All of the comments on that article are the usual pearl clutching drivel from pseudo MLs, bleating that ‘anarchists’ (collectively because anarchists are renowned for all thinking & behaving the same all the time!) are “rejoicing an imperialist power being instrumental in bringing down another oppressive govt” all based from a tweet from anonymous account that probably looked at another anonymous twitter account with an Ⓐ in it’s profile, while they were all “you need to vote blue to keep the orange man out” and do fuck all for establishing a vanguard movement in their own countries, or even are involved in any kind of mutual aid programs at the very least.
Those people are so unserious that it’s becoming harder by the day to distinguish them from the maga cultists
That’s the problem with a movement which has no leader. Everyone who picks up the logo can say things for it. And a lot of “Anarchists” have started saying they hecking love regime change. Are they mostly bots? Probably. But a few real figures have disappointed as well.
Anyone can, and does, call themselves an ML and out of the myriad I’ve seen online there’s but a handful who have not only read theory but actually understand it, instead of regurgitating empty quotes and/or engaging in purity politics.
I don’t see MLs supporting regime change, nor rejecting the utility of leaders. I’m not sure who you count as the handful that not only read theory but actually understand it, but I certainly don’t see support for the Mossad/CIA influence in Iranian protests nor kidnapping Maduro.
They’re on average more consistent on their positions, sure you can find plenty of self proclaimed MLs that are absolute clowns and nobody has the most pristine and most correct take about literally everything but in general they have more coherent positions on current geopolitics and are generally highly skeptical of imperialist propaganda, unlike anarchists who are all over the place.
It is absolutely hilarious for a person who refuses on principle to support actually existing revolutionary movements and governments to accuse anyone else of purity politics
ML’s also quote Marx or Lenin when it comes to imperialism which are their leaders. I don’t think I’ve seen any self-proclaimed ML’s advocate for a military invasion of Iran so I guess that’s the difference here. Though a lot of self-proclaimed ML’s are not following those books as religiously when China does something contradicting them.
For geneva_convenience, weak allies are enemies, and imperialism is being insufficiently anti-imperialist. When presented with this, they blocked me and spammed a bunch of unrelated Bad Empanada tweets. The importance of the distinction between weak anti-imperialism and imperialism proper is between working for and hoping for better anti-imperialism in the existing system vs actively needing to dismantle the PRC, which is why I felt it necessary to address in the first place.
Figured this targeted vaguery needed to be addressed, even if geneva can’t see it. The only reason I gently reached out in the first place was because they are generally more reasonable, but seems like they were poisoned by Bad Empanada thinking, just taking the most inflammatory stance possible and burning bridges with people over slight disagreements.
This isn’t even a “read theory” argument, it’s that geneva believes they can dictate who does and doesn’t understand Marx and Lenin based on watching Bad Empanada videos and tweets, without doing any reading on their own part or trying to come to a deeper understanding. This is also why geneva started claiming Hexbear is “Transzionist,” and that Hexbear defends contrapoints on Israel because she’s trans, which is blatantly false: Hexbear is anti-contrapoints and anti-Zionist. This corresponds with geneva_convenience’s love for Bad Empanada:
All in all incredibly disappointing to see from someone who usually has decent political instincts, such as not falling for Mossad and CIA propaganda surrounding regime change in Iran. They seem to love to argue and don’t block even the most reactionary of people, so the only reason I can think of for blocking me is because they didn’t want to confront the idea that they are mistaken about imperialism. The bright side is that I can still interact with their comments, even if they can’t see my responses.
I know, spending 2 seconds on Hexbear and searching “contra” will get you mountains of complaints. This is why I say geneva is more concerned with mudflinging than actual anti-imperialism, and why they would especially benefit from getting organized and reading theory. It seems online debate is more of an outlet for them than something genuinely driven ideologically.
Thanks! Yep, it’s really disappointing, especially becayse they’re usually right about things. The problem is that they don’t take it seriously enough to study, and instead fill in the gaps on their own, which results in false conclusions from time to time.
It isn’t, assuming we are following Leninist analysis, and I’d argue that we should follow Leninist analysis of imperialism due to the depth of understanding it provides, how it works, why it arises, and how to stop it, all of which have been repeatedly tested in reality.
In short, BRI does not at all steal the surplus and prevent development of countries within the program, unlike what the West does, because BRI is about long-term cooperation and not about short-term superprofits. Capitalism can’t realistically fight the urge for immediate gratification, which is why it coups, bombs, and installs compradors, while socialist China focuses on win-win development that creates better contributors to the global market through shared development.
In other words, even the most cynical view of BRI, when viewed objectively, China’s strategy for personal benefit rests on long term delayed gratification, and it can make these choices because people have power over capital in China, rather than inverse in capitalist countries.
No? It’s not imperialism because it’s mutual development. Joining BRI results in large development without China stealing surplus value or installing compradors, which is what the west does. That’s why countries like the Congo are so poor despite being so resource rich when they are imperialized by the west. The fact that the result is mutual development and enrichment, and not one country plundering another, is why it isn’t imperialism.
You’re confusing the reasoning I gave for why China doesn’t have the same economic compulsion towards imperialism as the west does with evidence of it not being imperialist. Are you legitimately making the argument that mutual cooperation for long-term results for both countries is imperialism, or did you misread my comment?
I do criticize China. For example, I don’t think they go far enough when it comes to foreign policy, and they are still lagging behind countries like Cuba when it comes to social progressivism. I know the younger generation in the PRC is more socially progressive and internationally millitant, so the continued progress in China is likely to continue.
Can you explain why you belive BRI to be imperialist? You just said it’s “pretty imperialist” and “naked imperialism,” but haven’t justified why you believe so, other than an implied belief that any mutual cooperation for mutual gain between a more developed and less developed country is imperialism. You haven’t actually stated that, in fairness, which is why I’m asking for you to explain in your own words so I don’t have to read between the lines and assume.
B-b-but the chinese must be bad otherwise westerners aren’t superior anymore…
If only I could get everyone I see to believe that china is bad then reality would bend to my will and my order would be restored, but you ruined it! You don’t believe! Its your fault that the west is inferior now!
It’s only imperialist if it’s actually harmful and extractive. Otherwise all mutual aid is imperialist, Cuba sending doctors throughout the world is imperialist, disaster relief organizations are imperialist. It’s nonsense
Marx wrote books about Communism (building on a lot of material from others but those don’t get any credit) and Lenin wrote on ways to practically start a revolution to bring it about.
Anarchism rejects authority which is probably why so many Anarchists probably don’t like the Iranian government which is obviously very authoritarian. Though some online Anarchists (and other leftists) seem to think that without any prior organisation or mass education on Anarchism, Iranians can just remove an authoritation government and instead of a deadly power vacuum, people will all magically join communal volunteering organisations.
Marx wrote books about Communism (building on a lot of material from others but those don’t get any credit)
Marx wrote very little on communism itself, Engels did more of that. Marx’s major contributions were in breaking from Feuerbach and flipping Hegel’s dialectic from idealist to materialist, then applying dialectical materialism to history and the class struggle. This in turn led Marx to analyze capitalism first and foremost, its contradictions, and use this as the basis for what capitalism was necessarily working towards, ie centralization of markets into the necessity of collectivized and planned production and distribution.
Marx’s prececessors, such as Adam Smith, Ricardo, Hegel, even the Physiocrats which were overall more wrong than Smith but got nearer to the truth of fixed vs circulating capital all get due credit. The reason these people are not studied as much as Marx is because Marx advanced upon them, and analyzing them is useful for better understanding the context of Marx’s advancements.
Lenin wrote on ways to practically start a revolution to bring it about.
Partially correct, but this is missing that Lenin’s greatest advancement was analyzing imperialism, and combatting the vulgarization of Marx by the second international that painted Marx more as a reformist than a revolutionary. Lenin didn’t really talk about starting a revolution, but preparing and organizing for one, as you cannot simply force a revolution.
This is just proving comrade RedSturgeon and myself correct, though. Purity tests are nonsense, especially coming from those unfamiliar with Marxism-Leninism.
Anarchism rejects authority which is probably why so many Anarchists probably don’t like the Iranian government which is obviously very authoritarian. Though some online Anarchists (and other leftists) seem to think that without any prior organisation or mass education on Anarchism, Iranians can just remove an authoritation government and instead of a deadly power vacuum, people will all magically join communal volunteering organisations.
I generally agree with this criticism of what some western anarchists are doing right now. There isn’t a mass organization in place in Iran that can both topple the government and replace it with a socialist one without Mossad and the CIA wrecking it, both of the latter 2 are far more organized in Iran from what I’ve seen.
This is why I critically support your posts and comments, if I may be cheeky. I know you can’t see this, but some of your takes are good. It’s your refusal to take analysis of the characteristics of imperialism seriously that leads you to working more with your gut instinct than any materialist analysis, leading you into false conclusions like claiming China is imperialist, and conflating weak anti-imperialism with imperialism proper. Same with your transphobic theories of “Transzionism” on Hexbear.
Partially true, but all the anarchist platforms (both on and offline) are mired in a “debate” about whether it would be better for Iran if the current regime fell without any established left power to take the reins and that in itself is a failure. Up until the Iraq war there was ZERO debate about whether a foreign government should fall or not. The movement’s members knew that their job is to stop the US/NATO warmachine and acted accordingly. Black blocs were tearing shit apart in major western cities and sabotage was a daily occurrence. Where is that kind of energy in today’s anarchist movement? Literally every time the US openly tries to bring chaos to a country the same handwringing bs is echoed all the fucking time from “anarchists” who then have absolute zero accountability when the regime whose overthrowing they cheered for “because it’s an opening to bring anarchy” NEVER gets swapped to an anarchist commune but usually an even worse, even more exploitative government that starts clearing space with leftist movements.
So while i might agree to some degree to your point about MLs, the article is completely right about those “anarchists” whose opinion gets paraded in mainstream media.
All of the comments on that article are the usual pearl clutching drivel from pseudo MLs, bleating that ‘anarchists’ (collectively because anarchists are renowned for all thinking & behaving the same all the time!) are “rejoicing an imperialist power being instrumental in bringing down another oppressive govt” all based from a tweet from anonymous account that probably looked at another anonymous twitter account with an Ⓐ in it’s profile, while they were all “you need to vote blue to keep the orange man out” and do fuck all for establishing a vanguard movement in their own countries, or even are involved in any kind of mutual aid programs at the very least.
Those people are so unserious that it’s becoming harder by the day to distinguish them from the maga cultists
That’s the problem with a movement which has no leader. Everyone who picks up the logo can say things for it. And a lot of “Anarchists” have started saying they hecking love regime change. Are they mostly bots? Probably. But a few real figures have disappointed as well.
How are MLs any different?
Anyone can, and does, call themselves an ML and out of the myriad I’ve seen online there’s but a handful who have not only read theory but actually understand it, instead of regurgitating empty quotes and/or engaging in purity politics.
I don’t see MLs supporting regime change, nor rejecting the utility of leaders. I’m not sure who you count as the handful that not only read theory but actually understand it, but I certainly don’t see support for the Mossad/CIA influence in Iranian protests nor kidnapping Maduro.
They’re on average more consistent on their positions, sure you can find plenty of self proclaimed MLs that are absolute clowns and nobody has the most pristine and most correct take about literally everything but in general they have more coherent positions on current geopolitics and are generally highly skeptical of imperialist propaganda, unlike anarchists who are all over the place.
It is absolutely hilarious for a person who refuses on principle to support actually existing revolutionary movements and governments to accuse anyone else of purity politics
Point to on the doll where I’ve “refused on principal to support actual existing revolutionary movements”
Get your head out of your arse kid. Huffing your own jenkum at the source is messing with your head
Classic weird SA shit
You presumably self identify as an anarchist or ultraleftist of some kind, no?
Huff my jenkum, loser
ML’s also quote Marx or Lenin when it comes to imperialism which are their leaders. I don’t think I’ve seen any self-proclaimed ML’s advocate for a military invasion of Iran so I guess that’s the difference here. Though a lot of self-proclaimed ML’s are not following those books as religiously when China does something contradicting them.
For clarity, geneva_convenience hasn’t read Marx nor Lenin but believes China is imperialist, according to Lenin, without actually proving how, purely because they abstained from the UNSC vote on the TRUST plan for Palestine. geneva_convenience blocked me after contextualizing it and proving that, while certainly not what I would have wanted the PRC to do, does not change that they are not an imperialist country.
For geneva_convenience, weak allies are enemies, and imperialism is being insufficiently anti-imperialist. When presented with this, they blocked me and spammed a bunch of unrelated Bad Empanada tweets. The importance of the distinction between weak anti-imperialism and imperialism proper is between working for and hoping for better anti-imperialism in the existing system vs actively needing to dismantle the PRC, which is why I felt it necessary to address in the first place.
Figured this targeted vaguery needed to be addressed, even if geneva can’t see it. The only reason I gently reached out in the first place was because they are generally more reasonable, but seems like they were poisoned by Bad Empanada thinking, just taking the most inflammatory stance possible and burning bridges with people over slight disagreements.
This isn’t even a “read theory” argument, it’s that geneva believes they can dictate who does and doesn’t understand Marx and Lenin based on watching Bad Empanada videos and tweets, without doing any reading on their own part or trying to come to a deeper understanding. This is also why geneva started claiming Hexbear is “Transzionist,” and that Hexbear defends contrapoints on Israel because she’s trans, which is blatantly false: Hexbear is anti-contrapoints and anti-Zionist. This corresponds with geneva_convenience’s love for Bad Empanada:
All in all incredibly disappointing to see from someone who usually has decent political instincts, such as not falling for Mossad and CIA propaganda surrounding regime change in Iran. They seem to love to argue and don’t block even the most reactionary of people, so the only reason I can think of for blocking me is because they didn’t want to confront the idea that they are mistaken about imperialism. The bright side is that I can still interact with their comments, even if they can’t see my responses.
how fucking dare someone say we like contrapoints
I know, spending 2 seconds on Hexbear and searching “contra” will get you mountains of complaints. This is why I say geneva is more concerned with mudflinging than actual anti-imperialism, and why they would especially benefit from getting organized and reading theory. It seems online debate is more of an outlet for them than something genuinely driven ideologically.
I am so embarrassed for u/geneva_convenience after reading this
Comrade Cowbee is one of the most patient and couragous members of this community
Thanks! Yep, it’s really disappointing, especially becayse they’re usually right about things. The problem is that they don’t take it seriously enough to study, and instead fill in the gaps on their own, which results in false conclusions from time to time.
Belt and road is pretty imperialist
It isn’t, assuming we are following Leninist analysis, and I’d argue that we should follow Leninist analysis of imperialism due to the depth of understanding it provides, how it works, why it arises, and how to stop it, all of which have been repeatedly tested in reality.
In short, BRI does not at all steal the surplus and prevent development of countries within the program, unlike what the West does, because BRI is about long-term cooperation and not about short-term superprofits. Capitalism can’t realistically fight the urge for immediate gratification, which is why it coups, bombs, and installs compradors, while socialist China focuses on win-win development that creates better contributors to the global market through shared development.
In other words, even the most cynical view of BRI, when viewed objectively, China’s strategy for personal benefit rests on long term delayed gratification, and it can make these choices because people have power over capital in China, rather than inverse in capitalist countries.
So it’s only imperialist if it’s for short term gain?
Imagine believing that they’re doing it out of the kindness of their hearts and don’t expect anything in return.
Why can’t you criticize anything they do, even when it’s naked imperialism?
No? It’s not imperialism because it’s mutual development. Joining BRI results in large development without China stealing surplus value or installing compradors, which is what the west does. That’s why countries like the Congo are so poor despite being so resource rich when they are imperialized by the west. The fact that the result is mutual development and enrichment, and not one country plundering another, is why it isn’t imperialism.
You’re confusing the reasoning I gave for why China doesn’t have the same economic compulsion towards imperialism as the west does with evidence of it not being imperialist. Are you legitimately making the argument that mutual cooperation for long-term results for both countries is imperialism, or did you misread my comment?
I do criticize China. For example, I don’t think they go far enough when it comes to foreign policy, and they are still lagging behind countries like Cuba when it comes to social progressivism. I know the younger generation in the PRC is more socially progressive and internationally millitant, so the continued progress in China is likely to continue.
Can you explain why you belive BRI to be imperialist? You just said it’s “pretty imperialist” and “naked imperialism,” but haven’t justified why you believe so, other than an implied belief that any mutual cooperation for mutual gain between a more developed and less developed country is imperialism. You haven’t actually stated that, in fairness, which is why I’m asking for you to explain in your own words so I don’t have to read between the lines and assume.
B-b-but the chinese must be bad otherwise westerners aren’t superior anymore…
If only I could get everyone I see to believe that china is bad then reality would bend to my will and my order would be restored, but you ruined it! You don’t believe! Its your fault that the west is inferior now!
(What I believe goes on in liberals’ heads)
It’s only imperialist if it’s actually harmful and extractive. Otherwise all mutual aid is imperialist, Cuba sending doctors throughout the world is imperialist, disaster relief organizations are imperialist. It’s nonsense
deleted by creator
Marx wrote books about Communism (building on a lot of material from others but those don’t get any credit) and Lenin wrote on ways to practically start a revolution to bring it about.
Anarchism rejects authority which is probably why so many Anarchists probably don’t like the Iranian government which is obviously very authoritarian. Though some online Anarchists (and other leftists) seem to think that without any prior organisation or mass education on Anarchism, Iranians can just remove an authoritation government and instead of a deadly power vacuum, people will all magically join communal volunteering organisations.
Marx wrote very little on communism itself, Engels did more of that. Marx’s major contributions were in breaking from Feuerbach and flipping Hegel’s dialectic from idealist to materialist, then applying dialectical materialism to history and the class struggle. This in turn led Marx to analyze capitalism first and foremost, its contradictions, and use this as the basis for what capitalism was necessarily working towards, ie centralization of markets into the necessity of collectivized and planned production and distribution.
Marx’s prececessors, such as Adam Smith, Ricardo, Hegel, even the Physiocrats which were overall more wrong than Smith but got nearer to the truth of fixed vs circulating capital all get due credit. The reason these people are not studied as much as Marx is because Marx advanced upon them, and analyzing them is useful for better understanding the context of Marx’s advancements.
Partially correct, but this is missing that Lenin’s greatest advancement was analyzing imperialism, and combatting the vulgarization of Marx by the second international that painted Marx more as a reformist than a revolutionary. Lenin didn’t really talk about starting a revolution, but preparing and organizing for one, as you cannot simply force a revolution.
This is just proving comrade RedSturgeon and myself correct, though. Purity tests are nonsense, especially coming from those unfamiliar with Marxism-Leninism.
I generally agree with this criticism of what some western anarchists are doing right now. There isn’t a mass organization in place in Iran that can both topple the government and replace it with a socialist one without Mossad and the CIA wrecking it, both of the latter 2 are far more organized in Iran from what I’ve seen.
This is why I critically support your posts and comments, if I may be cheeky. I know you can’t see this, but some of your takes are good. It’s your refusal to take analysis of the characteristics of imperialism seriously that leads you to working more with your gut instinct than any materialist analysis, leading you into false conclusions like claiming China is imperialist, and conflating weak anti-imperialism with imperialism proper. Same with your transphobic theories of “Transzionism” on Hexbear.
Partially true, but all the anarchist platforms (both on and offline) are mired in a “debate” about whether it would be better for Iran if the current regime fell without any established left power to take the reins and that in itself is a failure. Up until the Iraq war there was ZERO debate about whether a foreign government should fall or not. The movement’s members knew that their job is to stop the US/NATO warmachine and acted accordingly. Black blocs were tearing shit apart in major western cities and sabotage was a daily occurrence. Where is that kind of energy in today’s anarchist movement? Literally every time the US openly tries to bring chaos to a country the same handwringing bs is echoed all the fucking time from “anarchists” who then have absolute zero accountability when the regime whose overthrowing they cheered for “because it’s an opening to bring anarchy” NEVER gets swapped to an anarchist commune but usually an even worse, even more exploitative government that starts clearing space with leftist movements.
So while i might agree to some degree to your point about MLs, the article is completely right about those “anarchists” whose opinion gets paraded in mainstream media.