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Lefty Memes
An international (English speaking) socialist Lemmy community free of "ML" (read: Dengist) influence. This is a place for undogmatic shitposting and memes from a progressive, anti-capitalist and truly anti-imperialist perspective, regardless of specific ideology.
Serious posts, news, discussion and agitprop/stuff that's better fit for a poster than a meme go in c/Socialism.
If you are new to socialism, you can ask questions and find resources over on c/Socialism101.
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Rules
0. Only post socialist memes
That refers to funny image macros and means that generally videos and screenshots are not allowed. Exceptions include explicitly humorous and short videos, as well as (social media) screenshots depicting a funny situation, joke, or joke picture relating to socialist movements, theory, societal issues, or political opponents. Examples would be the classic case of humorous Tumblr or Twitter posts/threads. (and no, agitprop text does not count as a meme. Please post agitprop here)
0.5 [Provisional Rule] Use alt text or image descriptions to allow greater accessibility
(Please take a look at our wiki page for the guidelines on how to actually write alternative text!)
We require alternative text (from now referred to as "alt text") to be added to all posts/comments containing media, such as images, animated GIFs, videos, audio files, and custom emojis.
EDIT: For files you share in the comments, a simple summary should be enough if they’re too complex.
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When alt text is absent, a reminder will be issued. If you don't add the missing alt text within 48 hours, the post will be removed. No hard feelings.
0.5.1 Style tip about abbreviations and short forms
When writing stuff like "lol" and "iirc", it's a good idea to try and replace those with their all caps counterpart
- ofc => OFC
- af = AF
- ok => OK
- lol => LOL
- bc => BC
- bs => BS
- iirc => IIRC
- cia => CIA
- nato => Nato (you don't spell it when talking, right?)
- usa => USA
- prc => PRC
- etc.
Why? Because otherwise (AFAIK), screen readers will try to read them out as actually words instead of spelling them
1. Socialist Unity in the form of mutual respect and good faith interactions is enforced here
Try to keep an open mind, other schools of thought may offer points of view and analyses you haven't considered yet. Also: This is not a place for the Idealism vs. Materialism or rather Anarchism vs. Marxism debate(s), for that please visit c/AnarchismVsMarxism.
2. Anti-Imperialism means recognizing capitalist states like Russia and China as such
That means condemning (their) imperialism, even if it is of the "anti-USA" flavor.
3. No liberalism, (right-wing) revisionism or reactionaries.
That includes so called: Social Democracy, Democratic Socialism, Dengism, Market Socialism, Patriotic Socialism, National Bolshevism, Anarcho-Capitalism etc. . Anti-Socialist people and content have no place here, as well as the variety of "Marxist"-"Leninists" (read: Dengists) (actual ML's are welcome as long as they agree to the rules and don't just copy paste/larp about stuff from a hundred years ago).
4. No Bigotry.
The only dangerous minority is the rich.
5. Don't demonize previous and current socialist experiments or (leading) individuals.
We must constructively learn from their mistakes, while acknowledging their achievements and recognizing when they have strayed away from socialist principles.
(if you are reading the rules to apply for modding this community, mention "Mantic Minotaur" when answering question 2)
6. Don't irrationally idolize/glorify previous and current socialist experiments or (leading) individuals.
Notable achievements in all spheres of society were made by various socialist/people's/democratic republics around the world. Mistakes, however, were made as well: bureaucratic castes of parasitic elites - as well as reactionary cults of personality - were established, many things were mismanaged and prejudice and bigotry sometimes replaced internationalism and progressiveness.
- Absolutely no posts or comments meant to relativize(/apologize for), advocate, promote or defend:
- Racism
- Sexism
- Queerphobia
- Ableism
- Classism
- Sexual assault
- Genocide/ethnic cleansing or (mass) deportations
- Fascism
- (National) chauvinism
- Orientalism
- Colonialism or Imperialism (and their neo- counterparts)
- Zionism
- Religious fundamentalism of any kind
Middle class 14 year old leftists and self-hating third worldists try not to jerk off at the thought of proles in the west dying challenge (impossible)
Wanting the imperial hegemon to dissolve isn't exclusive to either of those groups, and would significantly advance the aims of socialists globally. The western labor aristocracy is gradually aligning more with the glonal south as the bribes of imperialism dry up and austerity is forced domestically, so the chance of socialist revolution is increasingly greater than 0. Quantitative buildup is resulting in qualitative leaps.
Within the empire itself, younger generations are increasingly in favor of communism. Not socdem "socialism," but communism. That doesn't mean they are all committed Marxists, but the trend is extraordinarily positive and aligns with the deterioration of the labor aristocracy. This genocidal settler-colonial empire is finally reaching levels of sharpened contradictions that are forcing the populace to get organized.
If by "socialists globally" you mean hitlerite AES nation states (e.g. China, Vietnam) then yes it would benefit them immensely as now their capital accumulation gets boosted and they get to do more imperialism in the future as there's less competition now. If you mean sub-20 member student uni book clubs, then yes it would also benefit them as now they have more stuff to larp about.
In either case, a collapse of US doesn't help the real movement. If anything, the collapse would get rid of a ton of accumulated value, temporarily increasing the rate of profit abroad and bribing the labor aristocracy that presumably is aligning itself with global south (though I call BS, they're as hitlerite as ever) back to defending global capital which would be counterintuitive.
When I say "socialists globally," I mean it quite literally, as the international socialist movement. This includes AES states, which you call "Hitlerite" and "imperialist," as well as the working class in the global south and global north. AES states, where public ownership is the principle aspect of the economy and the working classes in charge of the state, are entirely different from fascist states where private ownership is principle and the bourgeoisie in charge of the state.
Confusing the fact that private ownership exists with it being principle is placing form over essence, and focusing on similarities (having a strong state and some degree of private ownership) while ignoring differences (the commanding heights of AES states are publicly owned and the working class runs the state). Further, these countries aren't imperialist either, this has no real basis.
The idea that the international working classes would not benefit from the dissolution of the international dictatorship of the bourgeoisie sides with the labor aristocracy and imperialists over the imperialized. You have an extreme chauvanism towards the global south in calling them "hitlerite," which you keep passing around like candy without basis. You're acting as a social chauvanist here, using socialist phrasemongering to argue for the perpetuation of the US Empire.
Nothing screams socialism more than class collaboration, active expansion of commodity production and commodity accumulation, funding military junta in Myanmar and so on. At this point China would only become socialist if its capital forces magically became conscious and went against it's own interests.
Also good job with the slander on that last paragraph. All nation states are hitlerite, no matter if global north or south as they all brutalize their proles, are ruled by bourgeois and would happily go colonialist imperialist if they were in an economic position that necessitated it. The real chauvinism is putting some states on a pedestal and masking it with moralizing bullshit.
Also you ought to know the difference between "arbitrary collapse wouldn't be useful and would just bring unnecessary suffering" vs "I support this empire and hope it stays forever!". I'd much rather see all the contradictions result in US becoming a genuine DOTP once workers there finally wake up rather than millions dying for no reason other than revengeism and for some other capitalist state to take over.
China isn't class collaborationist, they have a dictatorship of the proletariat. The fact that the bourgeoisie exist there does not mean they have leverage over the state, and the commanding heights of industy are out of their hands. There's no such thing as class collaborationism, this is a lie told by socdems to keep the bourgeoisie on top. In reality, the state can only be under the control of a single, definite class, and in the PRC that class is the proletariat. Building up the productive forces and having significant exports as a means for technological transfer and development is a good thing, actually.
It seems it wasn't a strawman at all, really. In insisting that every nation is "hitlerite," no matter if they are socialist, imperialized, or colonized, you take a stance of inaction. This is exactly what I was getting at when I said you're phrasemongering, social chauvanism to justify inaction against imperialism and siding with the imperialists and labor aristocracy.
You also ought to know that nobody really hopes for collapse over socialist revolution in the US Empire. That would be the best for everyone, but failing that the death of the world's imperial hegemon would be dramatically positive. Dissolution of the US Empire removes the largest obstacle holding global development back, and eliminates this genocidal settler-colony once and for all.
If China's bourgeois were truly powerless with no leverage and there's no class collaborationism going on, they wouldn't keep them and instead nationalize everything - after all, why keep a parasitic middle man that just sucks up billions in surplus value? To build up productive forces the bourgeois aren't necessary - the state could handle it just fine.
Also, despite being a "DOTP", China goes against worker interests almost every step of the way. Commodity production fundamentally relies on exploitation of workers and is in the interest of capital, the supposed proletarian party is actively letting bourgeois to join as seen with Three Represents for instance, independent labor unions are crushed, international proletariat interests are also being betrayed by China (like supporting Ukraine, their recent affairs within Africa, the junta I mentioned), economic imperialism via initiatives such as BRI, etc.
Painting a bourgeois nation red is such an effective strategy to fool leftists I swear. Maybe once third imperialist war drops, every bourgeois state is gonna be calling themselves socialist! Who knows....
Why does China have to nationalize the small proprietorships, agricultural cooperatives, and mid-sized secondary industries for you to accept that the bourgeoisie is kept out of political power? Markets are fairly useful for developing industry, and if private ownership has no dominance over the commanding heights of industry then that don't have political power over the socialist state. If China was controlled by the bourgeoisie, then we wouldn't see executions of billionaires at a regular basis, nor would we see such dramatic investment in infrastructure meant for the working classes.
The state could nationalize everything, sure. Under the late Mao period and during the Gang of Four, they had higher rates of public ownership, but growth was uneven. Reform and Opening Up, along with the crucial aspect of technology transfer, stableized growth and slightly increased it:
This strategy of maintaining public ownership as the principle aspect and relying on markets to help facilitate gaps left by the socialist system in a controlled manner have had dramatically positive results. They of course aren't without new contradictions, but at the same time the presence of contradictions does not imply that the bourgeoisie are in control. This approach to socialism is elaborated on by Cheng Enfu:
Currently, the PRC is working towards the intermediate stage of socialist construction, per the chart.
As for the state being run by the working classes, this is also pretty straightforward. Public ownership is the principle aspect of the economy, and the CPC, a working class party, dominates the state. At a democratic level, local elections are direct, while higher levels are elected by lower rungs. At the top, constant opinion gathering and polling occurs, gathering public opinion, driving gradual change. This system is better elaborated on in Professor Roland Boer's Socialism in Power: On the History and Theory of Socialist Governance, and we can see the class breakdown of the top of the government itself:
This is despite the Three Represents system. Overall, this system has resulted in over 90% of the population approving the government, which is shown to be consistent and accurate.
Independent labor unions aren't allowed, correct, nor do they need to be. Unions are required to be a part of the All-China Federation of Trade Unions, and aren’t allowed to be independent from that federation. This isn’t a violation of worker rights, though, as the only purpose rogue unions would serve is undermining the socialist system, and would be vulnerable to foreign backing (such as from the US Empire).
BRI and the PRC's presence in Africa and the global south in general isn't imperialist either. The PRC is expanding trade, but not dominance, nor does its trade deals come at the barrel of a gun. They trade with pretty much everyone, and support their allies, but this is not imperialism. To the contrary, the PRC is acting against imperialism.
The CPC punishing Chinese landlords for improper treatment of Africans, mass arresting the landlords, passing reforms, and apologizing to the African Union
China has forgiven over 10 billion in foreign debt
Belt-Road Initiative: An Anti-thesis of Colonialism
Evo Morales speaks on claims of "Chinese imperialism
Five Imperialist Myths About China's Role in Africa
Is China a Better Partner for Africa than Europe and the West?
Challenging US Imperialism with Chinese Multilateralism
The Fallacy of Denouncing Both Sides of the US-China Conflict
And many, many more sources back this up. It's no secret that imperialists have been trying to smear China into being "no better" than the west, but the reality on the ground is that partnering with China results in mutual development and cooperation, while partnering with the west results in stripped autonomy, underdevelopment, and exploitation.
The idea that the PRC is a "bourgeois state painted red," and that that's why many Marxist-Leninists are "fooled" into supporting it, is ignoring my very clear arguments that public ownership is the principle aspect of the economy, with the working classes in charge of the state. Your most compelling argument seems to be that they could sacrifice the economic growth that Reform and Opening up brought and stuck with a more totally planned economy similar to the DPRK, but the fact that they are taking a different path does not mean that they are taking the wrong path, one where the bourgeoisie control the state and private ownership is principle, ie capitalism.
Again, your greatest error is in confusing form for essence, and only seeing similarities while ignoring differences. This causes you to make frankly absurd statements like "every nation state is hitlerite," regardless of results and structure.
Most of what you've pointed out just now isn't even in the interest of the working class, nor is it somehow exclusive to AES states - rather, these are just common interests held by bourgeois states.
GDP growth by itself indicates greater capital accumulation, which in turn indicates that a greater degree of worker exploitation has been achieved in a commodity producing society, directly going against worker interests. Same with maintaining the existence of bourgeois and their economic position under the guise of "helping GDP grow" for obvious reasons - it's just absurd.
Aside from that, national/public ownership also doesn't automatically mean "in workers interests". For instance, majority of capitalist countries early on had or still have their means of public transportation (railroad, buses) nationally owned. Does it mean these parts were "socialist"? Of course not - cheap public transportation allows workers to travel cheaply and faster to their workplaces, which in turns allows capital to expand and accumulate value more efficiently. In other words, their purpose was capital growth.
All in all, my main point is that despite China being labeled as a DOTP, it purely advances its national capitalist interests and does nothing to advance proletarian interests. There might be incidental benefits for the proletariat here and there (as is the norm under capitalism, economic growth sometimes bringing better standard of living and infrastructure improvements), but all the actual advancements of worker interests are promised way, way into the future.
And hey - maybe China will actually achieve communist mode of production purely on its own which would largely debunk orthodox marxism, only time will tell.
Bourgeois states don't seek grand infrastructure development, aren't dominated by public ownership, and don't develop mechanisms of democracy reaching approval rates over 90%. The PRC continuously puts the working class first. The idea that development of the productive forces is bad because it implies exploitation is inherently flawed, highly developed productive forces are the basis of socialized production to begin with, as it is with this development that we can best meet the needs of everyone with as little work as possible. What's absurd is using GDP growth in an economy where public ownership as principle as a bad thing.
Secondly, I agree, nationalized infrastructure in bourgeois states, where private ownership is principle, is indeed not socialist. The PRC has public ownership as the principle aspect of the economy, and the working classes in charge of the state though, so any comparisons to, say, Bismark are entirely off-base. The PRC is qualitatively different from heavily state-driven capitalist economies like the Republic of Korea or Singapore, because in the state-driven capitalist economies private ownership governs the large firms and key industries.
I get that I'm beating a dead horse, but you keep making the same basic blunder, so I'll state it again: you confuse form for essence. You utterly ignore the principle aspect of the economy, and see presence of contradiction as evidence of subservient aspects as dominant. This error in thinking is derived from purely looking at similarities, and ignoring differences. Only seeing the general, while ignoring the particular. In other words, utterly maiming the dialectical half of dialectical materialism.
All of the actual benefits are being given to the working classes on a steady and constant basis. Their quality of life has steadily gone up dramatically year over year, in a fundamentally far greater degree than social democracies offer by ratio, without bribery from imperialism. And no, the PRC isn't saying they will achieve communism in one country, just that communism, when achieved, will fit that description. Obviously communism must be global.
Yeah, bourgeois states would never ever develop infrastructure for market expansion and capital accumulation purposes (e.g. building up infrastructure in colonial states to facilitate exports + extract resources or undertaking massive projects such as the Suez and Panama canals), they would never ever nationalize nor have dominant national ownership of their industry for national bourgeois benefit or capital stability (like in Saudi Arabia, fascist Italy, various national oil companies), nor they would have high approval rates like seen in fascist regimes and economic boom periods (entrenched superstructures also make workers "approve" things that go against their interests). Maybe there's more DOTP's out there than I thought....
Productive forces by themselves are neutral, what matters is the underlying social relations of production. Capitalist mode of production presupposes exploitation via extraction of surplus value and market constrains, which is not only exploitative but also conflicts with the long-term worker interest that is production-for-use. Expansion of exploitation goes against working class interests, that much is hopefully obvious - you're not gonna find anyone but bourgeois or workers deep in nationalist superstructure being happy about their nation state having GDP growth.
On the other hand, a society that produces for use rather than for profit that doesn't have the exploitative surplus extraction mechanism - now that and it's growth is inherently in the interests of the working class.
China hasn't made even the most gradual of shifts towards this, it's a full on market economy that maintains the exploitative relation and sometimes merely transfers ownership around, but this doesn't materially affect the relationship between the worker and means of production.
Mere promises for the "future plans" do not alter the bourgeois essence of the economy as it stands now in China, and I highly doubt that a state maintaining this essence that is in it's national material interests will one day just do a 180, completely go against those interests and abolish the current state of things.
This is true for literally most capitalist countries during its active development, or after WW2. It is also a blatantly anti-marxist socdem narrative, as the marxist goal is abolishment of current state of things rather than merely making things temporarily better until capitalist contradictions inevitably catch up and result in crisis.
Except in the PRC, infrastructure projects are explicitly made to service both the overall socialist economy, and the lives of the working classes, at the expense of the domestic bourgeoisie. Your argument is essentially "the PRC has infrastructure projects, therefore it's capitalist," and considering I already demonstrated that public ownership is the principle aspect of the economy and the state run by the working classes, we need to re-examine these infrastructure projects. You are, again, confusing form for essence, and focusing on similarities while turning a blind eye towards stark differences. Again, making a mockery of dialectical materialism.
they would never ever nationalize nor have dominant national ownership of their industry for national bourgeois benefit or capital stability (like in Saudi Arabia, fascist Italy, various national oil companies),
Except in those economies, private ownership still remained principle. This is why I brought up Bismark earlier, and that I agree that nationalized industry isn't inherently a sign of socialism. That's why, as Marxists, we need to take the dialectical materialist approach and analyze not just individual elements, but the nature of the economy as a whole. Nationalization in the context of an economy where private ownership is principle ultimately is in service of the bourgeoisie. The Republic of Korea is dominated by giant megacorps like Samsung, LG, Hyundai, etc, despite having a strong bourgeois state, while the PRC is dominated by public ownership and SOEs with a proletarian state, despite having bourgeois ownership over small and medium secondary industries.
Again, since you seem to ignore your critical lack of dialectical analysis, I'll keep pointing it out every time it comes up. You are, again, confusing form for essence, and focusing on similarities while turning a blind eye towards stark differences.
Except the PRC's "boom period" seems to persist even in times of instability, and for many decades at a time, while fascist regimes have been flashes in the pan and boom/bust cycles in capitalist economies are regular. The highest approval rates in capitalist economies come in times of war, yet the PRC has been at peace for many decades and still retains this approval rate.
Again, since you seem to ignore your critical lack of dialectical analysis, I'll keep pointing it out every time it comes up. You are, again, confusing form for essence, and focusing on similarities while turning a blind eye towards stark differences.
This is a deeply confused analysis. The PRC has public ownership as the principle aspect of the economy, not private. Growth in production is essential for actually being capable of production-for-use, and this very problem was what caused instability under the Gang of Four. The idea that the small proprietors, the secondary, small industries, and the agricultural cooperatives need to be nationalized overnight is anti-Marxist analysis. You're using phrasemongering to try to paint increased industrial capacity as something contrary to worker interests.
The backbone of China's economy is production for use, though. Exploitation is a contradiction, correct, but trying to nationalize industry before it actually socializes is unnecessary from Marxist analysis, and delays productivity. You're making the argument of the Gang of Four, that being that it's better to be working in a fully nationalized economy as a poor worker than working in partially privatized yet ultimately socialist economy with more productive capacity and access to goods and services. Marxism doesn't posit that dogmatically nationalizing is inherently better because it gets rid of exploitation, but instead takes a scientific approach to analyzing production and distribution.
Utterly baseless claims, when the economy is dominated by the public sector and Five Year Plans guide the development of the economy. I've given you multiple examples backing this up, while you return with unbacked claims counter to reality.
China doesn't need to pull a 180, it's already a socialist economy gradually nationalizing the small and medium secondary industries as they develop and socialize. This isn't about "future plans," they are already socialist and already in the long and protracted process of transition between capitalism and communism, ie socialism. Nowhere in my comments thus far have I stated that they need to pull a 180, they need to continue their process of folding socialized production into the public sector and maintain the DotP.
Except this is entirely false. The capitalist countries during active devevelopment have not directed their gains towards the benefits of the working classes, and post-WWII the capitalist countries entered an era of even greater imperialism. This, in the context of a post about the US Empire (which you batted hard to defend under the guise of worry about the labor aristocracy there), is clear social chauvanism. Further, the idea that the PRC is only making things temporarily better until "capitalist contradictions inevitably catch up and result in crisis" is entirely unfounded, as I explained earlier the PRC has been in a period of stable growth without a boom/bust cycle for decades, far longer than the capitalist world.
Repeating it because you ignored this, and accused me of being anti-Marxist and a "socdem:" you confuse form for essence. You utterly ignore the principle aspect of the economy, and see presence of contradiction as evidence of subservient aspects as dominant. This error in thinking is derived from purely looking at similarities, and ignoring differences. Only seeing the general, while ignoring the particular. In other words, utterly maiming the dialectical half of dialectical materialism.
Mhmm, really digging your expansion here as an addendum to our earlier conversation on the same subject.
Thanks! Happy to help!
Thank you, for taking the time. I honestly can't wait for their next argument to learn even more!
Haha, hopefully there are fewer arguments and more constructive discussions.
Arguing isn't bad. How it's done may be!
Argument tends to be less fruitful than discussions, in my experience.
I think it's how we've been trained to understand it.
If anything, debate-culture is dominant in liberal spaces, not Marxist. We should try to take a dialectical approach to education and self-education.
I understand you. What I'm saying, for example, if I am considering between a green salad, fruit, or smoothie for lunch, my argument for greens would be iron content, fruit argument may be for the C content, smoothie would be "I can get both." But in the United States, we're taught "argument" is disagreement, or negative. So yes. I do agree we can take a dialectical approach, which if I'm understanding it correctly, takes contradiction in ideas and basically does the same as my lunch example? But I'm still grappling with my understanding of the word, so there's also that. As a side note, it occurs to me dialectics informs your style when correcting us on misconceptions (and also wondering if it's your general disposition to be so patient and good natured, or if understanding and practicing dialectics had lent extension to any degree)?
Ah, gotcha. When I hear "argument," I hear "debate culture," the kind of liberal bloodsports that focus mostly on rhetorical wins than finding a fundamental truth. I'm not quite using dialectics the way they were first formalized in ancient society, but instead more as a dialectical materialist. We can't come to a better understanding purely through the realm of ideas, such is the strategy of dialectical idealists, but instead we can be more cooperative in education.
As for my style, I do try to emulate the dialectical method of Marx, but I absolutely do not compare to him in skill. Practicing dialectical materialism as a method of analysis is a skill like any other, it takes repitition and intention to become more accurate. Regarding disposition, I mostly take from Liu Shaoqi's How to be a Good Communist, which helps me maintain revolutionary optimism!
Oooh, I'll add that to my (unrealistically long!) reading list. Thanks!
No worries! It's very repetitive, haha.
👍
As long as MLs don't hijack the revolution and betray the working class again, this is good news but the sharks are circling.
MLs don't "hijack the revolution" nor do they "betray the working classes."
Are you suggesting they never expressed solidarity to the working class to begin with?
I'm stating that socialist states have been legitimate.
Imma be real, browsing lemmy and seeing liberal and leftist nonsense, the "resistance" (taking a sick day off is now a general strike apparently) and the general teamsport politics do make me want to start kkklacking at the keyboard and go full third worldism
Too bad every country is hitler and thirdworldism is just nationalist moralism
Collapse of
≠ deaths of proles in 
If anything, the death of the
project will save millions of proletarian lives, including proles living within
.
Yup, once the only bad country in existence (US) is out of the picture, every other country that currently exist, who definitely don't brutalize proles and certainly don't have any interest in imperialism will turn communist and end centuries of suffering for all....
Collapses too are notoriously peaceful and civil and certainly don't result in millions of deaths until another bourgeois hitler takes power
I think you're yelling at someone else? Maybe OP? I'm not pro-{any country}, but I am an anarchist and
is absolutely my biggest op right now.
The status quo is more dangerous than collapse, full stop. Whatever millions of deaths the collapse of
will cause in the short term, capitalism as it currently exists will cause orders of magnitude more in the longer term (eventually all of us!) and more than collapse even in the short term, but just in ways that are designed to be hard to notice.
No, collapse of US wouldn't even really hurt capitalism - all it's gonna do is change what nation state is currently the center of capital (likely Germany, Japan or China) who would pick up the slack and status quo is maintained.
In fact, a collapse of such a large hegemony would probably bolster global capital given how it'd take out a ton of accumulated capital, solving overproduction (main capitalist contradiction) for the short-term and making countries temporarily prosper in a fashion not too dissimilar to post-WW2 era. This would legitimize rule of capital further since the times are good.
I'm with you on the first paragraph, hence why downfall of the US is necessary but insufficient for communism.
Yeah if
got nuked into the stone age or otherwise completely obliterated all at once, but if it fell to consistent communists or socialists, the accumulated capital would be expropriated and given back to the people, right?
I don't think that
is the only country causing overproduction.
Which is why our comrades outside of
need to prepare for our downfall and learn the lessons of our genocidal history, namely to never settle for what the capitalists offer you.
But we can honestly agree to disagree on the details of the future. My main goal is to demonstrate that there is an anti-
position that isn't just "Middle class 14 year old leftists and self-hating third worldists try not to jerk off at the thought of proles in the west dying". Like
is the flag of the people who want to put me and my family and all my friends and all my comrades in camps. Of course I'm rooting for its downfall!
We can't really agree to disagree on wishful thinking vs centuries of materialist analysis that has been historically proven time and time again, sorry.
Accumulated value being destroyed doesn't just mean physically existing property (e.g. factories and houses) but also fictitious capital such as bonds and stocks which would result in instant wipe out of capital on paper, collapse of existing factory supply chains meaning they can no longer produce nor sell profitably which devalues them significantly and I can go on and on. This would allow capital abroad to fill in these market spaces with their own produce and enjoy increased profits since competition just got taken out.
Also, it's not up to some "communists and socialists" to pick up the slack - for a revolution to happen, the proletariat as a class has to rise up and fight for their own emancipation. The job of communists is to shift the consciousness from trade union (e.g. merely making conditions better) to communist consciousness (e.g. abolishment of the current state of things) and making sure the revolution succeeds via leadership. Without that, literally nothing can be achieved apart from mere spectacle, as shown by urban guerillas, years of lead and so on, and any collapse would just result in different reactionaries taking power as history shows.
If there's actual class consciousness in a country, collapse isn't necessary at all. If there isn't, collapse wouldn't bring anything other than suffering and shift back towards status quo.
No we actually can agree to disagree, because maybe I have reached my conclusions through a materialist but distinct analysis. Reasonable minds can differ on most things. Give it a shot!
Good. It wasn't real anyways, so we shouldn't be playing along like it is.
Does collapse of
necessarily mean collapse of the supply chains? I'm skeptical that workers will stop working in absence of the
boot; if anything, workers will be more productive.
As long as "leadership" doesn't mean a vanguard, then I really don't have any problems with the second paragraph, and frankly it is a more precise version of what I want to see.
The problem is that the military and cops are not proletarians and never will align with our interests. So even if the proletariat fully achieved class consciousness, we would have to fight the military and the cops at a bare minimum. I.e., the
government and their forces would need to collapse.
It would take
and its evils off the world stage, saving millions of lives, albeit not mine. Obviously I want collapse with class consciousness, but I'm not gonna pretend like it wouldn't be beneficial for everyone else if
disappeared overnight, because it would be.
Obviously. State collapsing = nobody is ensuring safety of trade routes anymore, nobody organizing ports, clearing international payments, controlling foreign relations to facilitate trade - in other words, the collapsed state becomes isolated. Firms that had international contracts to provide raw materials for their factories would also flee or fail, making production largely impossible.
What this leaves you with is people's needs not being met and famine, factories that can't produce anything, violence out of desperation and foreign peacekeeping affairs trying to keep things stable while also furthering any interests they might have (like installing a new government). This is where the mass prole death comes from.
This is straight up just bs. Military and cops are proletarian, but are also class traitors since they protect and uphold capitalist rule. This goes against their material interests however (nobody is interested in dying for their national bourgeois at the trenches) and is a product of bourgeois society instilling nationalism and war propaganda into its populace.
Also if you were to look at previous revolutions, military was instrumental as most would refuse to shoot at masses of workers trying to overthrow the bourgeois rule and emancipate themselves, joining their side and overwhelming the government. Without the military joining the side of proletariat, the revolutionaries are no match against trained military tactics and equipment. With a collapsed state, the threat becomes foreign military intervention which would result in the exact same premise.
Anyway this is my last wall of text that nobody reads, I cba to explain basic history or economics anymore.
Speak for yourself, I'm jerking off to the thought of Western empires losing the ability to project power against the third world. Will there be a lot of death and destruction involved? Yes, but I lost the ability to care one genocide ago. Will other empires rise to fill the gap? Also yes. Will they be as irredeemably evil as America? Probably not.
Why just Western empires? Why not oppose eastern empires too? Putin has made little secret of his aspirations for a new Imperial Russia