Deinocheirus - even though it’s a herbivore, I’m still pretty fucked.

Reminds me of Philomena Cunk

Popper is often celebrated by libs, but he is just a racist western chauvinist (like most of the libs themselves).

Here’s a quote from Domenico Losurdo’s book, War and Revolution:

An explicit rehabilitation of colonialism is ventured by the theoretician of the ‘open society’ himself. Popper seems to offer an unequivocally positive assessment of the centuries-long domination of the rest of humanity by the great European and Western powers: ‘We freed these states too quickly and too simplistically.’

Yes, to reach people we need to be where the people are, and nowadays a lot of people are online. Of course, this shouldn’t and can’t replace real life organizing, but it should supplement it.

From Roderic Day’s ‘The Virtual Factory’:

this doesn’t mean that the amount of time we spend online should be treated as something shameful, silly, or superficial. It absolutely deserves to be handled with greater seriousness and discipline.

(…)

There is no way to retreat into a pre-internet era. Instead of self-flagellating and guilt-tripping, pretending we can escape our wired future by unplugging, we need to take our participation in the medium seriously and in a way that integrates well with our offline organization.

I agree that the question is problematic, but he doesn’t challenge it. He answers as if the assumption of an abstract multipolarity is valid. I think he should’ve answered concretely, in accordance with today’s material reality.

Again, I don’t care about Shea, I’m not defending him, and I don’t care what he’s saying. I’m commenting on the interview in question.

I don’t take anything Shea says at face value. I’ve listened to the part of the interview in question and find Becker’s answers to be weird and contradictory. As I’ve explained in another comment, he answers the question “is it good that unipolarity has been challenged?” and his answer is in essence no because it seems like he just argues against some multipolarity in general without considering the material reality of today’s world split into the west and the rest (with China on top). His answer implies that today’s multipolarity is like that of pre-WW1 which is in contradiction with his stance in general.

He asks the question "How can we make radical change in America by saying ‘Vladimir Putin is our leader?’, which is a very salient point. He goes on to say that we should strive for socialist leadership in all of our countries. What is so off about that? Seriously?

Nothing is wrong with that in general, but who is he saying it to? Who are these people that only want multipolarity and simp for Putin? His call for socialism is good, but ignores the material reality of today’s world in which new socialist construction is not possible without first the decline of US hegemony.

I don’t like Shea and think he’s quite problematic, but your comment about what Kim is saying is, I think, not a good portrayal.

but just thinking about it for like 20 seconds, this obviously wouldn’t mean supporting reactionary states against the US for the pure sake of it. Would Kim il Sung have supported Hitler? Obviously not.

The USSR and China did ally with other capitalist and imperialist forces against Japan and Germany in WW2. And today’s world is largely split into two camps - the US and China. Critical support given to Russia (which while being reactionary still currently plays a progressive role globally in the struggle against US hegemony and is allied to the world’s socialist countries, though only out of necessity) is not the same as “supporting Hitler”. Putin and Russia today are not equivalent to Hitler and Nazi Germany.

As Losurdo puts it:

we can speak of a struggle against a new colonial counter-revolution. We can speak of a struggle between the imperialist and colonialist powers — principally the United States — on the one side, and on the other we have China and the third world. Russia is an integral part of this greater third world, because it was in danger of becoming a colony of the West.

I mean, he is still kind of saying that, no? He answers the question “is it good that unipolarity has been challenged?” and his answer is in essence no because it just seems like he argues against some multipolarity in general without considering the material reality of today’s world split into the west and the rest (with China on top). His answer implies that today’s multipolarity is like that of pre-WW1 which is in contradiction with his stance in general.

Multipolarity is coming simply as a part of the historical process of our development - just like feudalism emerged, then capitalism, then imperialism, etc. Empires also come and go and in their wake other countries rise - we have seen this numerous times throughout history. Yet it seems like these socialist anti-multipolarity people think we can stop these processes just by the actions of a few individuals or small groups. Not to mention the straw man argument presented where we apparently just want multipolar capitalism as an end goal and nothing else. Yes, all of us would prefer if every state just turned socialist right away, but that is not physically possible. We have to work with what we are given, and currently that’s multipolarity.

If that’s the case, then my point the he has the wrong syllogism still stands

I’m not arguing that the OP’s syllogism is perfectly constructed, I’m arguing against your critique of it because I don’t think it’s valid either.

Well, that’s debatable but it’s not the subject here. Consciousness being a part of material reality is more of a belief than a fact

This is plain Idealism, and it’s something that’s demonstrably, scientifically false. We as Marxists are dialectical materialist and reject Idealist interpretations of reality. That is the broader problem in your comment, which probably I should have stated directly in my first reply. Your base assumptions here lead you to argue from and for an idealist position which is not compatible with Marxism, and in many cases in general goes counter to reality.

whatever the answer is I think it’s totally irrelevant to the way we live and it’s just mental masturbation

This is also false. The philosophy we take as the basis of our entire worldview has large effects on how we live our lives, especially with regard to political theory and practice. This is the whole point of Marxism and the scientific communist movement. It’s the basis on which Marxism is uniquely differentiated from other political ideologies like Liberalism or Anarchism, and it’s the reason for it’s wide success both in theory and practice.

just the same way we placed white men above women and black people for a very long time

The reasons we did, and still do, these things are material and primarily stem from our material conditions in various historical situations. The reasons these are improving are because the oppressed classes are gaining ground through class struggle. The material reality is changing which is affecting the way our ideology changes, not the other way around. Societies don’t become less racist or sexist because they just decide it’s morally wrong, changes in the material conditions improve the social and economic standing of these groups which in turn enables the societal changes in what’s considered moral. This is achieved by the political struggle of these and related groups.

let’s not forget that we humans are emotional creatures first It’s no coincidence if every propaganda (even Marxist one) relies on emotional and not rational appeal

I would not agree that we are emotional creatures first, as that view disregards the material basis of our emotions. Our emotions are not disconnected from our material reality and we are not as irrational as you suppose. We are complex social beings and a multiplicity of factors go into forming our ideologies, however, the material conditions play a large and primary role, as is taught by Marxist theory, and demonstrated in Marxist practice. People do come to Marxism for moral reasons, but successful practice which results in long term material gain for the oppressed classes comes from a dialectical materialist understanding and analysis of concrete historical situations. The basis and substance of our movements is material, we don’t preach morality and focus on choices of individuals. Marxist propaganda, even if it incorporates emotional appeals, is still grounded in material analysis and is expressed as such.

the number of people who will be concerned for moral reasons by the exploitation of animals will grow exponentially

You cannot know what will happen in the future, especially once a communist society is achieved. In any case, this is not an argument that can affect our current reality.

since there is no material reason to support it

This is also patently not true, people that eat meat benefit from eating it, similarly how even the poor proletarians in the West still do benefit from the imperialism conducted by their countries. Of course, in the grand scheme of things, especially environmentally, our current modes of animal farming are unsustainable and destructive and need to be radically changed, but there are reasons that most people today still eat meat. No real change will come about from preaching to consumers about their individual choices, especially in the current system. We do benefit from exploiting animals as we receive food and other products fairly cheaply and abundantly, not to mention the economic benefits of the bourgeoisie which owns the meat industry. To effectively challenge and change this, we should focus on the production side with a concrete materialist analysis, and not form our strategy around the moral condemnation or praise of individual consumer choices. There is nothing wrong with being vegan for moral reasons, but it alone doesn’t inform practice and offer concrete practical solution to the problem of capitalist animal industry.

Nowadays, for example, we largely condemn antisemitism and have laws in place against it, however that wasn’t the case throughout even much of the 20th century. The USSR, at the time of its foundation, was the first country to effectively challenge antisemitism and its practices which were common throughout Europe at the time. Lenin and the other Bolshevik leaders made many speeches condemning it and educating the population, in addition with enacting laws against it. Their arguments were focused on the material basis of antisemitism, its roots and effects. The change in attitude in large sections of the entire Western population, not just that of the USSR, was ultimately the result of concrete policies and laws, and the spread of education to counter the material realities of antisemitism which was primarily done in the socialist world, but spread to the capitalist West in certain ways. Similar things happened with many other social aspects we now take for granted. With the current decline of material conditions in the West we see a resurgence of antisemitism, and especially sinophobia, which is a manifestation of the same phenomenon. The point is that it is very difficult, if not impossible to change peoples’ positions on issues which align with their material interests with moral arguments alone.

Well, calling that chauvinistic is needlessly aggressive, especially in the abscence of any kind of argumentation.

It’s not aggressive, I’m not calling it chauvinistic as a personal attack against you, it’s just my critique of your statement with, in fact, argumentation provided. Equating the positions of oppressed human groups with our treatment of animals and subsequently preaching, on equal ground, that all are absolutely bad is the definition of chauvinism, especially when those human groups are still oppressed with disastrous consequences in many situations. In my view this is sort of similar to the “all lives matter” arguments. Expanding on the argument - taking our western views and morality (which is largely influenced by our privileged material position in the world) and supposing that it’s the clearly correct solution everywhere and that everyone should abide by our standards is by definition chauvinistic. A widespread example are the excuses provided for the “human-rights” imperialism perpetrated by the West all over the world. Socialists are, of course, not a priori removed from this, as evidenced by conflicts between socialist states and the chauvinistic views taken in such cases by the stronger socialist powers in relation to the weaker ones, informed by national interests while ignoring the specificity of each country’s conditions. This again highlights the weakness and small scope by which the moral arguments against any such position are limited. If we instead use material analysis of concrete situations in their proper context, we can identify problems particular only to specific situations and find local solution to them. A one size fits all solution is not the answer, as demonstrated, for example, by the differences in socialist construction in different countries around the world.

I wouldn’t say anyone here is attacking the moral route to veganism, especially on an individual level, but I think we as Marxists shouldn’t rely on it. The materialist argument is much stronger and more widely applicable. Moral veganism can also turn into a form of chauvinism directed towards various societies, especially in the third world, which do consume some animal products but aren’t part of the capitalist meat industry and get all those products from animals they keep or hunt locally.

That to me forms a big distinction. On the one hand, denouncing all animal products as bad and, on the other, focusing the problem on the capitalist meat/animal industry. The moral argument doesn’t lead to useful practice because it implies problems in individual choices of consumption and not systemic issues stemming from the production side. Many of us do come to communism for moral reasons initially but then we learn the proper materialist arguments for it which turn communism from utopian to scientific and inform practice.

While I don’t agree fully with the original post, and especially with how it’s worded around what is “natural” I don’t agree with your line of argument here.

Not every human is equal

When we say everyone is equal, we mean that everyone should enjoy equal rights and responsibilities, not that everyone is identical. Marxism definitely recognizes and takes into account that every individual person is different.

intrinsic value of animal lives

What is the intrinsic value of any life? All of these concepts are socially and historically constructed and not absolute.

Your syllogism is focused on the physical form of the individuals, but that’s not what we think about.

The ability to feel or think is directly connected to and stems from the physical form. Consciousness is a part of our material reality and our physical bodies, our thoughts and feelings are not separate from it. We know, and are still learning, what and how different other species feel or think, but our human societies, while we are a product of nature, have reached a more complex level of social and historical relations in which we must operate in order to address these issues. We do place humans above other species, for better or worse, and that is not a relation that can change easily, if at all.

Our moral perspective posits that inflicting intentional harm on sentient beings purely for our pleasure is ethically wrong.

It is immoral to cause unnecessary suffering to sentient beings

The point is to move away from a moral argument, just how our critique of capitalism and similar systems is not primarily a moral one. Morality is, again, socially and historically constructed. People laughed and cheered at public executions in Europe in the 19th century. I do agree that the reduction of meat consumption in the west would be a good thing, and it’s good for any individual that is able to make that choice and does so, but a moral argument fails where a Marxist one is much stronger. We should strive to drastically change the west’s meat industry but that will not happen by individual choices made by consumers. Suggesting that people eating meat is a moral failing of the individual will not lead to anything. Systemic change is necessary which we will probably not see under capitalism, but the argument to be made for radical changes to our meat industry is much stronger when it comes from an environmental position, or a more general position of worker exploitation in the meat industry - an argument which can be applied universally without condemning any specific cultures or societies which consume and use animal products sustainably, and not a moral one which cannot be universalized. The only way widespread changes in human diet occur, and subsequently changes in our relations to these animals, is through changes to the mode of production in our meat industry. We know that any such radical changes do not come about from individual consumer action, but from organized class struggle and ultimately changes on the side of production.

I think that as leftists, we should strive to abolish any kind of ideology that preaches the unjust discrimination and exploitation of others based on their physical attributes, whether it be speciesism, carnism, racism, sexism, ableism, and so on…

Equating racism, sexism, ableism, etc. with human treatment of animals is quite chauvinistic and fails to take into account the material basis for any of these phenomena. Just preaching that these things are wrong doesn’t do anything. What can help is proper education which includes an analysis of the material conditions that brought about these phenomena and ultimately no real change can happen in these areas until the material conditions which cause them are changed.

You cannot just compare as 1:1 the societal relations during a revolution and the human consumption of meat. We do not kill and eat animals because we think they pose a danger to us. As the original post says, our relations to other species are defined socially and largely determined by our material reality - consider the difference of pets, working animals or food animals, or even non-animal species. Again, these relations are different in different human societies.

For millions of years humans have eaten other animals and plants. For most of history humans didn’t moralize about this, they just did what they had to to survive and ate what they could get their hands on. As our societies developed, and we started practicing agriculture, our diets changed and most people ate a largely more uniform plant-based diet. In modern times the meat industry developed to a massive extent under capitalism. Most people today eat meat simply because it is there and accessible, and importantly, good alternatives are not present everywhere. Diets are also not uniform in today’s world and we shouldn’t take a western-centric view and abstract it onto every society on the planet.

Any such individual choices, as we know, don’t have impact on the system and communists certainly don’t preach about individual morality. If our material conditions change and we develop in a way that reduces the meat industry (which can probably only happen in a socialist society) our diets will change along with it and because of it - even our societal moral relations to these animals might change with this. However, we cannot force these changes in reverse order due to moral considerations. Not to mention that more humane and sustainable farming practices would be much easier to implement under socialism with the priority of the food industry being to feed people and not to make a profit.

We as Marxists can certainly be vegetarian or vegan, but preaching veganism as a moral good is not compatible with Marxism, and the idealistic, liberal ideology and political movements of veganism - which just presuppose any use of animal products in the abstract as moral wrongs and are thus quite chauvinistic in their expression - are not compatible with Marxism. We don’t want to impose these concepts onto people from above and plenty of human societies consume and have consumed meat in environmentally sustainable ways. The problems here are those of agricultural and industrial practices which are problems due to capitalism, and not due to eating meat or using animal products as such.

Classes describe concrete socio-economic relations in human society. We can’t just add or remove them as we please or apply them to any concept or relation in general.

I’m glad you found my comment helpful!

why it seemed like Stalin is exalted while nobody mentions Fidel when (due to bad and/or misinformed information) Stalin seemed like a more brutal…dictator?

This comes from the fact that the USSR was a lot more powerful than Cuba (and every other socialist state that existed then) and could thus much more effectively, and on a much greater scale repel western imperialism and colonialism - the clearest example of this is the USSR’s victory in World War 2. In the West, a lot more propaganda and effort to demonize was directed towards the USSR, and Stalin in particular as he sort of embodied the greatest victories of the Soviets. You can also see a similar dynamic with how the broader left in the West tends to like Che Guevara (who represents revolution but died young and can be idealized as a handsome, charismatic rebel) while in comparison demonizing Castro (who successfully lead a socialist country permanently blockaded and threatened by the US).

After the war, mainstream liberal philosophy and history, instead of promoting actual material analysis, proceeded to paint a picture of WW2 (and the Soviet Union in general) that didn’t correspond to facts. The US wasn’t instrumental in the defeat of Nazi Germany, and wasn’t even ideologically opposed to it. It joined the war to protect its imperial interests which could be threatened by the rise of German (and Japanese) imperialism - this is only one part of the whole war. A second, key part of WW2 was the anticolonial war fought by the USSR and China (and Korea) against the colonial invasions by Germany and Japan. To obfuscate this reality, liberal theory often falls back on concepts like totalitarianism which seeks to falsely equate Nazi Germany and the USSR, and subsequently also Hitler and Stalin. This concept is flawed in many ways and, as we know, Nazi Germany and the USSR were polar opposites. Any similarities between the two could also be found in the “liberal” countries at the time.

Still to this day in the West there exists a sort of knee jerk reaction to Stalin and the need to quickly denounce him as nothing but bad which is a result of the propaganda I’ve described and also a way to try and demonize present day communist movements by associating them with Stalin. Both of these are erroneous and done in bad faith, as you can see from the articles I’ve linked.

Unfortunately, I think most of the libs will just go along with whatever the mainstream view becomes, regardless of contradictions. Not like they really care about any of this anyway.

I think it’ll be almost impossible to get right numbers because of the secrecy the USSR had

We have perfectly fine accuracy regarding the numbers for most things in the USSR. In the 90s, the USSR archives were open to researchers from across the world and many propagandized narratives about the USSR were promptly shown to be false, at least in serious academic circles.

I believe we can find better communist leaders that didn’t kill at least 700,000 of his political opponents to maintain power

Firstly, Stalin didn’t do any of this on his own and neither did any other communist leader. Secondly, around 700 000 people were executed in the entire ~30 years Stalin was the leader, not just during the purges. Thirdly, he didn’t “just do this to maintain power”. Our job is not “to find better communist leaders” from the past. It’s to accurately analyze concrete historical situations, the material reality in its social and historical context and learn from that analysis as much as we can - both the good and the bad. However, ceding any ground to baseless anticommunist propaganda does not benefit us at all. No one is going around saying Stalin was flawless but any nuanced discussion is impossible in mainstream spaces.

Jackson School of International Studies

This doesn’t mean much at all. It’s a liberal institution connected to a university in the US. It cites the CIA world fact book as a good source and even mentions The Gulag Archipelago in a positive, uncritical light. Not to mention all your other sources which include wikipedia and the history channel website which cites Business Insider articles and Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty all of which serve as explicitly anticommunist propaganda.

I think we have different people in history that set a much better example, like Fidel Castro for one.

You cannot just pick and choose who you like and don’t like from history. You have to study all of it fairly. The situation in Cuba from the 50s onward is not the same as in the USSR around WW2. We aren’t looking for good examples to blindly follow form the past. We are looking to learn, based on their specific examples, how to in general better analyze and approach our situation today. We cannot just replicate any past socialist strategy, we have to formulate our own that is specific to our current circumstances.

I would recommend you read Blackshirts and Reds by Michael Parenti or Stalin: History and Critique of A Black Legend by Domenico Losurdo to better understand the history and historiography concerned with past and current socialist states, and Stalin in particular.

Pretty much all of lemmy outside lemmygrad is a lib space, especially now after the influx of reddit users. Lemmy.ml admins for example are Marxists but the majority of the users are just libs.

Of course. My analysis is nowhere near comprehensive but I just think we don’t know enough yet to really go further without heavy speculation.

They might but at least right now that doesn’t seem like the main trigger for this event.