On asceticism, aestheticism, western perspectives of socialism, and catgirls
On asceticism, aestheticism, western perspectives of socialism, and catgirls
In the West, we are constantly bombarded with lies and blatantly incorrect statements about the living conditions of socialist countries. During the original Cold War, depictions of the USSR as a cold, purely utilitarian world with extreme restrictions on any sort of luxury were quite frequent, and though they were blatantly false, it still rubbed off on the West’s impression of socialism in numerous ways that affect even those ideologically committed to socialism subconsciously.
How else to explain the existence of “Nazbol” ideology? People, due to some degree of ignorance about the true nature of the USSR and of socialism in general, but drawn to ascetic, “anti-excessive” (excessive, a term butchered and vulgarized so much I could write an essay about that alone) aesthetics. These people could be drawn to this completely illusory ideology due to bigotry, mere aesthetic appeal, or any number of reasons, but the important thing to remember is that the majority of people are not like this.
The USSR greatly supported “excessive” things that the Nazbol would see as absurd. State-funded movie directors existed. And the USSR pioneered much of modern animation. And what a legacy that is! Not only is animation for the sake of art and self-expression the furthest from cold asceticism I can think of, this deeply important art form has direct ties with numerous current-day queer communities.
Socialism and “excessive” art does not end with the USSR. Anyone who has been in the furry community long enough knows this to be the case. I will not elaborate as to respect the instance’s rules against sexual content (though, arguably, the original content is not sexual, the internet’s general reaction to it definitely was, and the original was by no means drab). The fact I even have to specify that hopefully demonstrates my point.
In this present day, despite all of these obvious examples of rich, romantic and “excessive” art from socialist countries, the Western left still had a somewhat ascetic view of socialism, this could be based on a misguided belief that Lenin’s view of a responsible and likeable revolutionary was proposing excessive self-restraint, but if anyone truly believed that Lenin advocated that, it’s quite sad. Beating yourself up moralistically for enjoying anything is a fairly reliable way to get people to think you’re weird, in a way more unsettling to people than any kind of “excessive” activity the Nazbol would despise.
I propose that we must fight this tendency however we can. But how?
Does anyone else remember when a socialist subreddit banned catgirls for objectifying women?
I’m not going to get into if that was right or wrong here, but it sounds like a pretty good example of something “excessive”, something which, even when having it’s truly problematic character removed from it (possibly especially at that point given how misogynistic Nazbols probably are) scares the aesthetically committed revolutionary.
These days, the catgirl is not exclusively associated with misogyny. Plenty of queer and women-dominated spaces have adopted it as an icon of sorts. We can, then, fight two reactionary tendencies, social conservatism and Nazbol ideology, with one stone.
Let’s post more catgirls. And make them queer feminist ones.
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I just don't see the value in catgirls. When it comes to brocialists (socially conservative leftists), which I believe you are conflating with nazbols (fascists who LARP as socialists to amplify their message by bringing to it a veil of legitimacy), the point of unity is class membership, it's the 1 thing which connects all workers no matter our differences. Posting more catgirls (not in catgirl communities) and other examples simply outlines our differences more. The distinction between brocialists and modern Marxism members must be based on class and not social stances. One does not attempt to recruit a pro-LGBT billionaire towards Marxism as we recognize it as a waste of time, their class interests contradict the goals of Marxism. The same follows all ideologies our class has stumbled into. (except nazism, this is the outlier)
As far as all infantilized content (anime, furries, etc...), I view it as utopian. Understand this cutesy fluffy content is being generated within the context of outright vicious class war. And as such, it can only serve to disarm or hinder the orientation of our class at addressing this. We are not on cloud 9, we are in war. Believing otherwise is the equivalent of religion under feudalism - a new mental and social opioid of the masses. The difference between cat videos and shooting heroin is heroin is a lifestyle, a habit-forming flow of the day altering metaphorical cage which prevent the worker from toiling, reflecting, radicalizing, socializing, and coagulating. All in all, we're just not having a fun time and pretending otherwise is simply lying to yourself.
As per the drugs conversation (which demonstrated the necessity of this disclaimer of sorts), I don't advocate for shunning those who partake, but not advocate for these things ourselves and work to help our comrades to realign themselves with material reality.
I must say reading history it is apparently clear, there has never been such a time of so many idealistic thoughts, concepts, and movements since the time of peak religion.
Is being a worker under capitalism fun for you?
No, but choosing abstinence from any specific activity does not solve that. What happens, is that as socialists, we would extract ourselves from these activities we enjoy, and then see no change in political progress.
Is being miserable all the time fun for you? Jesus Christ. You're the type of person who thinks people don't have a life outside of political activism or work life, and expects everyone to only work towards socialism 100% of their spare time, hobbies and interests be damned just because "we live under capitalism".
If there are 10 socialists in the room and 5 of them chooses to temporarily unwind or focus on their life for a bit, there's still 5 other socialists working on radicalizing others. Not everyone's as miserable or hyperfixated towards political activism as you.
Especially in a time where it feels like Capitalism has a stronger grip towards the world, people need some fucking escapism every once in a while so they don't get fucking exhausted from all this.
The fact that you call having interests as "infantile" is going to alienate a lot of potential socialists - who, unlike you, actually have interests that make them feel like their lives are worth living rather than just giving up.
Stop catastrophizing things. Infantile interests are not all interests, not even close to the majority. I am using the term scientifically as this is a serious space for serious conversations, or at the least I am a serious person. This does not mean I would refer to this in a recruiting environment as such. You misunderstand again thinking I am an all work and no play kind of comrade, or that I have no interests outside of politics or that this is my expectation for others. Some activities are not beneficial or outright harmful for socialist development of comrades, these are some of those imo. Porn is another, drugs are a third. I have said nothing of poetry, archery, singing, art, basketball, etc...
Comrade, please do some research into neurodivergency, and please consider the conflicting implications within your own post. This perspective on different leisure activities having different value is not only an aesthetic, idealistic one (there is no difference in productivity between someone writing poetry about catgirls or poetry about flowers), it is ignorant of years of outright propaganda and moralizing from the bourgoisie class.
This position, one of the existence of “infantile” hobbies and “mature”, productive hobbies, is one not only influenced and reproduced because of outright ableism (Neurodivergent people are much more likely to have hobbies that are not considered societally normal, such as interests in specific subjects or media), but committing the exact mistake I mentioned in my post.
Oh, I'm sorry that people like doing things that makes them happy as opposed to "forcing yourself to get into big boy interests and reject things that make them happy just because it's 'oh-so-beneficial'", it's why they're called interests in the first place.
Funny that you consider anime, furries as infantile despite them being a type of art.
Don't believe me? Look at Studio Ghibli films or Violet Evergarden (anime examples) and try telling me those aren't art. Oh, but knowing the type of person you've shown yourself to be, it's probably not the kind of thing you'd call art even after that; because you don't seem open-minded enough to be willing to explore new phenomena.
Before you try to accuse me of being "a raging child trying to defend her toys", my interests include both "beneficial" and "non-beneficial" interests like writing, coding, drawing, trying to play music; as well as anime, music and games.
Incorporating "beneficial" hobbies is nice, but forcing people to reject so-called "non-beneficial hobbies" when it makes them happy and feel like continuing to live under capitalist hellholes and not just call it quits is just not the way to go.
Also lmfao that you call the grad as a "serious space to hold serious conversations" despite the existence of many non-serious spaces like c/memes, c/moretankie196, c/shitposting, which usually tend to be more active.
And unfortunately for you, when most people encounter the term, "infantile" - its so-called "scientific definition" is not the first thing that comes in mind.
Porn is art too, photography is a form of art. It's the type of art and what purpose it serves. I'll kindly ask you check the community we are currently in and compare it to the list you've compiled. So long as leftists choose self indulgence over social activities based within the material reality we will not get very far.
Social activities exist within a defined culture. It’s true that connecting to others can help with organizing, but things like catgirls (not specifically, but so-called “infantile” things like it) have become the culture that you connect over. Not to mention, these things are not any more individualistic than the activities you mentioned as supposedly good.
If you want an example, the furry fandom has multiple organized meetings across the entire United States, a distinct cultural identity which allows members of it to connect to each other, full-on traditions, music that furries listen to together in person, and more.
Personally, I think what you’re saying is missing the actual harmful element of what you’re seeing- Individualistic consumption. Though you mentioned it, you seem to have failed to identify it as the root cause, choosing instead to target the aesthetics of these things.
The actual truth is that nearly any activity can become a source of connection to others through some organizing.
In many situations where we can’t, such as the oft-maligned Disney adult, their reactionary nature comes from their ideological commitment to a company.
Aesthetics like “cat girls” are not connected even remotely enough to a specific capitalist organization for that to be the case, and as such, are entirely capable of being part of the social activities that are essential to a healthy socialist society.
Either way, it’s on us to reach out to the interests people have, and agitate through them, not expect people to spontaneously decide to swap to ones we already have an easy time connecting in because of something they would need to be a very specific kind of ideological Marxist to figure out. And, since we need to reach out to people’s interests and not the other way around, it seems silly to spend time and energy changing one’s interests when connecting with others within the ones they already have is possible.