist org in the imperialist core, you have to maintain political cohesion and the only way to do that is through some level of top-down party control. Otherwise ultras (whom may or may not be feds) will come in, and they will ruin your shit. The U.S. feds in particular got really good at disrupting demcent parties in the 70's and 80's. Perhaps they have gotten relaxed in their tactics now that the USSR isn't priority number one, but given the state of Western leftist organizations, it doesn't take much to completely knock it off base with abit of propaganda about the 'anti-imperialist' leadership and you're back to square one. Most of the principled leftist orgs I know are in siege mode and focused entirely on education and getting people into places where they can be educated. Good or bad, that's where it's at atm. Honestly, I'm surprised the CC isn't in full control of the party management in the PSL.
It's not about 'hanging with the cool kids because soc-dems are sooooo annoying'. This isn't high school. It's about getting people who are interested into revolutionary education that acknowledges and understands the role of revolutionary defeatism, and the current and past revolutionary proletarian history of the U.S. And socdems, and even most baby leftists I know are not ideologically willing (and likely will never be willing) to sacrifice imperialism (particularly moral) if it comes at the cost of material comfort, which it always does, because that is not why people join (or in particular stay) the DSA.
Look, you clearly want to engage with 'the mass' through the DSA and push it left, so go for it (edit: keep at it). Personally, I've seen how this works time and again, writ small. I don't have much hope for it writ large. Maybe times have changed and the context is different. If it works, I'll gladly shut my mouth and join the DSA (again).
You can say I am making unserious suggestions, but given that some people here riffed that your suggestion is an April Fool's joke, all suggestions are unserious until they suddenly aren't.
I def support political education as a requirement for vanguard/center purposes, but that isn't what this is about.
Isn't CPUSA another example of an org that claims to be demcent but is just cent? Isn't this not a good example to use? Feds got up high in the internal structure and used their cent against them.
PSL just straight up isn't in the illegal period. And even during the illegal period, the bolsheviks didn't enter "siege mode" If you're in siege mode now, what is PSL going to do when shit continues to get worse? Does PSL foresee a period where there is less political repression in the US than there is now?
You're going to eventually have to talk about imperialism with not-particularly politically developed social democrats.
"It's about getting people who are interested in..." to do what?
Literally be a historical materialist about it. The july 26 movement and the bolsheviks both emerged from and participated in less disciplined orgs, they didn't exile themselves. Can you name a successful vanguard of a movement that isolated themselves like US sects do?
I'm not 'exiling' myself. I just will not pay dues to the DSA ever again until I see a real shift in the relationship between the regional and national parties.
CPUSA, to my knowledge, started demcent, then became cent over time as the leadership tightened under 'fed' (or democrat comprador, at least) control, to the point now that it is now completely centralized. The history is alittle wonky there, at there is a lot of documentation on that is old head and zine knowledge lost to time at this point imo. I am unsure of the trajectory of the PSL in that regard (which is something to look into), I just assumed by their stances and prominence they would be nearly completely centralized (which hey, egg on my face). In my personal experience, I have just had easier times discussing the state of things with their members, so imo clearly they are doing something right imo from an education or recruitment perspective. They seem clearly focused on getting ideologically trained members willing to participate in immediate and responsive direct action (one of the reasons I didn't join, cause I wasn't sticking around in tbe area). To what end, I couldn't say, perhaps their protest logistical training is poor.
I already have to talk to social democrats and baby leftists all the time. It wouldn't help me for them to have organizational cover.
For context, where I am living now, there is no left-wing movement to speak of at all. Most of the students I was around didn't even know what 'Palestine' was, let alone that there were protests going on at other campuses. The ones who did know either had friends on other campuses getting arrested, or because their conservative parents had asked them about it. But I do what I can, go to Marx reading group, discuss Marxism in public when the topic arises and history broadly when I can, but between working two jobs in the summer and a job and school it is tough to remain politically active in an area where it is not really self-sustaining.
If you are actually in the thick of it, you are more active than I am atm, and can make better judgements as to where your time is best spent. I was not impressed by the DSA to say the least, but hey, time moves ever forward.
Stalin himself would go on to ally with governments to the right of social democracies in order to fight actual fascists. It's absolutely an L that he lumped them all in together as basically the same. It's also absurd to be so dogmatic about a comment made 100 years ago in a wildly different political and material context.
At the end of the day, these are people who've taken a concrete step left of the Democratic Party. We should be convincing them to take more steps, not calling them fascists.
Okay, but consider ceding the terrain where the baby social democrats and socialists congregate to groundwork and SMC because social democrats are annoying? : P Then we'd be able to hang out in the cool kids club without having to constantly explain ourselves to the semi-organized masses, which communists, as you know, hate doing.