The Daily Mail

[MinDonner]

Something's going on here. Either those Marxists were woefully misinformed about what Marxism actually involves, or you are. If only we knew which one it was!

[Galactus]

Determinedly Marxist agenda? Comfiscation of all private property by the state, submuation of all religious and cultural practices to the state, the banning of private enterprise and so on and on. Something I've missed? Marxism presents itself as a humanistic alternative to capitalism, in practice the transformation is so utterly radical, utopianist and so against human nature that the only way of making a population coooperate is through violence.

Have you actually read the comunist manifesto?

More generally, you seem to have some odd definitions of the various terms. Let me take a few of them

Marxism: Is a a really wide term. It applies to more or less everyone who self-consciously consider themselves intellectually influenced by Karl Marx. This includes some social democrats, communists, left-communists like trotskyites, and arguably some syndicalists (although they crossover rather heavily with anarchists, who were in direct opposition to Marx) note that being "a marxist" doesen't neccessarily mean you take Marx at face-value, most social-democrats are revisionists who argued that Marx's predictions had not played out by the late 19th/early 20th century and that revisions in both tactis and analysis were thus needed. Revisionists are still marxsts, in the same sense that modern evolutionary theories are still "darwinist".

Note that not all social democrats are marxists. Some come from other directions and non-marxist forms of socialism, some are social liberals, some are christian socialists, etc. etc. The same is true of the far-extreme left (anarchists, syndicalists, etc.)

Communism is tricky. It's *usually* synonymous with marxism-leninism (IE: the strain of marxism promoted by Lenin, that become the foundational Soviet ideology) and Maoism (which was in some ways a critique of and a further development of marxism-leninism) it's not always the case though, prior to 1917 it was simply a synonym for "socialist" and thus encompassed a wide variety of groups, and not all of them switched names. There was also a tendency for communist parties to splinter, for various reasons (either as a result of simple internal politics, or due to external events. Usually this involves the splinter-group and their former ally decrying each other as (essentially) false prophets. 1917 itself caused a wave of such splinterings. There was awave earlier that more or less separated syndicalist and anarchist organisations from mainstream socialist ones. There was a wave of trotskists in the 30's, a bunch of parties that split over various actions of the soviet (and later chinese) parties etc. Some took sides in Sino-Soviet tiffs, some large ones rejected the Soviets after '68 (see "Eurocommunism") etc.

Note hat many of those kept the name, but not neccessarily the politics. So you have a ery large group of small-scale communist parties.

If you want to be precise it's probably better to use "marxist-leninist" rather than "communist" just to avoid confusion, and even then you might run into angry trots.

[The Marquis de Leech]

Determinedly Marxist agenda? Comfiscation of all private property by the state, submuation of all religious and cultural practices to the state, the banning of private enterprise and so on and on. Something I've missed? Marxism presents itself as a humanistic alternative to capitalism, in practice the transformation is so utterly radical, utopianist and so against human nature that the only way of making a population coooperate is through violence.

To quote Marx himself:

You are horrified at our intending to do away with private property. But in your existing society, private property is already done away with for nine-tenths of the population; its existence for the few is solely due to its non-existence in the hands of those nine-tenths. You reproach us, therefore, with intending to do away with a form of property, the necessary condition for whose existence is the non-existence of any property for the immense majority of society.

His meaning of "private property" is very specific, and refers to the productive capacity of society. Or do you really think that nine-tenths of society in 1848 owned no property at all?

[The Marquis de Leech]

More generally, you seem to have some odd definitions of the various terms.

To be fair, I think it's quite clear what Borsabil's definitions are. Advocating radical left-wing economics equals Marxism equals Leninism equals Stalinism equals Maoism equals Advocating Mass Murder. Unless your name is George Orwell, of course. He gets an exemption.

[The Marquis de Leech]

There was also a tendency for communist parties to splinter, for various reasons

New Zealand had four different Communist Parties in the 1980s. There was the official Communist Party, which had never forgiven Khrushchev for bashing Stalin, and decided to align itself with Albania (no, I'm not kidding). There was the Socialist Unity Party, which were pro-Soviet (or at least pro-Gorbachev anyway), there was the pro-Beijing bunch, and there was the Trotskyites. In a country with three million people total, and a First Past the Post electoral system, that really was "People's Front of Judea" territory.

[Borsabil]

To quote Marx himself:

You are horrified at our intending to do away with private property. But in your existing society, private property is already done away with for nine-tenths of the population; its existence for the few is solely due to its non-existence in the hands of those nine-tenths. You reproach us, therefore, with intending to do away with a form of property, the necessary condition for whose existence is the non-existence of any property for the immense majority of society.

His meaning of "private property" is very specific, and refers to the productive capacity of society. Or do you really think that nine-tenths of society in 1848 owned no property at all?

Oh I think the term 'doing away with private property' is pretty straight forward. Everything you write is the usual blather/special pleading from leftists desperate to distance Marxism from Soviet Communism. Doing away with private property means doing away with private property. You had property that was yours, it now belongs to the state, which is controlled by a small elite group of oligarchs on behalf of the 'people'. Communism sells itself as a means to a fairer egalitarian even utopian society, in fact it is an excuse for oligarchical dictatorship. What I never hear from Marxists is what they would do if large numbers of people resist their efforts to 'do away with their private property'?

[Borsabil]

Have you actually read the comunist manifesto?

More generally, you seem to have some odd definitions of the various terms. Let me take a few of them

Marxism: Is a a really wide term. It applies to more or less everyone who self-consciously consider themselves intellectually influenced by Karl Marx. This includes some social democrats, communists, left-communists like trotskyites, and arguably some syndicalists (although they crossover rather heavily with anarchists, who were in direct opposition to Marx) note that being "a marxist" doesen't neccessarily mean you take Marx at face-value, most social-democrats are revisionists who argued that Marx's predictions had not played out by the late 19th/early 20th century and that revisions in both tactis and analysis were thus needed. Revisionists are still marxsts, in the same sense that modern evolutionary theories are still "darwinist".

Note that not all social democrats are marxists. Some come from other directions and non-marxist forms of socialism, some are social liberals, some are christian socialists, etc. etc. The same is true of the far-extreme left (anarchists, syndicalists, etc.)

Communism is tricky. It's *usually* synonymous with marxism-leninism (IE: the strain of marxism promoted by Lenin, that become the foundational Soviet ideology) and Maoism (which was in some ways a critique of and a further development of marxism-leninism) it's not always the case though, prior to 1917 it was simply a synonym for "socialist" and thus encompassed a wide variety of groups, and not all of them switched names. There was also a tendency for communist parties to splinter, for various reasons (either as a result of simple internal politics, or due to external events. Usually this involves the splinter-group and their former ally decrying each other as (essentially) false prophets. 1917 itself caused a wave of such splinterings. There was awave earlier that more or less separated syndicalist and anarchist organisations from mainstream socialist ones. There was a wave of trotskists in the 30's, a bunch of parties that split over various actions of the soviet (and later chinese) parties etc. Some took sides in Sino-Soviet tiffs, some large ones rejected the Soviets after '68 (see "Eurocommunism") etc.

Note hat many of those kept the name, but not neccessarily the politics. So you have a ery large group of small-scale communist parties.

If you want to be precise it's probably better to use "marxist-leninist" rather than "communist" just to avoid confusion, and even then you might run into angry trots.

All forms of 'progressive' political movements have at their core the very simple concept of the involuntary removal of wealth from one person or group to another through the threat of state violence, the end. The rest is merely degree.

[TerraPrime]

involuntary removal of wealth from one person or group to another through the threat of state violence

*yawns*

[polishgenius]

Borsabil, a serious question this time:


Why do you insist on having opinions on things you know fuck all about?

[Maltaran]

All forms of 'progressive' political movements have at their core the very simple concept of the involuntary removal of wealth from one person or group to another through the threat of state violence, the end. The rest is merely degree.

So any political movement which does not call for the immediate abolition of all taxes is progressive? Good to know.

[mormont]

Way back in time, this thread was about a UK newspaper.

It should return to being about that.

Further off-topic posts will be deleted.

[Shryke]

Borsabil, a serious question this time:

Why do you insist on having opinions on things you know fuck all about?

Because he read it in the Daily Mail.

[Werthead]

Richard Littlejohn, one of the Mail's more odious writers, decided it would be a fine idea to try to blast Jack Monroe, a young writer who has been talking about living in poverty for the last several years (she isn't now, as her blog entries attracted the attention of the papers and she now writes freelance for them, as well as writing a cookbook for people on low incomes). She rather expertly demolished his bullying article here.

However, this did raise some interesting questions about the Mail's general coverage of people on benefits, namely that they continue to rather bizarrely characterise everyone who is on benefits as a feckless scrounger who's never worked a day in their lives. Dealing with what is now an overriding reality - hundreds of thousands of people who've worked all their lives before losing their permanent obs in the recession, who are now jobless (or in and out of short-term work) but still have material goods from when they were well-off - seems to be utterly beyond them. Their most constant complaint is about people who are jobless but who have 'flat-screen TVs', a complaint that is baffling. You literally have not been able to buy anything other than a flat-screen TV (other than from a second-hand store) for the last five years or so. And they are far, far cheaper now than the big-backed SD TVs when they were phased out. It's a bizarre non-criticism which they keep bringing up as if it's an argument-crushing statement.

[Alex.]

But you're working on the assumption that they are both using logic and care about making a good argument. Its just the Tea Party mentality of creating their own reality because they're scared of everything.

Its quite pitiful really, this fear-of-life thing.

[Arataniello]

Richard Littlejohn, one of the Mail's more odious writers, decided it would be a fine idea to try to blast Jack Monroe, a young writer who has been talking about living in poverty for the last several years (she isn't now, as her blog entries attracted the attention of the papers and she now writes freelance for them, as well as writing a cookbook for people on low incomes). She rather expertly demolished his bullying article here.

Jack's (who is female btw) rebuttal of Littlejohn's piece is a thing of beauty.

[Deedles]

Well done Jack! That was an excellent take down, admittedly of what was clearly a lazy, poorly researched comment piece.

[Pebble thats Stubby]

Well to be fair She did QUIT her Paid job thus was "sponging" of the State. Ok so she had been employed for years and has probably paid in far more than she took out in benefits that's a minor point for the daily mail and so not worth reporting that she's now paying in again. Obviously she should have done the irresponsible thing and not split up with her child's father and raised the kid in the misery of a broken family forced to not remain together. Or maybe she should just have given up the child if she could no longer take care of it.

Ok incase anyone is in any doubt that really hurt writing that. But the daily mail did get something correct in that article, She did quit her job. unfortunately they failed to noticed she quit because it was the responsible thing to do given the situation she found herself and her family in.