Basically if there were patty’s with some teeth they would enforce party discipline and education and that would lead to higher quality discourse online.
Not necessarily. Comrades that engage in actual praxis in RL mostly just don't care enough to engage in discussions online. I can certainly attest to that. Since I started organizing offline my interest in engaging with libs online has stopped almost entirely. It's time consuming, annoying, unpleasant and for the most part simply unproductive. 99% of people of any political affiliation do not engage in good-faith debate online - including me and most comrades here. The time I have for political activism is sparse and I can do more productive things with it than talk to a liberal who's just gonna reply with a sissy-pee social credit meme to a comment I took 30mins to write. RL discussions for the most part are much better in this regard, because the human component shines through much more and you tend to pre-select the people you engage with to a much larger extent. Getting into political discussions with people completely opposed to your view doesn't happen that much, whereas it is the standard online.
Is there anyway to work on like, an online party discipline?
For existing real-life parties going online maybe, but their energy is used much better elsewhere. For a bunch of randos like us? I don't think so tbh. We are not organized, there's no discipline, no organizational structure, no mechanisms to enforce things, no participation to come to conclusions and analysis.
I agree that communists in 2023 have to use the online space productively. Creating platforms like lemmygrad, producing content like podcasts, videos, articles, streams, etc is just much more worth-while (and even that's limited) and lends itself more to concerted efforts than discussions with dorky libs.
Fuckin hell that comment section is such a cesspool I had to comment there for the first time. If I bust a vein from that stress you'll be responsible for that lethal dose of liberalism, comrade
The absolute effect of liberalism on women's perception of themselves and their role in the world
Capitalism's ability to provide moral and ideological cover for the self-commodification of every aspect of humanity is incredible. 100 years ago you'd have to force women to do this, today some are not just willing to do it, but see it as a noble cause and contribution for the war machine of empire.
Mostly DayZ recently and some Rocketleague again for the first time in a while.
Gave TW:Attila a decent shot recently. Pretty good game, TWs just get stale fairly fast for me.
Also tried the HP game a while ago and...it's just boring. Looks pretty good, there's tons to do, they put in a lot of effort, but idk. Still feels weirdly lifeless and unengaging to me. Can't really put my finger on it. On paper it's everything my 10yo self would've wanted from an open world HP game, but it isn't. Played maybe 8h, haven't touched it in weeks and I highly doubt I'll ever finish it.
She’s not relevant and the only reason libs think she is is because she’s a white European who obeys the law
Well put, comrade. Never paid attention to her even when she first came up, because that was my immediate impression. She's the literal embodiment of white, middle-class European bourgeois sentiment.
As for mixing climate activism and the Ukraine war, I've actually seen quite a few speeches and contributions by climate-focused orgs on peace demonstrations outlining the absurd damage of militaries and this war specifically on the environment. It is possible to combine the two to make genuine anti-capitalist, anti-war points. She simply chooses not to.
Go ask what they think of the (still very mild) Extinction Rebellion.
Just look at their response to the "Last Generation" (misguided libs gluing themselves to streets to form human roadblocks; damaged some paintings). German politicans literally compared them to the fucking RAF lmao
Spicy question maybe, but I'm interested in your takes.
Personally, I think there's some major issues with at least the terminology of the 2 phase model of lower/higher stage communism or socialism/communism as the terms are used in classical theory. Specifically the 'lower stage' or 'socialism' term is problematic.
In the age of revision and after the success of counterrevolution it has become clear that there is in fact a transitional phase leading up to the classical transitional phase. Societies did not jump from developed capitalism to socialism immediately and even the states that arguably did were forced to roll back some of the core tenets of 'socialism' as it is described in Marx, Engels and Lenin. Namely no private ownership of the means of production and no exploitation of man by man.
To ultras this just means countries following this path aren't socialist. So then China isn't, Cuba isn't, no country still is really and those of us claiming they are then have to be revisionists. And to be fair, if you're dogmatic you can make that point going from the source material. China itself recognizes this inconsistency, thus not seeing itself at the stage of socialism. Yet it's a socialist state. But then what do we actually mean by 'socialism' when we use the term like this? Just a dictatorship of the proletariat? Any country in the process of building socialism?
That question comes up all the time and confuses the fuck out of people, because the term is either not applied consistently or as it's defined is lacking. I think discourse in the communist movement and about AES would profit immensely if we had a more consistent definition or usage of the term or a better defined concept of what that transition to socialism is and how we should call it.
Alright comrades, had to do some boring praxis, back for the real shit - what happened during the day? Did a literal coup actually end with the coup'ists going back...to the frontlines to fight a war they were couping for? Is that unironically what this came down to?
Well spitting my drink out at a TPB meme about a mercenary uprising in Russia seeking to remove the head of the MoD mediated by the Belarussian president wasn't on my 2023 shit-bingo card, yet here we are lol
There you go. As I said allegedly, but RWA brought this video up in their livestream too. Could be random civilians, but RWA is usually somewhat careful with these things so I didn't discard it immediately.
Could be just a delaying strategy, but still seems weird that nothing's really being done about them and all the units we've seen so far have been police, Akhmat, Rosgvardia and a few VDV in Moscow. You'd expect a convy in rebellion moving hundreds of kms through the country to be blasted apart, when this gets exponentially worse for every minute it drags on.
Edit: Videos of S400 missiles and S300s moving in/to Rostov, which is kinda weird too.
So there's multiple (?) armored columns moving through the country towards Moscow and almost 24h in there's been no real, organized resistance at any point. Wagner's just cruising past the few barriers, is still chillin at the Rostov HQ and allegedly the first video of Wagners detaining Akhmat forces has popped up. Sound's like substantial parts of the army and law enforcement at least tacitly approve of this.
Ka-52 "Alligator" diverted the anti-aircraft missile of Wagner combat vehicle over Voronezh
Several km long column of Chechens heading to Rostov
And thus the most obvious contradiction in the world resolves itself. This is a horrible hit to the perception of Russiain the world. They were able portray an imagine of stability and calm to their partners, investors, population and the economy at large up until now. That just literally blew up
A lot is still unclear, though it seems more serious than the usual reporting.
Rybar reports 3 aircraft shot down by Wagner, aviation is striking at Wagner columns. Footage of a blown up oil depot and a highway crossing has come up. After they took over the HQ of the Southern Military District in Rostov this morning and blocked off the city. Prigozhin met the Deputy Minister of Defence there, what happened to him is unclear.
This is definitely serious. People are dying already.
And all that, because Wagner wants the head of the MOD removed...which is the dumbest fucking reason for an armed rebellion I've ever heard.
For real? I’ve not heard about this, where’d you see it?
Was tweeted by a news site, but I looked it up and can't find the tweet anymore, so might've been bs and they took it down again.
Well some parts of Wagner apparently tried the dumbest semi-coup against the MoD. Seems like this was known in advance, because some videos, etc by the RAF were spread immediately. Western media reacted so fast, it looks kinda sus too, especially factoring in that Navalny called on the Russian military to join Wagner.
Also Putin being the revisionist he is dared to compare this to February 1917.
Yes, I, a Westerner living in the West, bombarded almost exclusively by Western media and narratives from the moment I was born, am actually brainwashed by...the Asians or something. Whereas you regurgitating Western narratives your whole life, are a real free thinker.
And because you're committed about anti-fascism and anti-imperialism you definitely have a coherent theory on what these are and are organizing against them, primarily by agitating against the monopolies that spawn fascism in your own country and especially in the West itself as the hegemonic sphere upholding those monopolies.
Omg yes, your alienated, depressed, average as wage-slave life would be so much better if Western venture capitalists and arms manufacturers could loot and destroy another nation, that would be so heckin based
The whole thing as in there is something happening, just not the Russian army shelling Wagner forces. That part seems fake, but not Wagner doing something and the government reacting. Because people unironically believe all of it is a psyop. The messages by TASS, Peskov, FSB, the generals, Prigozhin - all fake to idk "troll the Ukrainians" or something.
The video showing the supposed shelled Wagner base looks super fake and I don't think that happened, but I don't think this whole thing is fake like people on TG say
Statements by Surovikhin and Alekseev calling on Wagners to put down their weapons
Is this 5 or 6D chess yet?
![the background blur](https://lemmygrad.ml/pictrs/image/fdc1d029-9f50-4e2f-851b-ad7cc46f6e95.webp?thumbnail=256&format=webp)
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How I got here:
spoiler
As some of you might remember, a couple weeks ago I made a post asking for resources on the role of the students in class struggle. I didn't get much, because, as I found out in further research, though there surely is a whole lot of material on it, most of it probably isn't digitized. So I asked some studied older comrades irl. That yielded some results. One of them suggested a lecture by Clara Zetkin from 1924 on the question of the intellectuals. I actually found this almost forgotten speech somewhere in a corner of the web. Great, I thought, let's translate it - doesn't seem that long, should be available for the English speaking comrades and makes me read the text much more deeply. And I did start...
until I realized, a good few hours in, I still wasn't even half way done. Well, turns out this 'fairly short speech' actually is over 13k words long.
I'll still finish it, but I thought it would be much more engaging to just do it and share it piecemeal with the comrades online.
What's the text about:
As the title says, it's a historical materialist analysis of the role of the intellectuals in class struggle. But it is so thorough, it too develops or at least formulates a very early commentary on the just emerging fascism, on imperialism, on the question of women and much more. It's long for a speech, but it's incredibly insightful, comprehensive, is a highly interesting snapshot of the discussions in the communist world movement in 1924 and a very good example of how to conduct historical materialist analysis.
Clara Zetkin today is, unfortunately, a mostly forgotten figure outside of the German far left, even though she was one of the most important members of the German communist movement, of the KPD, an incredibly important figure for the women's movement and all round absolute giga chad who should be remembered at least as much as Rosa. I strongly urge everyone to at least read her wikipedia article. The woman had a theory of fascism as a distinct phenomenon less than 2 years after Mussolini seized power.
How's this gonna work:
I'll release the text in (probably) 4 parts, every 2-3 days from now. I'll make a new thread for each part. Whoever feels compelled to read and discuss along can just use the thread for the part. I'll try to be as active and to answer as many questions about it as I can, though I'm using this as an opportunity to really study Zetkin for the first time myself.
The translations are works in progress. I wont post total beta versions, but they will not be 100% refined
So without further ado
Part I:
spoiler
Clara Zetkin: The intellectual's question
(7th July 1924, Lecture before the V. Congress of the Communist Internationale)
CLARA ZETKIN: Comrades! Sadly I have to begin my lecture with an appeal for apologies. I'm momentarily not very healthy and therefore forced to leave out some of what I'd have to say in my lecture. You will therefore percieve gaps, but I hope to be able to fill these in later.
Today the intellectual's question is starting at us from tens and tens of thousands of hungry eyes. It's also screaming at us from the distress of tens and tens of thousands, who in the needs of life, in the needs of this time lost the previous ideal, a supporting internal power are not able to understand their personal experience and suffering in connection with the grand historical developments and to derive energy from it. But in addition to the misery of the intellectuals, which has heightened to the intellectual's crisis, we see another phenomenon: The crumbling face of bourgeois cultur in its death throes. The crisis of the intellectuals too is the crisis of mental labour in bourgeois society. The intellectual's crisis is facing us today in all the capitalist countries, to differing extents of course, with differing force, but is in the historical sense and the direction of development the same everywhere. We too see it in the socialist Soviet states, because there capitalism has been toppled politically, but the transformations of society towards communism are still in their infancy, and on top of that under the greatest difficulties.
The intellectuals' question shows itself ultimately as the crisis of mental labour and the culture of bourgeois society itself. It announces to us that bourgeois society is no longer able to be the keeper, developer of its own culture. And with this the intellectuals' question stops being a question of merely the intellectuals or of bourgeois society. It becomes a question of the proletariat, for it is its historical mission to develop all forces of production, of culture beyond the limits set by bourgeois society. If the proletariat wants to fulfill this task, it is faced with another: It has to give account to itself about the relation between the basic forces of historical becoming. On this later.
The intellectuals' crisis and the crisis of mental labour are a symptom of the deep and incurable disruption of the capitalist economy and the state based on it, the society it supports. The crisis of mental labour doesn't just show itself as a symptom of the nearing end of capitalism, but as part of the crisis of capitalism itself. In the Soviet states it is an expression of the remaining large gap between the political power conquered by the proletariat and the ramifications of this power via the dictatorship of the proletariat in the transformation of production and the ideological construction of society towards communism. All in all the crisis of mental labour and the intellectuals' crisis proves that there's a strong tension between the already far advanced process of disruption and dissolution of the bourgeois order and the process of the construction of communist production and culture.
The intellectuals' crisis reveals that it is not the social contradiction between manual and mental labour which determines the economic condition and social standing of the intellectuals. To many it seems that it is defining for the lot of the intellectuals, the class position of the proletariat seems to prove it. But this assumption is faulty. The social contradiction between mental and manual labour, between intellectuals and proletarians has its roots in the fact that mental labour can't be replaced by a machine, that the mental labourer requires a longer period of vocational training. The mental labourer can thus not be drilled, "trained" as quickly for the exploitation-relations of capitalism as the manual labourer.
But the social contrast, which results from this for the intellectuals to the proletariat, is only of secondary and temporary character. It steps back behind the defining fact which is the real basis for the social contradiction between manual and mental labour. That is the contradiction between property and human, between capital and labour, framed socially: the contradiction between rich and poor, between exploiters and the exploited, that social contradiction which found its classic historical expression in the class antagonism between bourgeoisie and proletariat. The fate of the mental labourer is by no means defined by strong talents or the acquired knowledge and skill in slow, tedious study, but ultimately by the contradiction between capital and labour. The intellectual finds himself in the society of capitalist commodity production, he is subject to its written and unwritten laws. In it he got transformed from a producer of cultural-values into either a seller of "commodities", similar to an artisan, so called as "freelancer" or he enters the market as "salary reciever" like the proletarian, as seller of his own commodity, the commodity labour, to devote to bourgeois culture in service of capitalists, in service of the state. Whether the intellectual is a seller of his produce or seller of his commodity labour, no matter whether as petty bourgeois or as proletarian, he is dominated by the contradictions of the capitalist market. In the "Communist Manifesto" Marx already pointed to this in shining sentences with all sharpness, that the scholar, the artist today is nothing but a trader, a commodity-seller.
The mental labourers find themselves, as consequence of their economic relation to capital, not, as they often tell themselves, in an irreconcilable contradiction to the proletariat, they are not at all solidly and intimately connected to the bourgeoisie in social terms. The opposite is true. The intellectual is in reality connected to the proletarian via his opposition to capital; he is irreconcilably divided from the bourgeoisie by his role as small commodity seller or seller of his commodity labour. In whatever form he enters the market as seller, he will be subjugated, the large capitalist will triumph over him. The worry about a piece of bread makes him as unfree as the proletarian of manual labour. The exploitation, the bondage he experiences is nothing but a particular form of the exploitation and bondage of every form of labour by capital. As a consequence the exploitation and bondage of mental labour can only be destroyed when the power of capital is broken, the private ownership of the means of production is done away with and replaced by collective ownership. Only through proletarian revolution can the intellectual, like the manual labourer, gain his freedom. His higher interest demands that he fights on the side of the proletariat the struggle for the overcoming of capitalist production and bourgeois class-domination.
Generally this is not the case. On the contrary. The intellectuals fell strongly and solidly connected to bourgeois society. This is explained by the development of the intellectuals as a separate social class, the type of the one-sidedly trained professional, as he fits the conditions of capitalist production with its division of labour and the atomized structure of bourgeois society with its division of social functions. The emergence of the mental labourers as a separate social class is intimately tied to the development of capitalist production and bourgeois class-society. At the beginning of capitalist production stand the achievements of science, of technology, of the great seafarers. Without the discovering and inventing scholar and technologist, without the organizing, scientifically calculating merchant, without the daring seafarer the development of capitalist production is unthinkable. But as science and technology, as organizing and administering were crucial factors for the emergence of capitalist production, inverse capitalist production had the greatest influence on the funding and development of the sciences, namely the natural sciences. Chemistry you can downright call a science of capitalist production. Thanks to that it developed from the phantastical gold-seeking of the medieval ages to a transformative science. The same is true for electrical engineering and other technical disciplines. The bourgeoisie couldn't have lifted production above the limits of feudal science without the most extensive and crucial participation of the mental labourers.
Only the bourgeoisie needed the intellectuals for the purpose of its political and social domination. Only with their aid did it become possible, on the basis of the developing new relations of production, to transform the ideological superstructure of feudal society into bourgeois society. The bourgeoisie as a property owning class was able to, even in the frame of the feudal order, ascend to a culture that surpassed the one of the old ruling powers and bound the intellectuals solidly to it. Those became its vanguard, its pioneers in the fight against the ideological space of feudal society and its privileged classes: Church, nobility and absolutist principality. The intellectuals forged and wielded the mental weapons for the overthrow of these bonding and exploiting powers. Their spokespeople in their struggle first reached back for the bible, to the sciences and arts of antiquity; later the primary weapon became English rationalism and especially the philosophy of the encyclopaedists. Intellectuals stood as pioneers, as leaders at the forefront of all reform-movements and revolutionary movements that transformed feudal society into the bourgeois order.
Likewise intellectuals were leaders of the most important social-revolutionary sects and peasants movements. The fight of the intellectuals liberated science, art, culture from the chains of feudal society and transformed them from servants of the ruling classes of that order into servants of the bourgeoisie, in transformative forces of bourgeois society. Art and science were "effeminated". The work of the intellectuals for the development of the capitalist economy, for the emancipation and the class domination of the bourgeoisie became ever more significant, the more the bourgeoisie strengthened due to capitalist production, and the more its position of domination solidified even in the frame of feudal society, till it finally emerged as the ruling class through revolutionary struggle. Thus grew the tasks and the importance of the intellectuals for the development of the economy. But so too grew the pressing powers for the transformation of the ideological superstructure, for the creation of a political power-apparatus which the bourgeoisie needed to push through and consolidate as the ruling class. The mental labourers were not only organizers and directors of the capitalist mode of production, they too provided the bourgeoisie for its state and its organs the necessary forces for its legislation, its administration: for all the areas and institutions affected by the bourgeoisie's need for domination over the not and little owning classes and especially over the proletariat.
But the bourgeoisie did not reward the intellectuals according to the measure of their historic significance for class domination. It too forgot that it was the intellectuals who created the ideology of bourgeois liberalism and bourgeois democracy, which so long chained and deceived the workers. The bourgeoisie has at every time only valued the intellectuals in so far as they produced immediate surplus. The intellectuals that didn't, the ones performing other societal functions, to the bourgeoisie count as "unproductive workers'', as futile eaters. Especially the great national-economists of the emerging bourgeoisie, Adam Smith and Ricardo, left no doubt that in the eyes of the bourgeoisie productive work is achieved by those who live to increase capital, but not those who live off of the income from capital. Adam Smith eg explained:
"Very respectable classes of society achieve as little productive work as the served." And as such "respectable classes of society", which his equated with the served, he listed: The landlords, the officers of the army and navy, the entire army-apparatus, the lawyers, the doctors, other scholars too, finally even opera-singers, actors, poets and ballet-dancers. From this described standpoint has the bourgeoisie looked down upon the mental labourers as an inferior class of futile eaters. Only once the surplus value, which the bourgeoisie extorted from the proletariat, became extraordinarily significant, it allowed itself the luxury of tossing crumbs of its wealth to the "unproductive" intellectuals, who were not immediately involved in the service of production. The low assessment of the intellectuals by the bourgeoisie got its historical expression in that the mental labourers, who created the ideological superstructure of bourgeois society, the ruling ideology, often hungered and lacked. They had to put themselves under the protection of small princes and princelets; they were forced to accept meager, often churchly, positions, despite their free-spiritedness; they bore the servitude of house-teachers, they had to flee to the salons of aristocrats. The history of the bourgeoisie and its fight for emancipation or more accurately of its emancipation fighters in England, France, Germany proves this.
The intellectuals did not draw the necessary consequences from this significant disregard of their achievements. They did not feel divorced from the bourgeoisie, but as part of the bourgeoisie itself. They lived in the delusion, that as "free"lancers they represented "free" science, "free" art, a "free" culture. And many of them still do. How can this be explained? Within the intellectuals a social stratification took place that is much more important than the usual superficial tripartition: in privately employed and private clerks, employees and clerks in service of the state, in public service, and freelancers. The uppermost strata of intellectuals got close to the bourgeoisie or originated from it. A minority had worked up into or had "strived up into" the bourgeoisie from outstanding positions in the production-process, in the state, in various areas of cultural life. Beneath these privileged stratas spread a broad class of intellectual existences, who lived in traditional petty bourgeois complacency, but also in petty bourgeois constriction, in economic as well as cultural relations. Beneath both of these stratas there was a third group of mental labourers, who had neither luck nor fortune, who permanently teetered on the border of the lumpenproletariat and often sank down into it. Because this is characteristic for the lot of the intellectuals: If he can't assert himself in a mere or privileged position in proximity to the bourgeoisie, he doesn't fall down into the working proletariat, but the lumpenproletariat. At least the intellectuals had in bourgeois society - compared to the living conditions, to the social position of the working-class - a privileged position. As a result they felt divorced from the proletariat.
The interest of the bourgeoisie in profit and accumulation, the interest of domination of the bourgeoisie in state and society could very well not accommodate a privileged position of the mental labourers in the long term. After its historical being it had to strive to break the privileged position of the intellectuals. And it did break it. It did break it by creating the equilibrium between the supply of mental labour and the demand for it.
It had contributed to the better social position of the intellectuals, that the development of construction of culture in general was suffering from the chains and limits of feudal society even long after the political emancipation of the bourgeoisie.
The number of intellectuals available to the bourgeoisie for the purpose of production and its rule wasn't large. The bourgeoisie requires a larger staff of scientists and engineers, who dedicated their strength to the blossoming of production; it requires a higher culture to command over all kinds of mental state-slaves to justify and underpin its rule ideologically. It needed to have a surplus of mental labourers. A period of foundings, of blossoming of higher educational institutions began, the elementary school-system too had been lifted. The consequence was an overproduction of mental forces, meaning a relative overproduction. Overproduction only existed insofar as more intellectuals emerged from the educational institutions than the bourgeoisie needed for the interests of its profits and rule. There was nothing less than overproduction when thinking about the enormous demand for culture of the broad masses. The bourgeoisie now had the required reserve-army to bring down the pay of the mental labourers, to worsen its conditions. It took full advantage of that.
The social tripartition of the intellectuals, which I mentioned earlier, had become sharpened, the differences deepened. The number of mental labourers sharing in the bourgeoisie's splendor, glory and luxury became relatively fewer and fewer, though growing in absolute terms. To what extent the ratio of the second and third group changed isn't statistically measurable. The gentlemen reformists, with Bernstein at the head, in the pre-war period concluded from the strong growth of the intellectuals in economy and state the development of a "new middle-class", which would form a new rampart of the bourgeoisie against the proletariat. According to this theory numerous mental labourers would move up socially. The correctness of this opinion hasn't been proven by all statistical figures. Not the lowness or height of salary or wage alone determine the social condition of the different stratas of the intellectuals. Something else adds to it: The accustomed to standard of living, the share in material and cultural opportunities which the intellectual can afford for his wage. From the standpoint one has to conclude the worsening condition of the intellectuals in all the regions and in different countries.
The intellectuals' question arose. For bourgeois society it was Medusas' head. It announced that this society had become unable to secure the mental labourers a social standing according to its professional occupation, one that matched its former "befitting" standard of living. The first characteristic mass-phenomenon emerged as proof of the intellectuals' question having arisen in bourgeois society. It was the tedious, passionate fight of the mental labourers against the higher education and employment of women. What was behind the ideological platitudes of the professors, doctors and other fools who took the field against women's emancipation? Primarily nothing but fear of competition. The fight for education and employment of women showed two things: First, that bourgeois society was unable to secure the intellectuals an income allowing to uphold the old "befitting" familial relations. The family in these circles could no longer grant women their livelihoods, nor a serious, dutiful purpose in life. Second, that the mental labourers shied away from the opinion that higher education and employment of women would worsen their own social condition. Facts prove this. In old Russia e.g. the fight for higher education and employment for women hadn't been - as in Western Europe - between men and women, but a fight between different generations, between fathers and sons, between the old ideology of the feudal, despotic order and that liberal ideology of rising bourgeois society. Now, that the intellectuals' crisis reached an unexpected height, the fight against employment of women, in the years before the war almost dormant, has broken out again with highest intensity not only in the "beaten" states, but also in the victorious countries, eg in the US, where the fight for equality for women celebrated its first big victories. Today in some circles there is a rather large counter-tendency against the spread of employment of women dominates certain circles (teachers etc). It is said:
"Each step forward for women is a step backwards for men."
But another mass-phenomenon proves the development of an intellectuals' question in bourgeois society. Since about the 80s of the past century social reformists of various kinds emerge - like an epidemic illness: podium socialists, land reformers, pacifists, ethicists, Neo-Malthusians, sexual reformers etc. What's characteristic of these social-reformist tendencies? The one shared trait is that most reformers suddenly are discovering the social question and with it the giant shape of the fighting proletariat beginning to move revolutionarily. The position of the intellectuals between the classes, its hybrid position between the two big classes of society, which are gearing up for a general resolution between labour and capital, lets the reformists act as preachers of class-reconciliation. They're urging the bourgeoisie and the proletariat to make peace. That's new and characteristic. Apart from exceptions, earlier societal-reformers mostly just hoped for insight and contemplation of the owners and rulers.
The reformers reject class-struggle, they reject above all revolution. They expect everything from reason, as much on the side of the exploiting bourgeoisie as on the side of the exploited and desiring proletariat. The reformist tendencies, which the intellectuals' question affects, get their characteristic expression in Germany, country of "theory", of podium socialism and its manyfold scientific and dilettantic varieties. In France, country of "politics", they affect the increasing trend to dress bourgeois-radical parties in more or less social decorations. Bourgeois parties emerge calling themselves democratic-socialist, radical-socialist or however, the main thing is the word "socialist" has to be in there. The most shining representative of this tendency in France was our comrade Jaurés. He developed from it continuously into a socialist. The vestiges of bourgeois democracy, bourgeois ideology he could still never fully shake off. In England the classic expression of the reformist movements, which developed in connection with the intellectuals' question, is the Fabian Society, so called constructive socialism, as is represented in the Labour Party, especially by intellectuals in it. In every capitalist country the intellectual social-reformers influence the labour aristocracy and its most radical offshoots had their ideas in the opportunism and reformism of the workers-movement.
Whatever program these reform-enthusiastic intellectuals developed, they agreed not to touch the foundations of the bourgeois order, not to abolish private ownership and thus not class domination and class antagonism, for whose alleviation they gushed. But the gentlemen needed a basis to make the implementation of their reforms possible. A straight line of development leads from the social-reformers to imperialism. On imperialism Cecil Rhodes, the famous English imperialist, made a characteristic statement: "Imperialism or revolution!" Indeed, that's the way things were. Bourgeois reformers, who wanted to carry out their social reforms to ban revolution, but not at the expense of the holy profits, the domination-basis of the bourgeoisie, had to look for a different economic basis for reforms. They found it outside of their home-countries, in the exploitation of the colonial and semi-colonial peoples, whose ruthless, inhuman plundering and servitude brought supernormal profits, from which the capitalists paid the crumbs of union concessions and social reform they carried out for the "Volksgenossen" [lit. "peoples-comrades", nationalist term for compatriots] in the mothercountry. But another motive was essential for the social reformers to become champions of imperialism. That was the concern for their own existence. In the fatherland many mental labourers no longer found profitable employment, an existence befitting their station. The colonies offered them the perspective of a shining, respected career, for a safe, high income, for adventure and glory. No wonder, as things were, that imperialism found its most passionate advocates right among the intellectuals. From the night watchman to the minister, from the village-school principal to the university professor, from the unknown reporter of a daily paper to the scholarly researcher, everyone discovered imperialism and descended as its champion "down to the people".
As the intellectuals earlier were the creators of bourgeois, national ideology, now their younger generation provided the creators of the ideology of imperialism, advocates of dilettantic race-theories, justifying all the contradictions and atrocities of colonial politics; intellectuals became the most fanatical agitators and organizers of imperialism, the most cruel practical representatives of the exploitation and servitude of the peoples in capitalist colonies and half-colonies. Intellectuals proved that in the plundering and enslavement of the colonial peoples they were able to combine the entire hideous brutality of the conquistadores from the time of primal accumulation of capital with the whole refinement of modern cultural- and gentle-men.
The intellectuals together with the heavy and finance capitalists in every country bear the highest responsibility for the arms race, for the breakout and the length of the world war. If there are people, beside the grand bourgeois, beside the reformist social-traitors, drenched from top to bottom in the blood of 4 years of slaughter, it's the intellectuals who preached the "greater fatherland". As carriers of the imperialist thought they caused that mass-exhortation, that mass-deception that allowed the arms race of all the so called culture-nations. They created that fateful mass-psychosis under the influence of which the war could be endured for years. It is a historical nemesis that there's hardly a social class who's been hit harder by the consequences of the world war as the class of intellectuals. Because none of the various powers, for whose triumph they prayed and cursed, remained as victor of the world war. The only victor was the grand bourgeoisie of all the countries, the vanquished in truth and deed were, in the victorious and beaten states, the proletariat and petty bourgeoisie and with them too the mental labourers. For their economic condition the expropriation of the petty and middle bourgeoisie by the grand bourgeoisie intertwined with the pauperisation by it.
Part 2 will expand on the crisis of the intellectuals, their worsening material conditions and how that leads to fascism
Hope this is helpful to someone, if not at least there's an English version of it online.
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How do you even compete with Villa's and Zapata's mustaches let alone their fucking drip?
Sup comrades,
Looking to do a deep dive into current price hikes and inflation with some comrades and looking for resources to explain, critique and solve the problem form a marxist perspective.
The term inflation famously doesn't really come up explicitly in Marx, only "money devaluation" afaik, but still if you got relevant material/articles/books/whatever on the topic, I'd love to go through them
Cheers
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>Veterans and children of the Great Patriotic War to the government and the people of Germany > >Today, because the German government has decided to deliver deadly weapons to Ukraine, the world has changed - the outlines of a new world war are more than clearly visible. And again it's Germany! But there are honest people in Germany, antifascists, and we hope that this message reaches you. People, who were born between 1927 and 1945, have the status of "war children" in Russia. This letter can be signed by all those, who survived this war. > >The tragedy in Ukraine > >We, the last veterans and all of the peoples of Russia, who survived this great and terrible war, are now on the brink of death. Our time is running out. The largest part of our lives we hoped it would end in peace - without the all-destroying hatred. After the Second World War we painstakingly overcame, over the course of long decades, our righteous wrath. We were longing for vengeance for the countless physical and mental wounds, that we're still carrying in our bodies and our hearts. But most of us have forgiven! > >In the end this happened not least for the reason, that for many years Germany demonstrated its regret, its understanding of what happened. And we didn't just overcome ourselves, but too the voice of the blood of our barbarically exterminated relatives. Exterminated by whom? By the Germans, by the fascists! We have forgiven - corresponding to the laws of human coexistence. Such it was - till 2014. > >Streams of blood > >Then, in 2014, when everything started in Ukraine, we looked to Germany with hope and to then chancellor Angela Merkel. We could not have imagined that the Germans, after everything they've done in Ukraine - after Babi Jar, after the mountains of mutilated corpses -, would still longingly look to the Ukrainian fields, that can still feed Europe today. Or that they, the Germans, who once drenched Crimea, which was promised to them, in blood, still have an interest in turning Crimea into an American and general NATO-base - ideal for attacks on Russia. This would've openly aimed for a future war. Because only fools don't understand reason and purpose of the coup in Ukraine, to which Russia reacted in the only possible way! > >But the Germans, they aren't fools. We Russians know them first hand. Their psychology as "blood brothers" - our blood, that they "calculatingly" shed in streams. We remember their "systematic" methods of "population reduction". Our population! To this day we're discovering hidden mass graves of our peaceful citizens in different corners of our once united fatherland where the boot of German fascism fell: In the region Nowgorod, in Kuban, in the region Rostow, in Karelia. In 2021 on the grounds of the Jewish ghetto in Brest in Belarus the remains of hundreds of peaceful citizens were found. The concentration camp Trostenez near Minsk - place of a terrible tragedy - has uncovered the mystery of tens of thousands more tortured and murdered people. We're speaking of tens of thousands newly discovered victims of Nazism! This blood is still screaming for vengence, while for decades now the memory of barbarically murdered Russian people and the monuments for Russian soldiers, liberators, have been desecrated with impunity. New Nazis are marching in the Baltics and in Ukraine infront of the eyes of the whole "civilized" world. > >And Germany, again > >But in 2014 we really were convinced that the Germans, in the face of these new Nazi-marches, would be our allies in preventing these atrocities. We were hoping that the Germans would - guided by an elementary consciousness - not take part in the openly fascistic coup in Ukraine. Because the following catastrophy in todays Ukraine was caused by the direct decendents of those that were a special rabble in the German army. Openly, unapologetic! The US-Americans and Canadians just concealed and conserved this devilish legacy, raised its decendents, but the breeding ground of this evil is - Germany! Hitler-Germany! We couldn't dare believe, that it was Germany which would show these monsters the way again. But we were wrong! Germany has again allowed this fasistic scum to enter the world. > >The support of todays Germany - in the face of the new government of Ukraine - for the Bandera-people, for the heirs of the SS division "Galicia", for UPA- and OUN-thugs and all the other atrocities were just unthinkable for us. > >That's beyond anything human! But you, Germany, have done it and continue to do it! You're again aiming for the slavic world and this scum - it's blood of the blood of German Nazism! And again against Russia! Just more inisidous: Our closest brothers, the Ukrainians, are stired up against us. And you know it! You know it as much as we know it! You have murdered a people in this Great War! Yes, we are a people! Your Steinmeier [President and former foreign minister of Germany (SPD)] often writes and says the truth, he who was simultaneously involved in the Kiev-Putsch of 2014 - an essentially fascistic putsch. For the Americans this might not be obvious, but for you it's more than obvious! > >And it's your pupils that were able to march with torches through Kiev. The living shadow of Nazi-Germany is standing behind all of this. This was just temporarily covered up by a sly diplomacy - "helmets instead of rifles". But this is it, the "masks have slipped". That you're currently delivering German weapons to Ukraine is logical, it follows the logic of your policy of the past decades. Today she's openly pro-fascistic again. You've made this step: German weapons will kill Russians again. The killing continues. > >Preparing for world war > >In the years of the conflict in Donbass your professional murderers have already killed Russians, at least taught "how to kill them properly". Now it's even more despicable - you're teaching it to blood brothers. The Donbass is on your conscience! Thousands of lives of its peaceful citizens - that is your work again. We're not concerned about the role the Americans are playing in all of this: There, money is god! > >Our veterans of this war, its children, are concerned about the role of the Germans. Because they are the ones who know exactly who makes up the Ukrainian "Nazi-battalions" and who could've prevented and stopped this new fascism. But that's not what you did! Because of this alone you're again responsible before history. You're unequivocally part of the preparation of Ukraine for war against Russia. You can't get around understanding the purpose of everything that happened: from the unconsitutional coup in Kiev to the bloodshed in Donbass. > >Essentially it's about preparation for a third world war. And again about you, the Germans...Germany. From the high German stage in Berlin we're hearing today: "Russia will pay a high price!!!" A speech of the chancellor of Germany! Unthinkable! We have paid the price already: 27 million of our lives. Is that not enough for you? About what price are you still talking? There's no house(hold) in Russia, Ukraine and Belarus in which "this price" wasn't paid. And there's no house(hold) in Germany that didn't take part in this terrible, bloody barbarity! Horrible! Beastly! > >Today more than 13.000 Russians have already died at the hands of the new Nazis. The public mockery of the genocide of the Russians in Donbass by the German chancellor himself is itself a crime. To such an extent can the lessons of history be neglected and defiled! The most terrible history of the world! Do you want something even worse? This new "Drive to the east" can make it so no second Nuremberg-trials will be held against you, because there just won't be a humanity. You will not be there! > >But a special court, a universal court for you, Germans, is inevitable. For all aggressors, but for you especially. The world will have justice! And we, the last veterans of this terrible war, are leaving this world as witnesses. As witnesses of the prosecution! And today victory will be ours, but those, who died yesterday, or those of us, who're dying today, are bearing witness to the role of the German people in the history of humankind - the bloody history. German weapons are again in the hands of young Nazis! > >Stop!
Letter is from the 27th of February. It was published by the »Spiritual center St. Johannes of Kronstadt« based in Moscow, following the German chancellors declaration of historic German rearmament and deliveries of German weapons to Ukraine on the same day. On the 6th of March the Russian Veterans Union posted a link to the article on its website stating they're signing "every word" of the letter.
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So days after Victoria Nuland visits Sri Lanka, a possible colour revolution attempt launches there and a soft coup with alledged assassination attempt in Pakistan happens.