Social Democracy

I don't quite catch what you intend to mean

and you assume that no one will ever go "Hey wait, this is literally Marxism?"

If Donald Trump can make the right dance to his perverse song, what's to prevent an actual marxist from making the right not just dance, but actually turn left?

This.
Marxism will never recover from the USSR.
Even if it is the better idea, it simply never will win out. even associating with it is a bad idea.

OP clearly doesn't have any real organizing experience. If you try to recruit people by deceiving them, you aren't gonna have a whole lot of support

Surely something can be rescued from it instead of allowing the tide of history just wash it away like it never happened

You are right, I don't, but how else are you supposed to attract people to socialist ideas when they clearly don't want to

And don't tell me just time will magically make it happen, history doesn't move forward through inertia, at least not from what I can tell

Too late.
It has to be amputated if we want to go anywhere.
I *might* have been salvageble after Lenin.
After Stalin? Well, it'd been a hard sell…

Mao and Pol Pot?
Forget it, anything associated with Marx will always have the connotation of painfully inefficient and totalitarian nightmares.

Even if it is the better method, Marxist revolutionaries blew their chance.

So how do you suggest a party, of whatever name, can unite socialists of whatever denomination with right wing base voters?

It just can't?

Because unlike Donald Trump, the left has no good ideas or rhetoric to back it up.

Donald Trump actually speaks to the people, telling them what they want to hear. Donald Trump actually knows what people want to hear. The left just calls people racist/sexist/bigoted and expects to get away with it.

Donald Trump reaffirms the values that made this country great in the first place. The left tries to abolish these values, but the working class they claim to support doesn't actually want to abolish these values.

Donald Trump is a capitalist, and capitalism actually works. There is nothing in today's capitalist system that cannot be brushed off as a simple , fixable malfunction in capitalism. Nobody is so miserable that they want to discard the entire system. Absolutely nobody has said that "we will make capitalism great again" and failed so spectacularly that people are willing to entertain an alternative.

Finally, Donald Trump actually does things that have an impact on the world. Stupid intellectuals, philosophers and other assorted tools never actually engage with real live people. No matter how much they claim their ideology is for the working class, their contempt and hatred for the people comes out in their elitist attitude and obsession with bullshit theory.

You Marxists have nothing. Your revolutionary theory offers nothing. So before you whine about Donald Trump, perhaps you should take a moment to stop being NOTHING.

ouch got me

Democratic Confederalists are a pretty good option.
It is pretty much anarchism, but without all the old unfortunate labels, except "socialism", but "socialism " is not as stigmatized.

Except that's just not true, otherwise there wouldn't be any commies or socialists in the first place

Lets also not forget the Marxist's obsession with violent revolution.

On one hand, we are expected to believe that violent revolution is the only way to overcome the bourgeoisie state.

On the other hand, the Soviet bloc was considered to be filled with bourgeoisie revisionists, yet it largely collapsed under its own weight instead of being violently overthrown.

Seriously, why is THAT not mentioned more often? You would think that Marxists would actually try to understand what happened when their own regimes fell, given that it is a very recent case study of revolutionary overthrow, but there is no discussion on that here.

How was it that the Soviet states, despite possessing more than enough hardware to suppress the population, fell largely without a shot? If the Stasi and GDR military had so many guns and so many informants, why were people allowed to party and dance on the Berlin wall?

Naturally, these examples cannot be explored, for they would call into question much of the Marxist dogma that somehow persists even today. The fall of the Soviet bloc proved that revolution does not require a party engaging in a bloody civil war, which means that our beloved Marxist intellectuals will have no jobs directing the Party nor would they be able to play chess with the lives of their followers.

Just more proof of the disconnect between the "left" and the actual people they claim to represent. Perhaps you should try explaining the importance of abolishing gender roles to the people who actually have jobs and produce things, especially when those same people are losing their jobs.

Hardly. A loose pack of "radical leftists", composed largely of students and moronic intellectuals, are nothing. The working class votes for Trump, and where they do not vote for Trump, they vote for democrats. You are neither of those. Nobody takes you seriously, therefore you are nothing.

Also

Then why are you here arguing with nobody in particular?

the premise checks out but the non-sequitur is a bit of a fixer-upper

Christ, I've never seen a post so generic and devoid of substance.

It also reads like it's written by a 13 year old.

Because I would rather heal a wound rather then let it fester under a bandage.

Your statement does not make any sense

Just because I am for including marxists does not mean I share their bloody mary cry for revolution

I just want everyone to get along

I'd like to use this opportunity to point some things.

First of all, OP is right on the intelectualism.
This is why I always say Xexizy is best leader, exactly cause he doesn't know enough theory.

The problem with too much theory was always the worst plague the left has. Even worse then sectarianism. That is cause by too much theory.

Remember the rise of anti-capitalist videos, after 2008?
Did we use them enough? No! They weren't "marxist" enough.

And how did we actually gather?
After pol started reusing CulturBolshevismus and dragging the left in the mud.

If you don't believe in the idea, how are you to spread it?
If you don't believe USSR was failed state capitalism, how will we go any further?

This is the greatest faggotry ever.
You know why SocDem fails and creates the conditions for fascism to rise?
Cause it doesn't adress the contradictions of Capitalism. It just wants to smooth the edges, make class struggle softer and everything will be fine… Just create more social structures.. Capitalism can still work…

Ofcourse we need Violent Revolution!
There is no other kind!

Or do you want Coffee withoute cafeine? Revolution without Revolution?

But before, we need a population with ClassCon. Or else they'll tell you "Trump is Smart". "Gommunism is good on paper".

So,
Sure is.
We've been making some pretter dank memes and they've been growing pretty well.

But!
What are you to do, when people are too entrenched in Ideology?
Can you beat it out of each and everyone?
Do you have the patience and strength?

I don't. And this is why we can't have every nazi faggot comming here spewing BS. This is why leftypol is too "banhappy".

Sorry, but we cannot save everyone!

reassuring conjecture about my methods is your prerogative, but they'll still be spooks

Its really simple, like it or not, Trump has shown the way forward; the ideological glass can be broken through some degree of carefully planned 'deceit' or whatever you want to call it

People will listen to reason when someone who 'feigns' being of their own talks to them

Am sorry but am not a communist and will never be one, simply because I do not advocate for taking people's property

I agree that capitalism is not as efficient or ethical as it touts, but I am quite more than willing to kill unless the alternative comes in peacefully and it behaves, even if it means the end of me

And if it means fascism, let it happen, it will burn itself out in the fires of its own insanity the same way the fascism of yesteryear did, sooner or later the alternative will show up without the revolutionary fires eating it all

Here see?

Now is it not OK.. Is it not REQUIRED to ban this user?

IS IT NOT HISTORICAL NESSECITY????

wewty wew wew

If you are unable to meme/debate them hence they came from, then your view is just as weak as you fear it is

I want to believe we can learn from it

As for the communism tags things from people, I am willing to concede that I am still quite entrenched in ideology, bite me

Death is a better alternative to wasting my time on this project.

Yeah. We'll come to your home and take your XBONE.

Do you have a bussiness? Do you have employees? Do you rent houses?
If yes, fuck off bourgie!
If no, WHAT ARE YOU AFRAID OF????

There's nothing to learn. He's a dilettante who improvises his speeches from the gut to appeal to whatever crowd is in front of him at the moment, because he's a greasy shyster who isn't accustomed to having to maintain even relative consistency from sales pitch to sales pitch. Even when it comes to business he has embarrassingly little academic knowhow, evidenced by his stumbling and bumbling in his December 2007 deposition to define a first year b-school term, "net present value."

In terms of method and presentation, someone like Bernie is already doing the best job anyone can reasonably be expected to do, because Trump's level of raw emotional appeal means disregarding personal consistency to a degree no leftwing candidate would ever be allowed by the media to sustain.

Then just meme them to the death, I wish leftypol had the backbone regular Holla Forums had during polharbour and sticked to its ideals

Not anymore at at least, but I wouldn't put a never again in my prospects

Am not even Murrikan, am from Uruguay

I don't know man, I would rather have the right wing accept some left wing ideas to make progress faster, in a way that doesn't force the right to think it through too much if possible

I am sick and tired of two steps forward and four backwards, political process is way too slow

We do!
But we make memes to educate more that to "debunk".
Also,
A) Pol has more people
B) MAKE MEMES FAGGOT!
C) … C.

Ok.. then will take your…
..
let's google what Uruguay makes…

minitutes later..

eerr…. pic related.. don't know..

But you get the IRONY!

Bourgies cannot allow this.

Surely you have witnessed the 'conservative intelligentsia's stomaches churn out its insides at Trump's rise

But am not counting on Trump to last, or even to finish a job that is remotely beneficial to the left, because… well, he is Trump, and he is probably if not surely swindling people with his talk

The left needs someone who can actually deliver on their promises, but at the same time to dog whistle the right into doing the left's programme or to at least not to impede critical parts of it

Am I explaining myself clearly?

And if you really want to know, the only thing you can steal in Uruguay is land, cows and sheep for the best part… which are already brazilian and argentinian owned because our so called 'leftist' governments are in fact sell outs that only pander to the left

So we need..

A LENIN!

I get you. I just have lost too much hope/faith in humanity

SEE? THE COMMIES TOOK YOUR COWS!

We wouldn't be discussing things on the internet if it weren't for a lack of faith in humanity

Am willing to side with you here that it was, indeed, the burgeois of our neighbouring countries that took both the land, cows and sheep and that indeed there's a ripe opportunity for a land reform here

Unfortunately, anything that remotely hints of 'nationalization' or even land reform, gets shut down like its made in the USSR or something

And this is why you cannot despook everyone, cause people don't want to see beyond their ideology.

It's sad actually.

...

You know, I could probably address your point with an argument that is semi-decent and yet half-arsed, but I cannot make any when you just imply they don't with a pepe

Of course originalpol won't discuss it, they have no fucking clue what social democracy was.
History doesn't repeat itself OP, but social-democracy failed. No one wants to deal with orthodox Marxism because people (incl. socialists) think it's an anachronism, people think Marxism is ebul, people just don't give a shit about politics/a new party…many reasons. No right-wingers want to join something that would use the State to coerce employers (muh job creators)

There is a way to explain Marxist stuff, I dunno about Hegelian, in lay terms but it would entail plenty of exposition and just more than the average prole wants to sit through and listen to.

So here is one for the anarchists. Please explain why the masses don't need political or ideological leaders or refer me to a text which does. The only argument I entertain now goes like this: objective/material conditions need to exist for a revolution to occur, and then be combined with subjective understanding and action. So, on the road to the material conditions, the consciousness of the proletariat will also grow, so they will know what to do and bypass both the state and the trade unions, smash the state, etc. I just don't see what guarantee there is that class-consciousness ('the correct/right ideology') will form from conditions getting shittier. There is no iron law in this regard. Things can go to shit and people don't turn to either Marxism NOR anarchism. Hence, the possible need for a vanguard. And you know, I think you anarchists and ancoms actually constitute a segment the vanguard, why not assume the role with grace and dignity?

Could you expand on why social-democracy failed? I really want something to kinda finish the day with this thread, its been going on for hours now, and I am quite pleased with the replies so far

Started this thread at almost 6 pm and its now almost 10 pm

Well, for one, I think the first soc-dems were French. Marx wrote of them in Eighteenth Brumaire "Against this coalition of the bourgeoisie, a coalition between petty-bourgeois and workers had been formed, the so-called Social-Democratic Party. The petty-bourgeoisie saw that they were badly rewarded after the June days of 1848, their material interests imperiled and the democratic guarantees which were to secure the assertion of these interests endangered by the counterrevolution. Accordingly, they came closer to the workers."

I think independent working class political action is necessary. But when you talk about SocDem you are basically talking about the SPD, the Germans. They had a huge party, with 2 million votes in 1895, but it was and had been a more or less bureaucratic structure that eventually ideologically degenerated. Bernstein was a big SocDem and came out with the original revisionism, that capitalism could peacefully develop into socialism (or something more tolerable to the proles at least), meaning no need for a transitional worker's state. That was in 1900 or so, but the bureaucracy was real and revolutionary potential of the SPD in decay probably before then. I forget the exact dates and years but it has been suggested also that BIsmarck's anti-Socialist law basically castrated the SPD, and it did not emerge as fighting and bold after the law's repeal as it was before its ratification. I'd say the problem wasn't so much that the SPD tried to LEAD the masses or spread propaganda, but that the leadership was ideologically moribund (facilitated by the structure of the organization) and held the masses back. It's pretty much theoretically and empirically confirmed that the masses and real events will always be ahead of an organization's understanding, but we still argue on the left if organizations will always hold the masses back.

So, you believe that organizations that form large bureaucracies eventually castrate the movement they are supposed to be based on?

Its an interesting conclusion, although it would also mean that any vanguard party would castrate its base movement

That's the anarchist position isn't it?

...

Easy Stirner/Nietzsche, I get your point, but the right wing to some degree do value their freedoms in the face of what they don't really comprenhend even if they don't really place much thought into what they really entail

It is an anarchist (and actually SocDem, e.g. Luxembourg) position.

I'd like to respond to the rest of your post when I'm not so high, since it's a complex and delicate issue that I find myself without a sure position on. The workers need independent power (with possibly bourg and petit bourg in subordinate roles). I really like the Situationists right about now. But I also like revolutionary Russia, support Trotsky in 1905, support Lenin in 1917, but not when he fucked over the Soviets :(
What does Gramsci have to say about this matter, anyone?

I see, its pretty interesting, alas I don't have much time left, its 11 pm here already

Not sure, I haven't read about him much, but see him mentioned everywhere there are socialists and leftists in general

Anyways, I have to leave, I'll probably check this thread tomorrow and reply to any further memes/replies, chitchat and whatnot if I can

Individuality is a spook.

Me again. Visit the thread on OWS for arguments about leadership of a revolutionary movement tomorrow, too.

Since I can't sleep I'll do it now

Alright, since last night nearly nobody was on the OWS thread I went to sleep

And now am back, should I make a new thread? Or continue to bump this one?

There seems to be a lot of hate for the word socdem (social democrat) from what I gather, but I just can't quite place my finger on why this is

Yes feel free to bump your thread. Other threads around here get 200+ posts. Anyway, it's

We hate SocDems because they (in Germany) agreed to WW1 without much of a fight, and then after the war sent thugs to kidnap and murder the leaders of the revolutionary wing of the party who split off and formed the German Communist Party (KPD) soon after the Russian Revolution. Then, they basically always agree with capitalism. Another criticism of the SocDems can be found in Karl Marx's "Critique of the Gotha Programme" widely available online.

…because "muh hardcore leftism"

SocDems are regarded as one-level-up from sjw and "liberals"
Too tame. Too piss-ant. Too tolerant of the bourgies. Too willing to compromise. Not willing enough to fuck-the-fascists-shit-up. Not "hardcore" enough for this board. Just as this user says:

I know there's sometimes for some folk here more rationally philosophical reasons than that, but because Holla Forums is really good at boiling down twenty volume treatises on the "contradictions of capitalism" to a single gondola meme, socdem just gets dismissed out of hand without much debate, and it comes across like above

You left out, "Change nothing but the superstructure while ignoring the actual cauae of the problem."

Well, what I would want to see, is a pre-WW1 united social democrat party, with both reformist AND revolutionary wings together

I believe the split was a mistake and only fucked both sides; it made the socdems into a cuck party, and the revolutionaries eventually lost the grass roots and became an elite

I agree with the basic premisse that capitalism has contradictions and that its got to be superceded by something better, what I don't agree with is the methodology and also with the fact that socdems and the revolutionary left just can't see on each other's eyes without going at each others throats

Socdem supports capitalism. Leftism is anticapitalism. Therefore socdem is an enemy of leftism (as it has proved itself, throughout its history, to this day).

That's all that need be said.

Hahaha, you cannot turn back history. SocDem is a fail platform/theory and a fail practice. I mean you can go and call yourself SocDem w/ a different platform but…you would you /really/ be a SocDem?
and while I do believe the revolutionary organization needs to be a crucible of debate and ideological self-clarification (the 'party' always in motion, discussing new matters, to be up-to-date) it needs to be a revolutionary organization first and foremost. Otherwise there will be a split, either like the Mensheviks and Bolsheviks or like the Spartakusbund from the SPD. The SPD had already grown a bureaucratic elite well before the split.

Anyway, these days, reformists and revolutionaries are like oil and water. Can't be undone I'm afraid.

Then how would you characterize the communist party of Uruguay joining with other socialist and social-democrat, hell even christian democrat parties to make the broad front?

Its not a 'reformed' communist party mind you, it still retains its pledge to revolution and so on

I guess now you can see what their pledge is worth.

Unless those social and christian democrats want to destroy capitalism, they're hindrances at best and enemies at worst.

left-socdem is a band-aid or temporary relief at best, but I like band-aids and temporary relief much better than Marxism-Leninism authoritarianism nonsense.

Left-social-Democrats have a long history of picking on liberals.

Case in point Phil Ochs:
youtube.com/watch?v=bLqKXrlD1TU

Left-socdems aren't socialist allies unless they have an explicit plan for transition (like a Meidner Plan). But they are often treated with a lot of respect by socialists. And that's really born out on this board given 90% of this board is orgasmic for the capitalist-social-democrat Bernie Sanders. Or Greens who propose virtual communism in a capitalist framework. Left-social-democrats are almost never treated as outright enemies by socialists quite the opposite.

If liberals are really like that I would join them. I would have no. problem. living in that webm world.

I have no clue what self-identifying liberals these days are like though because no one is really involved in politics. And virtually no one calls themselves liberals except for a few neoliberal politicians these days.

libcom.org/files/Gilles Dauvé- The Renegade Kautsky and his Disciple Lenin.pdf

Giles Dauve - Renegade Kautsky and his disciple Lenin