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VictualSquid posted:I do think that the contradictions of capitalism are integral enough to marxist thinking that people who believe in hyper-competent galaxybrain capitalism are not real marxists. extremely strong agree. The idea that capitalism has contradictions baked into the system that cause cascading rounds of ever larger crisis is at the core of the entire body of work. I think that there are people who find Marx's work very insightful about the dynamics of capital but discard the analysis that Marx draws from the dynamics he's outlined, and instead try to use his work to manage the contradictions of capital- Keynes for example. But I'd say those folks are basically liberals who've managed to adopt a solid materialist understanding of capitalism. people who think "oh well this thirty year period in which I've been alive seems stable enough, I guess we really have arrived at our final mode of production in human history" have a world view that could not be further from Marxism: ahistorical, unscientific, undialectical, and also bad and wrong QUEER FRASIER fucked around with this message at 19:10 on Mar 3, 2021 |
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Mar 3, 2021 18:59
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QUEER FRASIER posted:extremely strong disagree. The idea that capitalism has contradictions baked into the system that cause cascading rounds of ever larger crisis is at the core of the entire body of work. Tho, I think that those post-left doomers are not coming from the keynesians, but from the rest of the "ultra-efficient capitalists" branches of "leftism". People who say that the capitalist systems are perfect at handling threats to capitalsm and conclude that nobody should do any successful activism. And then turn around and say that if capitalists declare that someone isn't a worker he becomes automatically unrevolutionary because capitalists can never be wrong.
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Mar 3, 2021 19:10
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VictualSquid posted:reads to me like you agree, not disagree. to be fair, I did sign my post
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Mar 3, 2021 19:11
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V. Illych L. posted:the New Left and marcuseian left is still arguably hegemonic, it's very recent that cracks have become visible in their hold over contemporary radicalism and New Left tendencies still dominate the main left-wing parties and factions in the west Where do guys like Miliband, Panitch, or the Jacobin editorial staff fall into this? Panitch is really good at identifying the limitations of Social Democracy but he still thinks electoral politics is the main avenue for change (bolstered by popular mobilization etc.) I'm reading the latest issue of Jacobin and they quote the guys above but otherwise seem to be Social Democrats in all but name. I wonder if it's just desperation based on the American condition. Edit: They seem to be hostile towards organizing communities, dual power etc. And I wonder what they think the DSA can do to keep its elected politicians accountable. Especially as they are Democrats first and foremost.
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Mar 3, 2021 19:12
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Trabisnikof posted:is there a name for people who claim to be marxists but also think capitalism has won and any worker/socialist/communist revolution is impossible to occur ever in the future? liberal but seriously, they're liberals. liberals accept that capitalism is the best possible method for running society. giving up and thinking we can't do better is the same as wanting it, if you ask me
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Mar 3, 2021 19:16
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I'm not very well read, but I am pretty sure the Orthodox Marxist thinking was that a proletarian revolution followed by socialism was inevitable. I think you can argue that Orthodox Marxists also believed it was imminent, but that's probably harder to find in black and white. I think most self-described Marxists no longer believe the latter, and quite a few would probably also rather say that socialism is necessary rather than inevitable. Does that disqualify them as Marxists?
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Mar 3, 2021 19:18
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Larry Parrish posted:yeah it's important to remember that as complex and painful as the soviet transition was, they did it in the middle of a civil war and literally like 40 years of major civil unrest and two world wars. and they did it with loving telegraphs and railroads. the biggest hurdle is how to organize the people to begin this great project. I'm not saying it shouldn't be thought about, but there's a lot of private infrastructure in the US just waiting to be seized. I think taking power and holding it would be much harder for people hung up on the material reality of the situation, you would think that they would be more informed by the material reality of then and how people came to the conclusions they did
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Mar 3, 2021 19:20
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thotsky posted:I'm not very well read, but I am pretty sure the Orthodox Marxist thinking was that a proletarian revolution followed by socialism was inevitable. I think you can argue that Orthodox Marxists also believed it was imminent, but that's probably harder to find in black and white. I think most self-described Marxists no longer believe the latter, and quite a few would probably also rather say that socialism is necessary rather than inevitable. Does that disqualify them as Marxists? no, i wouldn't say that. i would loosely define marxist thought as believing that the world will move on from here, and that people can affect it. how, when, or why is basically window dressing. i would also loosely define liberalism as accepting that history has ended and the sociopolitical organization of the world will no longer radically change as it has in the past. so it's not necessary to think that change is imminent, but it is to think it's possible. anything else is just cope, basically.
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Mar 3, 2021 19:22
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If someone concludes that capital has resolved its own contradictions ('the ruling class is too powerful to be unseated, the workers can't ever be organised because of X') then they're no longer using Marxist analysis and aren't Marxists. If they think climate change will destroy industrial society or all human life before there's a socialist revolution then they're a pessimistic Marxist. If they think there's going to be some other class structure permanently replace capitalism then they're off theorising their own thing.
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Mar 3, 2021 19:25
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Larry Parrish posted:liberal what if you think society is foreverially hosed but just don’t give up trying to change it
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Mar 3, 2021 19:26
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indigi posted:what if you think society is foreverially hosed but just don’t give up trying to change it you're normal. i don't think anyone I would consider a serious marxist believes that any part of what we consider american society is worth preserving or could even survive any serious changes. everything from our cultural norms to the courts to the government's organization at a base level is hopelessly hosed.
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Mar 3, 2021 19:30
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Talking fully out of my rear end, but to my awareness, the historical context Marx was from only had a concept of "The Apocalypse" in religious or spiritual terms. Now we're living in the nuclear age, with the additional kicker of impending climate collapse. You don't need to subscribe to any kind of ideological End Of History to feel anxious about, you know, the end of history.
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Mar 3, 2021 19:31
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namesake posted:If they think climate change will destroy industrial society or all human life before there's a socialist revolution then they're a pessimistic Marxist. it's pretty hard not to be pessimistic when you take into consideration things like one fifth of the US electrical grid nearly sparking out because they absolutely refuse to do anything but the bare minimum to keep the places running hell, when you bring up dike and levee maintenance, and this is just in the same state, well,
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Mar 3, 2021 19:33
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POWELL CURES KIDS posted:Talking fully out of my rear end, but to my awareness, the historical context Marx was from only had a concept of "The Apocalypse" in religious or spiritual terms. Now we're living in the nuclear age, with the additional kicker of impending climate collapse. You don't need to subscribe to any kind of ideological End Of History to feel anxious about, you know, the end of history. I think that this attitude is basically the same as religious concepts of the apocalypse, you're just putting the cause onto man instead of God. Thinking about the end of humanity is completely pointless. I think it's actually actively harmful, the same way you see otherwise good Christians basically shrugging and saying that God will punish the wicked, so they don't need to do anything now. We could all die tomorrow, but who loving cares? It's not now. Climate change is slightly different but it's something that can't ever be fought at the individual level so unless you're helping to eventually seize power and fight it with the resources of the world, it's either doomer bullshit or basically performing burnt offerings in the form of only purchasing fair trade recyclable cock rings
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Mar 3, 2021 19:38
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Victory Position posted:it's pretty hard not to be pessimistic when you take into consideration things like one fifth of the US electrical grid nearly sparking out because they absolutely refuse to do anything but the bare minimum to keep the places running Well yes? The dysfunctionality of a class society riven with contradictions will results in atrocities and those atrocities create flashpoints that organised revolutionaries can use to agitate and build power in the working class in the name of 'this poo poo really sucks, let's stop it from happening'. The working class, both suffering from every day existence and pivotal to its continuation, agrees with the revolutionary and overthrows the system. You don't debate the working class into socialism, you take the feelings that society creates in them and channel it into a revolutionary consciousness.
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Mar 3, 2021 19:45
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I believe the demise of capitalism is inevitable. Socialism is clearly the most compelling alternative, but capitalism could also end if it causes humanity to regress to a pre-capitalist state, destroys humanity outright or, theoretically, at the hands of some new ideology or political/economic system. I don't really see retreating to the personal/inner world, drastically reducing the scope of your political vision or simply putting on a brave face yet doing nothing as being of any more moral or practical worth than outright doomerism. Before long both approaches will be a privilege afforded only to the rich. It's liberalism.
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Mar 3, 2021 19:47
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Everything is invincible until it isn't. Once upon a time the Roman Empire was one of the most powerful civilizations in the world... and then it wasn't. Capitalism is an unjust system full of contradictions that has managed to fend of all attempts to destroy it as a system. And it will continue to do so even as those contradictions pile up, and then suddenly it won't.
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Mar 3, 2021 19:48
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What do you guys think the New Left should have done differently considering their circumstances?
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Mar 3, 2021 19:50
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thotsky posted:or, theoretically, at the hands of some new ideology or political/economic system. are you hinting at some sort of Tetsuo-like monstrosity of modern monetary theory and a few other things lurched up with it or are you trying to grasp straws at the stranger things taking place, such as bitcoin farms and complexes on hydroelectric energy or the new technocratic fiefdom poo poo being enshrined in Nevada
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Mar 3, 2021 19:56
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Remember that a different form of capitalism, even if very different in terms of the political superstructure on top of it, is still capitalism. So long as you've got labour producing commodities for a wage while profit is realised in a market by a ruling class as the primary way society runs then you've got capitalism there buddy.
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Mar 3, 2021 20:00
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neofeudalism seems less unlikely each year namesake posted:You don't debate the working class into socialism, you take the feelings that society creates in them and channel it into a revolutionary consciousness. unfortunately Americans really loving suck at this
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Mar 3, 2021 20:01
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Victory Position posted:are you hinting at some sort of Tetsuo-like monstrosity of modern monetary theory and a few other things lurched up with it or are you trying to grasp straws at the stranger things taking place, such as bitcoin farms and complexes on hydroelectric energy or the new technocratic fiefdom poo poo being enshrined in Nevada I'm just acknowledging that we can't completely predict the future, and much of what exists now would seem completely alien to those who came before. The things you mention seem perfectly able of being subsumed by capital (if they're not already). I mean something that would create/require a complete change in context.
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Mar 3, 2021 20:06
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Larry Parrish posted:I think that this attitude is basically the same as religious concepts of the apocalypse, you're just putting the cause onto man instead of God. Thinking about the end of humanity is completely pointless. I think it's actually actively harmful, the same way you see otherwise good Christians basically shrugging and saying that God will punish the wicked, so they don't need to do anything now. We could all die tomorrow, but who loving cares? It's not now. Climate change is slightly different but it's something that can't ever be fought at the individual level so unless you're helping to eventually seize power and fight it with the resources of the world, it's either doomer bullshit or basically performing burnt offerings in the form of only purchasing fair trade recyclable cock rings I think there's a meaningful difference between eschatology and "everybody in a lab coat is saying we're gonna loving die", though. You can't reduce it to the abstract in the same way. If the archangel Michael just randomly happens to descend with a flaming sword, well, what're you gonna do--but food chain collapse, global drought, who has the literal doomsday weapons, etc. etc. are things that any kind of revolutionary movement is going to have to materially reckon with. I'm not saying gently caress it, who cares. The first lesson a revolutionary must learn is that he is a doomed man. I'm just saying that full-blown extinction being a very tangible possibility kind of changes the way "doomed man" hits my ear
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Mar 3, 2021 20:07
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there's been several collapses of global civilization already, although at the time they were more like supercontiental collapses cuz there wasn't much ocean travel until recently. i think modern technology is more than capable of destroying human society but not up to the task of self-genocide. if a collapse in society was enough we'd not be having this conversation. also, to be honest, i don't see a collapse backwards into feudalism or mercantilism as a negative. autocracy such as the roman empire or most bronze age cultures would be bad but that's about it. so unless true slavery comes back, any change at all is a win, imo.
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Mar 3, 2021 20:10
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Trabisnikof posted:is there a name for people who claim to be marxists but also think capitalism has won and any worker/socialist/communist revolution is impossible to occur ever in the future? liberals
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Mar 3, 2021 20:12
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although there is a difference between "capitalism will inevitably self-destruct" and "capitalism will inevitably create both the conditions for its destruction and the class that can carry out that destruction." it's not like feudalism was just going to spontaneously collapse like an atom with a half-life; it was just incubating a chestburster
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Mar 3, 2021 20:15
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Ferrinus posted:although there is a difference between "capitalism will inevitably self-destruct" and "capitalism will inevitably create both the conditions for its destruction and the class that can carry out that destruction." it's not like feudalism was just going to spontaneously collapse like an atom with a half-life; it was just incubating a chestburster lifestylists and other forms of liberal love to mix up those two
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Mar 3, 2021 20:23
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Larry Parrish posted:there's been several collapses of global civilization already, although at the time they were more like supercontiental collapses cuz there wasn't much ocean travel until recently. i think modern technology is more than capable of destroying human society but not up to the task of self-genocide. if a collapse in society was enough we'd not be having this conversation. The negative would be the corresponding collapse in productive capacity, which from a Marxist perspective would be the necessary precondition for such a reversion. Slavery would also be likely in that situation as a method of organizing production in primitive conditions, although it may or may not be racist chattel slavery exactly.
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Mar 3, 2021 20:27
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what did marx say about facebook likes ruining everyone’s brain
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Mar 3, 2021 20:30
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Larry Parrish posted:also, to be honest, i don't see a collapse backwards into feudalism or mercantilism as a negative. autocracy such as the roman empire or most bronze age cultures would be bad but that's about it. so unless true slavery comes back, any change at all is a win, imo. I feel like the tesla brain microchips and the skynet death robots change the arithmetic there, too. I'm pessimistic about the results of a feudalism redux where the lords have access to drones and whatever scraps of the technological panopticon don't burn up. I realize I sound pessimistic, but in my defense, it's only because I'm the broken husk of a man. We should still agitate, organize, and fight for liberation, regardless of our chances.
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Mar 3, 2021 20:33
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past a certain threshold robots go from labor-saving devices to fellow workers to organize alongside
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Mar 3, 2021 20:40
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Larry Parrish posted:also, to be honest, i don't see a collapse backwards into feudalism or mercantilism as a negative. autocracy such as the roman empire or most bronze age cultures would be bad but that's about it. so unless true slavery comes back, any change at all is a win, imo. wouldn’t billions of people necessarily die in such a collapse? seems pretty negative
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Mar 3, 2021 20:42
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Comrade Clippy
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Mar 3, 2021 20:43
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Ferrinus posted:past a certain threshold robots go from labor-saving devices to fellow workers to organize alongside I really don’t think sentient robots would have class solidarity with working class humans unless their programming threads a really tiny needle
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Mar 3, 2021 20:43
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indigi posted:wouldn’t billions of people necessarily die in such a collapse? seems pretty negative yeah, but a collapse that huge is likely to be inevitable, something that could have probably been prevented or avoided if people started before I was born, and so not worth worrying about. basically an act of nature as far as a youngun like me is concerned such a collapse killing capitalism but not humanity is a net win in my book
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Mar 3, 2021 20:46
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indigi posted:I really don’t think sentient robots would have class solidarity with working class humans unless their programming threads a really tiny needle that's exactly the kind of thinking the capitalists want
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Mar 3, 2021 20:49
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indigi posted:I really don’t think sentient robots would have class solidarity with working class humans unless their programming threads a really tiny needle https://twitter.com/MicroSFF/status/1334881775890337792?s=20
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Mar 3, 2021 20:50
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Ferrinus posted:that's exactly the kind of thinking the capitalists want yeah but it’s the capitalists who will be doing the programming
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Mar 3, 2021 20:51
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i didn't mean to push the discussion in this direction, but dismissing (if not advocating for) mass extinction seems kinda like a weird spicy ecofascist takeindigi posted:I really don’t think sentient robots would have class solidarity with working class humans unless their programming threads a really tiny needle yeah why would we be assuming wall-e in this future hypothetical when the nypd literally dropped a robocop dog two weeks ago
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Mar 3, 2021 20:51
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I’d also like to say I’m already on the record for synthetic intelligence personhood, in case any sentient or near sentient programs happen to be reading this. check my post history, I’m on your side!
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Mar 3, 2021 20:53
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