Socialism

[commentator]

I can't believe it's the 21'st century and people are still pedalling the same communist garbage. They call themselves socialist because they are afraid to call themselves communist. I'm sure there's a few SWP 'believers' post here. Socialist Workers Party, don't make me laugh. Indoctrinated Communist Student are all they are, we've had it all before in China, Cambodia etc... They're only allowed pedal their vicious, dangerous, totalitarian, fantasies because the society they live in believes in values totally alien to their bloodthirsty heroes. Stalin, Trotsky, Mao, Pol pot.
People should stay focused on the blood lust of these murderous butchers but also make sure that the totalitarian student fringe which glorifies them stays on the fringe where they belong.
And don't give me this good commie, bad commie routine that a lot of them hide behind. Stalin was so evil he tried to kill cuddly uncle Trotsky. Stalin killed millions, thats what communists do, and Trotsky wasn't the only nascent murderous tyranny he killed. Communism is a vicious, blood soaked crime against humanity and those in our midst who fantasise about it should continually be reminded of what they actually are in case they get the slightest chance to spread their hatred beyond their own little warped covens.

The only garbage here is your post. I would reply to it in detail if I could make sense of it!! Most marxists agree that Stalin killed millions and don't defend him but most genuine marxists wouldn't describe him as a marxist or communist. You should really try and calm down and try post something a bit more thought out.

The reason why communists do not defend stalin is not based on any moral repugnance at his crimes but is simply because it suits them to do so. He is a strawman on whom they can hang the failings of Marxism in action or communism. essentially their analysis is that all the hideous reality of communism in action was One man's fault. if it hadn't been for nasty old uncle Joe the world would be rosy. That analysis is ahistoricsal and bizarre. It is as if a neo nazi told us the national socialism was good adn was perverted by nasty old uncle Adolf.

Marxism is based on a fatalistic and inaccurate prediction about society by marx, communism is the utterly discredited attempt to apply it. That the SWP and others ignore the lessons of history is shameful and that they are allowed a platform on which to propound their desire for tyranny is a comment on how a liberal non communist society allows those who hate it room to speak. tangier is however correct to point out that just as we need to meet Irving with fact and truth not censorship it is necessary to remind people of the moral deviance and repugnancy of SWP and other equivocators about communist history and its inhuman stain of the last century.

[stringjack]

The reason why communists do not defend stalin is not based on any moral repugnance at his crimes but is simply because it suits them to do so.

[tangier]

The only garbage here is your post. I would reply to it in detail if I could make sense of it!! Most marxists agree that Stalin killed millions and don't defend him but most genuine marxists wouldn't describe him as a marxist or communist. You should really try and calm down and try post something a bit more thought out.

I didn't mind what you call my post Engles. I, like the vast majority of civilised people, don't swallow this 'genuine marxists' nonsense. All that means is you're uncomfortable with the blood on the hands of your fellow communists so you politely distance yourself from it with revisionist humbug. Your 'genuine marxists' are merely totalitarian communists who didn't get power, and as they watched how rotten and inhuman that ideology unfolded they couldn't admit to the cancer in the 'ism' but proceeded to make Communism lite, for the less barbarous totalitarians among us.
If you can't make sense of my post it might be because I use words like totalitarianism, dictatorship, murder, blood, vicious and inhuman, and although communists seem to understand these words well then they are the accuser their perceptive skills seem somewhat dulled when they are the accused. In fact they positively can't make sense of it..

[Engels]

The only garbage here is your post. I would reply to it in detail if I could make sense of it!! Most marxists agree that Stalin killed millions and don't defend him but most genuine marxists wouldn't describe him as a marxist or communist. You should really try and calm down and try post something a bit more thought out.

I didn't mind what you call my post Engles. I, like the vast majority of civilised people, don't swallow this 'genuine marxists' nonsense. All that means is you're uncomfortable with the blood on the hands of your fellow communists so you politely distance yourself from it with revisionist humbug. Your 'genuine marxists' are merely totalitarian communists who didn't get power, and as they watched how rotten and inhuman that ideology unfolded they couldn't admit to the cancer in the 'ism' but proceeded to make Communism lite, for the less barbarous totalitarians among us.
If you can't make sense of my post it might be because I use words like totalitarianism, dictatorship, murder, blood, vicious and inhuman, and although communists seem to understand these words well then they are the accuser their perceptive skills seem somewhat dulled when they are the accused. In fact they positively can't make sense of it..

I think you'll find if you bother to look that my party has often used the term totalitarianism, dictatorship etc about the Soviet Union etc. We didn't support the regimes in the SU or Eastern Europe.

There is no blood on my hands and if you care to check out any of my party's websites you will find a consistency on these questions and not a revisionist view in sight!

[Engels]

I can't believe it's the 21'st century and people are still pedalling the same communist garbage. They call themselves socialist because they are afraid to call themselves communist. I'm sure there's a few SWP 'believers' post here. Socialist Workers Party, don't make me laugh. Indoctrinated Communist Student are all they are, we've had it all before in China, Cambodia etc... They're only allowed pedal their vicious, dangerous, totalitarian, fantasies because the society they live in believes in values totally alien to their bloodthirsty heroes. Stalin, Trotsky, Mao, Pol pot.
People should stay focused on the blood lust of these murderous butchers but also make sure that the totalitarian student fringe which glorifies them stays on the fringe where they belong.
And don't give me this good commie, bad commie routine that a lot of them hide behind. Stalin was so evil he tried to kill cuddly uncle Trotsky. Stalin killed millions, thats what communists do, and Trotsky wasn't the only nascent murderous tyranny he killed. Communism is a vicious, blood soaked crime against humanity and those in our midst who fantasise about it should continually be reminded of what they actually are in case they get the slightest chance to spread their hatred beyond their own little warped covens.

The only garbage here is your post. I would reply to it in detail if I could make sense of it!! Most marxists agree that Stalin killed millions and don't defend him but most genuine marxists wouldn't describe him as a marxist or communist. You should really try and calm down and try post something a bit more thought out.

The reason why communists do not defend stalin is not based on any moral repugnance at his crimes but is simply because it suits them to do so. He is a strawman on whom they can hang the failings of Marxism in action or communism. essentially their analysis is that all the hideous reality of communism in action was One man's fault. if it hadn't been for nasty old uncle Joe the world would be rosy. That analysis is ahistoricsal and bizarre. It is as if a neo nazi told us the national socialism was good adn was perverted by nasty old uncle Adolf.

Marxism is based on a fatalistic and inaccurate prediction about society by marx, communism is the utterly discredited attempt to apply it. That the SWP and others ignore the lessons of history is shameful and that they are allowed a platform on which to propound their desire for tyranny is a comment on how a liberal non communist society allows those who hate it room to speak. tangier is however correct to point out that just as we need to meet Irving with fact and truth not censorship it is necessary to remind people of the moral deviance and repugnancy of SWP and other equivocators about communist history and its inhuman stain of the last century.

Any right thinking people couldn't fail to be repulsed by the crimes of Stalin particularly people from a Trotskyist tradition where the participants of the Left opposition were routed by Stalin and his cohorts.

Your analysis is typically lazy - If, as you do take the Soviet Union as "communist" then your post may have some merit - I on the other hand don't accept that the SU was communist/socialist/marxist - it was a dictatorship of a bureaucracy which came to power for many many reasons - Lenin's death, the civil war, invasion of imperialism post the revolution, the backward nature of Russian society, the uneducated masses , the invasion of the Bolsheviks assisted by Stalin for his own ends of endless numbers of opportunists opposed to the revolution but who saw the chance of getting in on power - Many of these things would not have been a factor if the revolution had taken place in a more economically advanced country such as France or Germany as Marx had expected.

So the crimes of the SU were essentially one mans fault - but he got away with them for many of the reasons outlined above.

There is a book called the "Stalin falsification of history" - you should read it some time you would learn much from it.

[Engels]

I can't believe it's the 21'st century and people are still pedalling the same communist garbage. They call themselves socialist because they are afraid to call themselves communist. I'm sure there's a few SWP 'believers' post here. Socialist Workers Party, don't make me laugh. Indoctrinated Communist Student are all they are, we've had it all before in China, Cambodia etc... They're only allowed pedal their vicious, dangerous, totalitarian, fantasies because the society they live in believes in values totally alien to their bloodthirsty heroes. Stalin, Trotsky, Mao, Pol pot.
People should stay focused on the blood lust of these murderous butchers but also make sure that the totalitarian student fringe which glorifies them stays on the fringe where they belong.
And don't give me this good commie, bad commie routine that a lot of them hide behind. Stalin was so evil he tried to kill cuddly uncle Trotsky. Stalin killed millions, thats what communists do, and Trotsky wasn't the only nascent murderous tyranny he killed. Communism is a vicious, blood soaked crime against humanity and those in our midst who fantasise about it should continually be reminded of what they actually are in case they get the slightest chance to spread their hatred beyond their own little warped covens.

The only garbage here is your post. I would reply to it in detail if I could make sense of it!! Most marxists agree that Stalin killed millions and don't defend him but most genuine marxists wouldn't describe him as a marxist or communist. You should really try and calm down and try post something a bit more thought out.

Actually, while I agree with you that Tangiers is hardly making the most eloquent case, I think Stalin was a marxist and a communist, but he was also fairly clearly a psychopath. I know exactly what you mean Engels, but it's almost irrelevant. Any system or power structure can allow people to the top who are utterly malign, but a single party system speeds their rise like no other and provides no clear means of halting them. The example of Stalin or Pol Pot doesn't shed any light on communism or marxism in practice, other than the clear issue of how do marxist political structures inhibit the exercise of excessive power by tyrannical individuals. I think democratic centralism aided Stalins malignancy, but that isn't marxist, it's actually leninist. And that is a problem. Leninism has a problem with checks and balances, the proper dispersal of power is perhaps impossible inside a single party structure - and I've been through three of them and remain mightily unimpressed by them all on that level.

That said I think it is possible to build in pluralistic, even oppositional structures into marxist political structures. However, I don't think the opportunity to apply them in contemporary society is likely to arrive soon. :wink:

I'm sure you wont be surprised that I don't agree with you on democratic centralism. It seems to be a feature of ex WP members (I think you said you were, someplace else) to be opposed to DC. I've heard Colm Breathnach rant about Leninst parties on a number of occasions. I was never a member of the WP but I am aware of some of the problems in the party though I don't think that because a method is wrongly implemented makes it a wrong method - the WP were in effect the Irish equivalent of the communist party in the Soviet Union and took their organisational form from there so inevitably probelms re democracy were inevitable.

The SP is run on a DC method and it is absolutely democratic in my mind.

I disagree with you on Lenin's checks and balances he outlines points in "State and Revolution" precisely to avoid the crystallation of a bureaucracy and to prevent the rise of people such as Stalin - "no official to receive higher wages than skilled workers", admin duties to be rotated within the state apparatus to prevent bureaucracy etc etc I'm sure you've read it.

[tangier]

I think you'll find if you bother to look that my party has often used the term totalitarianism, dictatorship etc about the Soviet Union etc. We didn't support the regimes in the SU or Eastern Europe.

There is no blood on my hands and if you care to check out any of my party's websites you will find a consistency on these questions and not a revisionist view in sight!

Oh Engles get real and take your head out of the propaganda. Your 'party' (if it is the SWP) are merely left wing fascists who pedal this nonsense about how poor Trotsky was stabbed in the back by evil Stalin. They provide a whole library of 'selected' and specially written history for you and your fellow gullables to read and they call non-trotskyite histories "bourgeoir' and "reactonary". They create smokescreens to shield themselves from the facts of history they don't like, and it's very hard to pin them down because they believe in a world of fantasy communism. i.e. they're not responsible for anything that communism did but they have a pure untried form of it in their heads and in their propaganda. Do you honestly believe that all the communist regimes this poor world has suffered are perversions of some precious unattained communist holy grail.
I don't know if you're a "full believer' or are one of the 3rd level students they deliberately groom, (strange for a 'workers' party), and i'm not going to get into the ins and outs of particular interpretations of leninism or marxism. The SWP pedal dangerous anti democratic ideas and outside of their own little circle of believers they are seen for what they are, pedalers of the most bloody totalitatian "ism' we have witnessed in modern times.

[Engels]

I think you'll find if you bother to look that my party has often used the term totalitarianism, dictatorship etc about the Soviet Union etc. We didn't support the regimes in the SU or Eastern Europe.

There is no blood on my hands and if you care to check out any of my party's websites you will find a consistency on these questions and not a revisionist view in sight!

Oh Engles get real and take your head out of the propaganda. Your 'party' (if it is the SWP) are merely left wing fascists who pedal this nonsense about how poor Trotsky was stabbed in the back by evil Stalin. They provide a whole library of 'selected' and specially written history for you and your fellow gullables to read and they call non-trotskyite histories "bourgeoir' and "reactonary". They create smokescreens to shield themselves from the facts of history they don't like, and it's very hard to pin them down because they believe in a world of fantasy communism. i.e. they're not responsible for anything that communism did but they have a pure untried form of it in their heads and in their propaganda. Do you honestly believe that all the communist regimes this poor world has suffered are perversions of some precious unattained communist holy grail.
I don't know if you're a "full believer' or are one of the 3rd level students they deliberately groom, (strange for a 'workers' party), and i'm not going to get into the ins and outs of particular interpretations of leninism or marxism. The SWP pedal dangerous anti democratic ideas and outside of their own little circle of believers they are seen for what they are, pedalers of the most bloody totalitatian "ism' we have witnessed in modern times.

I'm not a member of the SWP, nor am I a student. I thought Trotsky was stabbed in the head by Stalin's agent!

I don't believe in fantasies of any description (including your posts) I don't need smokescreens either. I have no difficulty accepting the crimes of the Soviet Union or that they were committed by many claiming to be communist where me and you differ is that I don't believe they were socialists or marxists and nothing I will say will convince you of that although at least we have made some progress tonight that at least you do accept that there have been different interpetations of Leninism/Marxism - you are just not "going to get into them".

[tangier]

So the crimes of the SU were essentially one mans fault

Maybe I should form a fascist party and write books about how that bloody Adolf fellow ruined everything with his perverse haterid of the Jews. I could tell people that even though I use the term 'Fascist' i have nothing to do with that evil Dictator who hijacked corporatist ideals and twisted them into his own perverse agenda, and fooled most of the German population into following him. No really.. there are some people believe these sort of things can happen...

[Engels]

So the crimes of the SU were essentially one mans fault

Maybe I should form a fascist party and write books about how that bloody Adolf fellow ruined everything with his perverse haterid of the Jews. I could tell people that even though I use the term 'Fascist' i have nothing to do with that evil Dictator who hijacked corporatist ideals and twisted them into his own perverse agenda, and fooled most of the German population into following him. No really.. there are some people believe these sort of things can happen...

Thats a ridiculous post - go and read about fascism and read what Lenin, Trotsky wrote about socialism - "the struggle against fascism in Germany" - Leon Trotsky a complilation of his writings written in the thirties against fascism - read it you might learn something (though I doubt it).