There is a spectrum haunting C-SPAM. I, on the contrary,

The Something Awful Forums > Archives > Comedy Goldmine > The Goodmine > There is a spectrum haunting C-SPAM. I, on the contrary,

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Fallen Hamprince: Nov 12, 2016

Tinker Tankie Soldier Spy posted:

gee i wonder who changed my name

someone insanely good

# ¿ Jan 2, 2017 21:49

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# ¿ May 20, 2024 13:14

Fallen Hamprince: Nov 12, 2016

Darkman Fanpage posted:

rich people bad! destroy rich! help poor! help working people!

that good baloogan?

checks out

# ¿ Jan 12, 2017 00:33

Fallen Hamprince: Nov 12, 2016

Aeolius posted:

for real. here's a piece i enjoyed on the meaning of the soviet space program

my understanding is that the USSR was constantly playing catch-up in the arms race, while the USA was constantly playing catch-up in the space race. if that's accurate, it says a lot. but i really haven't read enough on it

the article you linked is really terribly written and has some cool revisionism about wwii. i really liked the part about how lend-lease era us was pro-axis, that's some real quality insanity right there.

The arms race and the space race were integrally linked. A spacecraft like Vostock-1 is little more than an ICBM with a person instead of a bomb, so the space programs of both countries were build off, and worked in tandem with, military rocket development. Manned space exploration such as Gagarin's first flight and the Apollo landings were primarily funded for propaganda, as was Sputnik. The Soviets took the lead in this in large part out of ideology; Soviet Communism going back to Lenin had a deep affection for technology and industrialization that has its roots in Marx's quintessentially 19th-century view of technology and was magnified by frustration at Russia's perceived backwardness, a sensitivity that was expressed in geopolitical terms under Stalin. At times when domestic living standards were still below those of even much of the Eastern Block, winning the space race was an achievement that Soviet leaders could point too as a sign of strength. But the Soviet Union was always poorer than the US, even during its economic heyday during the oil crisis, so once ICBM technology was fully developed space technology took a back seat to the military-industrial complex, as did virtually every other economic concern. The US had cash to spare and its government was eager to make up for its failure to keep up with space technology, so it kept up development on the moonshot while the Soviets abandoned it after an admittedly disastrous accident that killed several of their best engineers.

# ¿ Jan 12, 2017 00:51

Fallen Hamprince: Nov 12, 2016

OhFunny posted:

Since the thread is talking about the failure of socialism in the USSR. I'd like to know how and why socialism has failed in Venezuela.

It was never really socialism so much as piecemeal nationalization and some extraordinarily bad attempts and minimizing the damage of the collapse of oil prices. Chavez was very much a caudillo in the traditional Latin American mould, he had little serious devotion to socialist principles. Maduro is an utterly incompetent toady who's primary virtue was not posing a threat to Chavez, so he got to be second in command.

# ¿ Jan 12, 2017 00:54

Fallen Hamprince: Nov 12, 2016

Karl Barks posted:

maduro is a very bad leader

Venezuela would be in pretty much the exact same position were he in charge, he ignored warnings from within PSUV about the country's dependence on oil exports. His reputation will survive solely because he died before things really hit the fan but Venezuela's economy had been in significant decline for years before Maduro took over.

# ¿ Jan 12, 2017 01:37

Fallen Hamprince: Nov 12, 2016

*in a Beria voice* Every catgirl must be ground into labour-camp dust

# ¿ Jan 13, 2017 19:34

Fallen Hamprince: Nov 12, 2016

single childless nazis who masturbate to anime just got their idiot king elected to america's highest office and socialists have responded by purging a catgirl artist from their internet club

communism will only succeed when it realizes that the true path to power lies solely through anime and jerking your dick/rubbing your cooch to anime

# ¿ Jan 13, 2017 20:53

Fallen Hamprince: Nov 12, 2016

Pener Kropoopkin posted:

read a freakin book once in a while

New PSL campaign slogan showing promise

# ¿ Jan 14, 2017 00:41

Fallen Hamprince: Nov 12, 2016

Baloogan posted:

*Waits 7 years to buy a car*

*gets arrested for illegal emigration*

# ¿ Jan 16, 2017 06:42

Fallen Hamprince: Nov 12, 2016

Atrocious Joe posted:

The FARC has some criticism of that piece but broadly approves

https://twitter.com/FARC_EPeace/status/821068565185003520

is raping hostages in your jungle camp socialism or neoliberalism?

# ¿ Jan 18, 2017 04:05

Fallen Hamprince: Nov 12, 2016

R. Guyovich posted:

my response to that is the actual history of those countries rather than the fever dreams of tony cliff but sure

woke American Leninist rolling up to tell u what the Soviet Union was really like, and also that China is a workers paradise

# ¿ Jan 18, 2017 22:29

Fallen Hamprince: Nov 12, 2016

Odobenidae posted:

*extremely CIA voice* sup im here to tell u what the soviet union was really like, and also that America is the land of the free

the CIA pays way better than george soros I even get to ride a shuttle bus to the volcano lair where I work

# ¿ Jan 18, 2017 23:17

Fallen Hamprince: Nov 12, 2016

up in the public library hollarin about how the scissor crisis was a MI6 false flag and Trotsky was made w/ CGI

# ¿ Jan 18, 2017 23:32

Fallen Hamprince: Nov 12, 2016

R. Guyovich posted:

if power is exercised in any structured way, it can't be socialism. got it

you're the 'china is still socialist' guy

# ¿ Jan 19, 2017 00:00

Fallen Hamprince: Nov 12, 2016

https://twitter.com/marxbot3000/status/821869791455707136

# ¿ Jan 19, 2017 01:24

Fallen Hamprince: Nov 12, 2016

Peel posted:

the point about development still being heavily state/party directed is sound but the claim that the dictatorship is of the proletariat remains a sticking point

Xi Jinping rules only to advance the interests of the worker, as he emphasized in his speech at Davos.

# ¿ Jan 19, 2017 01:28

Fallen Hamprince: Nov 12, 2016

consumed by normies posted:

wait lol you still think china is socialist ??

HomeEx's entire worldview is constructed for the purposes of validating his political beliefs, independent of observable reality. He's very hip that way.

# ¿ Jan 19, 2017 02:18

Fallen Hamprince: Nov 12, 2016

Odobenidae posted:

am i hip yet? i'm going for a real edgy take here and im not sure if my worldview is being validated by the goons im desperately trying to impress

i wouldnt call your meltdown 'nice' i mean it needs some work but you do show promise

# ¿ Jan 19, 2017 02:28

Fallen Hamprince: Nov 12, 2016

Squalid posted:

This line of conversation made me google "is china socialist" which gave me this lolzy quote from some communist blog

i'm the 'hood habits

especially saggy pants. i'm mostly saggy pants

# ¿ Jan 19, 2017 02:34

Fallen Hamprince: Nov 12, 2016

consumed by normies posted:

well poo poo i have asdf32 and fallen hamprince on my side of an argument, maybe china really is socialist

hey shinji

your posts are good :twisted:

# ¿ Jan 19, 2017 02:40

Fallen Hamprince: Nov 12, 2016

Enjoy posted:

baloogan is a fag

highly problematic

# ¿ Jan 19, 2017 08:37

Fallen Hamprince: Nov 12, 2016

Aeolius posted:

The third question that I forgot to ask in my previous post was "what's the end-game for absolutely insisting that the USSR be excluded from the category of 'socialist'?" But thankfully, you answered it anyway: "that's important if we want the term 'socialism' to be the goal of socialist worker movements." To be clear: The USSR's system is not "the goal"; it's one socialist project out of many, built in its own context � a context that included the property of being unprecedented in history. It was far from perfect, but we do the workers' movement no great favors by fudging categories just to maintain the purity of socialist-state-as-utopia.

Anyway, here's my stab at an answer. Brought to you by (grumble sigh) the magical girl cadres of the Something Awful Anime Communist Party-ML (Anti-Revisionist) (SAACP-ML(AR), or "sack-pummeler").

i hope you're loving happy

It's actually pretty fraught. In the way it tends to be imagined by the more-Trotsky-than-actual-Trotsky sorts (Tony Cliff & co.), of the state acting as one giant capitalist, it runs into some pretty major problems straightaway. Per Marx, "capital exists and can only exist as many capitals"; market competition being both the inner nature and reciprocal interaction of capital, it would make zero sense to conceive of a unitary "virtual capitalist" who somehow persists and grows through bouts of autarky. This is far from the only issue here (does production for exchange predominate internally, then? where's the enormous accumulation of surplus value as profit? how does it manage to avoid both crises of overproduction and inflation? and again, where's that drat labor market? etc).

Lenin used "state capitalist" a bit differently, to refer to an advanced stage of capitalism typified by more active state management via public/private partnerships, monopoly capital, etc. Consider the following, from "The Tax in Kind":

In this and other articles written as the NEP was being inaugurated, he described socialist production itself (as of 1918) as still being constructed, not yet by itself the most prevalent mode of production in operation. However, the overarching control structure of the proletarian state is one consciously built to privilege socialist production and pursue transition to it in the rest of the economy � hence a "socialist" republic, despite a highly mixed economy.

In much the same way, we can consider the USA to have been an early from-the-ground-up bourgeois state built to accommodate the capitalist mode of production. The USA likewise was "capitalist" from the outset, despite the mode of slavery predominating through much of it for its early years. And this is reflected as much in the overarching structure as in the internal structure of production via slavery; it didn't resemble ancient Rome's slavery-dominated economy, but rather a system subordinated to capitalism. Slaves were accounted for as capital goods, like machines or livestock:

The coexistence of multiple modes of production generally involves varying degrees of embeddedness in a primary mode, which structures the often messy and complicated reality on the ground. Many distinguish revolution from reform inasmuch as the former happens all at once and the latter happens over time. This is incorrect. Revolution also necessarily happens over time; one can't wave a wand and replace every social institution and relation (hence that line about "birthmarks" I quoted from the Critique of the Gotha Programme). The real distinction between reformist and revolutionary politics is which class is in the driver's seat. The dictatorship of the proletariat is thus the font from which the rest of a socialist project can flow, as it is capable of privileging socialist production as primary. "Our state capitalism differs essentially from the state capitalism in countries that have bourgeois governments," Lenin remarked, precisely because of the proletarian government.

Now, I'm not 100% sure how to tackle your request for a definition of "ownership," since I think we use this word the same way, inasmuch as we both recognize a place in this continuum for "public property." Consider a public park; you are a partial owner of it, and yet you are not free to just walk in an start chopping down trees or tagging up the place on whim. Does this mean you are not in control of it? Certainly not in the absolute sense of your own toothbrush or TV, both perfectly fit canvases for whatever graffiti one wishes. But the distinction between personal and public property under socialism is as crucial as the distinction between personal and private (and, indeed, public) property under capitalism.

To actually exercise the degree of control one has over public property requires following procedures to receive authorization from the appropriate jurisdiction, subject to consultation or review or the like. This is probably obvious to you. In fact, I don't expect that I'm informing you about anything here, so much as I'm encouraging you to make connections between things you already recognize, in different contexts. For example, you already gave a very clear affirmation of the importance of planning, so consider how important jurisdiction becomes when planning supplants the anarchy of production. Just as any given line worker usually can't up and change the factory's schedule, I'd bill it rare that single factory can unilaterally change the regional priorities. Does this mean the people in question don't control these things? Not, again, in the absolute sense of personal property. But they do have a stake and a say. Local worker councils have representation in regional councils, and so on up, and one seeks change at a given scope by negotiating these levels of authority.

Al Szymanski goes into some detail:

If the means of production are public property, and the public is overwhelmingly workers (as ever it has been through human history, and ever moreso as class itself is gradually abolished), then in the most forthright way possible, the means of production are owned by workers, and their most fundamental relationship to it is democratic.

This leaves the question of the party. Consider what the party is, and what it does. Just as the state is the holder of executive power, the party is the structure responsible for everything that underlies that � the reasons, the broader program, the ultimate telos. That executive power should be subordinated to a set of principles in the last instance is not hard to understand, and nor is this configuration unique to the USSR; it's been the norm since mass political action birthed factions that grew into what we now call parties, and even before. It's the case in the US, too � people access elected office almost exclusively through parties holding explicit ideologies, capable of disciplining members.

Now, the orthodox take on the single-party state is that the primary purpose of a party is to represent discrete class interests, and given that bourgeois class interests are being suppressed, only one is needed. Another take, associated with Trotsky, argues that separate parties could represent factions within a class. I find this inherently plausible inasmuch as that's the case in the USA; both major parties express the interests of the bourgeoisie, while the main differentiation appears in their respective outreach to petty-bourgeois vs labor aristocrat populations, in either case broadly aligned with the aforementioned class. I think the issue is open to strategic debate and I wouldn't/don't begrudge a socialist nation taking either approach, though I probably currently lean toward the "orthodoxy."

Anyway, to call the nomenklatura a "class," as I said before, one must discard the specific Marxist definition of the word, conflating an economic owning class with a political elite. One can even find prominent Trotskyists discussing this at some length:

Here's another, written as a more direct polemic directed at Tony Cliff's writing. It makes some interesting points � for example, the state capitalist theory effectively presupposes a crypto-bourgeois structure to the entire Russian Revolution, an extraordinary claim to be sure, requiring extraordinary evidence.

The simpler, and better-supported answer, is that the powerful political elites of the USSR were political elites and not an economic class. Mandel says much the same in his "third place" point: "[the] form of appropriation of the social surplus product would not change ... by such a revolution (which we therefore prefer to call a political one)." These distinctions are important because of the "stratified" ontology I've referenced a few times � something innate to Marxist thought, though by no means exclusive to it. I'll spare the philosophical jargon (of which there was quite a bit in my first pass) and suffice to say that these operate at discrete "levels" that influence one another in different ways, but cannot be conflated or reduced to one another.

Anyway, I don't aim to minimize your concerns about accountability. Oversight is one of those wicked issues in building any society; who will police the police, and so on. Democracy, I think most would agree, is the best available ground; leverage the law of large numbers, recognize innate equality and such. I certainly agree, in the broadest terms. But the twist here is that the analysis of class struggle problematizes treating the public as one coherent unit at this stage of history. The interests of a large landowner will be directly opposed to those of the landless laborer � recall that classic aphorism about wolves and sheep voting about what to have for dinner. The aforementioned landowner, following expropriation, would likely curse the system for the rest of his days, and foster the same mentality in those around him. As nice as it would be, class cannot be eliminated at a stroke; built-in defenses against counterrevolution are required. So the Leninist solution is to embed the analytical and ideological tools of the militant working class in the steering structure.

There's no "perfect" answer, I'm afraid. I think their achievements were nevertheless remarkable all the same, given the "unprecedented" thing. And I think it's incorrect to attribute "zero accountability," as you do. Here's Szymanski again, from a speech that was part of a longer debate on the nature of the USSR that is broadly relevant:

The walks-like-a-duck-quacks-like-a-duck thing is a fair point in context, but I do think it retrospectively reads as dismissive of the growing petty-bourgeois liberalism in the more privileged sectors. This is the motive force behind the revisionism that drove the years of stagnation, and ultimately culminated in a counterrevolution. It's one of the USSR's great failings, a cautionary tale proving out Lenin's remarks up top � "the principal enemy of socialism in our country." (This is also obviously a big deal in China.) Please, kids: practice safe socialism.

*stares at own hands like in a movie when someone kills for the first time*

comrade this is a mcdonalds drive thru

# ¿ Jan 19, 2017 19:52

Fallen Hamprince: Nov 12, 2016

*extremely cool and good leftist voice* "ugh, this protest is so neoliberal. guess i'll go home and work on my twitter owns instead"

# ¿ Jan 21, 2017 02:40

Fallen Hamprince: Nov 12, 2016

Breakfast All Day posted:

its not a protest, neolib. they made a whole website to make it very clear it isnt a protest and theres a whole foods nearby so everything is very safe and network television and mlk solved racism just by talking nice

*writes 4000 word essay in the jacobin about how a march on washington isn't a protest because ~the discourse~*

# ¿ Jan 21, 2017 02:54

Fallen Hamprince: Nov 12, 2016

Pener Kropoopkin posted:

I have no idea what Fuckin Hampiss is salty about

i'm goblin pissed

# ¿ Jan 21, 2017 03:03

Fallen Hamprince: Nov 12, 2016

just link to your livejournal marxailures

# ¿ Jan 21, 2017 03:17

Fallen Hamprince: Nov 12, 2016

Darkman Fanpage posted:

stfu and get out of this thread

# ¿ Jan 21, 2017 03:26

Fallen Hamprince: Nov 12, 2016

Odobenidae posted:

lol go make another "russia is forming a fascist internationale" type thread so that everyone in cspam can join forces for a common cause and make fun of you again

sounds dangerous, i'm not sure i could withstand the combined power of the cspam maoism crew telling me to delete my account

# ¿ Jan 21, 2017 04:05

Fallen Hamprince: Nov 12, 2016

*extremely buff marxism man voice* "heh, lucky the mods were there to save you from my devastating owns lib scum"

# ¿ Jan 21, 2017 04:24

Fallen Hamprince: Nov 12, 2016

fine ok, lets get back on topic

i need an update on the dialectic, are catgirls revolutionary or reactionary

# ¿ Jan 21, 2017 04:28

Fallen Hamprince: Nov 12, 2016

its super cool that the modern version of the international brigades is one dude on twitter known only as piss pig grandpa

our generation's for whom the bell tolls will be a twitter thread about cum addressed to @arbys

# ¿ Jan 21, 2017 04:37

Fallen Hamprince: Nov 12, 2016

Dreddout posted:

*Hamprinces mom looks in on him from the door*
"Hamprince, honey? It's passed your bedtime"
*Hamprince turns to face his mother, his face lit by the glare of the moniter*
"I can't mother, someone is leftwing on the internet!

actually, as a social democrat, i'm the leftwing

OF FACISM!!!!!

# ¿ Jan 21, 2017 04:38

Fallen Hamprince: Nov 12, 2016

Enjoy posted:

you suck

jsut got back from the doctor... he said i blacked out from being 'owned'... if u can read this, troll, i will find you

# ¿ Jan 21, 2017 05:24

Fallen Hamprince: Nov 12, 2016

Tardcore posted:

Oh hey hows it hanging Eichenwald?

is this a threat?

i warn you: my son is large and has deadly hands

# ¿ Jan 21, 2017 06:12

Fallen Hamprince: Nov 12, 2016

Dreddout posted:

You probably don't even watch hentai do you, cuck?

hentai these days is neoliberal garbage promulgating bourgeois values. i jerk my fierce hog only to the filthiest donjinshis produced deep in jungle and traded to finance the revolution

# ¿ Jan 21, 2017 06:28

Fallen Hamprince: Nov 12, 2016

Dreddout posted:

YOU'VE JUST SPLIT THE PARTY YOU DUMB gently caress DUCK!

loving hentai incrementalists are only delaying the revolution, keeping the masses placated with a trickling of anime dicks and holes. when the proletariate rise theyll be first up against the wall and then the workers will be free to create and peruse the full breadth of porno manga

# ¿ Jan 21, 2017 06:41

Fallen Hamprince: Nov 12, 2016

Pener Kropoopkin posted:

The whole of humanity slowly transitioned into an ideal hermaphroditic race of hot babes with huge cocks, is something the Soviet utopians would have dreamed up.

the New Soviet Dickgirl is a sadly under-appreciated element of stalinist ideology

# ¿ Jan 21, 2017 07:15

Fallen Hamprince: Nov 12, 2016

we prefer the term "alt-sleeping"

# ¿ Jan 22, 2017 07:12

Fallen Hamprince: Nov 12, 2016

https://twitter.com/getfiscal/status/823353790397030400

# ¿ Jan 23, 2017 06:47

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# ¿ May 20, 2024 13:14

Fallen Hamprince: Nov 12, 2016

you're not a real marxist-lenninist organization unless you also include the 'totally meant to be temporary, pinkie swear guys' ban on 'factions' that lenin instituted after people kept arguing with him

# ¿ Jan 23, 2017 20:34

The Something Awful Forums > Archives > Comedy Goldmine > The Goodmine > There is a spectrum haunting C-SPAM. I, on the contrary,

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