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for some decades now the left has tended to resort to infighting for converts within the small group of people who are already radicalized versus engaging with working class people and trying to bring more of them to socialism. thats not true of every individual or person but its fairly common. how many people on this forum or in a myriad of leftbook groups can count the number of online arguments over the nature of the USSR theyve had and then how many of those same people have walked a picket line or even just tabled once? how many of them are actually active members of a party or organization thats actually engaging in working class politics? im a lot less interested in getting into ideological or tactical arguments with individuals or groups which are already radicalized but have different tactics and a lot more interested in figuring out what tactics work and putting them into practice to create more socialists. a lot of people here and everywhere online like to give groups and people poo poo for selling newspapers and tabling etc. but going out and being physically present and trying to push your ideas and sell them to people is how you make new socialists, not by arguing with or putting down people who have small tactical or theoretical disagreements with you. it takes time to find the best spots to table, and it takes time to find the correct slogans to use to get people to buy a newspaper filled with your ideas or even stop to buy a button or pin. these are actual tactical issues that have to be resolved, they're boring and mundane and not as fun as arguing about whether you're a socdem or a demsoc but this is the actual work that informs whether youre a demsoc or a socdem.
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Dec 27, 2017 16:17
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basically why write an article about some event or a party/org you disagree with? why not instead write one about a party/org or event you do support and help it grow?
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Dec 27, 2017 16:23
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Jizz Festival posted:I think we can safely put to bed any tactics that involve selling newspapers and buttons in the year 2017 and beyond. the moment it stops being effective then I'll stop doing it. this is actually a perfect example of what im talking about : my org and pretty much every other labor org and union in the area tables and finds success doing so. you have some strategy or tactic that will work better then why dont you tell me what it is instead of telling me how wrong we all are to do what were doing?
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Dec 27, 2017 16:31
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Jizz Festival posted:Fun publicity stunts and parties/social events or whatever. You know, stuff thay isn't boring as poo poo. I'm not trying to start an argument with you specifically but this kind of flippant dismissal is just exactly why I increasingly disengage from discussion about socialism in online places. so many people are very angry and flippant about others without wanting to seriously engage with what is being said. this is a perfect example because what you describe is exactly what we and all these other orgs do - we hold public rallies and festivals for May Day and international women's day and pride and every other left day or event and at these fun happy events that we put together, we table! and by doing so we get the phone numbers and emails of the people present so we can contact them later and get them to come to future events. and they buy our pins and papers and pamphlets which helps us fundraiser for actions and spreads out ideas. there's also plenty of people who won't show up at these fun events because they have to work or are busy so we table in front of retail spaces too sometimes and talk to their workers and anyone else who walks by about unions and about how to organize ad about the need for universal healthcare and higher wages. like yes having fun events is a good thing to do but it shouldn't take the place of going to people where they live and work an talking to them about what their issues are and how we can help address them. like yeah tabling is boring, even at fun events it can be boring. meetings are boring. picket lines and strikes are boring and they take months of planning at boring meetings to pull off successfully. data entry and phone banking are boring. not trying to be a downer cause I wouldn't trade all the time I've spent doing this stuff for anything but not all the work can be fun or sexy
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Dec 27, 2017 17:23
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namesake posted:Do you spend your time trying to force a 20 page newspaper into peoples hands and collecting signatures for petitions which don't go anywhere or do you actually know the details of each of the campaign leaflets on the table and the event you're attending? 'Presence' is counter productive if you get the rep for bringing a horde of politically uneducated randos to an event handing out papers which have nothing to do with the event rather than contributing. Tiberius Christ posted:DSA fixing taillights is more effective than pamphlets Karl Barks posted:trotskyists are garbage tier leftists submit reply our only petition which we spent the past year gathering was to get a ballot measure on the next ballot to restore voting rights to felons and we tabled to get signatures for that for practically a year along with every other left or labor group in the state. again, these really snide and flippant owns or whatever are really frustrating cause rather than engage with what I and others say you just project what you want to be true on to us. yeah we get people to sign petitions, and yeah we try to sell newspapers that give our position on current events and yeah we have pamphlets that describe what socialism is. we use these as tools to make more socialists. and with those people who are already socialists, we work together to help one another. I said it before in the DSA thread and maybe none of yall are DSA but I assume most people in this subforum are - all of the DSA people I've met irl are very genuine and nice and we work together and help each other so I have no clue why online so many people who identify as DSA seem so sectarian. our local org has great relations with every local labor or left group and we continuously attract new blood and the reason for this is because of our tactics but also because we try to be nice to everyone and we dont talk poo poo about other groups or their tactics
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Dec 27, 2017 17:39
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Jizz Festival posted:I am being flippant, but doing "what's been proven" is such a conservative approach to take in an area where there's been so little success. What if it doesn't have to be boring? What if the reason that you're working so hard is because nobody is attracted to your organization (because it's boring)? What if people are bored because they're being educated and organized rather than educating and organizing themselves? I hear what you're saying and yeah, its not about one person or group of people coming in and "organizing" people. workers have to organize themselves and the working class is always the subject of organizing, not the object. that being said, its difficult to organize and educate without help from those who have been there before. again, planning events can be boring sometimes but it's absolutely necessary for them to be successfull. anecdotally, I've seen socialist orgs in our area that have come together quickly, helped form up a union and lead a strike, only to not adequately do the boring planning and the strike failed because they didnt have enough in a strike fund, the business shut down, all the workers lost their job, and the org fell apart because people left or blamed each other for the failure. you absolutely have to lay the groundwork for the exciting stuff to work and translate into wins. I think it's a habit of people on the left to look back at the last 20-30 years and see the tactics and strategy used by people as a failure because the left was so miniscule, but I think it's also important to step back and realize that the current level of activity and organization that's occurring right now wouldn't necessarily be happening if they hadn't been doing the work they did during that time. I've learned a lot from activists and organizers who are older than me and were around for much leaner times.
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Dec 27, 2017 17:50
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Karl Barks posted:i've mentioned it in this thread before, the 3 trotsky people are on our steering committee and tried to convince us to not incorporate, and to instead open up a book store or newspaper front group to embezzle money. which is the insanely stupid, and led me to believe the entryist stuff i read about might actually be true yeah and fair dues, I recognize there are plenty of groups like world socialist web site which I guess are trotskyist and continuously publish pieces on how roman polasnki is innocent and the lacrosse player that raped that woman didnt deserve all the media attention  like there are actual orgs and individuals that its dangerous to ignore and not come out openly and say "these people are not us and they are bad" I guess its just a trend I see where people, usually online, just say like "gently caress tankies" or "lol maoists" or whatever and it just breeds sectarianism and leads to more infighting. its one thing if youre criticizing an org for giving cover to pedophiles and engaging in sexual assault, its another to mock them cause you think they had an awkward convention or event or something
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Dec 27, 2017 17:59
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yeah I'm not trying to be a spoil sport and ruin everyones fun, its just a lot of people it seems increasingly are being radicalized online and in joke/meme pages and groups and stuff. as a result, I feel like there is kind of a responsibility to even in those kind of environments have a certain level of nuance and legit discussion. I've met a lot of people recently who I can tell have been radicalized in those environments cause they can tell you all about how this group or that group is revisionist or trash or too far left etc. and know all the jokes about icepicks and who killed rosa luxembourg but dont know the first thing about how to form a labor union or even how to run stack
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Dec 27, 2017 20:35
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walgreenslatino posted:strongly agreed yeah, I think theres also a significant minority of people of late who see being a socialist or a leftist as more of a cool identity than an actual set of beliefs and actions. like I see people post their political tendency or spectrum online all the time like "what am i? i think im an anarcho-syndicalist with hoxhaist tendencies" and i can just tell this person has never been a member of a party or org and never will be cause when people ask me or anyone i know irl we just say im a socialist
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Dec 27, 2017 21:00
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that jacobin thing is ridiculous because regardless of how you personally feel about it as a publication, its the largest and most widely circulated socialist publication in the US so even if you disagree with parts of it you should engage with it and its ideas constructively to reach more people. calling it a menshevik rag is completely alienating to 99% of people and prolly 1/2 of the people even reading jacobin
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Jan 16, 2018 19:09
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thats actually prolly the biggest annoyance I see on the left and thats kind of a small example of it: a lot of groups and individuals are more interested in turning or converting members of other parties to their party rather than going out and making people who arent socialists into socialists. like its definitely important to have debate and discussion with other socialists to help broaden understanding and settle tactical or ideological conflicts. but I have zero interest in trying to convince someone to abandon their party or line or whatever for mine and a lot more in trying to find someone whos not engaged at all and engage them
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Jan 16, 2018 19:17
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the question about front groups is a good one I think. generally I'm very opposed to them, I think it's important to operate openly and with clear intentions as a party or formation. I understand why parties have used them in the past but I don't think theyre ultimately a good tactic to employ. its important to distinguish between front groups and coalitions however, coalitions are important and using front groups can often undermine real coalition building and work
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Jan 17, 2018 18:41
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I've also seen how front groups perpetuate problems that I think a lot of people incorrectly attribute to democratic centralism. they basically create like 2 tiers of membership in an org where theres the actual members who actually have the ability to make decisions and then a large number of front group members or membership adjacent people who are led to believe theyre memvbers and part of the democratic process but arent actually considered members for real decision making. a lot of fomrations who are dem centralist use front group tactics and so I think this problem becomes associated with democratic centralist party building but its really more a problem related to the use of front groups and an infrastructure which doesnt prioritize transparency and accountability which can exist in any system
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Jan 17, 2018 18:45
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nothing changed, its just that a bunch of people who are nominally socialist spend all their free time online and none of it organizing so they post memes and long diatribes on twitter about how revisionist or opportunist some party or clique is even though if they actually did any work alongside them theyd discover they agree and can work together on 99% of things
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Jan 21, 2018 14:27
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BrutalistMcDonalds posted:totally. i'm still wading into it but there's a photo of his inner circle in the '20s after he was in power and they look like any random socialist club in an american city in 2018. like twenty- and thirty-somethings and the men have scraggly facial hair. like, these people are running the USSR? WTF. but my visual reference points are world war II and later. thats obviously a part of it. as people even if we want to change society were also greatly affected and molded by our surroundings and society in ways were not aware of. the bolsheviks were actually extremely democratic and as much as people in the west like to portray lenin and others as all powerful despots leading their true believers, lenin had some crazy number of articles rejected from pravda because the editorial board didnt agree. the big problems the bolsheviks had after gaining power was the more or less betrayal by the right menshiviks and SRs and refusal to participate in the new government, combined with the emergency measures they had to enact because of the civil war. there were also more specific instances like the lenin levy which brought in hundreds of thousands of new communist party members, many of which werent communists but saw it as a path for advancement and some others who were brought in by party insiders to increase the number of party members loyal to them
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Jan 21, 2018 21:19
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one contradiction I see a lot nowadays (again usually online) is people who staunchly defend the most authoritarian aspects of the USSR under stalin and afterwards, hating on everyone who ever criticized the USSR, but celebrating and lionizing rosa luxembourg. luxembourg was very critical of the bolshevik approach in russia and specifically called lenin and trotsky out on what she saw as their failings and mistakes, though she ultimately acknowledged their contributions and defended the revolution there. its pretty bonkers then when you see people who go to great lengths to explain how trotsky was a filthy counter-revolutionary social dem, despite him and the left opposition more or less taking the same line later on regarding the ussr, but then hold luxembourg up as some martyr for marxism-lenninism. the left opposition always defended the ussr but they also recognized the ways in which it was losing its revolutionary character
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Jan 21, 2018 21:27
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for anyone curious or who doesnt know, militant was the forerunner of the the current socialist party of england and wales and basically the first section of the CWI which socialist alternative in the US is part of. that pic is from around when they were at their strongest with several mps and several city councils controlled by them, right before prolly their greatest success the anti-poll tax campaign. following that, the labour party proceeded to expel and kick out many members of militant because of the campaign for non-payment of the poll tax by what would become new labour.
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Feb 25, 2018 17:43
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really wish i had been recruited to a party that prints out internet posts instead of one that does labor organizing
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Mar 5, 2018 12:22
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Captain Queernabs posted:people who get really really really mad about centralism often can't organize a pizza party without coming to blows over it. a kneejerk commitment to absolute horizontalism ignores and thus entrenches invisible power dynamics. as literally anyone who has worked with other people irl before can point out this. I also think it comes from a place of people wanting to join movements but who are unwilling to learn or change their minds about things. they basically want to be part of a big tent party or org where they are free to continue doing or thinking whatever they want, regardless of how effective or meaningful any of what theyre doing is. its cause I think a lot of people on the left use their ideology as an identity to latch on to rather than as a means towards achieving social change and so if theyre not allowed to think and do whatever they want but might have to actually change themselves some, then it negates a big part of why they are trying to get involved
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Mar 8, 2018 19:27
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lenin walks around the world
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Mar 13, 2018 23:59
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america in general has a very low level of political consciousness. democrat/republican and conservative/liberal are for many people more of an identity than an actual coherent political ideology (because they arent coherent political ideologies). even many american socialists I would say have fairly low levels of political consciousness generally and basically just use their ideology as an outsider identity to latch on to since the two prevailing political identity groups dont appeal to them for whatever reason.
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Mar 28, 2018 21:27
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Pener Kropoopkin posted:I think the point is that ideological differences aren't genuine, because both parties are rooted in the same ideology. "Minority issues" and "religious conservatism," are both cynical vote-grabbing strategies for politics as sport - because the only interest that will always be served is Capital's. The qualitative difference between Republicans and Democrats is that they serve different sectors of the bourgeoisie. yes
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Mar 28, 2018 21:33
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its pretty clear theyre referring to politicians since they say refer to them as "cynical vote-grabbing strategies" and voters would not be grabbing their own votes
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Mar 28, 2018 22:10
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I have comrades that have been arrested and tortured in China and others who have had to be smuggled out of the country for trying to organize labor unions and strikes there. the state also arrested a student maoist group for organizing protests in february
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Mar 29, 2018 00:36
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Karl Barks posted:man, communism101 is lit ive become increasingly care-mad over online socialists and their arguing, sectarianism, and inability to organize a single drat thing lately
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Mar 29, 2018 18:09
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ya socialists need to organize politically an actually act like political actors e.g. create and distribute propaganda, engage in electoral campaigns, ballot initiatives, petition drives, and generally try to win people over to their ideas. a lot of "socialists" are more interested in arguing with each other about what tendency they and poo poo and that's worthless compared to going out and moving workers and radical movements into mass militant action. like some socialists complain that trade unions are conservative and reactionary, but they only are if they're not filled with socialists so join them and turn all the members into socialists trough the strength of your ideas and political program.
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Apr 5, 2018 20:49
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the modern usage of the word social democrat and the 1905 usage of the word are completely different, mostly because of the betrayal of the what we would now call social democrats like kautsky over their patriotism and social chauvinism during WW1.
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Apr 14, 2018 12:57
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i hate almost all socialist internet discourse specifically hate sites like the rhizzone and all the weird inaccessible sites that just poo poo talk irl orgs and post long indecipherable screeds about whatever form of maoism theyre on now, but the difference between socialism and social democracy is pretty big and not inconsequential
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Apr 14, 2018 18:52
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trotsky owns
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Apr 14, 2018 23:45
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jacobin has leaned in real hard to the reformist side of things, especially over the last 2-3 years. i listen to their podcast a lot when im running and the whole podcast has basically become the propaganda arm of the reform the dems people in the DSA
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Apr 26, 2018 00:15
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theres plenty of people in DSA and even some whole chapters that are revolutionary socialists, but the leadership generally and many of the editors and "thought leaders" associated with stuff like jacobin are very much not. dan denvers entire show is basically just "heres how the DSA is changing/can change the democrats from the inside" every week
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Apr 26, 2018 01:32
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I dont think lenin failed, he was the prime mover behind the idea of the revolutionary party and he and trotsky both had the correct analysis on the path the bolsheviks should take when most of the party was still supporting the provisional government in 1917. he was shot in 1918 and suffered several strokes the first in 1922 so he effectively had little control over the party or country after that point. we can draw lessons from the ultimate failure of the soviet union but lenins model for the bolshevik party remains a key positive lesson for socialists to understand in terms of organizational effectiveness and how to achieve revolutionary change.
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Apr 29, 2018 02:43
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Apr 29, 2018 12:12
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paul_soccer10 posted:Nothing says socialism like dismantling workers councils and centralizing power in the hands of the benevolent vanguard in all seriousness, it sounds like you're not too familiar with the course of events during the russian revolution. im not saying that to be mean, just seems that way. the bolsheviks won power on the basis of the slogan "all power to the soviets" the soviets being, those worker councils you're talking about. the provisional government, the one that was the victim of the october revolution, was undemocratic with all its representatives being appointed and unelected, and refused to end russian involvement in WW1 which the vast majority of the russian people supported. its pretty common to portray the february revolution as a great democratic and popular action and the october one as some secretive insidious coup, but the reality is the october revolution was planned by the bolsheviks yes but had the support of the workers and soldiers. the bolsheviks had won the support of the soviets and trotsky was the chairman of the petrograd soviet. not to go on forever but this statement indicates a eal lack of knowledge about the course of the russian revolution as well as what a vangaurd party actually is/does but I wont get into that since this is a long post in a joke debate forum
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Apr 29, 2018 13:05
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even after the october revolution the bolsheviks attempted to include the menshiviks and other socialist parties in a socialist coalition government. the other parties refused, even though they had no problem making common cause with the liberal and conservative parties in the provisional government and were happy to forestall a working class revolution in favor of a bourgeois revolution. the bolsheviks were the only party which actually had the program of creating a socialist society, the other socialist parties held to orthodox marxism which basically meant they were prepared to cede power to the liberals so a capitalist revolution could occur. even the bolsheviks were split on this with figures like stalin and kamenev supporting the provisional government up until lenin published the april theses and won the party over to the idea of fighting for workers democracy now
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Apr 29, 2018 13:10
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if you're trying to say that the history of the ussr is ultimately a negative one historically, I don't know if I agree 100% but I understand and prolly largely agree with the idea. that shouldnt translate into saying the history of the russian revolution is a negative one. that the ussr became something wholly undemocratic and not-socialist doesnt, to me anyway, diminish the victory and positive lessons and accomplishments that the russian revolution brought about. I think to say that somehow the eventual failure of the ussr and its slide into authoritarianism can be put solely on the hands of lenin and the bolsheviks of 1917 would be like saying that the leaders and organizers of the haitian revolution of 1804 are somehow responsible for the condition of haiti in the present day and that they were wrong to try to end slavery and free themselves
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Apr 29, 2018 13:25
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paul_soccer10 posted:Apropos ty for your posts btw np, trotskys history of the russian revolution is a great first hand account of the events of the revolution and provides a lot of lessons for socialists even today for anyone who wants to learn more. i havent read it but mieville's october im told provides a more casual overview of the events and does a pretty good job overall
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Apr 29, 2018 13:34
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reading any historically accurate account of the period between february and october 1917 makes pretty much any argument that the bolsheviks were the bad guys seem ridiculous. at one point they saved the country and provisional government from falling to a military dictatorship even while the provisional government had their leadership in exile or under arrest
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Apr 29, 2018 13:42
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namesake posted:So what is a good discussion of the lessons of the Russian Revolution that isn't 'didn't gulag enough kulaks'? Books, pamphlets, video, anything's fine. since last year was the hundredth anniversary, a lot of books, talks, etc. were made like mieville's october i mentioned before. here's a podcast put out by socialist alternative of which I'm a member that discusses the events and some of the lessons we can draw and apply today https://www.socialistalternative.org/2017/08/17/podcast-russian-revolutions-relevance-today/
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Apr 29, 2018 14:15
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Jizz Festival posted:And then you read past October 1917 and the bolsheviks don't look so great. apropos to nothing posted:if you're trying to say that the history of the ussr is ultimately a negative one historically, I don't know if I agree 100% but I understand and prolly largely agree with the idea. that shouldnt translate into saying the history of the russian revolution is a negative one. that the ussr became something wholly undemocratic and not-socialist doesnt, to me anyway, diminish the victory and positive lessons and accomplishments that the russian revolution brought about. I think to say that somehow the eventual failure of the ussr and its slide into authoritarianism can be put solely on the hands of lenin and the bolsheviks of 1917 would be like saying that the leaders and organizers of the haitian revolution of 1804 are somehow responsible for the condition of haiti in the present day and that they were wrong to try to end slavery and free themselves
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Apr 29, 2018 17:34
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