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Socialist strategists?

I see you embrace the typical liberal idiocy of labelling anything of strong convictions that refuses to compromise or refuses to coat itself in a thousand false qualifications of modesty as totalitarian. Overlooking of course the totalitarian kernel of liberalism.
 
No, you're just ignorant and not seeing the wood for the trees, not to mention stoopid!!!

Anything who disagrees has "no backbone"...:rolleyes: Tell you what: I know I have a lot of it. Which we do not know about you...:p
 
revol68 said:
the revolutionary subject is the proletariat or there is no revolution.
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So, if you only read a little you would have known: there is no possibility for a revolution of any sort right now and it seems for quite a while to come...

And I say that with sadness!!! But sobriety is necessary if one wants to continue on the path of emancipation...

Especially if we are talking of a non-violent type of "revolution"... I don't want a society based on violence!
 
gorski said:
So, if you only read a little you would have known: there is no possibility for a revolution of any sort right now and it seems for quite a while to come...

And I say that with sadness!!! But sobriety is necessary if one wants to continue on the path of emancipation...

Especially if we are talking of a non-violent type of "revolution"... I don't want a society based on violence!
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fuck and there was me packing my back lunch in preparation for a field trip to the smoking ruins of the Houses of Parliament.

Also the pathetic cry that you don't want a society based on violence is the most disgusting self indulgent liberal shit. What is this society but one based on violence? Are you so petrified of taking actual ethical reponsibility and decisions that you prefer to wallow in the honourable victim card, fetishing suffering and oppression as badges of honesty and honour. A social revolution should not be based on violence but it will surely make use of it, those who demand a revolution without violence are really asking for revolution as a sublime tragedy, as a fleeting flower, something for liberals to fawn over at dinner parties, you want a revolution that is castrated.
 
sorry to be part of this derailment but gorski really is a fucking cunt.

I don't think i seen him make and sustain anything approaching a point in all the years I've been posting on here.
 
I've met him and he's a good bloke (despite strange tendency to have bought into Habermasian pro-EU liberalism :p). Has a bit of an odd posting style at times, I'll grant you, and is a bit temperamental on here...
 
Fucking Habermas, who gives a fuck about that old cunt and his pathetic descent into pettier and pettiers forms of legalism and refomism, the Billy Bragg of critical theory.
 
revol68 said:
fuck and there was me packing my back lunch in preparation for a field trip to the smoking ruins of the Houses of Parliament.

Also the pathetic cry that you don't want a society based on violence is the most disgusting self indulgent liberal shit. What is this society but one based on violence? Are you so petrified of taking actual ethical reponsibility and decisions that you prefer to wallow in the honourable victim card, fetishing suffering and oppression as badges of honesty and honour. A social revolution should not be based on violence but it will surely make use of it, those who demand a revolution without violence are really asking for revolution as a sublime tragedy, as a fleeting flower, something for liberals to fawn over at dinner parties, you want a revolution that is castrated.
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There are no greater cunts on Earth then those advocating loadsa violence according to THEIR vision of the world, as they can't be bothered to "negotiate it with everybody else in a society or some such liberal shite"... Too great a prince he is, to be waiting at all - and then, if it is happening, it'll either be EXACTLY as he imagined or he ain't gonna bother, as nothing is happening... READ HEGEL AND WEEP, regarding this kind of idiocy... Then, Marx - but slowly, if you possibly can, which I doubt, what with all that attitude of yours!!! And then show me this REVOLUTIONARY SUBJECT HERE AND NOW, WANKER!!!! IF NOT - SHUT THE FOOK UP, SIT DOWN AND LISTEN TO SOME OF US WHO DO HAVE A CLUE ABOUT SOCIETY AS A WHOLE...:rolleyes:

I lived under that type of boot and no, I wouldn't want it on anyone, ta very much, you stoopid eejut!!! YOU DO NOT HAVE A CLUE WHAT YOU ARE TALKING ABOUT!!!!!!!
 
:eek: Thread has turned somewhat savage...!?

gorski said:
There's smashing [revolution or a stark violent rupture] and then there's sublation [in this context let's call it evolution, for want of a better word...]... Both are possible, both elements of the same process, both possibilities are on the table - just not equally at all times...
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My point is that they aren't both elements of the same process. Revolution would smash capitalism - reform can't do this. To the contrary, it reinforces the existing economic structure because it strips the proletariat of revolutionary inclination. We have a system based on exploitation and private property - you can reform this for a thousand years and you will never have equality or anything approaching human fulfilment.

Sure and just how much different than the original, unchallenged, unbridled, reckless capitalism this new version is?!? Remember Engels' depiction of the condition of working class in England of XIX century?
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Under Engels capitalism you might imagine the physically wretched and mentally stunted masses tearing the ruling classes limb from limb and quite literally smashing the state to pieces. I can't see myself and my air-conditioned fellow office-workers doing the same.
 
Quite. Ergo, no chance of a revolution. Not yet.

Those that think that there is only one version of possible essential change in power relations and mode of production, I say look at recent history, to the East Europe, ta a bunch...:rolleyes:

Some did tear the autocrats limb from limb, some did it peacefully.

But to presume that there is only one way of doing things...

Well, that's essentially a Bolshevik type of thinking/acting.

Add the Nazi/Fascists to it - essentially the same...

At least in this regard, that is!
 
A thread becomes savage whenever savages appear, that is: the revolting one and butcher of the mind... Bolsheviks if ever I saw one!!!
 
Bolsheviks are the same as Nazi's, right....

Now I have no love for Leninism but such assertions only highlight your fluffy liberal thinking that can't see anything beyond BIG SCARY TOTALITARIANISM.

Anyway Gorski I've read alot of Marx and a small amount of Hegel and I fail to see your point regarding violence. Do you think the Prussian state that Hegel revered didn't rest on violence (whether he wished to accept that or not)? Or have you missed the many times Marx criticises those who imagine revolution can happen simply in some lovely carvinalesque manner with the bourgeois shaking hands and saying "Well played"? Have you overlooked his bitterly sarcastic comments about the peace loving, violence hating liberal bourgeois who mourn the destruction of bricks and mortar yet look coldy over a battle field of corpses or who slaughtered the Communards? Maybe you also missed his rather brilliant turn of phrase "at a certain point the weapon of criticism must give way to the criticism of weapons"?

Anyway continue on with your liberal handwringing and the use of such a lazy liberal concept of Totalitarianism as a catch all 'anal'ysis.
 
Oh, FFS... 'This "The Muddled Thinkers Reunion" or something?

revol68 said:
Bolsheviks are the same as Nazi's, right....
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If only you could be even slightly just and fair you'd see the qualification in my statement - but oh, noooo... Which is why I am scared of people like you and I would rather not get tangled with the likes of you in an organisation that purports to change the violent world by pouring yet more violence into it, but only this time "the right way, the enlightened, liberatory violence employed... just trust us, we're different... this time..." - thanx but no thanx...

I have a sneaking suspicion that - if it ever happens - this time it will be more akin to the recent Eastern European "velvety shit", whether you lot like it or not... but with a different agenda to a "radical change"...

revol68 said:
Now I have no love for Leninism but such assertions only highlight your fluffy liberal thinking that can't see anything beyond BIG SCARY TOTALITARIANISM.
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Again, I would like to be at least somewhat discerning and careful in my assessment than you but: Bolsheviks and Mensheviks did differ. As did Social Democrats and Socialists and Anarchists etc. The very fact we have a variety of views on the Left means fook all to you, and as such you are lost, as is the potentially varied way out of this Capitalist misery we're in, as other's points of view are totally lost on you... Hence, to me, you and your lot are scary, your attitude stinks to hell and back and it shows big time in your posts.

You still haven't renounced any totalitarian tendencies in your thinking and actions. And you can't. End of!

revol68 said:
Anyway Gorski I've read alot of Marx and a small amount of Hegel...
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...and it shows!!!

revol68 said:
and I fail to see your point regarding violence.
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And you're surprised by it or something? It's because you're totally immersed in it!

revol68 said:
Do you think the Prussian state that Hegel revered didn't rest on violence (whether he wished to accept that or not)?
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Check out the "Hegel" thread and you may begin to grasp that I do know a few things you do not know and that I am a little bit more informed than you are prepared to give me credit for, hence all this immature bullshit from you...

revol68 said:
Or have you missed the many times Marx criticises those who imagine revolution can happen simply in some lovely carvinalesque manner with the bourgeois shaking hands and saying "Well played"?
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Having [and clinging to] a nice little dogma [with dying man's vigour], are we? Or haven't you noticed that Capitalism has changed significantly [thanx to (used and abused) Marx, too] and with it the potential for such a Revolution, through having lost the Revolutionary Subject, FFS!!! We just can't pull it off like he envisaged, as the conditions of possibility, to use the Kantian term, are simply no longer there!!! Even the Marxists have to acknowledge it big time, so why not you?!? Cloud Coocko Land? Ostrich shit so tasty and infatuating?!?

revol68 said:
Have you overlooked his bitterly sarcastic comments about the peace loving, violence hating liberal bourgeois who mourn the destruction of bricks and mortar yet look coldy over a battle field of corpses or who slaughtered the Communards?
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FFS, spare me the platitudes: these pictures are gone and with it the outrage, that early Capitalism, created!!! Do read, FFS, if you can't see elementary stuff around you [say Gramsci, Gorz, Wallerstein and co. etc. etc.], inform yourself of some elementary stuff and don't embarrass yourself so freely.

revol68 said:
Maybe you also missed his rather brilliant turn of phrase "at a certain point the weapon of criticism must give way to the criticism of weapons"?
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Jeezus wept!!! Which weapons would that be? And I mean which class[es], which layers of society would take them up, even if they existed, under which conditions, how exactly will all that happen?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!? And what kind of "radical change" would that be, if we base everything on a lot of bloodshed all over again [Arendt]?!?

revol68 said:
Anyway continue on with your liberal handwringing and the use of such a lazy liberal concept of Totalitarianism as a catch all 'anal'ysis.
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Answer the fooking Q I posed - you and your possy!!!!

You're scared shitless that you're out on your own, shown through as dogmatic, empty, with no proper insights and no real idea, no proper strategy, nothing serious to cling on to and hence blind to a changed context to such an extent that you are blocking out completely a series of studies showing quite clearly that the conditions for Revolution and the absence of Revolutionary Subject preclude any such Happening any time soon!!

Hence the Q: what is the big idea, who are these strategists on the Left, what is happening?!? Which way to go, what to do to keep the idea of Humanity's Emancipation alive and reification and alienation on the back foot, ultimately to defeat it comprehensively...

In the meantime, I will try to do whatever I can, whatever anyone who can think sideways, critically, in order to achieve (the slow and painful way, through education and outrage expressed in any way I can, working on myself and trying to keep alive the emancipatory potential of the best Humanity has come up so far, making my time and effort, good will and energy freely available to anyone willing to listen and listening to anyone with ideas on the same broad road to Freedom): Liberté, Égalité, Fraternité fully realised...

Unfortunately, I have a bad vibe about it [you and your ilk], i.e. that the narrow-minded, scared shitless people, like yourself, holding on to a dogma like a drunkard to a lamppost, would ever make any use of it... See, you guys have a huge chip on your shoulders, really interested in power and nothing but power... And it shows big time. Hence you can't possibly show any respect to people who do know a few things about this stuff and dare differ from you openly. You violently hate - more than your class enemies, the capitalists - those on the Left who disagree with you, as you want all the power to "lead"... All or nothing.

And that's where you lot are right now, because of it: nowhere. You are nothing! No support, no "following", sectarian, seriously arguing between yourselves, going nicely with the Capitalists' plans...

Sometimes I wonder who do people like you work for really, putting people off the Emancipatory ideas and away from such potentially emancipatory organisations, parties, movements - with such attitudes and actions that you exhibit on this forum...

Meanwhile on Mother Earth, there is a real alternative: in Sweden, 80% of the workforce is unionised and they have a mature strategy and do manage nicely without you lot!!!

I would like to mention, in this context, Esping-Andersen's study "Politics against markets"!!!
 
To go back to the brief near-discussion of Combate on page 1, here's a little bit of historical intro etc

What is certain is that in the pages of the 51 issues of Combate there is a repotrary of all that happened within the workers' movement in 1974-75. It is a goldmine for researchers and for anyone interested in the workers' movement of this time, probably one of the great experiences of the end of the 20th century. It is in this vein that we put out these issues, in Portuguese only at the moment. A collection of essays, called (Capitalismo Privado ou Capitalismo de Estado N'o ' Escolha!, Porto: Afrontamento, 1975). And it is worth noting that the book Portugal. The Impossible Revolution? (Londres: Solidarity, 1977; also available on the internet, which was translated into Portuguese as Portugal: A Revoluao Impossivel?, Porto: Afrontamento, 1978), by Phil Meyler, one of the various foreigners who were directly involved in Combate right up to the end., contains many references and quotes from Combate.
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That was from 2006 and i don't know where the Portuguese issues are now or if they are available. It was me that originally did the scanning htmlingand putting on the net of the Meyer book mentioned, but i took it down after a while as there were too many spelling mistakes.I intended to come back to it but never managed to. I think someone else has cleaned up the text and re-uploaded it. This may be that one or it may be a fresh scan or may be the original - don't know.
 
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Azrael said:
Depends whether your "socialist stratergy" is cultural or economic.

The cultural Left has won on all fronts: just compare today's attitudes to sexuality, civic duty, education, the state and patriotism with those of 50/60 years ago. And the economic/moral distinction is overstated: the concept of "social justice" is firmly embedded in popular consciousness, even if its implementation by capitalism is economically incoherent.

?
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Is it though ? Personally I'm of the view all that has been a victory for neo liberalism , when modern capitalism found such ideas redundant . And the role of the left was little more than to be co opted . Pro austerity parties have been elected right across Europe in the midst of a capitalist crisis . With the exception of Greece the left is dead and neo liberalism reigns supreme in the public consciousness .
 
Just had a quick turn through the moulding archive. There's an article "The Unions in the lives of the workers" from Combate 49, reprinted in LWG bulletin 10. Some articles in International Discussion Bulletin 5 : "What we are" "A brief history" "Internationalism, the communist struggle and political organization" from Combate 36, "A project for an international newspaper" from Nov 76 and "Portugal 5 years on" from 1980 which was also published in English as a pamphlet. I also have a copy of their Manifesto, in the back of which it refers to other pamphlets in English.

Can scan all/some if you're interested.

I have an even more vague recollection of seeing stuff by them elsewhere - 5th Estate maybe?
 
Lurdan said:
Just had a quick turn through the moulding archive. There's an article "The Unions in the lives of the workers" from Combate 49, reprinted in LWG bulletin 10. Some articles in International Discussion Bulletin 5 : "What we are" "A brief history" "Internationalism, the communist struggle and political organization" from Combate 36, "A project for an international newspaper" from Nov 76 and "Portugal 5 years on" from 1980 which was also published in English as a pamphlet. I also have a copy of their Manifesto, in the back of which it refers to other pamphlets in English.

Can scan all/some if you're interested.

I have an even more vague recollection of seeing stuff by them elsewhere - 5th Estate maybe?
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Most def am - could get a project rolling. I wonder what other stuff comrades in other places have. Scans would be fantastic if you have time.
 
butchersapron said:
Most def am - could get a project rolling. I wonder what other stuff comrades in other places have. Scans would be fantastic if you have time.
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Will do. Found a couple more articles in a Root and Branch pamphlet - "The development of autonomous working-class organization after six months of struggle" (Combate 15) and "What workers councils?" (Combate 27), along with some stuff by Charles Reeve. If I come across more I'll do them as well.
 
Lurdan said:
Will do. Found a couple more articles in a Root and Branch pamphlet - "The development of autonomous working-class organization after six months of struggle" (Combate 15) and "What workers councils?" (Combate 27), along with some stuff by Charles Reeve. If I come across more I'll do them as well.
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Great stuff - i salute your loft/garage/spare room work this afternoon!
 
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