Tankie critiques of the SPGB

[alanjjohnstone]

Not an expert in body language, Sympo, and you might be right but it could be as easily seen as Lenin hiding his face in shame and guilt.

[Anonymous]

The best way to expose Lenin and Leninism is through his own works like the SPGB has been doing since 1903. There are only about four major works of Lenin and we have debunked all of them. We have a very good article about Lenin which shows that he accepted his own defeathttps://www.worldsocialism.org/spgb/socialist-standard/1970s/1970/no-788-april-1970/did-lenin-admit-defeatMartov was able to see that the Bolshevik revolution wasn't a socialist revolution, but Lenin was able to see the emerging of a new exploitative class within the Soviet Union

[Sympo]

alanjjohnstone wrote:

Not an expert in body language, Sympo, and you might be right but it could be as easily seen as Lenin hiding his face in shame and guilt.

Sure but that is not how most people intepret the memeIf you google "Picard facepalm" you will see the original meme before it got "leninized"Sorry for making such a big deal out of this but if that picture is posted people are going to tweet "#theleftcantmeme"

[Bijou Drains]

Don't know if we really can ever make any headway with the Tankies and their ilk.I had a conversation with a member of the RCG on May Day, which made me think that I might be better off talking to someone who was more open to different ideas and willing to question their belief system, such as a Jesuit or a Scientologist

[Wez]

There's no reason to believe that Leninists are any closer to socialist consciousness than your average liberal or conservative.

[Wez]

They're all equally devoted to authoritarianism.

[robbo203]

Wez wrote:

There's no reason to believe that Leninists are any closer to socialist consciousness than your average liberal or conservative.

 Indeed,  Wez,  On the aforementioned FB forum – Socialist Economics – in response to a point I made  that Marx's conception of the "lower phase of communist society" did not possess " those fundamental structural features that pertain to capitalism and class society in general – such as wage labour, class property and the existence of a state",  one of their leading lights, a Leninist, blurted out  "Literally utopianism. Will not happen".   This same individual was enthusiastically endorsing the price mechanism as the best way of registering human wants You have to wonder why do these individuals even bother to pay lip service to the idea of a communist society at all

[Anonymous]

Wez wrote:

There's no reason to believe that Leninists are any closer to socialist consciousness than your average liberal or conservative.

At least the Liberal advocated for a society without the intervention of the state in the economic affairs, but Leninism is pure state capitalism

[Anonymous]

robbo203 wrote:

Wez wrote:

There's no reason to believe that Leninists are any closer to socialist consciousness than your average liberal or conservative.

 Indeed,  Wez,  On the aforementioned FB forum – Socialist Economics – in response to a point I made  that Marx's conception of the "lower phase of communist society" did not possess " those fundamental structural features that pertain to capitalism and class society in general – such as wage labour, class property and the existence of a state",  one of their leading lights, a Leninist, blurted out  "Literally utopianism. Will not happen".   This same individual was enthusiastically endorsing the price mechanism as the best way of registering human wants You have to wonder why do these individuals even bother to pay lip service to the idea of a communist society at all

They called themselves Marxists but they do not support an Anarchist society without a state, they also contradict Engels concept of Utopia, also true socialists are utopians in the sense that they  support a society which doesn't exist at present time, but it might exist  in the future

[Anonymous]

Good observation from someone on the Ultra v Tankies Facebook group:

Quote:

Why do so many leftcoms have a great man fetish for Lenin? All he did was create a bourgeois revolution. His writings just rip off Marx/Engels and he added little to Marxist theory. He didn't even practice what he wrote in S&R. The very first thing he did once in power was to create Sovnarkom. He spent considerable time crushing strikes, instituting capitalism and taking power from the soviets.Leftcoms spend a lot of time pretending Lenin was 180 degrees from Stalin but the two weren't that different. Even toward the end of his life Lenin was starting to contemplate socialism in one country along with the collectivization. Stalin was the logical conclusion of Lenin.Why such cultish worship for a guy who didn't even attempt socialism?

And an equally good response apart from maybe some questionable terminology:

Quote:

First off, it depends what is meant by "leftcoms." The ones involved in the early years of the Third International were Leninists. But that term is also often applied to classical Marxists and similar types who are NOT Leninist.Second, as shown many times here, it's true Lenin didn't attempt socialism. He helped restructure the capitalistic regimen in the form of centrally managed state capitalism, hoping it would act as a "transitional" state eventually leading to socialism. However, he himself feared more and more as time went on that it would not transition as a revitalized capitalistic class was reconsolidating its power and rule. Stalin's rise to power ended any last hope of any "transition" happening.Third, why didn't Lenin "attempt socialism?" Because, also as argued here many times, he couldn't. No one person or ruling elite can make socialism happen. Only a sufficiently conscious/enlightened and democratically self-organized working class can make that happen via taking democratic control of the means of production and governance. The working class at the time of the revolution was not ready to do this.Fourth, meaningless drivel like the bogus "collectivization" and "socialism in one country" were mainly marketing slogans by the Stalinist regime to polish and spin its Accelerated Capitalist Development (which Stalin himself recognized it as being) policies designed to corporatize and capitalize Russian corporations and bureaucracies as possible for reassert the nation as a competitive imperial power as quickly and as much as possible. That was achieved by increased exploitation of labour via brutal repression and austerity measures.

There's hope yet!

[Anonymous]

gnome wrote:

Good observation from someone on the Ultra v Tankies Facebook group:

Quote:

Why do so many leftcoms have a great man fetish for Lenin? All he did was create a bourgeois revolution. His writings just rip off Marx/Engels and he added little to Marxist theory. He didn't even practice what he wrote ranksin S&R. The very first thing he did once in power was to create Sovnarkom. He spent considerable time crushing strikes, instituting capitalism and taking power from the soviets.Leftcoms spend a lot of time pretending Lenin was 180 degrees from Stalin but the two weren't that different. Even toward the end of his life Lenin was starting to contemplate socialism in one country along with the collectivization. Stalin was the logical conclusion of Lenin.Why such cultish worship for a guy who didn't even attempt socialism?

And an equally good response apart from maybe some questionable terminology:

Quote:

First off, it depends what is meant by "leftcoms." The ones involved in the early years of the Third International were Leninists. But that term is also often applied to classical Marxists and similar types who are NOT Leninist.Second, as shown many times here, it's true Lenin didn't attempt socialism. He helped restructure the capitalistic regimen in the form of centrally managed state capitalism, hoping it would act as a "transitional" state eventually leading to socialism. However, he himself feared more and more as time went on that it would not transition as a revitalized capitalistic class was reconsolidating its power and rule. Stalin's rise to power ended any last hope of any "transition" happening.Third, why didn't Lenin "attempt socialism?" Because, also as argued here many times, he couldn't. No one person or ruling elite can make socialism happen. Only a sufficiently conscious/enlightened and democratically self-organized working class can make that happen via taking democratic control of the means of production and governance. The working class at the time of the revolution was not ready to do this.Fourth, meaningless drivel like the bogus "collectivization" and "socialism in one country" were mainly marketing slogans by the Stalinist regime to polish and spin its Accelerated Capitalist Development (which Stalin himself recognized it as being) policies designed to corporatize and capitalize Russian corporations and bureaucracies as possible for reassert the nation as a competitive imperial power as quickly and as much as possible. That was achieved by increased exploitation of labour via brutal repression and austerity measures.

There's hope yet!

Lenin took from nikolai bukharin the concept of socialism in one country, also Lenin took from bukharin the concept of state capitism and imperialism, he took from Karl kautsky the idea of the vanguard partyStalin was not a new figure within the Bolshevik as the Trotskyist has always indicated he was part of the old ranks of the Bolshevik.  Trotsky himself provoked the rising of Stalin due to the fact that he was a despot when he became the comissair of the red armyAs Adam indicated we won the battle with the leninists many years ago

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