Sorry as I am less well read, but aren't they so wrong to say the vanguard party is a class? If you are proletarian, you are more then welcome to join...

[–] ExotiqueMatter@lemmygrad.ml 12 points 4 days ago (1 children)

Classes are defined by their relations to the means of productions and to other classes, the party's members aren't a different class than the proletariat because they have the same relations to the means of productions as the proletariat.

[–] sewer_rat_420@hexbear.net 11 points 4 days ago (1 children)

Was anyone free to join the Bolsheviks, as long as they could become well enough educated?

[–] ExotiqueMatter@lemmygrad.ml 10 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago)

I think so, yes. @yogthos would know more about that.

[–] vovchik_ilich@hexbear.net 9 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago) (1 children)

The party went tremendous efforts to promote itself among the population and there were more members of the communist party in the USSR than members of any party anywhere else on earth AFAIK (edit: except probably China later).

Simultaneously, the party, especially in the pre-Khruschchov era, subjected itself to a lot of so-called "purges" (chitska) in which it would rid itself of people perceived as bureaucrats and people who were in just for personal benefit instead of ideology and praxis. To remain in the party during one such purge, many people were requested to give account of their contributions to the party and society, the time they volunteered in which actions, etc.

[–] sewer_rat_420@hexbear.net 8 points 4 days ago

This is what I thought. I just wish I was better at de-bunking the "anti-tankie" folks who claim that USSR was authoritarian despite being a dictatorship of the proletariat. Anarchists that just think the state will dissolve magically without the people taking it back