Why do some MLs try to shutdown any criticisms of, like, the Syrian or North Korean governments...

Why do some MLs try to shutdown any criticisms of, like, the Syrian or North Korean governments? "Critical support" must be whole-hearted support. I know of MLs who dogpile on anyone who says something as lukewarm as "Assad's government is oppressive, but that's for Syrians to handle and other countries to stay out of".

One of my closest friends has been getting more and more entrenched in those kinds of circles. When we were hanging out a few months ago, we started discussing Iran, which is a minor interest of mine. I voiced criticisms—not even stuff that's conjecture, things we have hard evidence of like public executions of rape victims and outlawing communist parties—and I could tell he disagreed with me for saying Iran is NOT "a comrade" but was too pussy to say it.

What the fuck is the rationale for this sort of ideology and behavior.

Other urls found in this thread:

marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1916/imp-hsc/ch09.htm
twitter.com/AnonBabble

1. Most of the criticisms are legit western propaganda (especially of North Korea but to a lesser extent the other countries as well). I have never heard an anti-dprk statement from a leftist that wasn't absolute nonsense. I'm not saying legitimate criticisms don't exist but they're not common even among the left.
2. From a tactical standpoint it's often beneficial to gloss over bad things these states do since no one in the West can stop those things anyway (e.g. pretty much every middle eastern country, including the anti-imperialist ones, persecutes homosexuals but there's no way people outside those countries are going to stop that) and talking about them makes the state look worse in the western consciousness (which makes it easier to deploy the propaganda in point 1).

Probably because a lot of them have a really anti-imperialist mind set, so even if a country isn't particularly leftist, they'll still defend based on that mentality

Hyper awareness of how NATO is a bloodthirsty war machine itching to topple governments and loot the resources from Iran et al.

Also, clarifying
FSA has already been polluted, both by Assad's government (by releasing imprisoned mujahideen) and the West. I'm pro-Assad until the next election and ultra anti-imperialists try to attack me even for that. It's fucking weird.


I guess that makes sense. It just doesn't seem like a good strategy to try to silence genuine criticisms, though. Even though we can't do anything about what they do wrong, it rubs a lot of people the wrong way to be expected to act like they don't do anything wrong EVER, even when you're defending them against people/governments who want to escalate and invade.

>>/leftpol/

Are MLs trying to kill people or extort people who criticize kim on the internet now? come on now.

Stop thinking moralistically and start thinking tactically.
What do lukewarm positions do to fight imperialism? And what does whole-hearted support do in comparison?

Because most of it is slander that must be combated.

So would you "critically support" your gf or your best friend? That's fucking stupid.

They're right to do so, Assad is only oppressing terrorists and imperialists.

You are a Hitchensite piece of shit who will wail and scream about the "evil regime" while the USAF is conducting bombing runs.

KYS

Did they not teach you reading comprehension at school?

Marxist Leninists who refuse to criticize the governments they support are LARPING if they think splitting hairs over whether we should begrudgingly or whole heartedly support Assad matters at all to anybody

This here is all that needs to be said.

Propaganda is everything. You, as a leftist, should know this. The US has engaged in anti-left, pro-imperialist propaganda for generations.

Why the fuck are you trying to make their job easier?

Do you see right wingers speaking up about all the racist mass shooters? fuck no they just dig in even deeper.

back to reddit

>>>/out/

So we have to engage in active denial of admitted, existing problems of various places?

...

t. liberals

The only governments that deserve criticism are western ones (especially America.)

You say that like it's a bad thing. Your half-hearted "support" is hardly better than no support at all.

OP is a faggot
1/10 made me reply
>>>/gulag/

how comes you liberals have so much time at hand discussing the evil of Iran that is under threat of your military while still not having rebuild and organized a party that wasn't killed off and subverted by feds to oppose this threat?
why so busy with justifying the right wing as a "left" mouthpiece for them?

The main enemy is at home
your cuckdem phrases against the "reactionaries abroad" already showed it's character the first time around in WW1
go choke on a bagload of dicks

...

No, but mind the social environment and impact of your speech. Between comrades, sure. NK is a dystopian hellhole, still, ironically, in many aspects better than major Western countries.

Since you assumed your flag: one of the most disgusting thing I see anarchists doing is using imperialist propaganda for their own advantage, most of the time unconsciously. The tactic is, basically: 1. regurgitate US propaganda 2. add that "our anarchist project will be much better than that hellhole."

Since anarchism never got to the point to seriously threaten global capital like the USSR did your side doesn't really understand the seriously dangerous treachery this tactic involves.


They do have a point, tho. It's too easy to hide behind such a statement:
Not to mention it's obviously false (truth is no propaganda) and pomo-ish. A rigid attitude can easily turn into perversion of an otherwise good principle.

There's also another reading possible, probably why this other faggot keeps you calling a "reactionary": your statement is too close to the conservative "wisdom" of the fundamental lie (you need to lie to the plebs to keep society together).

How can state capitalism threaten global capitalism?

Is this another thread where your end goal is to provoke the mods to ban you, then claim the position of the innocent and morally righteous victim? We could certainly hasten this process if you'd just be open about it! I thought you leftpol-types finally settled down.

Are you saying that the socialist bloc in the 20th century wasn't the main target of US imperialism?

Why would mods ban him? He's right.

upvoted

No it's not you idiot.

I'm saying there was no socialist block. There was a capitalist alliance (read: Warsaw Pact) that fought against another capitalist alliance (read: NATO) over influence over the world and conducted its own imperialism.

What's with idiots misusing imperialism and pretending they're socialists? (or worse, "real socialists" lmao).

The concept was clearly defined by Lenin in a very short book.

most modern ☭TANKIE☭s unknowingly subscribe to kautsky's theory of imperialism

critical support means you're not allowed to criticize.

And to back up point 1 , just look at this moron

What's wrong with that?

lmfao no they don't.

There’s criticism of liberal tier social issues and then there are radical anti-proletarian actions of these governments, like executing people for being communists. These regimes are radically anti-proletarian in character and are only anti imperialist because their porkies don’t want to all their nations wealth for themselves, rather than taking a cut of what foreign porkies extract. I have no doubt that they would become imperialists themselves if they had the chance, in fact Lenin points out that this is an inevitability. China is a prime example of a formerly anti-imperialist country becoming imperialist itself.

That being said, these regimes are probably better, both for the people of their countries, and the communist movement, than imperialist puppets. But that doesn’t mean we should see them as allies, and communists in these countries should organize and work to establish themselves as the dominant opposition force, until they are strong enough to defeat both local reaction and imperialism.

Good post.

lenin said its wrong once or twice

Long Peace, NATO and EU have lended credence to Kautsky's ultra-imperialism theory.

effects of ideological bubble, basically bullied into supporting assad… or hating da joos, authoritarians never change.

The American empire needs to be destroyed before we can even start on socialism. I'm sorry if this makes you feel bad but it is the truth. Deal with it.

This Burger agrees.

Literally communism, if it's like that then I don't trust anything socialist without anarcho- in the label.

any hardcore ☭TANKIE☭ believes that the US/NATO is the only imperialist force around and that competing imperialism no longer exists

If we use Lenin's definition of imperialism then "the territorial division of the whole world among the biggest capitalist powers is completed" is irrelevant, since no country annexes territory these days and if anything the trend towards decolonisation post-WW2 would render it obsolete entirely.

You can criticize Syria and North Korea as much as you want in a world without capitalists and imperialists.

Criticizing Syria and North Korea in a world infested with them is just carrying water for the imperialists.

well, it's quite clear that MLs hold an infantile black/white view of the world that allows for no nuance or subtler of thought. They are quite literally LARPers who would rather pretend that outmoded and dead 19th-20th century ideology is somehow relevant and not a simplistic form of fascism with Russian characteristics. It's best to ignore them and just wait for them to grow up

LARP should be made an instant ban, nobody but reddit vermin use that term.

Lenin said "Super imperialism" was a stupid theory because it was just obvious. He said there was no doubt that imperialist countries would enter into an alliance against major threats to capitalism, but that the alliance would eventually dissolve again. As well, part of Kautsky's stupid theory was that super-imperialism would guarantee peace, which Lenin refuted. Lenin was right, of course.

next you're gonna cry me a river because i just accurately describe your retard talk as liberal, huh?

nobody can deny that those empty phrases spouted by this little liberal brainlet are the essencial anticommunist talking points you'd hear across the entire retard-spectrum from nazis to cuckdems

But Russia and China are more or less in a new Cold War with the West bloc and Trump’s protectionism and antics is putting increased strain on the West bloc

No state of things is ever permanent, especially not one that involves capitalism.

but that's literally what Lenin's objection to (that particular statement from) Kautsky was.

Did Kautsky claim that capitalists would collaborate forever?

The notorious theory of “ultra-imperialism”, invented by Kautsky, is just as reactionary. Compare his arguments on this subject in 1915, with Hobson’s arguments in 1902.

Kautsky: “… Cannot the present imperialist policy be supplanted by a new, ultra-imperialist policy, which will introduce the joint exploitation of the world by internationally united finance capital in place of the mutual rivalries of national finance capitals? Such a new phase of capitalism is at any rate conceivable. Can it be achieved? Sufficient premises are still lacking to enable us to answer this question.” [7]

Hobson: “Christendom thus laid out in a few great federal empires, each with a retinue of uncivilised dependencies, seems to many the most legitimate development of present tendencies, and one which would offer the best hope of permanent peace on an assured basis of inter-Imperialism.”

Kautsky called ultra-imperialism or super-imperialism what Hobson, thirteen years earlier, described as inter- imperialism. Except for coining a new and clever catchword, replacing one Latin prefix by another, the only progress Kautsky has made in the sphere of “scientific” thought is that he gave out as Marxism what Hobson, in effect, described as the cant of English parsons. After the Anglo-Boer War it was quite natural for this highly honourable caste to exert their main efforts to console the British middle class and the workers who had lost many of their relatives on the battlefields of South Africa and who were obliged to pay higher taxes in order to guarantee still higher profits for the British financiers. And what better consolation could there be than the theory that imperialism is not so bad; that it stands close to inter- (or ultra-) imperialism, which can ensure permanent peace? No matter what the good intentions of the English parsons, or of sentimental Kautsky, may have been, the only objective, i.e., real, social significance of Kautsky’s “theory” is this: it is a most reactionary method of consoling the masses with hopes of permanent peace being possible under capitalism, by distracting their attention from the sharp antagonisms and acute problems of the present times, and directing it towards illusory prospects of an imaginary “ultraimperialism” of the future. Deception of the masses—that is all there is in Kautsky’s “Marxist” theory.

Indeed, it is enough to compare well-known and indisputable facts to become convinced of the utter falsity of the prospects which Kautsky tries to conjure up before the German workers (and the workers of all lands). Let us consider India, Indo-China and China. It is known that these three colonial and semi-colonial countries, with a population of six to seven hundred million, are subjected to the exploitation of the finance capital of several imperialist powers: Great Britain, France, Japan, the U.S.A., etc. Let us assume that these imperialist countries form alliances against one another in order to protect or enlarge their possessions, their interests and their spheres of influence in these Asiatic states; these alliances will be “inter-imperialist”, or “ultra-imperialist” alliances. Let us assume that all the imperialist countries conclude an alliance for the “peaceful” division of these parts of Asia; this alliance would be an alliance of “internationally united finance capital”. There are actual examples of alliances of this kind in the history of the twentieth century—the attitude of the powers to China, for instance. We ask, is it “conceivable”, assuming that the capitalist system remains intact—and this is precisely the assumption that Kautsky does make—that such alliances would be more than temporary, that they would eliminate friction, conflicts and struggle in every possible form?

The question has only to be presented clearly for any other than a negative answer to be impossible. This is because the only conceivable basis under capitalism for the division of spheres of influence, interests, colonies, etc., is a calculation of the strength of those participating, their general economic, financial, military strength, etc. And the strength of these participants in the division does not change to an equal degree, for the even development of different undertakings, trusts, branches of industry, or countries is impossible under capitalism. Half a century ago Germany was a miserable, insignificant country, if her capitalist strength is compared with that of the Britain of that time; Japan compared with Russia in the same way. Is it “conceivable” that in ten or twenty years’ time the relative strength of the imperialist powers will have remained unchanged? It is out of the question.

Therefore, in the realities of the capitalist system, and not in the banal philistine fantasies of English parsons, or of the German “Marxist”, Kautsky, “inter-imperialist” or “ultra-imperialist” alliances, no matter what form they may assume, whether of one imperialist coalition against another, or of a general alliance embracing all the imperialist powers, are inevitably nothing more than a “truce” in periods between wars. Peaceful alliances prepare the ground for wars, and in their turn grow out of wars; the one conditions the other, producing alternating forms of peaceful and non-peaceful struggle on one and the same basis of imperialist connections and relations within world economics and world politics. But in order to pacify the workers and reconcile them with the social-chauvinists who have deserted to the side of the bourgeoisie, over-wise Kautsky separates one link of a single chain from another, separates the present peaceful (and ultra-imperialist, nay, ultra-ultra-imperialist) alliance of all the powers for the “pacification” of China (remember the suppression of the Boxer Rebellion[13]) from the non-peaceful conflict of tomorrow, which will prepare the ground for another “peaceful” general alliance for the partition, say, of Turkey, on the day after tomorrow, etc., etc. Instead of showing the living connection between periods of imperialist peace and periods of imperialist war, Kautsky presents the workers with a lifeless abstraction in order to reconcile them to their lifeless leaders.

You might as well read the whole thing because it's obvious you haven't or were half-asleep when you did.
marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1916/imp-hsc/ch09.htm

Could that be the definition of TOP CUCK?

So persecution of homosexuals is a minor thing?

awfully reactionary of you, comrade

What did the floppy hat mean by this?

Daily reminder Russia needed two revolutions to finally get to the USSR. One to transition from empire to republic, another from republic to communism.

As compared to what? It is a minor issue compared to the invasion and destruction of Iraq and Libya, and the continuing destabilization of Syria. Be critical of it all you want, but the reality is that the west is doing more to destroy the societies in toto than to help the homos.

I refuse to defend states that are obstacles to the emancipation of the proles of those countries. You can want the US to leave Iran alone without supporting the Iranian state itself in its reactionary crusade against communists.

awful reading comprehension from you, comrade