Question about historical materialism

[LBird]

alanjjohnstone wrote:

 Material – synonyms:physical, corporeal, tangible, nonspiritual, mundane, worldly, earthly, secular, temporal, concrete, real, solid, substantial

Quote:

irrelevancies to  our material lives

 I fear my belly over-rides my mind on so many occasions and i think that it is the motor when we discuss society and social change. 

Yeah, I agree with your diagnosis of your political problem, alan.Whilst food 'over-rides' philosophy, workers will always be in thrall to the ideas of the ruling class.That's what Marx thought, too.But, since we workers have some spare time now to read Marx, Engels and other philosophers and physicists, we can begin to place a higher priority on philosophy, since Big Macs are available to all workers.Still, I don't know your particular socio-economic position – perhaps you work 6 days a week, from 6am to midnight, and lack even the basics of a diet, in a 19th century hellhole like Engels' Manchester… and so Marx was correct, and 'your belly' will continue to 'over-ride your mind'.Anyway, since you don't seem able to question (never mind criticise) ruling class ideas, are you really the right person to be telling workers, who can criticise ruling class ideas, what 'socialism' will be?Oh yeah, whilst I remember – and that 'material production' for Marx meant 'social production', not 'matter producing' for itself.Good luck with the belly, alan. Leave your mind to us class conscious workers to sort out.

[Anonymous]

LBird wrote:

Oh yeah, whilst I remember – and that 'material production' for Marx meant 'social production', not 'matter producing' for itself.

Prove it! But as an idealist,  Leninist and Stalinist  you don't have to. Just declare  it and set your organised violence onto anyone who disagrees with your 'truth'

[Anonymous]

LBird wrote:

Just like Lenin, they like to 're-write' to suit their own political purposes – hey, Marcos, that can be your job under your 'materialist' regime – you can 're-write' history, too, not just my words.

We don't seek a 'regime'.  that is what idealist seek to impose on people  Idealists like you, Stalin and Lenin. You decide what is 'truth' then impose it on all the world We have dealt with many left wing fascists like yourself:"The party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command. His heart sank as he thought of the enormous power arrayed against him, the ease with which any Party intellectual would overthrow him in debate, the subtle arguments which he would not be able to understand, much less answer. And yet he was in the right! They were wrong and he was right. 1984 " There cannot be organised violence in communism/socialism as you and other Stalinists claim. People will be free to think what they want to think and determine their own 'truth' . In short they will not live in a regime or a dictatorship,  they will be free. Stalinists and idealists like yourself cannot grasp the idea of freedom. Try listening or go find a nice little Stalinist group and impose YOUR TRUTH on it, because your pissing against the wind here, 

[alanjjohnstone]

We are now getting closer to an actual debate about our problems as put by me in messages # 40 and  #58, LBird. As Marx pointed out 

Quote:

The ideas of the ruling class are in every epoch the ruling ideas, i.e. the class which is the ruling material force of society,

And we have not succeeded in breaking out of their parameters, have we? We are still dominated by their cultural hegemony as Gramsci expressed itIn the war of ideas we have failed, a point i keep repeating to my party comrades. The question iis, is this a permanent defeat? Some would concede it is and advise a "humane regulated "capitalism' as more plausible. I'm an optimist and say no, although i have no tactic or strategy to offer that will mean the socialist case will prevail. I can only speculate.In message #40 i referred to those Marxists who hold hope that some inherent structural weakness within capitalism will produce desperate conditions – the need to fill an empty belly, (or if you prefer, LBird, to provide food for thought)…which will kick-start the revolution by demanding a change in consciousness, spurred by bitter class struggle that will throw up organs of workers democracy, which also means presenting fellow-workers with an ideological alternative to capitalism as a hope and an inspiration and an aspiration. Is this Sorel's revolutionary myth, not the original General Strike but now Workers Councils. We cannot present socialism as an inevitability. The Trots and the Leninists suggest the Party and the Intellectuals as the path. We argue it has to be the self-emancipation of workers themselves and although ewe may propose the method, the means will be for the workers themselves.I now ask you and i expect an answer that we can begin to implement as a organisation to unite about, what sort of socialist "party" and what type of campaign or literature do you envisage succeeding in over-turning the "ruling material force"?Can we have some answers…i'm fed up with questions when my own answers are being so casually dismissed.

[LBird]

alanjjohnstone wrote:

We are now getting closer to an actual debate about our problems as put by me in messages # 40 and  #58, LBird. As Marx pointed out 

Quote:

The ideas of the ruling class are in every epoch the ruling ideas, i.e. the class which is the ruling material force of society,

And we have not succeeded in breaking out of their parameters, have we? We are still dominated by their cultural hegemony as Gramsci expressed itIn the war of ideas we have failed, a point i keep repeating to my party comrades.

Let's get this straight, alan.It's not 'we' class conscious workers who've 'failed', but you and the SPGB. Plenty of workers (being able to overcome their bellies) can read history, philosophy and physics, and can understand the utter tripe of the belief that 'material' equals 'matter' in Marx's works. There are plenty of Gramsci's 'organic intellectuals' within the class, today. 

ajj wrote:

I now ask you and i expect an answer that we can begin to implement as a organisation to unite about, what sort of socialist "party" and what type of campaign or literature do you envisage succeeding in over-turning the "ruling material force"?Can we have some answers…i'm fed up with questions when my own answers are being so casually dismissed.

'Casually dismissed'? Fuckin' hell, alan, I've spent hours slowly explaining to you, over years, drawing on my efforts to think (whilst you've been stuffing your belly, apparently), and you can insult me like this?I'll tell you what workers need, an organisation that starts from workers' democracy, not the shite of elite materialism, and the so-called 'Specialists' of the SPGB, with their bourgeois method of 'their own biological senses', and their wish to realise bourgeois individualism, rather than the democratic control of social production.I'd better leave it there for now, since I've said all this before, but you call it 'dismissal', so I'm going to have a 'casual' cup of tea, and calm down.

[Sympo]

No offence people but why does every thread have to turn into a debate about the validity of "idealism-materialism"Is this stuff really relevant to the thread?

[LBird]

Sympo wrote:

No offence people but why does every thread have to turn into a debate about the validity of "idealism-materialism"Is this stuff really relevant to the thread?

Yeah, in a word, fundamental.Either your question is about 'materialism' (and the 'historical' is just a sly prefix to be ignored, like 'dialectical', etc.) and so you are asking about Engels' views, or……you want to know about Marx's 'social production' (which is what Marx wished to dicuss – he never used the terms 'historical materialism' or 'dialectical materialism').So, Sympo, are you interested in humans and their changing socio-historical production, or how 'matter' determines human activity?If you are interested in the latter, see twc's answers.

[Anonymous]

Sympo wrote:

No offence people but why does every thread have to turn into a debate about the validity of "idealism-materialism"Is this stuff really relevant to the thread?

You'd better ask LBird that question, Sympo. 

[alanjjohnstone]

Casually dismissed because having claimed insight into the Party and acquainted with many of its internal debates you have not once offered any suggestions for its improvement, other than some truisms and vague generalities. Marx didn't offer the Holy Family or German Ideology to the public, he published the Communist Manifesto in the name of an actual political party.So i will rephrase the question, how would you approach the question of convincing fellow workers to strive for socialism beyond a Jehovah Witness policy of one-to-one conversion?Part of my "we" was directed at our party as you would have noticed by my explicit references to the SPGB on this thread and many others. But yes, "we" also means my fellow-workers who through fratricidal wars, famine, industrial conflict, and economic penury have been repeating the same mistakes for decade after decade, and over generations, across nations and continents. Other ideologies that can be contained by capitalism and can be wielded in the ruling class interests have prevailed. So yes, we are losing battles in the class war, we are suffering set-backs. The working class is complicit in their own exploitation and oppression because they see no alternative and think they have no choices apart from the ones they are presented with. But is it irreversible? If i thought it was, and if i did not recognise potential and possibilities in the struggles and resistance taking pace around me, i wouldn't be here. You may well be right about the presence of the many politically conscious aware workers, but where are the organisations? Workers unorganised, are impotent, as well you know. Our contribution in the SPGB is to help grow that needed organisation, and we must be sure that we are not stifling it. 

[Sympo]

LBird wrote:

So, Sympo, are you interested in humans and their changing socio-historical production, or how 'matter' determines human activity?

I'm interested inwhether or not capitalism will inevitably lead to socialismwhether or not there are several "roads" to take when humans create history (for example, would it be possible that feudalism would be succeeded by a system other than capitalism?)whether or not a class-based society (and therefore a society of class antagonisms) must develop into a new society

[Sympo]

gnome wrote:

You'd better ask LBird that question, Sympo. 

I guess, but I could also ask people who debate LBird on this particular thread. It takes two to tango (no offence to anyone)

[LBird]

Sympo wrote:

LBird wrote:

So, Sympo, are you interested in humans and their changing socio-historical production, or how 'matter' determines human activity?

I'm interested inwhether or not capitalism will inevitably lead to socialismwhether or not there are several "roads" to take when humans create history (for example, would it be possible that feudalism would be succeeded by a system other than capitalism?)whether or not a class-based society (and therefore a society of class antagonisms) must develop into a new society

I can only give you the Marxist answer to your questions, Sympo. You are right to also ask for the Engelsian Materialist answer, which other posters will give you.The answers are:1. No, it won't.2. Yes, there are.3. By 'new', if you mean 'non-class', then, no. If you include 'new class', then, yes.

[Young Master Smeet]

Sympo wrote:

whether or not capitalism will inevitably lead to socialism

No, capitalism could lead to a post-nuclear war cindr, a runaway greenhouse planet,a new slave society: these things could occur, but the logic of capitalism, and the direct consequences of its working is the development of a working class movement capable of abolishing capitalism, and in whose interest it is to create socialism.  Capitalism is not interesting except for the category of the propertyless working class who could realise socialism.

Sympo wrote:

whether or not there are several "roads" to take when humans create history (for example, would it be possible that feudalism would be succeeded by a system other than capitalism?)

Feudalism seemed not to lead to Capitalism in the East, China kept a very stable system for a very long time.  Arguably, it was the discovery of the Americas, and the huge surpluses of gold and people that lead to capitalism, not feualism itself (although we can look at the years preceeding the Black Death for a former occasion that feudalism nearly burst its bounds.

Sympo wrote:

whether or not a class-based society (and therefore a society of class antagonisms) must develop into a new society

That is a good question, i'd say yes, that antagonism is inherently unstable, and so eventually it must lead to a crisis and dramatic change: that change is not teleological leading from one thing to the next, and i can swing back and forth many times, per my black death example above, feualism re-asserted itself very strongly after that.The book reviewed here:http://www.worldsocialism.org/spgb/socialist-standard/2010s/2013/no-1311-november-2013/how-did-social-inequality-arise

teh Smet Meister wrote:

At this point, it should be noted, the authors present evidence of societies oscillating between equality and hierarchy, and elite groups lose their grasp on power (through incompetence, or in-fighting, or both). It should also be noted that these developments are not dependent on the state of agriculture or prevailing techniques of production, and seem to stem as much from the capacity of individuals at the right time taking chances and staking a claim to pre-eminence.

[LBird]

alanjjohnstone wrote:

You may well be right about the presence of the many politically conscious aware workers, but where are the organisations? Workers unorganised, are impotent, as well you know. Our contribution in the SPGB is to help grow that needed organisation, and we must be sure that we are not stifling it. 

I agree with you, alan, about the lack of workers' organisations.Once, I thought that the SPGB was trying to fulfil that role, and that I would join, to help the process.But, notwithstanding twc's claims about the SPGB being based upon its published 'principles', the reality is that the SPGB is not an organisation dedicated to producing a self-confident, class conscious, democratically-organised, proletariat, but is pursuing a hidden, unpublished dedication to 'Materialism'.I had thought that it was just some members (which is fair enough, debate is a good thing), but it's not just some – including you, it's a party 100% dedicated to 'Specialists' telling us workers that you, the elite, have an access to 'reality' that we workers don't have. If you didn't believe that you have this 'special consciousness', you'd agree to democracy in the production of all areas, including the universities' output of 'ideas'.So, to summarise, 'materialism' equals 'stifling workers'. Your party has nothing to say to attract workers. Ditch the 19th century materialism, and things might change. I've tried to help you do this, but to no avail. 1904 was too late, alan. The damage was done 50 years before that.

[LBird]

alan, is this sort of slanderous garbage, made up by twc, what passes for discussion in the SPGB?Is it any wonder you're struggling to make any headway in the working class?

[Author]

Posts