#1001

tpaine posted:

blinkandwheeze posted:

babyhueypnewton posted:

For example, the overwhelming tendendy of the western left today is to focus on liberal issues as sites of independent struggle which don't "go away" with socialism. The obsessive focus on lgbt rights in cuba should show that an obsession with practical politics is the opposite of utopianism: it is the abandonment entirely of the idea that socialism is an entirely new society which is necessarily more advanced than the capitalist world in culture.

i don't really understand what you're saying here. maoism quite clearly asserts that the cultural conditions of this new society do not come merely as givens but require the programmatic and conscious intervention of the masses to assert. lgbt rights or similar social concerns do not "go away" an require particular intervention as independent struggles even if their material basis is tied to broader systems. this was the basis for a great deal of social campaigns carried out during the cultural revolution, feudal and patriarchal attitudes were still pervasive throughout this new society which is why things like the Criticise Confucius campaign were mobilised

yeah i know. feudal and patriarchal attitudes persisted under socialism.... it was super fucked up.

#1002

blinkandwheeze posted:

babyhueypnewton posted:

For example, the overwhelming tendendy of the western left today is to focus on liberal issues as sites of independent struggle which don't "go away" with socialism. The obsessive focus on lgbt rights in cuba should show that an obsession with practical politics is the opposite of utopianism: it is the abandonment entirely of the idea that socialism is an entirely new society which is necessarily more advanced than the capitalist world in culture.

i don't really understand what you're saying here. maoism quite clearly asserts that the cultural conditions of this new society do not come merely as givens but require the programmatic and conscious intervention of the masses to assert. lgbt rights or similar social concerns do not "go away" an require particular intervention as independent struggles even if their material basis is tied to broader systems. this was the basis for a great deal of social campaigns carried out during the cultural revolution, feudal and patriarchal attitudes were still pervasive throughout this new society which is why things like the Criticise Confucius campaign were mobilised



Well getfiscal was talking about the dissident fiction of maoism in the west so im trying to speak on those terms. I'm more interested in the discursive role of the lgbt struggle in cuba for western leftists than the reality of the struggle in China or in the west. Of course you could criticize the maoist movement of the 70s for backwards attitudes towards such questions but i am more interested in the reasons behind these positions rather than the positions themselves. Specifically the change from china leading all cultural questions to being subordinate to american cultural struggles. Though tbh i take a kind of Saidian/queer postmodern view of the question and presume that such questions aren't really answerable outside of local and discursive conditions which has been a way to avoid the toxicity of the debate in actual political practice.

#1003

babyhueypnewton posted:

i take a kind of postmodern view of the question

BPHN... you gave me grief for so long about this... welcome....

#1004

babyhueypnewton posted:

Well getfiscal was talking about the dissident fiction of maoism in the west so im trying to speak on those terms. I'm more interested in the discursive role of the lgbt struggle in cuba for western leftists than the reality of the struggle in China or in the west.



right but there's no reason you're providing as to why your criticisms wouldn't equally apply to the efforts of the party in the cultural revolution or whatever. only the most ultraleft elements of actually existing socialism subscribe to the kind of utopianism you're talking about so i don't really see the value of this as a meaningful heuristic

if we're talking about why trotskyites are inordinately obsessed with practical politics post-revolution, i don't think they actually are, as a general principle. invoking lgbt rights in cuba has more to do with winning a rhetorical battle against an already designated enemy than a real substantial positions or approach. trotskyites will just as readily believe that these issues will be eliminated by the upcoming internationalist revolution when it suits them. and in practice they are notorious for sidelining these concerns when they are relevant, as in the multiple scandals we have seen in uk trotskyite parties of burying allegations of sexual violence

#1005
I keep deleting what i post. All I'll say is the discussion on such issues on the left has been exceedingly poor and leftists have basically capitulated to identity politics because it's easier. The amount of times the NCM is attacked over its stance on homosexuality or the ussr is dismissed as a "product of its time" tells me that everyone is afraid of seriously confronting the relationship between culture and production and the theoretical implications of core/periphery being basically reversed on cultural progressiveness beyond holding up fetishized third world groups that fit into preconceived categories.
#1006

Constantignoble posted:

what are some good references for this stuff? has anyone ever published something like a comprehensive (or at least reliable) genealogy of leftist sects, or is this more something one picks up in drips and drabs from a hundred different books over years





us anti-revisionist chart, 1956-1977

#1007

pogfan1996 posted:

Constantignoble posted:

what are some good references for this stuff? has anyone ever published something like a comprehensive (or at least reliable) genealogy of leftist sects, or is this more something one picks up in drips and drabs from a hundred different books over years



us anti-revisionist chart, 1956-1977



The whole reason i thought of this was because i was reading this interview:

https://www.marxists.org/history/erol/ncm-7/2-veterans.htm

And got to the part about the"personal is political" wrt sexuality. Obviously these are just two random people and i don't expect a theoretical explorations of what that concept means for the theoretical edifice of marxism but the lessons of the ncm seem to be "we were wrong and now we are right" which is so unhelpful and smug from people who should be informing us. i didn't wanna post it in your thread because we haven't even made it to the anti-busing protests of the RU (something which i also think is a symptom people can point to and feel superior rather than something significant) but reading about the NCM has made me realize i no one has a clue what to get out of it and no one is interested either. But that probably doesn't belong in this thread so ill move it there if the convo continues.

#1008
The P in bhpn now stands for "Pomo"
#1009

pogfan1996 posted:

The P in bhpn now stands for "Pomo"



You know when i made this account originally i genuinely didn't know Huey Newton didn't like the nickname "baby" bc that was like 8+ years ago and i was retarded and just thoughts of an "lf" name. I actually think it was blinkandwheeze who pointed it out to me a few years ago and boy was my face red. But now everyone knows me by this name so i can't change it otherwise i would be minihueypnewton or hueypnewton 2.0. anyway that's my life.

#1010
Those alternate names are terrible. count your blessings. I just thought you were into baby stuff ie. baby ducktales, muppet babies
#1011

babyhueypnewton posted:

pogfan1996 posted:

Constantignoble posted:

what are some good references for this stuff? has anyone ever published something like a comprehensive (or at least reliable) genealogy of leftist sects, or is this more something one picks up in drips and drabs from a hundred different books over years



us anti-revisionist chart, 1956-1977

The whole reason i thought of this was because i was reading this interview:

https://www.marxists.org/history/erol/ncm-7/2-veterans.htm

And got to the part about the"personal is political" wrt sexuality. Obviously these are just two random people and i don't expect a theoretical explorations of what that concept means for the theoretical edifice of marxism but the lessons of the ncm seem to be "we were wrong and now we are right" which is so unhelpful and smug from people who should be informing us. i didn't wanna post it in your thread because we haven't even made it to the anti-busing protests of the RU (something which i also think is a symptom people can point to and feel superior rather than something significant) but reading about the NCM has made me realize i no one has a clue what to get out of it and no one is interested either. But that probably doesn't belong in this thread so ill move it there if the convo continues.



the perspectives of ex-Sojourner Truth org members is also interesting, moreso in the sense that a lot of these former members havent really engaged with the question of why the organization failed

http://insurgentnotes.com/2012/10/symposium-truth-and-revolution/

in any case, i would be happy with more collaboration/discussion in the NCM thread

#1012

c_man posted:

babyhueypnewton posted:

You can claim Mao-against-Mao while no one can claim Trotsky-against-Trotsky

this is interesting because ever now and then i see non-Trotskyist MLs talk about rescuing Trotsky from his supporters, who (apparently?) often take lines that Trotsky himself would have disavowed, which makes me think that some modern Trotskyists are actually doing this, but in the opposite direction, using Trotsky against Trotsky to work against a more functional anti-imperialist politics. I don't know much about it though but maybe some of that sounds familiar to you.



i love posting this at the ISO

#1013

roseweird posted:

fape posted:

Woudl be good to delete the last page or so of off topic posts.

if i knew how to do this i would


i like how, in classic rhizzone fashion, this was immediately followed with another solid couple of pages of commie trainspotting

#1014
Russian ambassador in turkey got shot,
#1015
he's dead
#1016
rip
#1017
rip, to those that died
#1018
dude was yelling about aleppo and all before pulling the trigger. fake news smdh
#1019
jesus christ


Edited by Flying_horse_in_saudi_arabia ()

#1020
rip
#1021
turks immediately jack ruby'd him
#1022
Right, the ambassador conveniently dies in the ambulance, after having survived all the way over there... I smell Putin's rubles at work
#1023
murked by the turk: a star wars story
#1024
http://21stcenturywire.com/2016/12/16/reports-at-least-10-nato-military-officers-captured-by-syrian-special-forces-this-morning-in-east-aleppo-bunker/

#1025

swampman posted:

http://21stcenturywire.com/2016/12/16/reports-at-least-10-nato-military-officers-captured-by-syrian-special-forces-this-morning-in-east-aleppo-bunker/



they'll never be the head of a major corporation

#1026

swampman posted:

http://21stcenturywire.com/2016/12/16/reports-at-least-10-nato-military-officers-captured-by-syrian-special-forces-this-morning-in-east-aleppo-bunker/



I was so excited when i saw this on the sidebar:

http://21stcenturywire.com/2016/12/17/neo-cons-are-trotskyites-how-the-system-perpetuates-faux-democracy-vid/

But sadly it's by a crazy person who's most recent article is "The Goonies IS About the Illuminati (And It’s a Rube Goldberg Machine)" though to be fair it makes a pretty strong case:

Aside from bizarre phallic references like the “Copper Bone” key that happens to look like a penis, “One Eyed Willy” (a reference to the Masonic secret) Goonies is a film about the “hidden history” of Astoria, a city built upon the wealth of a Masonic mafia family who eventually became “respectable.” The Sicilian mafia (the Fratellis) are displaced, giving way to a new family of dons who actually are part of the real Illuminati according to Dr. Carroll Quigley, the Cliveden Set and the Royal Society. The “secret” the Goonies discover is that their hallowed town was founded by goons – pirates and scallywag members of secret societies who made their name through the opium trade. The rise and fall of various dynasties (mafia families) is merely a determined cause-effect relationship, like a big, historical Rube Goldberg Machine.



This must have been what it was like to be against the lies about the iraq war when they were still fresh. What a crazy world we live in where basic facts are so hidden you have to ally with crazies (or maybe knowing these facts without the immortal science of marxism leninism drives you crazy?)

#1027
Well it may be a little radiolab of me to say, but any honest conception of mental illness has to come from the starting point that capitalism is either the major or sole contributing factor. It's not that people won't have say, manic episodes under socialist government, just that the solutions will actually be effective because they won't have to turn a profit or fear community involvement.
#1028
[account deactivated]
#1029
To be fair, this is a good criticism of the ISO. If you're going to support the foreign invasion of Syria you might as well go all the way with it

http://muftah.org/leftists-rather-right-principled-syria/#.WFh8TdBOKhD

Still, even the ISO appears to be trapped by some of the same mentalities plaguing other far left groups. A piece by Ashley Smith in the Socialist Worker is a good example of this. It opens strongly, quoting extensively from Burning Country, but then goes on to say that because Saudi Arabia and Qatar want to arm the rebels, and because these countries are never going to defy the United States, the Syrian rebels must forget about them and look to the international working class for help—a privileged suggestion that seems very detached from reality.

The ISO also has continued to support PKK/YPG attacks on Turkey, which weaken its ability to support the Syrian revolution against Assad. The ISO blindly treats Turkey as a wholly bad actor in Syria (and in many ways, it surely is bad), even though the country has helped the FSA retake nearly 400 square miles around Jarablus. The ISO insists that Jabhat Fateh Al-Sham, formerly Jabhat Al-Nusra, and even Ahrar Al-Sham, are as reactionary as the regime.

Many Syrians, however, view these groups as preferable to the Assad government, even though they do not ultimately want to be ruled by them. Unlike the ISO, Syrians refuse to fall into the trap of treating rebel factions as legitimate targets, particularly after their success in helping temporarily break the siege of Aleppo in August 2016.
#1030
To be fair,
#1031
[account deactivated]
#1032

pogfan1996 posted:

Many Syrians, however, view these groups as preferable to the Assad government, even though they do not ultimately want to be ruled by them. Unlike the ISO, Syrians refuse to fall into the trap of treating rebel factions as legitimate targets, particularly after their success in helping temporarily break the siege of Aleppo in August 2016.


#1033
take it easy, turkey
#1034

pogfan1996 posted:

http://muftah.org/leftists-rather-right-principled-syria/#.WFh8TdBOKhD



When the popular uprising against President Bashar Al-Assad broke out in 2011, I had the good fortune of reading the writing of my Syrian friend of twenty years, Robin Yassin-Kassab—co-author of the book Burning Country. From the beginning, and partly through the valuable insights of Syrians like Robin, I could see the direction that both pro-revolution and anti-revolution narratives were taking.

To put it simply, the Syrians who rose up against Assad saw their struggle as a simple one for freedom and dignity, while their enemies presented it as complicated by neighboring states that had purportedly reduced the revolution to an armed proxy war.



#1035
hi folks just have to say something here for a second. meghan wren. rhizzone. sam harris fraud. bigmastadon. papal porno. civilization is crumbling. eldridge cleaver pants. hackers are scum. load bearing drywall grover. riley kilo marshmallow. stylish but illegal monkey. thanks and don't mind me just *Keven tears out of ifap restraints & attacks chadwick boseman*
#1036
tfw you can't decide whether its ironic cool or regular cool that kustom kolors krew can't read pogman's giant graphic unless they dissociate themselves with a leftist group by logging off
#1037
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/aleppo-fake-footage-children-five-peopele-arrested-egyptian-police-a7486541.html
#1038

swampman posted:

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/aleppo-fake-footage-children-five-peopele-arrested-egyptian-police-a7486541.html



"that's our al-qaeda: getting people involved, encouraging creativity,"

#1039
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/world/don-cry-russia-slain-envoy-putin-lackey-article-1.2917281

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/world/vladimir-putin-demanding-apology-article-1.2919090
#1040
Gersh Kuntzman