Want to give these libs some theory to read but think they’ll be scared off by Marx and Lenin? Anything a bit more SocDem friendly that gets the basic points across - class consciousness, why they need to organise and how etc.?

Shoer articles preferred but anything will do tbh

  • Red_Scare [he/him]@lemmygrad.ml
    34·
    9 days ago

    Copying my comment from another thread: when I need to discuss “change through bourgeois electoralism” with libs I love sharing this interview:

    https://web.archive.org/web/20240930111014/https://www.newstatesman.com/long-reads/1934/10/h-g-wells-it-seems-me-i-am-more-left-you-mr-stalin

    It’s so perfect; it’s a reputable Western newspaper so you can share it in almost any setting, just preface it for plausible deniability with something like: “It’s a hilarious read, one of the greatest modern liberal intellectuals debates a genocidal maniac frothing at the mouth!”

    Libs love the idea and usually swallow the bait expecting funzies, they looooove them a stuck-up Brit “speaking truth to power” and handing out “hitchslaps”.

    And then Stalin absolutely demolishes Wells and it really fucks with their world. Wells says FDR’s New Deal will bring about socialism in the USA and Stalin’s like nah cause the economy is in the hands of capitalists so at most you will get some concessions which capitalists will keep fighting to revert. Stalin’s arguments are so clear and concise, and his predictions are so plainly correct, while Wells is just being confidently wrong and terribly smug about it.

    I had some success with it too, including one well-meaning lib literally telling me the next day, “Stalin was right” which are the three words I would not expect a lib utter under any circumstances.

    • charlie [any]@lemmygrad.ml
      8·
      9 days ago

      Reading this reminds me of Tucker Carlson’s interview with Putin. It’s very obvious through the interview who is working within historical context and material realities and who is stuck in idealist fantasyland.

      Orwell: Now, however, there is a super­abundance of technical intellectuals, and their mentality has changed very sharply. The skilled man, who would formerly never listen to revolutionary talk, is now greatly interested in it.

      These are the folks purged by red scare McCarthyism. Stalin was very prescient. This is a good read, thank you.

      Edit: The best dig was at the end

      Wells: …the speeches of its members are widely reported in the press. It insists upon this, free expression of opinion – even of opposition opinion. I hope to discuss this point with Gorki. I do not know if you are prepared yet for that much freedom . . .

      Stalin: We Bolsheviks call it “self-criticism”. It is widely used in the USSR. If there is anything I can do to help you I shall be glad to do so.

      • Red_Scare [he/him]@lemmygrad.ml
        7·
        8 days ago

        Hahaha yeah I’m in awe of how Wells is full of himself, my favourite quotes are “It seems to me that I am more to the Left than you, Mr Stalin” which Wells utters in the same breath he praises Henry fucking Ford who would later support NSDAP with such fervor Hitler wanted to make Ford the leader of the fascist movement in the US; and “I do not know if you are prepared yet for that much freedom” in regards to the PEN Club, which at the time of this interview forbid it’s members from using words such as “nationalism, inter-nationalism, democracy, aristocracy, imperialistic, anti-imperialistic, bourgeoisie, revolutionist or alike”, wow that’s way too much freedom for authoritarian Soviets to handle lol

    • CriticalResist8@lemmygrad.ml
      5·
      8 days ago

      Important public men like yourself are not “common men”. Of course, history alone can show how important this or that public man has been; at all events, you do not look at the world as a “common man”.

      Do you think it was at this moment Wells knew he fucked up