DDR/ cultural marxism/ a lost polack

Lies Stalin und lass den Nazi Dreck hinter dir.

Lenin said that under socialism the interests of the nationalities will merge into a single whole—does it not follow from this that it is time to put an end to the national republics and regions in the interests of
internationalism? Lenin said in 1913, in his controversy with the Bundists, that the slogan of national culture is a bourgeois slogan—does it not follow from this that it is time to put an end to the national cultures of the peoples of the USSR in the interests of . . . internationalism?

Lenin said that national oppression and national barriers are destroyed under socialism—does it not follow from this that it is time to put a stop to the policy of taking into account the specific national features of the peoples of the USSR and to go over to the policy of assimilation in the interests of . . . internationalism?

And so on and so forth.

There can be no doubt that this deviation on the national question, disguised, moreover, by a mask of internationalism and by the name of Lenin, is the most subtle and therefore the most dangerous species of Great-Russian nationalism.

Firstly, Lenin never said that national differences must disappear and that national languages must merge into one common language within the borders of a single state before the victory of socialism on a world scale. On the contrary, Lenin said something that was the very opposite of this, namely, that "national and state differences among peoples and countries … . will continue to exist for a very, very long time even after the dictatorship of the proletariat has been established on a world scale" (Original Comment: JVS: My italics) (Vol. XXV, p. 227). How can anyone refer to Lenin and forget about this fundamental statement of his?

True, Mr. Kautsky, an ex-Marxist and now a renegade and reformist, asserts something that is the very opposite of what Lenin teaches us. Despite Lenin, he asserts that the victory of the proletarian revolution in the Austro-German federal state in the middle of the last century would have led to the formation of a single, common German language and to the Germanisation of the Czechs, because "the mere force of unshackled intercourse, the mere force of modern culture of which the Germans were the vehicles, without any forcible Germanisation, would have converted into Germans the backward Czech petty bourgeois, peasants and proletarians who had nothing to gain from their decayed nationality" (see Preface to the German edition of Revolution and Counter-revolution).

It goes without saying that such a "conception" is in full accord with Kautsky's social-chauvinism. It was these views of Kautsky's that I combated in 1925 in my speech at the University of the Peoples of the East. (Original Footnote: This refers to the address delivered at a meeting of students of the Communist University of the Toilers of the East, May 18, 1925 (see J. V. Stalin, "The Political Tasks of the University of the Peoples of the East," Works, Vol. 7, pp. 141-42)

But can this anti-Marxist chatter of an arrogant German social-chauvinist have any positive significance for us Marxists, who want to remain consistent internationalists?

Who is right, Kautsky or Lenin?

If Kautsky is right, then how are we to explain the fact that relatively backward nationalities like the Byelorussians and Ukrainians, who are closer to the Great-Russians than the Czechs are to the Germans, have not become Russified as a result of the victory of the proletarian revolution in the USSR, but, on the contrary, have been regenerated and have developed as independent nations? How are we to explain the fact that nations like the Turkmenians, Kirghizians, Uzbeks, Tajiks (not to speak of the Georgians, Armenians, Azerbaijanians,- and others), in spite of their backwardness, far from becoming Russified as a result of the victory of socialism in the USSR, have, on the contrary, been regenerated and have developed into independent nations? Is it not evident that our worthy deviators, in their hunt after a sham internationalism, have fallen into the clutches of Kautskyan social-chanvinism? Is it not evident that in advocating a single, common language within the borders of a single state, within the borders of the USSR, they are, in essence, striving to restore the muh privileges of the formerly predominant language, namely, the Great-Russian language?

What has this to do with internationalism?

Secondly, Lenin never said that the abolition of national oppression and the merging of the interests of nationalities into one whole is tantamount to the abolition of national differences. We have abolished national oppression. We have abolished national muh privileges and have established national equality of rights. We have abolished state frontiers in the old sense of the term, frontier posts and customs barriers between the nationalities of the USSR We have established the unity of the economic and political interests of the peoples of the USSR But does this mean that we have thereby abolished national differences, national languages, culture, manner of life, etc.? Obviously it does not mean this. But if national differences, languages, culture, manner of life, etc.; have remained, is it not evident that the demand for the abolition of the national republics and regions in the present historical period is a reactionary demand directed against the interests of the dictatorship of the proletariat? Do our deviators understand that to abolish the national republics at the present time means depriving the vast masses of the peoples of the USSR of the possibility of receiving education in their native languages, depriving them of the possibility of having schools, courts, administration, public and other organisations and institutions in their native languages, depriving them of the possibility of being drawn into the work of socialist construction? Is it not evident that in their hunt after a sham internationalism our deviators have fallen into the clutches of the reactionary Great-Russian chauvinists and have forgotten, completely forgotten, the slogan of the cultural revolution in the period of the dictatorship of the proletariat which applies equally to all the peoples of the USSR; both Great-Russian and non-Great-Russian?

Thirdly, Lenin never said that the slogan of developing national culture under the conditions of the dictatorship of the proletariat is a reactionary slogan. On the contrary, Lenin always stood for helping the peoples of the USSR to develop their national cultures. It was under the guidance of none other than Lenin that at the Tenth Congress of the Party, the resolution on the national question was drafted and adopted, in which it is plainly stated that: "The Party's task is to help the labouring masses of the non-Great Russian peoples to catch up with Central Russia, which has gone in front, to help them:

a) to develop and strengthen Soviet statehood among them in forms corresponding to the national conditions and manner of life of these peoples;

b) to develop and strengthen among them courts administrations, economic and government bodies functioning in their native language and staffed with local people familiar with the manner of life and mentality of the local inhabitants;

c) to develop among them press, schools, theatres, clubs, and cultural and educational institutions in general, functioning in the native languages;

d) to set up and develop a wide network of general-educational and trade and technical courses and schools, functioning in the native languages." (Original Footnote: See Resolutions and Decisions of CPSU Congresses, Confrences and Centrla Committee Plenums; Part 1, 1953, p.559).

Is it not obvious that Lenin stood wholly and entirely for the slogan of developing national culture under the conditions of the dictatorship of the proletariat?

Is it not obvious that to deny the slogan of national culture under the conditions of the dictatorship of the proletariat means denying the necessity of raising the cultural level of the non-Great-Russian peoples of the USSR, denying the necessity of compulsory universal education for these peoples, means putting these peoples into spiritual bondage to the reactionary nationalists?

Lenin did indeed qualify the slogan of national culture under the rule of the bourgeoisie as a reactionary slogan. But could it be otherwise?

What is national culture under the rule of the national bourgeoisie? It is culture that is bourgeois in content and national in form, having the object of doping the masses with the poison of nationalism and of strengthening the rule of the bourgeoisie.

What is national culture under the dictatorship of the proletariat? It is culture that is socialist in content and national in form, having the object of educating the masses in the spirit of socialism and internationalism.

How is it possible to confuse these two fundamentally different things without breaking with Marxism?

Is it not obvious that in combating the slogan of national culture under the bourgeois order, Lenin was striving at the bourgeois content of national culture and not at its national form?

It would be foolish to suppose that Lenin regarded socialist culture as non-national, as not having a particular national form. The Bundists did at one time actually ascribe this nonsense to Lenin. But it is known from the works of Lenin that he protested sharply against this slander, and emphatically dissociated himself from this nonsense. Have our worthy deviators really followed in the footsteps of the Bundists?

After all that has been said, what is left of the arguments of our deviators?

Nothing, except juggling with the flag of inter-nationalism and slander against Lenin.

Those who are deviating towards Great-Russian chauvinism are profoundly mistaken in believing that the period of building socialism in the USSR is the period of the collapse and abolition of national cultures. The very opposite is the case. In point of fact, the period of the dictatorship of the proletariat and of the building of socialism in the USSR is a period of the flowering of national cultures that are socialist in content and national in form for under the Soviet system, the nations themselves are not the ordinary "modern" nations, but socialist nations just as in content their national cultures are not the ordinary bourgeois cultures, but socialist cultures.

They apparently fail to understand that national cultures are bound to develop with new strength with the introduction and firm establishment of compulsory universal elementary education in the native languages. They fail to understand that only if the national cultures are developed will it be possible really to draw the backward nationalities into the work of socialist construction.

They fail to understand that it is just this that is the basis of the Leninist policy of helping and promoting the development of the national cultures of the peoples of the USSR.

It may seem strange that we who stand for the future merging of national cultures into one common (both in form and content) culture, with one common language, should at the same time stand for the flowering of national cultures at the present moment, in the period of the dictatorship of the proletariat. But there is nothing strange about it. The national cultures must be allowed to develop and unfold, to reveal all their potentialities, in order to create the conditions for merging them into one common culture with one common language in the period of the victory of social-ism all over the world. The flowering of cultures that are national in form and socialist in content under the dictatorship of the proletariat in one country for the purpose of merging them into one common socialist (both in form and content) culture, with one common language, when the proletariat is victorious all over the world and when socialism becomes the way of life—it is just this that constitutes the dialectics of the Leninist presentation of the question of national culture.

It may be said that such a presentation of the question is "contradictory." But is there not the same "contradictoriness" in our presentation of the question of the state? We stand for the withering away of the state. At the same time we stand for the strengthening of the dictatorship of the proletariat, which is the mightiest and strongest state power that has ever existed. The highest development of state power with the object of preparing the conditions for the withering away of state-power—such is the Marxist formula. Is this "contradictory"? Yes, it is "contradictory." But this contradiction is bound up with life, and it fully reflects Marx's dialectics.

Or, for example, Lenin's presentation of the question of the right of nations to self-determination, including the right to secession. Lenin sometimes depicted the thesis on national self-determination in the guise of the simple formula: "disunion for union." Think of it—disunion for union. It even sounds like a paradox. And yet, this "contradictory', formula reflects that living truth of Marx's dialectics which enables the Bolsheviks to capture the most impregnable fortresses in the sphere of the national question.

The same may be said about the formula relating to national culture: the flowering of national cultures (and languages) in the period of the dictatorship of the proletariat in one country with the object of preparing the conditions for their withering away and merging into one common socialist culture (and into one common language) in the period of the victory of socialism all over the world.

Anyone who fails to understand this peculiar feature and "contradiction" of our transition period, anyone who fails to understand these dialectics of the historical processes, is dead as far as Marxism is concerned.

The misfortune of our deviators is that they do not understand, and do not wish to understand, Marx's dialectics.
marxists.org/reference/archive/stalin/works/1930/aug/27.htm

The foreign Press sometimes carries such twaddle as that the Red Army pursues the aim of exterminating the German people and destroying the German state. This, of course, is a stupid lie, and a senseless slander against the Red Army. The Red Army has not and cannot have such idiotic aims. The Red Army’s aim is to drive the German occupants from our country and liberate Soviet soil from the German-fascist invaders. It is very likely that the war for the liberation of Soviet soil will lead to the exile or destruction of Hitler’s clique. We would welcome such an outcome. But it would be ludicrous to identify Hitler’s clique with the German people, with the German state. The experience of history indicates that Hitlers come and go, but the German people and the German state remain.

The strength of the Red Army lies, finally, in the fact that it does not and cannot feel racial hatred for other peoples, including the German people; that it has been trained in the spirit of equality of all peoples and races, in the spirit of respect for the rights of other peoples. The Germans’ racial theory and the practice of racial hatred have caused all freedom-loving peoples to become enemies of fascist Germany. The theory of race equality in the U.S.S.R. and practice of respect for the rights of other peoples have caused all freedom-loving peoples to become the friends of the Soviet Union.

Herein lies the strength of the Red Army.

And herein lies the weakness of the German-fascist army.

The foreign Press sometimes carries such twaddle as that the Soviet people hate the Germans just as Germans, that the Red Army exterminates German soldiers just as Germans out of hatred for everything German and that therefore the Red Army does not take German soldiers prisoner. That, of course is a similar stupid lie and senseless slander against the Red Army. The Red Army is devoid of all sentiments of racial hatred. It is devoid of such degrading sentiments because it has been trained in the spirit of racial equality and respect for the rights of other peoples. It should not be forgotten either that in our country any manifestation of racial hatred is punished by law.

Of course, the Red Army has to destroy the German-fascist occupationists inasmuch as they wish to enslave our Motherland; or when, on being surrounded by our troops, they refuse to lay down their arms and surrender. The Red Army annihilates them, not because of their German origin, but because they want to enslave our Motherland. The Red Army, like the army of any other people, has the right and is duty-bound to annihilate the enslavers of its Motherland, irrespective of their national origin. Not long ago the German garrisons in the towns of Kalinin, Klin, Sukhinichi, Andreapol and Toropets were surrounded by our troops, who offered them surrender and, in this case, promised to spare their lives. The German garrisons refused to lay down their arms and surrender. It is obvious that they had to be driven out by force and that not a few Germans were killed. War is war. The Red Army takes German soldiers and officers prisoner if they surrender, and spares their lives. The Red Army annihilates German soldiers and officers if they refuse to lay down their arms, and, arms in hand, attempt to enslave our Motherland. Remember the words of the great Russian writer, Maxim Gorky: “If the enemy does not surrender he must be annihilated.”
marxists.org/reference/archive/stalin/works/1942/02/23.htm

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why do you want traditional values

all the things you don't like about the modern "left" are basically the legacy of the 60's New Left, where people decided "what if we just ignored the class struggle and mobilized radical feminists and gays instead?", so basically became anti-Marxist.

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lol stormniggers deserve guillotine. I have zero desire to help you or your race. I hope you get beaten to death by a pack of feral muslims

Everyone itt should stop replying to this inbred fuckwit who literally believes that he's better than every black person

Got I hate all of you reactionary scum, you'll be put up against the wall. And for you're "superior race" the "poor oppressed white men" will be gifted the feeling of being on an equal footing or once.
>>>/gulag/

it's hilarious how some generic Holla Forumslack talk can drive the plebbitors mad

actually i am a tribalist who thinks no race is superior to any other race or holds the right to rule over it, and that every member of a race occupies its Lebensraum by birth right and no one has the right to invade your Lebensraum or expand his own but a peoples full potential can only be achieved if isolated of other peoples and races influence or infiltration.
this goes for the negro, this goes for the white man and this goes for the asians, everyone will be better off if we let each other alone.

This thread was going really well
I suggest you to ignore those idiots before the thread rots more

lol

stop reading aryanism.net u autist

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this

the left post 1960s is utter cancer

we should be able to discuss jews openly and fairly

ITS THE FUCKING JEWS FAULT THEY SECRETLY CONTROL EVERYTHING I SAW AN INFOGRAPH WAKE THE FUCK UP SHEEPLE

they don't but they do play a disproportionate role in movements

their natural instinct is loyalty to other jews, rather than other workers.

so kind of like dwarves

no, just very nepotistic people

twitter.com/coffeespoonie/status/832341044519895041

Natural instinct
NazBol, pls stop being so spooked

Yes let's deny that the way we think might be the product of evolution.

Are you trying to imply that there's a Jewish gene that seeks to fluoridise our water supply and control the world?

If anyone's spooked, it's them. I'm simply observing their nature.

That's a spook.

I'd also generally point out that Marxism in practice doesn't lead to the extermination of culture, but rather to its maximal flourishing. Although workers are united by their common relations to their means of production and ethnic divides exist only insofar as they are profitable, that doesn't mean that Marxism means a nihilistic single world culture. If you look at the USSR, as shown in the Stalinpost above, a central feature until Stalin's later deviationism and even to a lesser extent after it was minority liberationism. Different peoples, ranging from Muslim tribes to Belorussian farmers, united behind the revolutionaries of 1917 because they knew that they would be liberated by them and permitted their full rights to practice their culture.

I'm a leaf, I would fully expect that a Canadian socialist government would do its utmost to promote and defend the flourishing of all parts of Canadian culture and society, be it Quebecker, Aboriginal, prairie, Newfie, or whatever. While "upholding traditional values" is spooky, I believe that a socialist society must protect authentic and organic culture emanating from the masses from the corrupting influence of capital. At present, our strong public-owned media does a decent job of that, but under socialism I believe that the Canadian novelist, musician, poet, and artist would be supported and glorified. The same would, of course, be true in an American People's Republic or a British People's Republic.

I'm fully against racism, ethno-chauvinism, and racial divides in society, but with that being said I'm still certain that only under socialism can a true, lively, and wholesome realization of cultures be achieved.

all the things you don't like about the modern "left" are basically the legacy of the 60's New Left, where people decided "what if we just ignored the class struggle and mobilized radical feminists and gays instead?", so basically became anti-Marxist.

These.

The """leftists""" you generally see in the public eye aren't trying to apply Marx on the cultural level, they're fervently anti-Marxist in both theory and action. When you look at things like racism, sexism, etc. as cultural problems to be solved through cultural change, you deny the material basis of oppression. And you have to go out of your way to find problems which don't exist, like "mansplaining" and other SJW nonsense.

Take the immigration issue, for instance. The liberal "left" tries to frame all opposition to immigration as a hatred of different people and cultures. This certainly isn't the case for most people I know, so what gives? Well, there's a natural material conflict between 1) those who want to enter another country for higher pay to support their family at home or find better prospects for themselves and 2) the people of the host country subsequently harmed by depressed wages, fewer job openings and reduced bargaining power. The issue of outsourcing is very much the same, except it's capital that's moving. The liberal project is to "strike a balance" between the two conflicting sides and to alternately legislate in the favor of one against the other, as it becomes most profitable to most of the bourgeoisie. This naturally pits one group against the other as adversaries, each seemingly responsible for the other's misfortune or lack of opportunities.

What this doesn't account for is the basic assumptions underlying the capitalist system. The conflict between immigrant and native is not one that comes directly from nature, but from the private ownership of the means of production. There's always a certain level of socially necessary labor required to merely reproduce the current state of things and jobs are not per se "created," "destroyed," or "stolen," absent actual material change (technological advance, restructuring.) What's changing is the way the bourgeoisie gatekeeps your "right" to do them. When some well-meaning person insists we need to allow more immigration, and that the white working class can foot the bill, they're not addressing the actual contradictions in the capitalist system which require a zero-sum trade off between workers of different national origins, they're merely trying to carry them out in a way that benefits one "more deserving" group at the expense of another, "less deserving" one. In that sense liberalism amounts to merely fiddling with a range of dials.

The nationalist/protectionist stance has the very same basic formula, just with the preferences reversed. Even Hitler's promises of lebensraum, that the destitute German people must be made better off by invading other nations, sought change within the capitalist system and not through overcoming it to let all work and retain the product of their labor.

Like I say, I don't feel this describes us. We're a big tent united by a shared rejection of identity politics, in much the same way at the alt-right is a big tent of people who reject a handful of progressive principles.
youtube.com/watch?v=861f18VN6zI
I mean, I believe gays shouldn't get thrown off buildings, but I don't think strutting around in a pink speedo with a rainbow flag and telling others to "check their muh privilege" really helps us. As Stokely Carmichael said, "If a white man wants to lynch me, that's his problem. If he has the means to lynch me, then it's my problem." Sticks and stones. All you can hope is to remove the material basis to oppression and violence, and allow everyone to enjoy security and the product of their own labor. It's pointless and absolutely divisive to try and force people to feel a certain way.

(2)

Well, we're pretty much guilty as charged there. I feel like "we've always done it this way" isn't sufficient justification for a cultural norm or policy, they must always be examined around their own merits and internal contradictions. I assume you support traditionalism because cultural evolution produces the most useful culture for a given context, or something, but we can really determine what is good and bad through analysis. What is and isn't "traditional" seems like a hard question for me.
Remember though that it wasn't Marxists who destroyed the black family, it was the liberal welfare state, which only exists as bread and circus to prop up capitalism and treat some of its symptoms among the people.
Honestly if you're big on personal responsibility and self-ownership, things like workplace democracy are all about that.

I'm… really not all that convinced Jews are inherently a problem. Yes, they're overrepresented in the bourgeoisie, central banks, and culture industry, but it is those institutions themselves which are fundamentally broken and can be so thoroughly abused by nepotism/cronyism, not those who occupy them. Case in point - look at Trump's lackluster "ethics reform." Prioritize fixing bad systems over appointing good men to run them, always.
Here's what Marx had to say about the jewish cultural identity though, in his earlier days.
marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1844/jewish-question/
It's one of his first attempts at "historical materialism" and could be a good introduction for you.

no but they are annoyingly ethnocentric and defensive

PRECIOUS

BODILY

FLUIDS

Forgot to say identity politics is a device of class rule more than anything. It pits the workers against one another over fabricated non-issues, and has played a major role in neutering the real left and suppressing workers' struggles.

It's the porkies who control academia - private unis through donors, and public ones through the government. Post-modernists, critical race theorists, etc. populate its halls not because they're right, not because they're the authentic expression of leftism, but because it is in porky's interest they do.