Open Questions For A Marxist/communist

[Gabriela]

Do you agree with Marx because of his critiques of capitalism, or because of his support of communism, or both? It is completely possible to agree with his critiques without supporting his solution to capitalism's problems.

[John Ryan]

You're probably wrong. Unfortunately I am too stoopid to prove this but, I'm almost pretty sure you're way off.

 

Well, the primary anti-Communist writing to come from the Vatican (to the best of my knowledge) is Pope Pius XI's Divini Redemptoris. In the encyclical, the Holy Father only refers to Marx himself once. It was written in 1937, and was particularly directed at Bolshevism, which by that time was dominated by Josef Stalin (who V.I. Lenin said should never be allowed to lead the party). If Divini Redemptoris is addressing only Bolshevism as it was practiced at the time, Pope Pius XI may be right in his condemnations. Yet, from my knowledge of Marxism as a whole, he is way off. I think that oftentimes people misunderstand Marx's writings, particularly many Marxists. So, for example, I think people misunderstood Marx when he wrote that the family should be abolished. First of all, he specifically mentions the abolition of the family in the context of the bourgeois family, and secondly, the German word that is translated "abolished" is aufheben/aufhebung, has a specific Hegelian flare that means "to carry to a higher level". In my opinion, Marx wanted to liberate male/female love from the privation that characterized so many marriages of economic convenience. 

 

"I'm from the government, and I'm here to help"

 -- the most terrifying words in the English language, followed closely by:

"I'm a political scientist, and I'm here to help."

 

Too bad, Marxist guy, you already got your chance and slaughtered your millions. Let the other political ideologies have a turn.

 

I am guessing you have never actually read much of Marx's writings. It has become a myth on the right that Marxism represents the pinnacle of a strong state. In classical Marxism, the state is the defender of the bourgeois, capitalist order and must be seized by the proletariat, turned against the bourgeoisie, and then abolished.

 

And, I wonder if capitalism or state-communist ideologies have more blood on their hands. If we are to count the starvation and bloodshed under Josef Stalin and Mao Zedong against Communism than surely we can count the Imperialist activities of Great Britain in India, Australia and the United States, and the European subjugation of Africa against capitalism. World War I would have to been seen as a black mark against capitalism, and defending on how you look at it, World War II can be seen as a war amongst capitalist states.

 

Do you agree with Marx because of his critiques of capitalism, or because of his support of communism, or both? It is completely possible to agree with his critiques without supporting his solution to capitalism's problems.

 

I assent with both his critique of capitalism and his idea of communism. Though, it is possible to agree with his critique and not his solution. Anarchists often read Marx for his critique, but ignore his ideas about a dictatorship of the proletariat. Yet, I tend to believe that Communism is the natural consequence of his critique of capitalism. Marx is a dialectical thinker and therefore his deductions proceed by the process of negation. Marx never tells us — as far as I am aware — exactly what a communist society would look like. Marx establishes his idea of communism in antithesis to, as the negation of, capitalism. Communism is the end of alienation. So we look at the ills of capitalism, and we invert/overcome them. 

[Lilllabettt]

I am guessing you have never actually read much of Marx's writings. It has become a myth on the right that Marxism represents the pinnacle of a strong state. In classical Marxism, the state is the defender of the bourgeois, capitalist order and must be seized by the proletariat, turned against the bourgeoisie, and then abolished.

 

The point is not that Marx is a statist, the point is he is a political scientist - a profession which has wrung more sweat and blood out of innocent people than any other. I diss libertarianism for the same reason. Political ideology is soul-sucking puritanism.

 

 

You say you got a real solution
Well, you know
We'd all love to see the plan
You say you'll change the constitution
Well, you know
We all want to change your head
You tell me it's the institution
Well, you know
You better free you mind instead

Edited September 14, 2013 by Lilllabettt

[Apotheoun]

. . .

 

I think that Pope Pius XI had a poor understand of Marxist philosophy, to be quite blunt about it. He failed to distinguish between Soviet Communism (which Marx denounced in his Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844) and the actualized communism Marx envisioned.

I do not see how you can denounce something before it actually exists. Perhaps you can write something that could make it possible to question the legitimacy of something that develops later on, but you cannot really denounce something before it exists.

[John Ryan]

The point is not that Marx is a statist, the point is he is a political scientist - a profession which has wrung more sweat and blood out of innocent people than any other. I diss libertarianism for the same reason. Political ideology is soul-sucking puritanism.

 

 

You say you got a real solution
Well, you know
We'd all love to see the plan
You say you'll change the constitution
Well, you know
We all want to change your head
You tell me it's the institution
Well, you know
You better free you mind instead

 

What is the possible alternative to political ideology? The only alternative I can envision is the Augustinian refusal to participate in political matters.

 

I do not see how you can denounce something before it actually exists. Perhaps you can write something that could make it possible to question the legitimacy of something that develops later on, but you cannot really denounce something before it exists.

 

Well, I think that I can denounce the ideal of anarcho-capitalism without it ever actually existing. So that is not so much my disagreement. It's not as if I am singling out the Vatican/Pope for its misunderstanding of Marxism. I think that most Marxists do not understand Marx. 

[Apotheoun]

 

Well, I think that I can denounce the ideal of anarcho-capitalism without it ever actually existing. So that is not so much my disagreement. It's not as if I am singling out the Vatican/Pope for its misunderstanding of Marxism. I think that most Marxists do not understand Marx. 

But you said that Marx denounced Soviet Communism, which is not merely an abstraction, seventy years before it actually existed. The comment is illogical at face value.

[4588686]

Have you read David Harvey?

[4588686]

Are you a pure Marxist? What are your views on Libertarianism/Anarchism?

Marxism is an anarchist ideology. Libertarianism is something rich people fund so they can keep being rich.

[Era Might]

• The private property system wastes resources that could be going to satisfy real human needs. Capitalism is the only system which suffers from overproduction. So when the Global Financial Crisis hit the world, there was a superabundance of homes available and very large number of homeless families. A fundamental contradiction of capitalism is that produces abundance and poverty at the same time. And it is the wage-labor system that has so much construction employees becoming idle, when they could be working and creating to satisfy real human needs — the only reason they are not is because their is no demand to justify their labor in the monetary system of capitalism.

 

The minute you start speaking of "needs" you are on the road to inverting capitalism. What are "real human needs" and who do you propose "satisfies" them? Is housing a "human need"? That assumes that people should be "housed." It is a mark of poverty and dependence to be "housed," and once you start speaking of it as a "need," then you create the terms for someone to do the "housing." In steps whoever to fill that space...capitalist companies, communist government, social agencies, charities, etc. All because you have framed the human person as a dependent with "needs," rather than as someone capable of creating and acting in the world.

 

Industrial communism is going to have many of the same premises as capitalism, such as "needs," without the built-in freedom such as "pursuit of happiness" as a "need."

Edited September 14, 2013 by Era Might

[Ice_nine]

The only alternative I can envision is the Augustinian refusal to participate in political matters

 

 

sounds like my type of dude.

[John Ryan]

But you said that Marx denounced Soviet Communism, which is not merely an abstraction, seventy years before it actually existed. The comment is illogical at face value.

 

I am so sorry, I misread your original post and thought you said something completely different than what you accurately wrote. Yes, Marx criticized the abstract idea of Soviet Communism in his 1844 Manuscripts, calling the idea "crude communism." 

 

Have you read David Harvey?

 

Reading David Harvey is one of those things I need to make time for. I have listen to many of his videos on YouTube however. I do think he is one of the few Marxists who gets Marx's holistic philosophical project. 

 

The minute you start speaking of "needs" you are on the road to inverting capitalism. What are "real human needs" and who do you propose "satisfies" them? Is housing a "human need"? That assumes that people should be "housed." It is a mark of poverty and dependence to be "housed," and once you start speaking of it as a "need," then you create the terms for someone to do the "housing." In steps whoever to fill that space...capitalist companies, communist government, social agencies, charities, etc. All because you have framed the human person as a dependent with "needs," rather than as someone capable of creating and acting in the world.

 

Industrial communism is going to have many of the same premises as capitalism, such as "needs," without the built-in freedom such as "pursuit of happiness" as a "need."

 

I am not quite sure why you think that "needs" and "creating and acting in the world" are antithetical. A being without needs would be an inactive being, like the picture of the gods Plato paints in his dialogues who merely exist and contemplate, never acting in the world objectively. Surely it is need which is the catalyst of action.

 

sounds like my type of dude.

 

Of course, one could argue that inaction is a sort of action, and therefore that keeping out of politics does not absolve one of responsibility.

[Aloysius]

the most pertinent question is whether you believe in the right to individual private property ownership, including a man's individual right to own his own means of production where possible, as that's the most significant condemnation of socialism from Pope Leo XIII and Pope Pius XI.  Any philosophy that denies the right to private property ownership is an affront to the 7th commandment.  So my big question is, what do you think of Rerum Novarum (Leo XIII)?  Also, have you heard of Distributism, and if so what is your opinion of it?

[Era Might]

I am not quite sure why you think that "needs" and "creating and acting in the world" are antithetical. A being without needs would be an inactive being, like the picture of the gods Plato paints in his dialogues who merely exist and contemplate, never acting in the world objectively. Surely it is need which is the catalyst of action.

 

"Needs" are flexible concept. Literally speaking, we have very few "needs" to stay alive. Once you get beyond mere existence, then you get into the domain of things like happiness, vocation, community, culture, etc.These things shape, define, provide, etc. our needs. In capitalism, our "needs" become increasingly commercial. But, at the root of our capitalist system is the pursuit of happiness, and this leaves us flexibility to balance commercialism with the construction of needs that can have positive benefits (mass media, entrepreneurism, sports, etc). I do not see how this kind of pursuit of happiness, rooted in freedom and personality, is possible in industrial communism. I do not discount other forms of communism (such as in Indian societies), but modern industrial commuism is rooted in an entirely different world. It is a Western creation and forever a bitter foil to Western history...it has not rooted up organically as its own civilization, as among Indian peoples, for example. Any championing of Marxism has to deal not just with generic ideas of human society, but has to prove itself in the context of the West and modernity, because that is the world in which it was born and exists.

[John Ryan]

the most pertinent question is whether you believe in the right to individual private property ownership, including a man's individual right to own his own means of production where possible, as that's the most significant condemnation of socialism from Pope Leo XIII and Pope Pius XI.  Any philosophy that denies the right to private property ownership is an affront to the 7th commandment.  So my big question is, what do you think of Rerum Novarum (Leo XIII)?  Also, have you heard of Distributism, and if so what is your opinion of it?

 

I think, by definition, Communism is the belief in the abolition of private property and its negation in communal property. Yet, I do not believe this is an affront to the Seventh Commandment. While Marxists believe in personal property — books, a home, a dvd — they deny a right to privately possess the means of production. If you can show me where the Seventh Commandment references the right to ownership of the means of production, I would be more than glad to investigate it. I am not aware of any such discussion within the biblical literature. The Gospels appear to shun possession in favor of a life of poverty, and the only other reference to economics in the New Testament that I can recall at the moment is the primitive communism of the early Church in the Book of Acts. From a Marxian perspective your mistake is equating a universal law (thou shalt not steal) with its particular manifestation under a historical form. In a society where the means of production are communally owned, there is no theft on the part of the community. In capitalism it is theft, and that is why Communism is a revolution of the whole system. 

 

Distibutism is a philosophy I am not intimately familiar with, but I think it is a fruitful, though limited, critique of capitalism as a socio-economic system. The Vatican has always recognized the evils that capitalism fosters, but I think the philosophy is limited in so far as it is idyllic romanticism. It bears much resemblance to the Narodniki movement in Russia and the philosophy of Mahatma Ghandi. I do not believe a return to the idyllic past is the aim and neither is it very plausible. I think that Communism takes what is best from our conservative-traditionalist past and our liberal-capitalist past. 

 

"Needs" are flexible concept. Literally speaking, we have very few "needs" to stay alive. Once you get beyond mere existence, then you get into the domain of things like happiness, vocation, community, culture, etc.These things shape, define, provide, etc. our needs. In capitalism, our "needs" become increasingly commercial. But, at the root of our capitalist system is the pursuit of happiness, and this leaves us flexibility to balance commercialism with the construction of needs that can have positive benefits (mass media, entrepreneurism, sports, etc). I do not see how this kind of pursuit of happiness, rooted in freedom and personality, is possible in industrial communism. I do not discount other forms of communism (such as in Indian societies), but modern industrial commuism is rooted in an entirely different world. It is a Western creation and forever a bitter foil to Western history...it has not rooted up organically as its own civilization, as among Indian peoples, for example. Any championing of Marxism has to deal not just with generic ideas of human society, but has to prove itself in the context of the West and modernity, because that is the world in which it was born and exists.

 

(i.) Marx does not deny that needs should ubiquitously granted to the individual by society. He does not deny that certain needs are false. He calls the needs engendered by capitalism "crude" and "imaginary" needs, which he contrasts with human needs; (ii.) I am not sure where you are getting the idea that capitalism equals the pursuit of human happiness. Such is a proposition that I would strongly reject. Even Friedrich Hayek, the great Austrian economist — a man I greatly admire as a social philosopher — does not adhere to such romantic notions of capitalism; (iii.) I adamantly reject the idea that capitalism is a natural fit for Western civilization. It glosses over the very real conflicts both of the contemporary world and the past that capitalism had be crowned the victor within. Industrialization was a brutal and diabolical process that began with the dispossession of peasant farmers, who then made up an army of landless workers for the advantage of the urban bourgeoisie. History tells me, from my reading of it, that capitalism has only become "natural" and habituated from our perspective, because it won the brutal war. So you can claim that communism is not organic, but capitalism does not look any more organic. The word "organic" becomes pretty superfluous then.

[PhuturePriest]

Everything the Church says aside, my issue with Communism is this: If I'm a wealthy man and my neighbor is poor and in need of monetary assistance (Medical, food, clothing, etc.), it would be an act of charity for me to give him money to help him out. However, if the government takes money away from me and gives it to him, that is no longer an act of charity on my part. It takes away the ability to be charitable and give to others. It creates a dependence on the government, when our dependence should be upon God alone.