Is the case for socialism, one of morality, cold logic or long term survival of our species?

[steve colborn]

twc, I am afraid that, reading your posts, leaves me with the inescapable conclusion that you are pidgeonholing human beings as mere, "things", outside of a seperate consciousness of "humanness". Of merely being adjuncts to the system, rather than individual, self-aware, conscious, empathic, sympathetic, creatures. You seem to have transposed the unfeeling reality of Capitalism, to flesh and blood, thinking animals, that humans, most assuredly are. To have disregarded our ability to adapt, enthuse and create to, our circumstances and moreover to do this to the appaling situations our fellow humans find themselves in. In other words, you ignore our humanity and replace it with the manufactured, consciounceless artificiality that Capitalisms view of man would have us believe is reality.

[twc]

The Socialist Party, from the early 1920s onwards, has categorized the Soviet Union, as “state capitalism”.  That’s exactly what it was/is as a static description.However, what it more importantly was/is, as dynamic determinism instead of mere static description, is a perfect instance of the  “primitive accumulation of capital” working its inexorable way through all the ideas and morals of its actors.  Materialism in deterministic operation.Marx’s “primitive accumulation of capital” is in many ways the crowning predictive achievement of Capital Volume 1, giving us confidence in his science and its methodology for achieving socialism. That is precisely why such an apparently irrelevant-to-production process concludes Volume 1.“Primitive accumulation" is accumulation for the few at the expense of the many—by dispossession of the many.  It is never quick, never nice and always brutal, and the more clinically executed the more terrifyingly concrete its idealist “humanity”.Capitalism cannot function without a working class, and so its first priority, consciously or unconsciously, is to free its potential working class from any existing ownership of independent means of production.  Capitalism must first turn the working class it’s going to exploit into a class dependent on it alone.  “Primitive accumulation of capital” is for most of us, the making of the working class,It’s what we see occurring all around the “developing” world. Toy arguments based on sympathy for the victims of this terrible process are misplaced bourgeois indulgences, as piously hollow as the feigned sympathy of the professional burier of the dead for his corpses. Like death, the accumulation process is necessary to capitalism, and so is inevitable.I’m afraid the only solution is to comprehend world social processes, horrible as they are, and work to transcend a deterministically anti-social world, because it is divided into social classes.

[robbo203]

twc wrote:

On the contrary, overt morality is essential to a conniving society like capitalism.  Overt, and ostentatious, morality, of your obvious kind, is inextricably built into capitalism.  It drips from the capitalist air you breathe, because it is indispensable to the functioning of class oppression.  That’s where you pick it up your overt, ostentatious, morality from; unlike Marx who saw through capitalist appearance and exposed its rotten core.I’m sorry, but you and robbo are falling for the veneer of capitalism, even while convincing yourself you aren’t by giving lip service to its rotten core.[

 This is rubbish.  Your are confusing morality with "moralising" or what you call "overt morality".  You dont seem to understand what morality is. Morality is inextricacbly linked with notions such as altruism and empathy. It is inherently other-oriented, regards others as having value in themselves and not merely a means to your own ends (instrumentalism) and is based on a fundamental concern for the welfare and wellbeing of those others, whoever they may be. Some people get very confused about this, mistaking form for substance. Since capitalism (like any other conceivable form of human society) relies in some measure on morality, the inference is made that we must therefore reject "morality".  This is illogical and unwarranted.  What we need to reject is not morality but, specifically,  capitalist morality. I refer you once again to Engels statement in Anti Duhring: We therefore reject every attempt to impose on us any moral dogma whatsoever as an eternal, ultimate and for ever immutable ethical law on the pretext that the moral world has its permanent principles which stand above history and the differences between nations. We maintain on the contrary that all moral theories have been hitherto the product, in the last analysis, of the economic conditions of society obtaining at the time. And as society has hitherto moved in class antagonisms, morality has always been class morality; it has either justified the domination and the interests of the ruling class, or, ever since the oppressed class became powerful enough, it has represented its indignation against this domination, and the future interests of the oppressedWe have not yet passed beyond class morality. A really human morality which stands above class antagonisms and above any recollection of them becomes possible only at a stage of society which has not only overcome class antagonisms but has even forgotten them in practical life A really human morality.  That is what socialism is about!  What in anthropological terms is called a moral economy is predicated on a sense of reciprocal obligations to one another as human beings.  This is one of the strongest arguments against the "human nature" brigade who assert that socialism could never work because humans are inherently self-interested greedy and lazy yet, incredibly, some socialists seem unwittingly intent on endorsing such a view with their rejection of what they  call "morality ". They cede ground to the bourgeois apologists for the atomistic idea of the purely "self interested individual".  Its Adam Smith's invisible hand of the market all over again except the resulting social order that is meant to transpire from this mechanical application of the principle of "self interest" will be socialism and not  a "free" market.  As if. I find it absolutely astonishing that any socialist could reject the notion of morality.  The class solidarity and unity that we seek in order to overthrow capitalism precisely consists in a proletarian morality. How could it not?   The idea that socialism is nothing more than an objective that is in our "self  interest" to pursue is,  by contrast, a thoroughly bourgeois way of looking at things. It reeks of bourgeois individualism and bourgeois hypocrisy.  Of course socialism will be in our own self interest but it will be much much more than just our own self interests that will be involved ; it will also necessarily  involve the interests of fellow workers around us.  And since we cannot achieve socialism without the involvement  of our fellow workers necessarily that entails a vital  role for morality in the class struggle. If all you are really concerned with as an individual is your own private "self interests" well then you might as well strive to become a capitalist in capitalist society  and stab every other worker you encounter on the way, in the back, as you slither up the greasy capitalist pole of "self interested" material advancement. Socialism would definitely not be your cup of tea.  

[twc]

So you are at-bottom an “individual, self-aware, conscious, empathetic, sympathetic creature”, like the rest of humanity at-bottom.At-bottom humanity is powerless when its false perception of itself arises out of at-bottom necessary human practice under capitalism, now and forever it lasts.  The Party is one of the few havens that offers scope for at-bottom humanity to flourish under capitalism.But you, an at-bottom human specimen of humanity, must accordingly give liberally to all at-bottom deserving charities, and support all at-bottom human reforms for all the at-bottom inhuman ills that beset the rest of at-bottom human humanity. That is the immediate expression of everything you stated, and that the Party at-bottom opposes.All the humanity in the world is powerless to stop “primitively accumulating” capitalism wherever it emerges—formerly in Britain, recently in the Soviet Union, and currently in Africa, the Arab world, etc.—from dispossessing its future working class, bloodshed and all.  It has no choice, and morality is the casualty, and capitalism the victor over feudal [or tribal] morality’s corpse.Primitive accumulation’s task is to convert feudal [or tribal] morality into capitalist morality, and it must succeed in removing the feudal [or tribal] perceptions of moral usury from capital, whose profit, interest and rent must be perceived as moral right, and only deviations from commonly-agreed social standards perceived as immoral.If you don’t agree that the necessity of capitalism must, and does, turn morality inside out, please show me how capitalism can be brought into existence humanely, when its sole object is inhumane—to rob and to rule for private gain.Morality that is not useful to necessary social reproduction is immorality.  Social utility is the sole arbiter, the practical solution to a social problem.Marx observed that, when equal rights oppose each other, force decides.  That’s why socialism, which transcends bourgeois rights and morality, will not be based on right or morality.  Mankind will arbitrate its problems practically.You uncomprehendingly (just like the moral preacher whose bigotry extends to telling me I can’t be moral without him) assume that I must have no feelings for my fellows to pursue the materialist case. Grow up, and argue intelligently, not at-bottom like a duplicitous advertising, real-estate or used-car agent.

[twc]

Lewis Henry Morgan wrote:

The dissolution of society bids fair to become the termination of a career of which property is the end and aim; because such a career contains the elements of self-destruction.  Democracy in government, brotherhood in society, equality in rights and privileges, and universal education, foreshadow the next higher plane of society to which experience, intelligence and knowledge are steadily tending.  It will be a revival, in a higher form, of the liberty, equality and fraternity of the ancient gentes.

If you mean no more than Morgan, then I agree.But to talk of morality under capitalism is to talk of an evanescent or vulgarized thing, that is almost always a ploy, or bond of emotional selfishness, in a world where the sole nexus between man and his fellow is naked cash payment.  It is to abuse the word, because the action it connotes has become debased by the society wherein it can only be acted out.  That is an awful situation, but don’t shoot the messenger for alerting you to the reality.Every social movement lays claim to morality above all else.  You get upset when I refuse to go down that disreputable path.  Well you’ll just have to live with it.  I refuse to play the soppy game when all sides play the morality card, and you simply play the “more morality than thou” joker.Either discuss morality theoretically, or not at all.  By the way, I assume that you are aware of Trivers’s 1970s biological “altruism” that, of course, has scant relation to human altruism, but can only be negated theoretically, and not emotionally.

[robbo203]

twc wrote:

But to talk of morality under capitalism is to talk of an evanescent or vulgarized thing, that is almost always a ploy, or bond of emotional selfishness, in a world where the sole nexus between man and his fellow is naked cash payment.  It is to abuse the word, because the action it connotes has become debased by the society wherein it can only be acted out.  That is an awful situation, but don’t shoot the messenger for alerting you to the reality.Every social movement lays claim to morality above all else.  You get upset when I refuse to go down that disreputable path.  Well you’ll just have to live with it.  I refuse to play the soppy game when all sides play the morality card, and you simply play the “more morality than thou” joker.Either discuss morality theoretically, or not at all.  By the way, I assume that you are aware of Trivers’s 1970s biological “altruism” that, of course, has scant relation to human altruism, but can only be negated theoretically, and not emotionally.

 You still dont get it – do you? – after its been repeatedly pointed out to you.  Its not a question  of playing the “more morality than thou” joker.  Thats a naff, one-dimensional criticism that presupposes some kind of timeless universal and standardised notion of morality which individuals or social movements can tap into – some more effectively than others, so permitting themselves to pass themselves as more moral or "holier" than others. Nobody is making this argument  As usual you are barking up the wrong tree completely.  As Ive said several times now the relevant criterion  has to do with whom one morally identifies.  A proletarian morality implies a proletariat as the object of one's moral identification. Just as a nationalist morality presupposes "the nation" as the object of moral identification.  What makes you think you are so special as to be above  and superiour to the rest of us in not having  to adopt a moral position  (which you do anyway though you refuse to acknowlege it)?I note you have evaded the completely the thoroughly bourgeois implications of the argument that socialism is purely a matter of what is in our "self interests".  Yes I am aware of Robert Trivers' work on reciporcal altruism – what of it?

[twc]

robbo203 wrote:

As I’ve said several times now the relevant criterion has to do with whom one morally identifies.  A proletarian morality implies a proletariat as the object of one's moral identification.  Just as a nationalist morality presupposes "the nation" as the object of moral identification.

You rationalize morality as depending on who you identify with.  That is morality by Rafferty’s rules.In Marx’s Volume 1 paradigm scenario, how would you decide between opposing moralities.  In a class society, force decides, but force, for an identificatory moralist, such as your moral self, is the opposite of morality,You want to turn the class struggle into one of morality transcendent of capitalism, and yet you have never once acknowledged that our materialist Object is the only guarantee we have of realizing a morality transcendent of capitalism.Without that you are calling on proletarians to assemble around something you apparently don’t acknowledge can be implemented objectively, but only subjectively.  That’s why you can repeat your idealist morality calls until the cows come home, and I’ll treat them with the contempt subjective moral suasion deserves.The class struggle is only moral if its morality is capable of being realized, and is immoral otherwise.  Proletarian morality does not exist, just like socialism does not exist, and both must be proven to continuously reproduce themselves as social necessity, or it is immoral to strive for them.One does not consciously conduct a social revolution from one world-wide mode of production into another based on the flimsy pretext of morality that is, without science, incapable of proving it can ever be realized except in the feverish imagination of those whose morality consists, apparently, in primarily identifying with a social class.

[Anonymous]

Robbostill don't know what you mean by 'morality' . What is it?  When did it develope? Who decides its content?Is it not enough to say that we – like many other animals – have genetic traits of sociability, caring and empathy?  Such traits have been found in other animals. Or is it because with the rejection of 'creation' you still refuse to accept that we are animals that evolved from the animal world and developed an intelligence.Our predisposition to caring, sociability and empathy have been twisted by propertied society and its morality. We don't need another morality to twist our natural inclinations.  I have to say that the idea of a 'proletarian science' and a 'proletarian morality' sends shivers down my spine.2+2=5  is wrong but cannot be described as immoral.  

[twc]

robbo wrote:

I note you have evaded the completely the thoroughly bourgeois implications of the argument that socialism is purely a matter of what is in our "self interests".

No, I’ve never subscribed to “self interest”.An edit of my #213 unfortunately crossed with your #214. Apologies.  However, have a go at responding to it.Primitive accumulation is, for me, the crowning scientific predictive achievement of Volume 1.  This demoralizing process is taking place all around the world, with the same callous brutality.Stuart misdiagnoses the Soviet Union as a failure of morality.  But Marx explains why morality was a necessary casualty of the unavoidable Soviet primitive accumulation of capital.I appreciate that Marx’s testable prediction relates to a transition from feudalism to capitalism, but it is such confirmation of scientific predictability that is our only guide to the efficacy of our science, and the only reliable source of our confidence in it.  Confidence instilled by successful applications of Marx’s materialist science far outweighs confidence imbibed from idealist morality.I thereby gain scientific confidence in our Object, something that morality cannot give me, no matter how sincere.  Above all, it is Marx’s materialist science that underpins the sought-for morality consequent upon our Object, and we need confidence, more than hope, that it can deliver the socialist goods.You may not agree with me, but my stated materialist position conforms to none of the stereotypical nonsense you charge me with.

[stuartw2112]

When you say that "primitive accumulation" was unavoidable and necessary and that morality has nothing to do with it, and that this is a matter of objective scientific fact and that you wooly minded idealists and religious nutjobs shouldn't stand in the way of the march of history, you send shivers down my spine. The Bolsheviks would have agreed with you wholeheartedly. As would Mao as he sent his troops into Tibet. Imagine your argument with a gun (state power) in its hands. Chilling.

[robbo203]

Vin Maratty wrote:

Robbostill don't know what you mean by 'morality' . What is it?  When did it develope? Who decides its content?Is it not enough to say that we – like many other animals – have genetic traits of sociability, caring and empathy?  Such traits have been found in other animals. Or is it because with the rejection of 'creation' you still refuse to accept that we are animals that evolved from the animal world and developed an intelligence.Our predisposition to caring, sociability and empathy have been twisted by propertied society and its morality. We don't need another morality to twist our natural inclinations.  I have to say that the idea of a 'proletarian science' and a 'proletarian morality' sends shivers down my spine.2+2=5  is wrong but cannot be described as immoral. 

 VinI have defined what I mean by "morality" several times. It means a sense of obligation or concern with respect to the welfare and wellbeing of others.  It means treating others as having value in  themselves, not as a means to your own personal ends.  Morality is "other-oriented".  It is the social cement that holds togther any conceivable kind of society or, indeed, any kind of social movement that seeks to alter the structure of existing society.  It is a social fact which cannot be wished away however much you might want to. The fact of human morality cannot be wished away but the contents – or form – of human morality can  alter from one society to the next, from one group to another.  The great error that lies behind the arguments of those who assume morality has no place in the struggle to achieve socialism is that they think morality is some kind of standardised or universal set of rules that different societies or movements can tap into in order to present themselves as being more "moral" than others. This is not at all what the argument is about.  Morality is a "group" thing;  The form of a given morality is closely bound up with the particular group that is the object of one's moral identification.  So a nationalist morally idenitifes with the nation state and the cirizens that supposedly comprise the nation as opposed to foreigners.  As socialists we dont share that sense of a moral identification becuase we see the nation state as being fundamentally an institution that arises out of, or reinforces, capitalism.  We have an altogther different  morality…. You say the idea of a proletarian morality sends shivers down your spine.  But why? Do you not morally identify with your fellow workers? Do you not feel concern for their interests , quite apart from your own  (and I have no problem with self interest being a motivating factor alongside a concern with the interests of others)? Do you not consider that your fellow workers have value in themselves and should not be used simply as  a means to your own private ends? If so , then by definition you exhibit a proletarian morality, like it or not. Make no mistake about it.  Rejecting a place for morality in the struggle to achieve socialism is tantamount to saying that the only thing that motivates socialists is, should be,  their own private self interests and that the interests of others are,or  should be  of no concern to them.  The usual counter to this argument is that socialism is about "enlightened self interest" (instrumentalism) rather than atomistic go-it-alone self interest.  But I would argue that so called  enlightened self interest is a fundamally unstable compound.  It will tend to break down and evolve in the direction of atomistic self interest or in the opposite direction,  towards altruism. Being instrumentalist in stance, it entails having to constantly renegotiate the terms and purpose of one's ( ultimately) self interested cooperation with others. This is  unsustainable. And it does not get round the simple stark  fact that if self interest was really your sole and only concern – what motivates you –  then you would be much better advised to strive to become a capitalist in a capitalist world and stab your fellow workers in the back in your bid to become one, than advocate socialism The Communist Manifesto,  in a particularly striking passage, evocatively talks of how the bourgeosie have left "no other nexus between man and man than naked self-interest, than callous “cash payment”. It has drowned the most heavenly ecstasies of religious fervour, of chivalrous enthusiasm, of philistine sentimentalism, in the icy water of egotistical calculation".    I would argue that those who subscribe to the absurd notion that socialism is a matter of "self interest" and self interest alone are in fact reinforcing bourgeois ideology. They are exhibiting an essentially bourgeois outlook and a bourgeois set of values  not the values of revolutionary socialism.  You might protest that this is unfair and that you are not suggesting that socialism should be only be about "naked self interest".  But if you say that then logically what you are saying is that the interests of other workers in a matter of concern to you, not just your own interests.  That ipso facto is taking up a moral position! Finally , yes other animals exhibit traits such as caring , socialibility and even empathy  But how do you deduce from that  thatOur predisposition to caring, sociability and empathy have been twisted by propertied society and its morality. We don't need another morality to twist our natural inclinations.It is those very "natural inclinations" that make the question of morality unavoidable. We are intrinsically moral animals because we are naturally  social aninimals . It IS  our natural inclination to be moral animals.  It is simply impossible to dispense with morality because the very fact  that we live in a society requires it.  All we can do is change the form of morality we espouse or endorse.  When socialists purportedly reject morality what they are really rejecting is what I call "moralising" – which is the explicit and strident appeal to some particular moral code usually associated with some particular religion like Christianity.  But that is not a rejection of morality per se.  You cannot reject what is part of your very nature as a social animal. Even if you are not prone to moralising you are still a moral animal And as for the other animals –  well,  you will be aware of the work of people like Frans de Waal who argue strongly that the building blocks of morality – a kind of proto morality – is to be found in other animals particularly the higher apes.  Our kinship with other animals which the theory of evolution , even before Darwin, increasingly brought to light, ironically prompted a reaction in the religious minded in the opposite direction in order to retain intact the notion of a human soul. The differences with animals and the uniquenss of human beings was emphasised by them whereas in the old Medieval concept (going back to the Ancient Greeks in fact) of a Great Chain of  Being, human were placed in a continuum or gradation from lowly inorganic matter right up to purely spiritual beings – the angels.  Thats is why in the 19th century, the Great Chain of being was abandoned – because with the input of evolutionary ideas it threatened certain fundamental  religious beliefs  about the nature of human souls and so on.  The only people who continued to subscribe to the basic outline of the Great Chain were, oddly enough, the racists who converted the Great Chain concept into a kind of racial hierarchy.  That fitted in very nicely with an expanding imperialism that sought to justify foreign conquest and the supposed superiority of the white man etc but that is another story…

[LBird]

The simple truth is that, if humans are involved in an activity, whether political (socialism or fascism), or whether scientific (physics or sociology), then 'morality' plays a part.To argue otherwise is to return to 19th century philosophical beliefs, which are now outdated.The comrades who try to ignore this are basing their beliefs on Engels' misreading of Marx. And Marx is also partially to blame, for his often inpenetrable texts, which can legitimately (but wrongly) be interpreted the way Engels sometimes did.Neither Marx nor Engels are consistent, and both can be read to support 19th century positivist science. But the works of both also contain arguments antithetical to naive materialism and reflection theory of knowledge, which is the basis of Lenin's philosophical 'leadership' of the working class.Whilst any SPGB members are looking to crude 'materialism', they are philosophically at odds with the SPGB emphasis upon 'democracy'.Crude 'materialism' leads to minority 'truth', both in politics and science.This has no place in the 21st century, as the 20th century has already shown.

[Anonymous]

Robin I think it is a matter of 'you say potato I say potato'. We both believe the human species is inherently social, caring and empathetic. You choose to call it 'morality', I call it genetic.By the way keep up the good work on revleft etc 

LBird wrote:

 'morality' plays a part.To argue otherwise is to return to 19th century philosophical beliefs, which are now outdated.Crude 'materialism' leads to minority 'truth', both in politics and science.This has no place in the 21st century, as the 20th century has already shown.

I think you cut and past the same sentences repeatedlyYou keep asserting and repeating the same thing on various threads, which is why I asked you to add some facts to these theories or even just a backup argument. (I was not being facetious). After all,  one of your assertions is that theory determines the facts you use. You take up a 'moral' position then attack materialists as potential dictators and murderers. This proves my point about morality.  It places the moral person on the high ground passing judgement on the immoral.  It allows you to condem me as immoral, uncaring etc. This is simply not true. If you do not wish to lay out your own position could you please deal with what I have said in above posts.    

[LBird]

Vin Maratty wrote:

After all, one of your assertions is that theory determines the facts you use.

Vin, I've spent several months and several threads explaining in detail, giving quotes from dozens of sources, with links, and tried to use analogies to help comrades get to grips with these issues.The statement you call an 'assertion' is a completely uncontroversial, well-proved, totally accepted view of almost everybody who has read any philosophy of science.Even ALB gave Carr's 'fisher/fish' analogy on one thread. It's accepted by the SPGB. Einstein argued it in the early 20th century, and he's a physicist.The fact that you think it a mere 'assertion' is one for you to worry about, not me.

Vin Maratty wrote:

You take up a 'moral' position then attack materialists as potential dictators and murderers.

'Potential'? Where were you during the 20th century, Vin?

Vin Maratty wrote:

It allows you to condem me as immoral, uncaring etc. This is simply not true.

I have never condemned you as 'immoral' or 'uncaring'. I don't think you are at all. I accept you as a comrade, which is why I keep perservering.What I do 'condemn' you for is not reading philosophy of science, and taking Engels' 'materialism' at face value.

[Anonymous]

LBird wrote:

The statement you call an 'assertion' is a completely uncontroversial, well-proved, totally accepted view of almost everybody who has read any philosophy of science.

I didn't pick a particular statement but just for me could you restate the uncontroversial statement. (As you say I need to read some philosophy of science but perhaps you can enlighten me) Also which scientific method are you using to prove your point because you claimed earlier that science up to today is 'bourgeouis science'. (Do you remember?) I have to admit I am still confused at what it is you are arguing   

[Author]

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