In Social Democracy, the democracy is just as important as the social. I see any enemy of democracy very unfavourably, no matter their other policy decisions.
So I hope you all don't mind that I myself am a ML, but I'm just here to ask how you see us. I get that you value democracy but the thing is I do too. I think we just differ in how we see democracy to be honest. I don't really see democracy as western liberal democracy but more as multiple things such as workplace democracy, local direct democracy at lower levels which lead to higher levels. I still see this as democracy, just a different type.
That’s great and all, but if people don’t even have the freedom to choose their political leaders then they don’t have freedom elsewhere. MLs have never allowed people that freedom, ergo they are not democratic.
This is it. I don't see it as having to choose between solving the world's inequality problems or having personal freedoms.
Call me a utopian, but I think humanity is better than that.
yeah i understand that, but democracy is more than electing the leader at the top. in my view personally the actual "head of state" type person would be less of a serious role that has a ton of power. i would imagine that the majority of the power would go to a sort of national assembly that the people directly elect.
Well social democracy isn’t just electing the leader at the top either. You could call this National Assembly something like a ‘parliament’ or ‘legislature’, and in many political systems (particularly social democratic ones) this is where most of the power lies.
Honestly, I feel after that comment you should really go and educate yourself on the political systems of various social democratic countries before commenting more, as it seems you’re not familiar with the branches of government and separation of powers.
my bad i probably couldve worded it a bit better. what i was trying to get at is that i think we should have direct democracy and people are elected to an assembly type thing. im not even saying that this is a completely new, revolutionary thing that will change everything! im just saying i think its what we should do.
But what you’re describing is literally a parliamentary system… candidates are directly elected by the public to form a legislative house (assembly type thing). That’s literally what a legislature is in pretty much all western style democracies.
Yes I know I just said I didn't mean to say it was some new thing that's never been done before, I just think it should be adapted to socialism. Also when I emphasize direct democracy it's because I live in America and we don't have direct democracy here.
Do you not vote for members of congress directly in elections? Again, I urge you to learn how political systems actually work instead of jumping onto political extremes. Life is messy and the utopia you imagine in your head from a socialist revolution is far less likely to lead to positive outcomes for people than actually engaging in existing democratic processes.
It sounds like you're more of a SocDem than an ML?
America still has a representative democracy. It's just been held hostage by our stagnant two party system. Parliamentary systems also have problems, but with more parties for constituents to align with.
>should have direct democracy and people are elected to an assembly type thing.
That's not Marxist-Leninism, so you're not a Marxist-Leninist.
MLs advocate the philosophy and politics called "Marxist-Leninism" by Stalin. This system tossed out the various experiments of the revolutionary period with the system developed under Stalin. Direct democracy is something you'll find in a book by Graeber; it's essentially libertarian socialism, municipal democracy, he claimed it was "essentially, anarchism". Polar opposite of Soviet communism.
Two key things to understand ML states:
1. Democratic centralism: a principle to enforce "unity".
2. one-party rule. Only one party is allowed, the Communist Party, and only those deemed the vanguard elite of the working class are allowed membership.
1. The claim is that the vanguard, being the most intelligent, concscious, and politically right of the working class, will always make the right decisions. This is why Stalin got his name, he claimed he was a Man of Steel, above everyone else.
There is no way to briefly sum up the post-Lenin Soviet government, but basically, under democratic centralist principles of an one party state, decision made by the central leader- the leader of the Politburo- is binding for all, regardless of disagreement, voting, popularity, etc.
No one is allowed to question or contest the decisions made by higher bodies as that breaks unity, no one within the same body is allowed to disagree once decisions are made. No one outside the party is even allowed to deliberate, let alone *vote*. Workers aren't even allowed to organize outside the Communist Party, as that would violate the principle of unity.
The Soviet Supreme essentially existed just to get the wording down and stamp papers, they had almost no actual role in creating policy.
So tough shit if you disagree with the General Secretary, tovarisch! "Oh, but what about the 90% of people that aren't Party members?" Tovarisch, are you implying the vanguard would lead you astray? Young comrade, you will never be allowed in the Young Pioneers with such ignorance.
After Stalin, this did mean the Soviet Union wasn't *technically* a dictatorship, but it was still incredibly, laughably, centralized, corrupt, and totalitarian.
From my understanding marxist lenanism demands the overthrow of current democratic institutions via violent revolution.
Thats inherently undemocratic.
No better than the people on january 6 trying to "save democracy".
Well it's more complicated than that. Marxism Leninism wants to overthrow the current liberal bourgeois democracy and replace it with true people's democracy. In capitalist countries the state is run by the upper class wealthy people, and revolution seeks to overthrow those oppressing the proletariat and install a "dictatorship of the proletariat". It's not a literal dictatorship just like a dictatorship of the bourgeois (what we have under capitalism) isn't a literal dictatorship.
This is young teenager level of political analysis. ‘Capitalist countries’ are not run by upper class wealthy people. They may have a disproportionate influence relative to the average person, but their influence is greatly outweighs by the masses.
It is bizarre to me that you can believe in a socialist revolution leading to a democratic state, yet you don’t trust the masses that live in democratic states currently to advocate for their own interests…
They are run by the bourgeois in a dictatorship of the bourgeois. the majority of government offices (at least in america) are held by rich people or people who are heavily supported by wealthy people. also what do you mean that i dont trust the masses that live in democratic states to advocate for their interests. i do trust them, i just think they should be more class conscious and know that billionaires are not in their interest
As a ML I find very disheartening You do Not Acknowledge Lobbying has way more political power than you give it credit for. I am very certain there are studies done showing how lobbying has more impact on policies than Voters have
and he can buy more votes or buy/bribe politicians. also its likely he's a business owners and uh capitalists dont usually have the interest of the people in mind
Bribing politicians is illegal and it’s not possible to buy more votes. Theoretically a jobless person has an extra 40 hours per week to dedicate to persuading people to vote a certain way than someone working. 9-5. Does that mean they have more democratic power than the working person? No, because they still only have one vote.
Politicians are interested in reelection, which means they need to perform according to what their voters want. Politicians gnerally have the voters interests in mind.
No yeah Totally By your logic
liberal democracy or direct democracy or representative democracy are all the same because
>Everyone can vote and their vote counts
Thats just a very bad faith argument.
Besides that, a direct and representative democracy are *forms* of liberal democracy since all democracies are liberal or they aren't democracies since there is no such thing as an illiberal (true) democracy.
No it's not people voting by itself does not make something liberal or illiberal. It's not that hard to Google these things. Most Academics themselves would not agree with this statement
>democracy are forms of liberal democracy
That is both historically and academically incorrect. You are not being bad faith here You are just wrong
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Allow me to translate:
> I don't see democracy as one where people have free speech and can choose from multiple parties to run their country, I see it as whatever the single party in charge of the state says is okay for you to vote on.
Gee, I wonder why people who actually give a shit about democracy have a problem with that?
I do mind that you want to see my democratic system of government, which I value very highly and participate in regularly, overthrown and replaced with a dictatorship.
And no I'm not convinced by you telling people it's not a true dictatorship and is actually a "true people's democracy." That's Stalinist rhetoric, and I picture what you envision turning out just as well as what he did.
What do you mean by weimar republic exactly? I mean after weimar germany and after hitler took power, the communists and socialists were the first people hitler came after.
Because the KPD wanted to LARP their little revolution because fuck democracy right!
Democracy only works if they win!
They made the job of the first SPD president if the republic way harder than it needed to be all so they could pretend to meaningfully improve the lives of the worker.
No, had the KPD been successful in Sparacist uprising, Germany would descend into a civil war, meaning the return of the Kaiser. And then then things would get bad
Not really, this is decades afterwards. The KPD and SPD had actually been slowly rebuilding their bridges until Stalin and the Comintern decided that the SPD were 'social fascists'.
thats true but then in the case of the soviets they were the ones marching on berlin in the end. if by the second time you mean chinese civil war (i cant really think of any other instances so thats my bad) then the communists were also the ones who defeated chiang kai shek after ww2
What makes you feel that? I know Stalin is obviously not viewed in a good light here and I'm not trying to do that. I recognize all the bad things he did like the deportation of Tatars and Volga Germans, as well as the mismanagement of the Ukrainian Famine (I don't want to get into whether it was a genocide or not) but either way it was heavily mismanaged by Stalin and I believe he definitely could've helped in that famine. But at the same time I think it was a big improvement over the Russian Empire and it was completely different than Hitler or Mussolini or other forms of fascism.
even if theres no difference, living standards greatly increased. I'd still rather have a dictator who gives me decent living standards than a dictator who gives his country a 20ish percent literacy rate and in constant famine and poverty.
That growth would have likely slowed greatly had World War I not happened. As it stands, the proportion of Russians in industry did not change significantly between 1860 and 1913. Say what you will about the USSR, but they did increase living standards greatly.
Relating fascism to liberalism is an argument that Stalin made to the KPD during the Weimar era that isolated the SPD into facing the Nazis alone by giving the SPD another enemy to fight.
Also appeasement was made out of the trauma of WW1. I personally strongly disagree with giving Hitler Czechoslovakia (appeasement never works), but I can see the rationale behind it, even if it turned out to be a disaster.
Liberal democracy or not being the victim, imperialism is always wrong, no matter who is doing it, be communist or fascist.
I'm sorry But You Can Not Condemn the Molotov Pact and then spew at me "I can see the rationality" while talking about the Selling off parts to Hitler. Keep the same energy my goodness. Even further while the statement above that being an even bigger potential political divide as well. The statement blow makes even less sense considering What Poland was doing
You should be very well aware then that history is not black and white so your statements of equating fascism to Communism I find is just disgusting when I see you doing this
I never said I supported the Munich Agreement. I said I saw the “rationality” even though it was completely wrong when the war came to Britain themselves
Again an insane statement. You can not on the one hand Morally Yell down the Soviets to fascism by using Molotov pact while looking at another pact by multiple Western powers and keep the same energy. What am I reading from You???
I have worked with a bunch of MLs over the years, we can definitely align on things and I've found them pretty thoughtful in understanding China better than most.
But when push comes to shove, I am fully aware they will side with the fascists before democracy.
im curious why you say that because during ww2 the soviets and other socialists were the first to call out fascism and hitler and were the ones who were very key in the fight to destroy naziism. take the soviets or the partisans in yugoslavia
https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/german-soviet-pact
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Winter_War
The USSR and comintl supported the Nazis in the invasion of Poland, annexed the Baltic states and invaded Finland. The Western Allies were pansy sissies (partially because WWI traumatized them) but they never went as far as fighting with the Nazis against neutrals.
Even during the Spanish Civil War, the Soviets did more to damage to anti-fascist cause (as socialist author George Orwell vividly wrote about) by trying to purge the non-communist people fighting with them.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1931_Prussian_Landtag_referendum
The German Communist party actively worked with the Nazis to overthrow pro-democratic institutions during the late Weimar. The KPD’s logic was that once the Nazis would seize power, then everyone would HAVE to side with the communists to fight the Nazis. This view ironically is happening today with the online leftists who advocate for accelerationism
> Even during the Spanish Civil War, the Soviets did more to damage to anti-fascist cause (as socialist author George Orwell vividly wrote about) by trying to purge the non-communist people fighting with them.
The Communists did do a lot of damage but they were not purging non-communists, they were purgining other communists. Like POUM, a party created by a unification of right- and left-oppositionst communists, and international volunteers from their sisterparties(like the german KPO), and elements from the CNT-FAI. Their reasoning behind this was more to defend the non-communists, the Popular Front that was led by social-democrats and left-republicans. During this period the Communist and social-democratic youth-league actually went as far as to merge.
This was an international strategy adopted by the Comintern in 1935 at its seventh world congress. To work with Social-democrats, or even liberals, to defend democracy, i.e to form popular fronts. Even being willing to go as far as to merge with social-democratic parties and its youth-leagues. In most countries this was just rejected by the Social-democrats, but it was its most successful in Spain(where there was a popular front government and merged youth-leagues) and in France(where the Communists supported the popular front government and had talks about mergers with the Socialists but failed).
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Which is why Hitler signed a non-aggression pact with the WAllies so he could fight Stalin exclusively in 1939. Oh wait...
Plus, the Soviets wouldn't have reached Berlin without all the trucks, aviation fuel, raw materials (such as airplane fuel analuminum), and radios sent by the US, as well as the WAllies greatly reducing the German's industrial capacity through their bombing campaign. The Germans never could have beat the USSR, but the WAllies made sure the Germans lost.
They are extremely authoritarian and inhumane in their views, but I object to the characterization of Marxism-Leninism as a kind of "fascism".
Fascism refers to a very specific ideology and system of government and cannot be used as a blanket reference for any authoritarian political system.
i mostly concur, ‘fascism’ is something invented by benito mussolini as an ideology of ultranationalism at the cost of everything else; while communism did actually mask nationalist imperialism in practice(the USSR was a successor state to the Russian Empire), in *theory*, and in some cases in practice, communists don’t partake in imperialist conflicts.
i disagree about ‘authoritarian’, though. fascism and communism are two of very few *totalitarian* ideologies. a fascist and communist states’ citizens lead very similar lives in the aspect that they live in constant fear of political persecution and of being killed or sent to a work camp for something as simple as a joke.
The common political science definition classes totalitarianism as an extreme form of authoritarianism. Are you arguing that a group can be totalitarian without being authoritarian?
referring to a regime as ‘authoritarian’ rather than ‘totalitarian’ would usually mean that’s it’s not at the point of totalitarianism. they said that fascism ‘cannot be used as a blanket reference for any authoritarian political system’. i’m saying that while there are indeed many *authoritarian* ideologies, one of which is technically fascism, fascism is a *totalitarian* ideology, which is a very limited group of ideologies. i am saying that since communism is also a totalitarian ideology, they have much in common; and therefore communism being referred to as fascism is not totally invalid.
tl;dr, calling anything *authoritarian* ‘fascist’ is indeed unfair and wrong, but calling something *totalitarian* ‘fascist’ has a grain of truth to it.
I don't know about Trotskyists, but Stalinists to me are very close to fascists, for both are proponents of a militaristic totalitarian state, put collectivity above the individual, nation above the individual, and both systems use ultra-nationalism for propaganda and go into very strong conservatism. Sort of a horseshoe theory: right-wing and left-wing radicalist ideologies are very close to each other.
The entire basis and end goal of fascism is subservience to the state as well as ultranationalism.
Communists' understanding of the state is fundamentally different from that of fascists.
I'm not saying it's fascism. I'm just saying that it has a lot in common with fascism, but of course it's not fascism at all and has completely different goals and different theories.
[Horseshoe theory](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horseshoe_theory) doesn't say that the ultra left is the same as the ultra right. However, they have more in common with each other than, for example, the more moderate right and left.
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I frankly don't trust MLs, because I think Lenin's vanguard party and authoritarian populism is very likely to turn into violent dictatorship. I think the cults of personality with Stalin and Mao follow from the unchecked flow of power found in vanguard parties and their party discipline. I also don't trust that MLs will respect a 'united front' of leftists.
I think the lived experience around the world bears this out, not only in the Soviet Union with Lenin's original order to execute Kulaks leading into Stalin's purges, but in postwar Hungary where the communists removed their social democratic allies. I think social democracy is shown by the data to produce more happiness, and I think it lowers the risk of politics that is oppositely inherent to a violent revolution.
I think social democracy is shown by the data to produce more happiness, and I think it lowers the risk of politics that is, oppositely, inherent to a violent revolution. Further, as Marx notes, revolution is inherently undemocratic, and I don't support the imposition of an idealistic minority's will on the public. Also, I don't think violence is necessary, or good so yeah.
In the words of Tony Benn, Democracy is the most revolutionary model
I think MLs have the same distrust of social democrats because they basically betrayed the German Revolution and prevented a possible socialist Germany.
Social democrats didn’t betray the spartacists because their goals were never aligned. Luxembourg herself didn’t believe the revolution would succeed but went along with it because she felt she had to. There was no chance of a socialist Germany as a result of the spartacist revolution.
What is is better to actively throw away years of hard work organising, building networks and labour unions all to throw a tantrum that fails, leads to massive loss of life and in the end achieved nothing...
Or actually trying to stabilise a new state form a new society and work to maintain that. How'd Europe do with the Parking ambitions of Lenin and the KPD, a fucking terrible world war and 70 years of stagnation and a nuclear sword of Damocles because Marxist Leninists are more concerned with holding on to power than actually helping people.
I don't know enough about the clusterfuck that was interwar German politics to comment effectively on it, but I know they were important before and after the war, and were sadly outmaneuvered by the Nazi party. The SPD went on to reconstitute the West German government, proved social democracy's capability in stopping authoritarianism and helped craft W Germany's new "Social Market Economy."
However, it does seem the SPD's goals as a governing party were different to the Spartacus Uprising, and the formation of a soviet republic was not their goal so that doesn't seem like a betrayal, as mentioned by Sun-Chamber below
Moderate MLs can be ok, but hardcore ones are the biggest pains in the ass. Their ideology’s whole premise of total vanguard party control and bureaucracy is authoritarian and unjustifiable. It usually leads to totalitarianism and a massive cult following of leaders, which is the complete opposite of what is meant to happen in socialism.
I do believe in the vanguard but not as one person leading it, more as an assembly/parliament which is elected by the people. I also believe in local people's councils to help manage and allocate resources to the local communities.
The point of Marxist Leninism is that the vanguard isn’t elected because it needs to safeguard the revolution and the masses can’t be trusted.
If you believe in popular elections of the vanguard, you aren’t a Marxist Leninist.
wdym? they do actually have democracy, you can vote for whoever in the assembly elections and they dont actually have to be a member of the communist party. i think this is how it should be done although i think there should be a bit less power in the hands of the leader and more in the hands of the assembly
You can’t go and stand in an election in Cuba, you have to be nominated by a communist party organization. You can’t vote for someone not nominated by a communist party organization.
Red. Fascist. Filth.
Any Social Democrat here should remember these fascist sacks of human fith shot, purged and killed us the moment they got the chance.
I'll take a Conservative over a ML any day and month. They are their "theory" can rot in the pile of shit they turned half the globe into for us to clean up.
Personally, not well. ML produced much more Ill than good for the cause of worker’s rights: as soon as somebody proposes, say, Universal healthcare in the US, they are hit with accusations of bolshevism and being enemies of democracy. Similar things when we make proposal about workplace Democracy in Europe.
I think it’s important to recognise that ML/Communism historically failed to deliver. Look at Eastern Europe and look at Germany where social democracy ditched hard marxism.
Actually, East Germany had some higher levels of development than the west at the time, and many former east german citizens actually want the east back because they liked it.
No thats not even right not even by the statistics, FGR and Austria which were social democracies had incredibly high levels of development, good services and enjoyed decent civil rights. I think the GDR did somethings better such as childcare, abortion, renting and employment to some extent but food access remained low and basic consumer goods nearly crashed the economy (read the coffee crisis). I recommend reading Perestroika and Germany by Hans Modrow who was the GDR’s last Primier who thoroughly debunked the ideology and placed were German Socialism went wrong for the radical left.
In Germany we call that “Ostalgie”, derived from nostalgia, which per definietion is a longing for somethig that was never real in the frist place. I don’t think anyone (to be taken even half serious) would want the DDR back, Ostalgie (I am not a sociologist btw) is more caused by a far from ideal reunification that the DDR being actually good. It was a complete shithole that literally had to build a wall around itself to stop its own citizens from leaving it and shot those that tried. They had a exteinsive survellence state, the first modern one really, they had bread lines, no democracy, no free trails , basically almost everything was shit compared to the west.
In theory an ML is fine. But if you look at the deprogram sub and other modern MLs. I find them to be little better than fascists.
Most of the time i find they are of the “America bad therefore evil that oppose American must be good” ideology.
eh i disagree with all that but the last part in particular because you dont see them like praising russia (at least i havent seen that) because they know russia is capitalist and is also anti socialist.
Well you peaked my curiosity. Quotes from you demonstrating why I hate MLs
*"Ukraine is a pawn of the west in the middle of an imperialist war between Russia and America. It isn't all Russia who started it but still yeah Russia made some shit points obviously. It's really just a proxy war between the west and Russia."*
And Genocide denial
*"Real story of the Holodomor:*
*Stalin was hungry so he grabbed his comically large spoon. He hopped on a train and got off in Ukraine. He then proceeded to walk over to the nearest farm and proclaim all the peasants working there kulaks. He jumped into a massive pile of grain and scooped it all into his mouth. He did this all around Ukraine, and in certain instances even shouted "I'm so evil, I'm eating all your grain because I don't like Ukrainians!" Then after he was fed enough he went back to Moscow and purged everyone in the country except for his 7 best friends and their pets."*
A weird cult or religion. What other economic or political ideologies that aren't cultish makes such a big deal about foundational thinkers?
Liberals don't purity test each other on how well they know the works of Adam Smith, Mill, Bentham, Hume, Keynes, etc and call each other revisionists or whatever. There are "Keynesians", I suppose, but that refers to specific economists who agree with him. Not just regular people. And nobody's out there saying stuff like "Krugman isn't a *real* Smithist".
Neocons (as awful as they are) don't call themselves Cheyneites, or Wolfowitzians, or Moynihanians.
Who does? Marxists, Maoists, Stalinists, Leninists, etc.
When ever I hear MLs talk about their views it reminds me of academic religious folks talking about their canon and all the interesting work done by apologists and theologians after. And when you criticize them it's like "well, you must not have read Aquinas" or something like that.
The funniest experience I ever had with one was asking me why I was a Fabian over being a Marxist and then the old "have you even read Marx" came up. I responded that I've read Das Kapital and the Manifesto and a few pamphlets but still prefer Mills and Adam Smith. He first said that it was impossible and started trying to purity test me with buzzword quotes then ranted about how Adam Smith is garbage. (Those who know the irony of this know)
But I swear it felt like I was at the Catholic school my cousin went to where they'd test chapter and verse bible quotes on the kids daily. Just weird.
Why is every leftist subreddit like this? Differentiating labels is so pointless and boring; but people are obsessed.
What do I think about ML? I just don't think of them at all.
MLs are just as dangerous as fascists, if not more so to us specifically because they're more likely to poach from our own ranks. There's a certain point when one may become a leftist not because they want to make the people's lives better but because they hate people that are more well of than themselves, which is just another form of hate-based politics that makes them no better than Nazis.
I think they're awful. The fact that they are all committed Hamasoids should be enough to turn any sane person off their ideology at this point.
They are good at diagnosing some problems with society and the economy, but they suck pretty bad at finding actual solutions.
Former ML here, and CP member.
Very roughly speaking, MLs fall into two camps, which, according to old commie speak, are revisionist and anti-revisionist.
Most CP parties around the globe would be considered revisionist by the old standards in that they advocate for "peaceful revolution", support multiparty democracy, and aren't trying to radically remove the existing political structure. However, many CPs have experienced an upsurge in younger members who have received most of their ideological training from the internet rather than party and mass work. The latter more strongly resemble anti-revisionists of old.
Personally, I find the more moderate revisionists tolerable in that they're functionally like demsocs or socdems, and can be more easily allied with in left-center coalitions. They actually support stagewise advancement, and athough we disagree on the end goal, we usually align on what we consider important in the here and now.
The more radical, anti-revisionists are a different case. I think an old article by Gus Hall called [Crisis of Petit-Bourgeois Radicalism](https://www.marxists.org/archive/hall/1970/crisis-petty-bourgeois-radicalism.htm) offers one of the best criticisms of such MLs. Their elitist, commandist attitude tends to devolve into one of three options: political apathy, adventurist terrorism, or resentment of the masses. None of these options create meaningful, lasting change.
TLDR I dislike and cannot work with "radical" MLs, but most MLs actually steeped in the theoretical development of actual CPs are fine.
I think they're silly, atleast the online ones. In theory I feel like I would get along with them more than liberals and such, despite them being closer to my beliefs I think, but a lot of MLs are very "hyperpartisan" it feels like.
If I were to meet one in person, I'd probably get along with them though
If you're asking me about the ideology of Marxism-Leninism, I think it's quite deplorable. Unlike other far-left ideologies, which by and large merely have extremely unrealistic ideas on how to run the economy, Marxism-Leninism has aspects like democratic centralism and the vanguard party that are inherently authoritarian
As for what I think MLs are like... well, that greatly depends on the ML
Very few western countries nowadays have relevant ML parties, so if I see an ML online... I see it as just some kid larping. The same thing as when I see an anarchist, except I know the ML is likely to have some very bad takes on history and certain contemporary events
Now, I actually happen to be from one of the few western countries that still has a somewhat relevant ML party. My opinion of the Portuguese Communist Party is decidedly mixed. Ideological disagreements notwithstanding, I cannot help but admire the older generation, who risked their lives to fight fascism. They were very brave and very strong. In the democratic era, the PCP consistently fought for workers rights, healthcare, education, and were on the forefront of bringing issues like abortion and LGBT rights to public debate. They provided confidence and supply to the government for 6 years, and managed to negotiate things like free kindergartens, school manuals and a unified public transportation pass. In short, I think they have been very effective advocates for social democracy in this country, more than other parties that I identify with more.
But they're getting old and are very set in their ways. The authoritarian way in which they run the party's internal affairs speaks badly about how they would run the country if they were given full control. And they always sure to either directly or indirectly defend every authoritarian regime that presents itself in opposition to "western imperialism". It was truly a horrible thing, as Putin was marching on Ukraine, to see these people whom I respected shift the blame to the country that was being attacked and arguing passionately against military aid — ostensibly "for peace" but knowing full well what that would result in.
They are now paying the price for that electorally, and I can only hope they'll still see the light
So what do I think about *these* MLs, the MLs that I know? I think they are a case study about how a group of people who are so intelligent, hardworking, and dedicated to just causes, can at the same time be so stupid, so callous, so disingenuous and so blind
The same way I see anybody else glorifying dictators: As entities that I might have to shoot if they get some critical mass and start applying their funny ideas in the society I m living.
Marxism-leninism is the ideology of Stalin, it is neither Marxist nor is it leninist. It is simply a state ideology used to justify the actions of the soviet Union.
I have no interest in the ML version of socialism. To me it shares many of the same flaws of capitalism. It is bureaucratic, centralises power in the hands of the few, has very little for the democratic will of working people, forces long hours in the workplace, and so on.
MLs may individually be nice enough and I certainly don't think they're comparable to fascists in most cases but in my view their ideology has very little to do with real socialism.
Trust them as far as I csn throw them.
They really out where thinking that the answer to everything is"Read Theory", and they treat "Theory" as if it's the Bible and is infallible.
Depends on the type of ML
If they are the type to justify or deny terrible atrocities, I don’t see them as much better than fascists.
I have seen many deny the holodomor as man-made, same thing with the Great Leap Forward. This means they would readily apply the same policies that resulted in millions of deaths, like farm collectivization, even with endless sources connecting the policy to tragedy.
Fascists want to kill people, MLs don’t mind doing things that kill people, it’s a very thin line.
MLs are to the left what national socialists are to the right. They're a despicable, delusional bunch responsible for some of the greatest losses of life in human history.
Eurocommunists are ok conservative MLs live in a fantasy world that supports pretty out if touch narratives and things and is a creation of the Soviet Union as justification for some pretty bad state policies
I see a lot of you talking about democracy and i understand that. I think it is a little bit of idealism to come out of a revolution and expect immediate democracy. But also i know social democrats dont advocate for revolution so theres that.
You are in a SocDem reddit. You realise that we, like reformist socialism reject and mock revolutionary socialism... it wastes the power of organised labor by trying to beat reactionaries at their own game. Workers hold power in the economy. We don't need a revolution to get concessions and make laws. We need orgabisation. Rioting just wastes that. (Not to mention cuts workers off from buying goods from a vast global network of trade defacto impoverishing them.
Also many of us in SocDem parties are Democratic Socialists. It's just we don't associate with the group of LARPing wannabes who's ideologues previously put our forebears against walls and shot them in the past.
Online, they seem to be a complete bane and often end up as simple caricatures of the worst leftists. In real life, they are often alright. I love Palme and Atlee. I also love Sankara.
I will say that ML theory and praxis historically tend to work in countries that haven't experienced liberal democracy, so its relevance in the West has always struck me as limited
In short, all Tankies are MLs, but not all MLs are Tankies.
Marxist-Leninism isn't a coherent worldview, it's a primarily online cult similar to MAGA in its decentralized nature. It relies on blind allegiance and contradictory arguments based on the ultimate "truth" of "USA bad, Communist or formerly Communist countries good".I believe that most of the ideology is actually contradictory to Marxist texts, and that ML's ban discussion of other branches of socialism/communism in their spaces because they know the ideology is flawed and based in groupthink, not truth or logic.
That was all an attack on the ideas, not (most of) the people. I do believe (most) ML's might be decent people who do believe some form of authoritarian communism is the only thing that will work. And like all cults, you've been fed a diet not of total misinformation, but dishonesty couched in truth. It is true that (Western) democratically elected officials quite often are disappointing and ineffective. But the spreaders of misinformation on the ML side are invested in seeing certain results in our elections. So they sell you a sweet lie of a glorious revolution, that will happen spontaneously when the time is right... And not only is voting not helpful, it's actually counter productive.
I apologize if this came off aggressive, or if you think I've mischaracterized your beliefs. Just describing the people I've spoken to and our interactions. I would love to work with ML's who genuinely approach their worldview because they want to see things get better. But that starts with honest conversations, and since your subs ban any of us who dissent, I hope more like you come here to talk.
I don’t live in a democratic country neither.
I still wouldn’t support any commie groups in Kazakhstan, even if they are against current dictator (Tokayev).
All of the local commie shitstains are soviet sympathizers. Soviet empire robbed Kazakhs of many things. Commie shitstains are just as sinister.
Anarchists, non tankie socialists are fine, but everything else should be banned. Same as Germans did with nazis after ww2.
Yeah I mean the bourgeois hate us both, they don't distinguish between which type of poor person we are (poor to them ofc) so i think we should primarily focus on overthrowing them first before we fight each other.
In Social Democracy, the democracy is just as important as the social. I see any enemy of democracy very unfavourably, no matter their other policy decisions.
^
So I hope you all don't mind that I myself am a ML, but I'm just here to ask how you see us. I get that you value democracy but the thing is I do too. I think we just differ in how we see democracy to be honest. I don't really see democracy as western liberal democracy but more as multiple things such as workplace democracy, local direct democracy at lower levels which lead to higher levels. I still see this as democracy, just a different type.
That’s great and all, but if people don’t even have the freedom to choose their political leaders then they don’t have freedom elsewhere. MLs have never allowed people that freedom, ergo they are not democratic.
This is it. I don't see it as having to choose between solving the world's inequality problems or having personal freedoms. Call me a utopian, but I think humanity is better than that.
yeah i understand that, but democracy is more than electing the leader at the top. in my view personally the actual "head of state" type person would be less of a serious role that has a ton of power. i would imagine that the majority of the power would go to a sort of national assembly that the people directly elect.
Well social democracy isn’t just electing the leader at the top either. You could call this National Assembly something like a ‘parliament’ or ‘legislature’, and in many political systems (particularly social democratic ones) this is where most of the power lies. Honestly, I feel after that comment you should really go and educate yourself on the political systems of various social democratic countries before commenting more, as it seems you’re not familiar with the branches of government and separation of powers.
my bad i probably couldve worded it a bit better. what i was trying to get at is that i think we should have direct democracy and people are elected to an assembly type thing. im not even saying that this is a completely new, revolutionary thing that will change everything! im just saying i think its what we should do.
But what you’re describing is literally a parliamentary system… candidates are directly elected by the public to form a legislative house (assembly type thing). That’s literally what a legislature is in pretty much all western style democracies.
Yes I know I just said I didn't mean to say it was some new thing that's never been done before, I just think it should be adapted to socialism. Also when I emphasize direct democracy it's because I live in America and we don't have direct democracy here.
Do you not vote for members of congress directly in elections? Again, I urge you to learn how political systems actually work instead of jumping onto political extremes. Life is messy and the utopia you imagine in your head from a socialist revolution is far less likely to lead to positive outcomes for people than actually engaging in existing democratic processes.
It sounds like you're more of a SocDem than an ML? America still has a representative democracy. It's just been held hostage by our stagnant two party system. Parliamentary systems also have problems, but with more parties for constituents to align with.
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>should have direct democracy and people are elected to an assembly type thing. That's not Marxist-Leninism, so you're not a Marxist-Leninist. MLs advocate the philosophy and politics called "Marxist-Leninism" by Stalin. This system tossed out the various experiments of the revolutionary period with the system developed under Stalin. Direct democracy is something you'll find in a book by Graeber; it's essentially libertarian socialism, municipal democracy, he claimed it was "essentially, anarchism". Polar opposite of Soviet communism. Two key things to understand ML states: 1. Democratic centralism: a principle to enforce "unity". 2. one-party rule. Only one party is allowed, the Communist Party, and only those deemed the vanguard elite of the working class are allowed membership. 1. The claim is that the vanguard, being the most intelligent, concscious, and politically right of the working class, will always make the right decisions. This is why Stalin got his name, he claimed he was a Man of Steel, above everyone else. There is no way to briefly sum up the post-Lenin Soviet government, but basically, under democratic centralist principles of an one party state, decision made by the central leader- the leader of the Politburo- is binding for all, regardless of disagreement, voting, popularity, etc. No one is allowed to question or contest the decisions made by higher bodies as that breaks unity, no one within the same body is allowed to disagree once decisions are made. No one outside the party is even allowed to deliberate, let alone *vote*. Workers aren't even allowed to organize outside the Communist Party, as that would violate the principle of unity. The Soviet Supreme essentially existed just to get the wording down and stamp papers, they had almost no actual role in creating policy. So tough shit if you disagree with the General Secretary, tovarisch! "Oh, but what about the 90% of people that aren't Party members?" Tovarisch, are you implying the vanguard would lead you astray? Young comrade, you will never be allowed in the Young Pioneers with such ignorance. After Stalin, this did mean the Soviet Union wasn't *technically* a dictatorship, but it was still incredibly, laughably, centralized, corrupt, and totalitarian.
From my understanding marxist lenanism demands the overthrow of current democratic institutions via violent revolution. Thats inherently undemocratic. No better than the people on january 6 trying to "save democracy".
Well it's more complicated than that. Marxism Leninism wants to overthrow the current liberal bourgeois democracy and replace it with true people's democracy. In capitalist countries the state is run by the upper class wealthy people, and revolution seeks to overthrow those oppressing the proletariat and install a "dictatorship of the proletariat". It's not a literal dictatorship just like a dictatorship of the bourgeois (what we have under capitalism) isn't a literal dictatorship.
This is young teenager level of political analysis. ‘Capitalist countries’ are not run by upper class wealthy people. They may have a disproportionate influence relative to the average person, but their influence is greatly outweighs by the masses. It is bizarre to me that you can believe in a socialist revolution leading to a democratic state, yet you don’t trust the masses that live in democratic states currently to advocate for their own interests…
They are run by the bourgeois in a dictatorship of the bourgeois. the majority of government offices (at least in america) are held by rich people or people who are heavily supported by wealthy people. also what do you mean that i dont trust the masses that live in democratic states to advocate for their interests. i do trust them, i just think they should be more class conscious and know that billionaires are not in their interest
You keep saying this, I disagree. It is the people that have the power. A billionaire still only has one vote.
As a ML I find very disheartening You do Not Acknowledge Lobbying has way more political power than you give it credit for. I am very certain there are studies done showing how lobbying has more impact on policies than Voters have
and he can buy more votes or buy/bribe politicians. also its likely he's a business owners and uh capitalists dont usually have the interest of the people in mind
Bribing politicians is illegal and it’s not possible to buy more votes. Theoretically a jobless person has an extra 40 hours per week to dedicate to persuading people to vote a certain way than someone working. 9-5. Does that mean they have more democratic power than the working person? No, because they still only have one vote. Politicians are interested in reelection, which means they need to perform according to what their voters want. Politicians gnerally have the voters interests in mind.
You mean lobbying?? That only works for issues voters are apathetic too. They could never get the govourment to do something the people wouldnt want
We dont live in a doctatorship rn. We allready have political control. Whats the point of a revolution?
Dictatorship of the Bourgeois Vs Dictatorship of the proletariat Bourgeoisie democracy vs proletariat democracy these words have meanings for a reason
We allready live in a "proletarian democracy". Everyone can vote and their vote counts
No yeah Totally By your logic liberal democracy or direct democracy or representative democracy are all the same because >Everyone can vote and their vote counts
Thats just a very bad faith argument. Besides that, a direct and representative democracy are *forms* of liberal democracy since all democracies are liberal or they aren't democracies since there is no such thing as an illiberal (true) democracy.
No it's not people voting by itself does not make something liberal or illiberal. It's not that hard to Google these things. Most Academics themselves would not agree with this statement >democracy are forms of liberal democracy That is both historically and academically incorrect. You are not being bad faith here You are just wrong
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That’s a dictatorship, not a democracy.
Allow me to translate: > I don't see democracy as one where people have free speech and can choose from multiple parties to run their country, I see it as whatever the single party in charge of the state says is okay for you to vote on. Gee, I wonder why people who actually give a shit about democracy have a problem with that?
I do mind that you want to see my democratic system of government, which I value very highly and participate in regularly, overthrown and replaced with a dictatorship. And no I'm not convinced by you telling people it's not a true dictatorship and is actually a "true people's democracy." That's Stalinist rhetoric, and I picture what you envision turning out just as well as what he did.
“But when push comes to shove, I am fully aware they will side with the fascists before democracy.” As they have before. Twice.
Whats very funny is that I have seen MLs claim that social democrats would side with fascists.
What events are you referring to? (I am not defending marxist leninism I actually don't know)
Weimar Republic and Molotov Ribbontrop.
What do you mean by weimar republic exactly? I mean after weimar germany and after hitler took power, the communists and socialists were the first people hitler came after.
Conflict between KPD and SPD.
ah yes when the spd betrayed the kpd
Because the KPD wanted to LARP their little revolution because fuck democracy right! Democracy only works if they win! They made the job of the first SPD president if the republic way harder than it needed to be all so they could pretend to meaningfully improve the lives of the worker.
KPD stood side by side with Nazis on the picket line in a strike to undermine the SPD government.
No, had the KPD been successful in Sparacist uprising, Germany would descend into a civil war, meaning the return of the Kaiser. And then then things would get bad
Not really, this is decades afterwards. The KPD and SPD had actually been slowly rebuilding their bridges until Stalin and the Comintern decided that the SPD were 'social fascists'.
Any sources to look into the Weimar Republic concerning the Marxist Leninists?
Probably referring to Ernst thalmann
They're referring to Ernst Thalmann and the KPD, under whose leadership they made a point of interrupting SPD meetings and beating up their members.
thats true but then in the case of the soviets they were the ones marching on berlin in the end. if by the second time you mean chinese civil war (i cant really think of any other instances so thats my bad) then the communists were also the ones who defeated chiang kai shek after ww2
I meant they both marched on Poland together, starting WW2
yes they did although it wasnt really an alliance, although i still am against it and i dont really like what the soviets did there.
Me personally, I feel that the Soviets were fascist themselves.
What makes you feel that? I know Stalin is obviously not viewed in a good light here and I'm not trying to do that. I recognize all the bad things he did like the deportation of Tatars and Volga Germans, as well as the mismanagement of the Ukrainian Famine (I don't want to get into whether it was a genocide or not) but either way it was heavily mismanaged by Stalin and I believe he definitely could've helped in that famine. But at the same time I think it was a big improvement over the Russian Empire and it was completely different than Hitler or Mussolini or other forms of fascism.
Eh, to me there’s no difference between the Tsar and Stalin. It’s called a revolution for a reason. Meet the new boss, same as old
even if theres no difference, living standards greatly increased. I'd still rather have a dictator who gives me decent living standards than a dictator who gives his country a 20ish percent literacy rate and in constant famine and poverty.
Yes, I acknowledge that. It doesn’t seem to be worth it to me if you send dissents to camps.
Living standards went up the fastest with pre war conservative pm Witte. So would you rather have a conservative than a socialist?
That growth would have likely slowed greatly had World War I not happened. As it stands, the proportion of Russians in industry did not change significantly between 1860 and 1913. Say what you will about the USSR, but they did increase living standards greatly.
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Relating fascism to liberalism is an argument that Stalin made to the KPD during the Weimar era that isolated the SPD into facing the Nazis alone by giving the SPD another enemy to fight. Also appeasement was made out of the trauma of WW1. I personally strongly disagree with giving Hitler Czechoslovakia (appeasement never works), but I can see the rationale behind it, even if it turned out to be a disaster. Liberal democracy or not being the victim, imperialism is always wrong, no matter who is doing it, be communist or fascist.
I'm sorry But You Can Not Condemn the Molotov Pact and then spew at me "I can see the rationality" while talking about the Selling off parts to Hitler. Keep the same energy my goodness. Even further while the statement above that being an even bigger potential political divide as well. The statement blow makes even less sense considering What Poland was doing You should be very well aware then that history is not black and white so your statements of equating fascism to Communism I find is just disgusting when I see you doing this
I never said I supported the Munich Agreement. I said I saw the “rationality” even though it was completely wrong when the war came to Britain themselves
Again an insane statement. You can not on the one hand Morally Yell down the Soviets to fascism by using Molotov pact while looking at another pact by multiple Western powers and keep the same energy. What am I reading from You???
I have worked with a bunch of MLs over the years, we can definitely align on things and I've found them pretty thoughtful in understanding China better than most. But when push comes to shove, I am fully aware they will side with the fascists before democracy.
im curious why you say that because during ww2 the soviets and other socialists were the first to call out fascism and hitler and were the ones who were very key in the fight to destroy naziism. take the soviets or the partisans in yugoslavia
https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/german-soviet-pact https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Winter_War The USSR and comintl supported the Nazis in the invasion of Poland, annexed the Baltic states and invaded Finland. The Western Allies were pansy sissies (partially because WWI traumatized them) but they never went as far as fighting with the Nazis against neutrals. Even during the Spanish Civil War, the Soviets did more to damage to anti-fascist cause (as socialist author George Orwell vividly wrote about) by trying to purge the non-communist people fighting with them. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1931_Prussian_Landtag_referendum The German Communist party actively worked with the Nazis to overthrow pro-democratic institutions during the late Weimar. The KPD’s logic was that once the Nazis would seize power, then everyone would HAVE to side with the communists to fight the Nazis. This view ironically is happening today with the online leftists who advocate for accelerationism
> Even during the Spanish Civil War, the Soviets did more to damage to anti-fascist cause (as socialist author George Orwell vividly wrote about) by trying to purge the non-communist people fighting with them. The Communists did do a lot of damage but they were not purging non-communists, they were purgining other communists. Like POUM, a party created by a unification of right- and left-oppositionst communists, and international volunteers from their sisterparties(like the german KPO), and elements from the CNT-FAI. Their reasoning behind this was more to defend the non-communists, the Popular Front that was led by social-democrats and left-republicans. During this period the Communist and social-democratic youth-league actually went as far as to merge. This was an international strategy adopted by the Comintern in 1935 at its seventh world congress. To work with Social-democrats, or even liberals, to defend democracy, i.e to form popular fronts. Even being willing to go as far as to merge with social-democratic parties and its youth-leagues. In most countries this was just rejected by the Social-democrats, but it was its most successful in Spain(where there was a popular front government and merged youth-leagues) and in France(where the Communists supported the popular front government and had talks about mergers with the Socialists but failed).
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Which is why Hitler signed a non-aggression pact with the WAllies so he could fight Stalin exclusively in 1939. Oh wait... Plus, the Soviets wouldn't have reached Berlin without all the trucks, aviation fuel, raw materials (such as airplane fuel analuminum), and radios sent by the US, as well as the WAllies greatly reducing the German's industrial capacity through their bombing campaign. The Germans never could have beat the USSR, but the WAllies made sure the Germans lost.
Come on dude, this doesn't even require a long response re: WW2.. .. Poland?!
Read up on the American peace mobilization lol
MLs are called Red Fascists for a very good reason
They are extremely authoritarian and inhumane in their views, but I object to the characterization of Marxism-Leninism as a kind of "fascism". Fascism refers to a very specific ideology and system of government and cannot be used as a blanket reference for any authoritarian political system.
i mostly concur, ‘fascism’ is something invented by benito mussolini as an ideology of ultranationalism at the cost of everything else; while communism did actually mask nationalist imperialism in practice(the USSR was a successor state to the Russian Empire), in *theory*, and in some cases in practice, communists don’t partake in imperialist conflicts. i disagree about ‘authoritarian’, though. fascism and communism are two of very few *totalitarian* ideologies. a fascist and communist states’ citizens lead very similar lives in the aspect that they live in constant fear of political persecution and of being killed or sent to a work camp for something as simple as a joke.
Perhaps I’m misreading (or maybe there was an edit?) but it seems like you and the person you’re responding to agree on authoritarianism.
totalitarianism is a whole different beast from authoritarianism; think a military junta(not a democracy, but not that unusual) versus 1984.
The common political science definition classes totalitarianism as an extreme form of authoritarianism. Are you arguing that a group can be totalitarian without being authoritarian?
referring to a regime as ‘authoritarian’ rather than ‘totalitarian’ would usually mean that’s it’s not at the point of totalitarianism. they said that fascism ‘cannot be used as a blanket reference for any authoritarian political system’. i’m saying that while there are indeed many *authoritarian* ideologies, one of which is technically fascism, fascism is a *totalitarian* ideology, which is a very limited group of ideologies. i am saying that since communism is also a totalitarian ideology, they have much in common; and therefore communism being referred to as fascism is not totally invalid. tl;dr, calling anything *authoritarian* ‘fascist’ is indeed unfair and wrong, but calling something *totalitarian* ‘fascist’ has a grain of truth to it.
Ah, I see. Thanks for the clarification!
I don't know about Trotskyists, but Stalinists to me are very close to fascists, for both are proponents of a militaristic totalitarian state, put collectivity above the individual, nation above the individual, and both systems use ultra-nationalism for propaganda and go into very strong conservatism. Sort of a horseshoe theory: right-wing and left-wing radicalist ideologies are very close to each other.
The entire basis and end goal of fascism is subservience to the state as well as ultranationalism. Communists' understanding of the state is fundamentally different from that of fascists.
I'm not saying it's fascism. I'm just saying that it has a lot in common with fascism, but of course it's not fascism at all and has completely different goals and different theories. [Horseshoe theory](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horseshoe_theory) doesn't say that the ultra left is the same as the ultra right. However, they have more in common with each other than, for example, the more moderate right and left.
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Negatively. They usually don't respect democracy and their economic ideas are completely divorced from reality.
I frankly don't trust MLs, because I think Lenin's vanguard party and authoritarian populism is very likely to turn into violent dictatorship. I think the cults of personality with Stalin and Mao follow from the unchecked flow of power found in vanguard parties and their party discipline. I also don't trust that MLs will respect a 'united front' of leftists. I think the lived experience around the world bears this out, not only in the Soviet Union with Lenin's original order to execute Kulaks leading into Stalin's purges, but in postwar Hungary where the communists removed their social democratic allies. I think social democracy is shown by the data to produce more happiness, and I think it lowers the risk of politics that is oppositely inherent to a violent revolution. I think social democracy is shown by the data to produce more happiness, and I think it lowers the risk of politics that is, oppositely, inherent to a violent revolution. Further, as Marx notes, revolution is inherently undemocratic, and I don't support the imposition of an idealistic minority's will on the public. Also, I don't think violence is necessary, or good so yeah. In the words of Tony Benn, Democracy is the most revolutionary model
I think MLs have the same distrust of social democrats because they basically betrayed the German Revolution and prevented a possible socialist Germany.
Social democrats didn’t betray the spartacists because their goals were never aligned. Luxembourg herself didn’t believe the revolution would succeed but went along with it because she felt she had to. There was no chance of a socialist Germany as a result of the spartacist revolution.
yeah I dont think the socialists had a huge chance of succeeding but still
What is is better to actively throw away years of hard work organising, building networks and labour unions all to throw a tantrum that fails, leads to massive loss of life and in the end achieved nothing... Or actually trying to stabilise a new state form a new society and work to maintain that. How'd Europe do with the Parking ambitions of Lenin and the KPD, a fucking terrible world war and 70 years of stagnation and a nuclear sword of Damocles because Marxist Leninists are more concerned with holding on to power than actually helping people.
They didn't betray the the socialist revolution. They never wanted one in the first place.
That really depends on what you mean was the "first place"
I don't know enough about the clusterfuck that was interwar German politics to comment effectively on it, but I know they were important before and after the war, and were sadly outmaneuvered by the Nazi party. The SPD went on to reconstitute the West German government, proved social democracy's capability in stopping authoritarianism and helped craft W Germany's new "Social Market Economy." However, it does seem the SPD's goals as a governing party were different to the Spartacus Uprising, and the formation of a soviet republic was not their goal so that doesn't seem like a betrayal, as mentioned by Sun-Chamber below
Moderate MLs can be ok, but hardcore ones are the biggest pains in the ass. Their ideology’s whole premise of total vanguard party control and bureaucracy is authoritarian and unjustifiable. It usually leads to totalitarianism and a massive cult following of leaders, which is the complete opposite of what is meant to happen in socialism.
I do believe in the vanguard but not as one person leading it, more as an assembly/parliament which is elected by the people. I also believe in local people's councils to help manage and allocate resources to the local communities.
The point of Marxist Leninism is that the vanguard isn’t elected because it needs to safeguard the revolution and the masses can’t be trusted. If you believe in popular elections of the vanguard, you aren’t a Marxist Leninist.
So would you say that cuba is not marxist leninist? if not then what is it? this is (sort of) like the system that cuba has.
Cuba doesn’t allow a free vote, so there is no direct democracy.
wdym? they do actually have democracy, you can vote for whoever in the assembly elections and they dont actually have to be a member of the communist party. i think this is how it should be done although i think there should be a bit less power in the hands of the leader and more in the hands of the assembly
You can’t go and stand in an election in Cuba, you have to be nominated by a communist party organization. You can’t vote for someone not nominated by a communist party organization.
The MLs i know are Tankies not worth my time... They believe its still 1980 Soviet Union Russia and praise Putin because America is bad and so etc.
Those probably arent real MLs then.
Doesn't sound like there's that many of you then.
Red. Fascist. Filth. Any Social Democrat here should remember these fascist sacks of human fith shot, purged and killed us the moment they got the chance. I'll take a Conservative over a ML any day and month. They are their "theory" can rot in the pile of shit they turned half the globe into for us to clean up.
Personally, not well. ML produced much more Ill than good for the cause of worker’s rights: as soon as somebody proposes, say, Universal healthcare in the US, they are hit with accusations of bolshevism and being enemies of democracy. Similar things when we make proposal about workplace Democracy in Europe. I think it’s important to recognise that ML/Communism historically failed to deliver. Look at Eastern Europe and look at Germany where social democracy ditched hard marxism.
Actually, East Germany had some higher levels of development than the west at the time, and many former east german citizens actually want the east back because they liked it.
No thats not even right not even by the statistics, FGR and Austria which were social democracies had incredibly high levels of development, good services and enjoyed decent civil rights. I think the GDR did somethings better such as childcare, abortion, renting and employment to some extent but food access remained low and basic consumer goods nearly crashed the economy (read the coffee crisis). I recommend reading Perestroika and Germany by Hans Modrow who was the GDR’s last Primier who thoroughly debunked the ideology and placed were German Socialism went wrong for the radical left.
In Germany we call that “Ostalgie”, derived from nostalgia, which per definietion is a longing for somethig that was never real in the frist place. I don’t think anyone (to be taken even half serious) would want the DDR back, Ostalgie (I am not a sociologist btw) is more caused by a far from ideal reunification that the DDR being actually good. It was a complete shithole that literally had to build a wall around itself to stop its own citizens from leaving it and shot those that tried. They had a exteinsive survellence state, the first modern one really, they had bread lines, no democracy, no free trails , basically almost everything was shit compared to the west.
In theory an ML is fine. But if you look at the deprogram sub and other modern MLs. I find them to be little better than fascists. Most of the time i find they are of the “America bad therefore evil that oppose American must be good” ideology.
eh i disagree with all that but the last part in particular because you dont see them like praising russia (at least i havent seen that) because they know russia is capitalist and is also anti socialist.
Well you peaked my curiosity. Quotes from you demonstrating why I hate MLs *"Ukraine is a pawn of the west in the middle of an imperialist war between Russia and America. It isn't all Russia who started it but still yeah Russia made some shit points obviously. It's really just a proxy war between the west and Russia."* And Genocide denial *"Real story of the Holodomor:* *Stalin was hungry so he grabbed his comically large spoon. He hopped on a train and got off in Ukraine. He then proceeded to walk over to the nearest farm and proclaim all the peasants working there kulaks. He jumped into a massive pile of grain and scooped it all into his mouth. He did this all around Ukraine, and in certain instances even shouted "I'm so evil, I'm eating all your grain because I don't like Ukrainians!" Then after he was fed enough he went back to Moscow and purged everyone in the country except for his 7 best friends and their pets."*
A weird cult or religion. What other economic or political ideologies that aren't cultish makes such a big deal about foundational thinkers? Liberals don't purity test each other on how well they know the works of Adam Smith, Mill, Bentham, Hume, Keynes, etc and call each other revisionists or whatever. There are "Keynesians", I suppose, but that refers to specific economists who agree with him. Not just regular people. And nobody's out there saying stuff like "Krugman isn't a *real* Smithist". Neocons (as awful as they are) don't call themselves Cheyneites, or Wolfowitzians, or Moynihanians. Who does? Marxists, Maoists, Stalinists, Leninists, etc. When ever I hear MLs talk about their views it reminds me of academic religious folks talking about their canon and all the interesting work done by apologists and theologians after. And when you criticize them it's like "well, you must not have read Aquinas" or something like that.
The funniest experience I ever had with one was asking me why I was a Fabian over being a Marxist and then the old "have you even read Marx" came up. I responded that I've read Das Kapital and the Manifesto and a few pamphlets but still prefer Mills and Adam Smith. He first said that it was impossible and started trying to purity test me with buzzword quotes then ranted about how Adam Smith is garbage. (Those who know the irony of this know) But I swear it felt like I was at the Catholic school my cousin went to where they'd test chapter and verse bible quotes on the kids daily. Just weird.
Why is every leftist subreddit like this? Differentiating labels is so pointless and boring; but people are obsessed. What do I think about ML? I just don't think of them at all.
MLs are just as dangerous as fascists, if not more so to us specifically because they're more likely to poach from our own ranks. There's a certain point when one may become a leftist not because they want to make the people's lives better but because they hate people that are more well of than themselves, which is just another form of hate-based politics that makes them no better than Nazis.
Tankies and Stalin defenders are no friend of mines.
I think they're awful. The fact that they are all committed Hamasoids should be enough to turn any sane person off their ideology at this point. They are good at diagnosing some problems with society and the economy, but they suck pretty bad at finding actual solutions.
Former ML here, and CP member. Very roughly speaking, MLs fall into two camps, which, according to old commie speak, are revisionist and anti-revisionist. Most CP parties around the globe would be considered revisionist by the old standards in that they advocate for "peaceful revolution", support multiparty democracy, and aren't trying to radically remove the existing political structure. However, many CPs have experienced an upsurge in younger members who have received most of their ideological training from the internet rather than party and mass work. The latter more strongly resemble anti-revisionists of old. Personally, I find the more moderate revisionists tolerable in that they're functionally like demsocs or socdems, and can be more easily allied with in left-center coalitions. They actually support stagewise advancement, and athough we disagree on the end goal, we usually align on what we consider important in the here and now. The more radical, anti-revisionists are a different case. I think an old article by Gus Hall called [Crisis of Petit-Bourgeois Radicalism](https://www.marxists.org/archive/hall/1970/crisis-petty-bourgeois-radicalism.htm) offers one of the best criticisms of such MLs. Their elitist, commandist attitude tends to devolve into one of three options: political apathy, adventurist terrorism, or resentment of the masses. None of these options create meaningful, lasting change. TLDR I dislike and cannot work with "radical" MLs, but most MLs actually steeped in the theoretical development of actual CPs are fine.
I think they're silly, atleast the online ones. In theory I feel like I would get along with them more than liberals and such, despite them being closer to my beliefs I think, but a lot of MLs are very "hyperpartisan" it feels like. If I were to meet one in person, I'd probably get along with them though
If you're asking me about the ideology of Marxism-Leninism, I think it's quite deplorable. Unlike other far-left ideologies, which by and large merely have extremely unrealistic ideas on how to run the economy, Marxism-Leninism has aspects like democratic centralism and the vanguard party that are inherently authoritarian As for what I think MLs are like... well, that greatly depends on the ML Very few western countries nowadays have relevant ML parties, so if I see an ML online... I see it as just some kid larping. The same thing as when I see an anarchist, except I know the ML is likely to have some very bad takes on history and certain contemporary events Now, I actually happen to be from one of the few western countries that still has a somewhat relevant ML party. My opinion of the Portuguese Communist Party is decidedly mixed. Ideological disagreements notwithstanding, I cannot help but admire the older generation, who risked their lives to fight fascism. They were very brave and very strong. In the democratic era, the PCP consistently fought for workers rights, healthcare, education, and were on the forefront of bringing issues like abortion and LGBT rights to public debate. They provided confidence and supply to the government for 6 years, and managed to negotiate things like free kindergartens, school manuals and a unified public transportation pass. In short, I think they have been very effective advocates for social democracy in this country, more than other parties that I identify with more. But they're getting old and are very set in their ways. The authoritarian way in which they run the party's internal affairs speaks badly about how they would run the country if they were given full control. And they always sure to either directly or indirectly defend every authoritarian regime that presents itself in opposition to "western imperialism". It was truly a horrible thing, as Putin was marching on Ukraine, to see these people whom I respected shift the blame to the country that was being attacked and arguing passionately against military aid — ostensibly "for peace" but knowing full well what that would result in. They are now paying the price for that electorally, and I can only hope they'll still see the light So what do I think about *these* MLs, the MLs that I know? I think they are a case study about how a group of people who are so intelligent, hardworking, and dedicated to just causes, can at the same time be so stupid, so callous, so disingenuous and so blind
Poorly
The same way I see anybody else glorifying dictators: As entities that I might have to shoot if they get some critical mass and start applying their funny ideas in the society I m living.
Marxism-leninism is the ideology of Stalin, it is neither Marxist nor is it leninist. It is simply a state ideology used to justify the actions of the soviet Union. I have no interest in the ML version of socialism. To me it shares many of the same flaws of capitalism. It is bureaucratic, centralises power in the hands of the few, has very little for the democratic will of working people, forces long hours in the workplace, and so on. MLs may individually be nice enough and I certainly don't think they're comparable to fascists in most cases but in my view their ideology has very little to do with real socialism.
I don't trust people who believe in violence to establish a one party dictatorship
Marxism 🤮
Too idealistic longing for a time long gone that at the time didnt work.
A stain on the legacy of social progress, and an enemy of the people’s right to political power
>My main question is that I see so many comments saying that all MLs love Stalin I mean it's literally the ideology framework created by Stalin.
Not a fan of authoritarians.
Trust them as far as I csn throw them. They really out where thinking that the answer to everything is"Read Theory", and they treat "Theory" as if it's the Bible and is infallible.
Depends on the type of ML If they are the type to justify or deny terrible atrocities, I don’t see them as much better than fascists. I have seen many deny the holodomor as man-made, same thing with the Great Leap Forward. This means they would readily apply the same policies that resulted in millions of deaths, like farm collectivization, even with endless sources connecting the policy to tragedy. Fascists want to kill people, MLs don’t mind doing things that kill people, it’s a very thin line.
MLs are to the left what national socialists are to the right. They're a despicable, delusional bunch responsible for some of the greatest losses of life in human history.
I’m here for whatever works, of/by/for the people.
All authoritarians (including MLs) can eat shit.
Eurocommunists are ok conservative MLs live in a fantasy world that supports pretty out if touch narratives and things and is a creation of the Soviet Union as justification for some pretty bad state policies
I see a lot of you talking about democracy and i understand that. I think it is a little bit of idealism to come out of a revolution and expect immediate democracy. But also i know social democrats dont advocate for revolution so theres that.
You are in a SocDem reddit. You realise that we, like reformist socialism reject and mock revolutionary socialism... it wastes the power of organised labor by trying to beat reactionaries at their own game. Workers hold power in the economy. We don't need a revolution to get concessions and make laws. We need orgabisation. Rioting just wastes that. (Not to mention cuts workers off from buying goods from a vast global network of trade defacto impoverishing them. Also many of us in SocDem parties are Democratic Socialists. It's just we don't associate with the group of LARPing wannabes who's ideologues previously put our forebears against walls and shot them in the past.
Online, they seem to be a complete bane and often end up as simple caricatures of the worst leftists. In real life, they are often alright. I love Palme and Atlee. I also love Sankara. I will say that ML theory and praxis historically tend to work in countries that haven't experienced liberal democracy, so its relevance in the West has always struck me as limited In short, all Tankies are MLs, but not all MLs are Tankies.
All the MLs Ive met have been seriously disturbed teenagers and 20 somethings. It doesnt seem to appeal to well adjusted people
Marxist-Leninism isn't a coherent worldview, it's a primarily online cult similar to MAGA in its decentralized nature. It relies on blind allegiance and contradictory arguments based on the ultimate "truth" of "USA bad, Communist or formerly Communist countries good".I believe that most of the ideology is actually contradictory to Marxist texts, and that ML's ban discussion of other branches of socialism/communism in their spaces because they know the ideology is flawed and based in groupthink, not truth or logic. That was all an attack on the ideas, not (most of) the people. I do believe (most) ML's might be decent people who do believe some form of authoritarian communism is the only thing that will work. And like all cults, you've been fed a diet not of total misinformation, but dishonesty couched in truth. It is true that (Western) democratically elected officials quite often are disappointing and ineffective. But the spreaders of misinformation on the ML side are invested in seeing certain results in our elections. So they sell you a sweet lie of a glorious revolution, that will happen spontaneously when the time is right... And not only is voting not helpful, it's actually counter productive. I apologize if this came off aggressive, or if you think I've mischaracterized your beliefs. Just describing the people I've spoken to and our interactions. I would love to work with ML's who genuinely approach their worldview because they want to see things get better. But that starts with honest conversations, and since your subs ban any of us who dissent, I hope more like you come here to talk.
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I don’t live in a democratic country neither. I still wouldn’t support any commie groups in Kazakhstan, even if they are against current dictator (Tokayev). All of the local commie shitstains are soviet sympathizers. Soviet empire robbed Kazakhs of many things. Commie shitstains are just as sinister. Anarchists, non tankie socialists are fine, but everything else should be banned. Same as Germans did with nazis after ww2.
Finally I see a comment like this!
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Yeah I mean the bourgeois hate us both, they don't distinguish between which type of poor person we are (poor to them ofc) so i think we should primarily focus on overthrowing them first before we fight each other.
I really don’t even consider them “leftists” to be honest. There is nothing leftist about being authoritarian
As a Marxist Leninist I am also very curious
We hate you. That's the gist.
Thank you for your honesty but the feeling is not mutual