#1
Occupied Aztlan
Post rating: +
given sunkara's background with the org and this

"The magazine is not going to defend Stalin's collectivizations or Mao's Great Leap Forward or really any other aspect of "actually existing communism," but other than that, Jacobin is pretty welcoming. It's a place where social democrats and democratic socialists and Trotskyists and council communists and Chavistas and even the odd liberal can coexist."

http://www.vox.com/2016/3/21/11265092/jacobin-bhaskar-sunkara
#2
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Note: This article was initially solicited by Jacobin magazine. The first version, by Stephanie McMillan, can be read here. The current version is co-authored — Vincent Kelley of Grinnell College joined the project to add his perspective and to help revise it according to the Jacobin editor’s requests. We attempted to do so without diluting the content. Their requests included making the language less informal and more “academic,” and culminated in what we both interpret as blatant attempts to erase the working class from its content (the editor disagrees). When we refused to remove what we felt was our central point, Jacobin decided not to run the piece.

http://www.counterpunch.org/2015/10/20/the-useful-altruists-how-ngos-serve-capitalism-and-imperialism/

Edited by marimite ()

#3
[account deactivated]
#4
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Wasn't discipline collecting stories on them? I've seen a lot of shit on twitter, if it was gathered together you could get some great hit pieces out of it.

Think this was the only good thing I read there:
https://www.jacobinmag.com/2015/08/syria-civil-war-nato-military-intervention/

Remember someone saying that the editors sat on it for year. Probably some good stuff in there for the stickied Syria thread actually.
#5
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Jacobin was effective in getting left liberals to self organise into washing groups last year.
I joined my local one, to my shame... But that said it was positive to have many non aligned socialist leaning young people meet up together.

Is there a list of their editors?
Might be useful for mocking and making them accountable
#6
Mike Nelson here.
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If you don't like Jacobin, make a magazine of better quality! Don't hate, publish!
#7
"Jpg." - Hank Hill
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jacobin seems pretty good, OP.
#8
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i knew it was a fuckin bunk shit rag when they refused to run my lego movie piece. called it years ago folks
#9
UNUSUALY COOL
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Urbandale posted:

even the odd liberal

#10
UNUSUALY COOL
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i understand sunkara's lifetime goal to be 5% representation in the house for the dsa so you tell me op.
#11
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say what you will about The Odd Liberal but his blog has some pretty great stuff on it sometimes
#12
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cars posted:

i understand sunkara's lifetime goal to be 5% representation in the house for the dsa so you tell me op.



inspiring to see such monumental and optimistic goals on the left

#13
Mike Nelson here.
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I like the DSA because I like movement, and I'd rather reformists in the US organize openly around social-democracy than be submerged into bourgeois ruling parties, and the only way you'll get that is by pressuring the labour organizations to defend the working class instead of boss logic. Also because it's the USA, which hasn't had a strong labour party, the DSA can feign a sort of outsider quality reasonably well, which leads to a sort of "it's all good" approach to most people who work with them on issues. Like in most countries the equivalent of the DSA is run by people like the Clintons. I mean... the DSA was excited about the PS win with Hollande in France.
#14
[account deactivated]
#15
Mike Nelson here.
Post rating: -
i meant that... it retains its independent organizational form... such that it doesn't operate directly as loose members of the democrats. like they hold their own meetings and have their own structure. which might seem superfluous since they tail the democrats, but i don't think it is. it seems useful here to remember that the majority of the people they are organizing probably strongly agree with this as well, like they see the democrats as the lesser evil and see potential for organizing within them, especially sections of the rank-and-file labour movement, while maintaining some organizational independence. that seems to be my limited experience with the equivalent in canada, too, in that most reformist labour activsts see the NDP as a blairite mess, but think that most of the 'natural' membership would vote for a left-wing leader if given the right circumstances.
#16
[account deactivated]
#17
[account deactivated]
#18
Mike Nelson here.
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good post
#19
Mike Nelson here.
Post rating: +++++
I had tried to get them to break, didn't work:

#20
Mike Nelson here.
Post rating: +
I have a lot of jumbled thoughts about the Sanders campaign that sort of relate to the other stuff above. One thing is that people talk a lot about how Trump punctured the commonsensical notions that the punditry assumed all candidates would have to adhere to. Like he openly insults John McCain, and the lesson is that the punditry sort of created all these rules of politeness in their own little world which actually don't apply to most Americans. But then the idea is that Sanders did the same thing by saying he was a "democratic socialist" - and "13 million people voted for a socialist". And a lot of people I respect have said this is an unexpected, wonderful thing. But it is treated as a parallel event instead of a bursting of the same bubble.

Like, the point is that Democrats can run as socialists and still appeal to people, but who didn't believe that was possible? It was a small number of pundits and politicians. So winning "13 million" for a socialist is only remarkable if you don't think a majority (of at least the working class) could be quickly won over to socialism (holding aside any debates about the white working class, which they don't believe). And trying to "remake" the Democratic Party only makes sense if you think it's nearly impossible to win people to socialism and that you need to fight this guerrilla battle inside institutions that are openly hostile to you in order to get the "credibility" to run a socialist campaign. It's like you adopt most of the logic of the bourgeois politicians in order to win at their game.
#21
Mike Nelson here.
Post rating: +
The other, more general point is that both Sanders and Corbyn operate within the bourgeois horizon that essentially assumes the existing framework (the persistence of existing representative institutions and the existence of a normal central bank etc), and then just leans on them hard in favour of expansion of programs and jobs. Which is classic reformism, basically a minimum program (which never meant minimum as in negligible), where you basically negate austerity by superheating the economy and hoping it all works out. And the 'counterattack' is dealt with entirely with administrative regulation - make the banks smaller, nationalize a handful of key sectors, etc. Which is bizarre to me because it is classical Labourite reformism as well and has specific demonstrable results in history. But presumably people like Corbyn and Sanders are well aware of the key points in that history, so why are they proposing nearly identical programs? Which bakes my noodle, because is Marxism so correct that it traps everyone in these weird time loops? How will Data know to decompress the shuttle bay in time to save us?
#22
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Yeah history doesn't enter into any discussions in this campaign. Even on the left. I went to this awful panel discussion between dsa people and sa and nobody bothered to discuss the actual structure or history of the Democratic Party. It was all just assertions that we either should or shouldn't work in the party based on morality or highly technical rule bullshit
#23
Dont Mess With Sucess
Post rating: +++++
I went to a DSA event last fall at Verso Books where Sunkara advised a room full of self-described Socialists that they should get behind Bernie Sanders because he was going to change the Democratic Party from within and force the word "socialism" into the mouths of Clintons. The dissenting opinions in the room were that Sanders is another warhawk and a good speech from a WWP rep about the Democratic Party being much more likely to be manipulating and chiseling at the Sanders socialist movement than the other way around, but these were all from the audience in the question/comment section in the middle. Sunkara and the other speakers did not address Sanders' past, or any past or future event outside of the recent history of third-party maneuvering in bourgeois Amerikkkan "elections". Fuck the inbred chickenlice DSA pissshillers and their ahistorical nonmaterialist fucked analysis cum asssmoking

Edited by swampman ()

#24
UNUSUALY COOL
Post rating: ~

getfiscal posted:

But presumably people like Corbyn and Sanders are well aware of the key points in that history, so why are they proposing nearly identical programs?



bad faith?

#25
Occupied Aztlan
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.
#26
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So what should eg corbyn do/be proposing that's different this time?

Is direct council build of mass social housing as a solution to the housing crisis doomed to failure, for example?
#27
Mike Nelson here.
Post rating: +

xipe posted:

So what should eg corbyn do/be proposing that's different this time?

Is direct council build of mass social housing as a solution to the housing crisis doomed to failure, for example?

Well social housing is addressing one problem in one sector, but the problems are interrelated through the overall economy. Presently the entire economy is structured around the level of profit an investor can make on real estate deals and such, if you radically reduce the profitability of an industry then you'll collapse investment into it, that's the boss logic that is built into the system which makes intervening in each sector difficult. The only way to avoid that trap is to leap away from a system based on profit-seeking overall, so that there is no hostage-taking by capitalists. Otherwise it would end up exactly where earlier Labour governments have been, where they try to manage a crisis by imposing wage controls and austerity contracts and such. This isn't to say things wouldn't be much improved in some key ways, the point is that the logic has a point where it unravels and its at that point that you get another Thatcher who will "decisively" restore profitability to enterprises.

#28
ive gender
Post rating: +
Aping glomper's long post, DSA and Sunkara have had a serious opportunity for months now--to attempt to turn flagging Sander's support into something like the beginnings of an actual socialist base but there's been no activity. In fact you even hear Sunkara himself saying he'll vote for Jill Stein. this is bourgeois absurdity, she's not a Marxist candidate by any means, she's not even a "democratic socialist" in name. DSA and the Jacobin editorial board are fine watching this shitty faux left false consciousness take an even deeper hold because they're (no shit) not actually revolutionary. As far as I know, Jacobin hasn't published an article or made a single tweet about the PSL, god forbid WWP, this entire election cycle. At a time when the need for socialism in America finally seems within the overton window, the so called socialists seem to be doing all within their power to prevent this.

also uh the "would-be-base" is shitty or whatever and doesn't care about socialism which is why they're suddenly in line with stein's anti vax nonsense
#29
UNUSUALY COOL
Post rating: +

herbsaint posted:

As far as I know, Jacobin hasn't published an article or made a single tweet about the PSL, god forbid WWP, this entire election cycle.



thats fucked up.

#30
ive gender
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cars posted:

herbsaint posted:

As far as I know, Jacobin hasn't published an article or made a single tweet about the PSL, god forbid WWP, this entire election cycle.

thats fucked up.



its real jacked up if u ask me, they should at least mention those folks

#31
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getfiscal posted:

But it is treated as a parallel event instead of a bursting of the same bubble.


interestingly, hillary boosters compared sanders to trump pretty regularly, and suggested that they were basically part of the same process

#32
hi
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Edited by drwhat ()

#33
[account deactivated]
#34
UNUSUALY COOL
Post rating: ~

cars posted:

getfiscal posted:

But presumably people like Corbyn and Sanders are well aware of the key points in that history, so why are they proposing nearly identical programs?

bad faith?



no love for the correct & simplest answer, i guess rhizzone is with jez.

#35
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herbsaint posted:

At a time when the need for socialism in America finally seems within the overton window,


Please don't use this term. It legitimises think tank bullshit

#36
Dont Mess With Sucess
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#37
[account deactivated]
#38
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This absolute dicksmack I know who is really proud about being a trot was interviewed for Jacobin recently lmao
#39
hi
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2010 but still lol

https://twitter.com/sunraysunray/status/17159869623

EDIT: https://archive.is/GzCzG

Edited by HenryKrinkle ()

#40
Dont Mess With Sucess
Post rating: ~

HenryKrinkle posted:

2010 but still lol

https://twitter.com/sunraysunray/status/17159869623

EDIT: https://archive.is/GzCzG

hahahahaha