And now, some derp!

In 1869, Sergey Nechayev published The Revolutionary Catechism. It's worth a read, if only for it's general "WTF" factor. It's very clearly based on religious catechisms, outlining the way one should relate to others and society, delineating the purpose of a revolutionary, etc. etc. The sentiment is very real, don't get me wrong, I'm not talking about it's derpitude because I disagree with it. But the near cult-like manner in which the content is approached is more than a little off-putting.

Anyone who knows much about the Bolshevik Party and the appropriation of religious language by the Soviet authorities, however, shouldn't be surprised that the Radical Left in Russia was doing this before the 1870s. Give it a look, if for nothing else, you can judge yourself and your friends on how radical you guys are.

Business Colleges

So I missed Marxism Monday. So sorry, folks! It was a combination of work kicking my ass and not having completed my research on the socialist value equation. It's coming. I swear. Anyway, I wanted to discuss something that every comrade should be aware of, and why it is a pernicious evil that propagates bourgeois sensibility among those that should be our allies but walk away with degrees declaring their status as enemies.

That, dear friends, is the Fisher College of Business, a recent addition to the Ohio State University which served as my alma mater (fucking Buckeyes....). Now, when I say it's recent, I mean it is one of the most recent additions to the University's curricula, not that it was added in the past ten years. Fisher has been in the business of doing business for some time, and paired with the football team, makes quite a bit of money for a University that no longer has education or academics as its core focus.

The presence of a Business College is a pernicious stain on any University campus. The terminology used by people who attend it are especially telling. Engineering, physics, linguistics, statistics, biology, anthropology, gender-studies, etc. are all academic disciplines. They are not something one can commoditize. With my degree in Russian, with a strong emphasis on culture (I like to think of myself as a linguist and anthropologist, but I digress), I cannot simply set up shop and sell my services in these areas to the general population. This is not a practical degree, nor was it ever intended to be. No University has ever concerned itself with practical application of its curricula. You go to a University to learn how to think critically in a particular field to further the sum total of human knowledge and understanding. This is not practical. This is all speculative and theoretical. Are there some degrees (Engineering, biochemistry, etc.) that have practical applications? Absolutely. But one is also providing a service to their academic field and future students in the same field.

The Business College is absolutely exempt from this reality. For centuries, one became a businessman by engaging in business and learning it as one would a trade--hands on. Today, the principles of business management remain very much the same as they always have. Ensure your supply is equal to your demand, pay a fair wage, ensure decent human resources access, and adapt your business model to changes in business climate to ensure you stay in business. This is a trade, not a speculative field of research. "Research" projects in Business Colleges amount to "how I would set up my business" and ensure one has read the material. They do not, however, offer valuable insights into the way one might do business in the future. And why is this the case if they are part of the family of highly speculative and forward-thinking curricula that make up the rest of the University syllabus? Because Business Colleges do not exist to promote freedom of thought, nor do they exist to contribute to the larger body of human knowledge. They exist to indoctrinate and propagandize those that walk their hallowed halls. They exist to shame the rest of the speculative fields being heavily invested in, and showing the University that THEY bring in business. THEY capitalize themselves. THEY are superior to all other fields of knowledge.

Remember what I said about how Business College attendees have a particular vocabulary? This is their vocabulary. They frame themselves in the context of the social construct that is the perceived prestige of attending an academic institution, but they themselves are not engaged in any way with academia outside academic requisites set by the University as terms of one's graduation.

But, here, also is a major issue with the decades-long legacy of the Business College. You do not attend a University and look at its job-placement rate. To engage in academia is the quiet acceptance that, while a practical job outside academia might exist for you, your ultimate career path is to remain in academia. Academics are people who never leave school. Business College graduates, however, have no choice. For them, the job-placement rate is tantamount to the academic's search for accreditation. So an already-large University like Ohio State can attract more money through more students by investing heavily in a Business College...and then watching as the social construct is reformed to glorify it and measure the rest of the University in the same terms.

The Business College is not an academic institution, so framing the debate on the humanities, arts and sciences, etc. in the terms of the Business College is disingenuous. A Business College has no place at an academic institution because it helps engender and indoctrinate people who do not even attend it. Academics ARE the vanguard of the revolution. Academics ARE the professional revolutionaries, because they have the time and energy to study and pursue further study. But the Business College prevents academics from joining the revolution because they become adherents to the propaganda of the Koch Brothers and McGraw Hill. Everyone, even in the Humanities, starts chasing that dollar sign and the entire premise of academia is undermined.

But when everyone is a business man and the economic collapses out from underneath them, where will their practical degree get them? Money can't really feed you, but I'm sure the embossing on your "university" degree will add some texture to that delicious business salad.

Fresh Friday #3

I was reviewing some of my recent posts and realized I haven't really addressed any strategies for a United Left outside of a call for Evangelistic Marxism. So I wanted a return to this concern since that is, after all, the modus operandi of the blog. So I will be talking about sectarianism within the American Left (and the Left in general), and how we can address these problems.

On Uniting the Left: Socialism Without Adjectives
-E.M. Diderot

My Comrade, Jack, posted on Facebook yesterday "Socialism without adjectives". It sparked a few tongue-in-cheek responses including my personal favorite: "Sentences without adjectives or verbs." But the sentiment is very real. Another Comrade, Chris, has been posting lately on the Anarchists, with whom the radical left on Facebook recently spontaneously and (nearly) unanimously declared solidarity over the Anarchist Memes fiasco, and their absolute refusal to accept our solidarity. I have to say the level of despair he is proclaiming is not unique to him. There is a reason I have stopped actively engaging the AnCaps on the usurper AM page. There is a reason many of my Comrades have dropped the offensive. But then, in a Facebook group whose aim is the discussion of radical Communist theory in general, on the same day as all this, a post was made asking which Leftists would we be unwilling to work with in a revolutionary group.

Three independent individuals, posting at different times in different places with different intentions, all in one day, underlining the ever-present snake that is Leftist sectarianism. And it really made me think about what "Socialism without adjectives" and the concept of a "United Left" really mean.

For starters, "Socialism without adjectives" is simply that. It is sort of a declaration similar to non-denominational Christianity. You are declaring your adherence to a particular ideology and its particular set of principles without any further qualifiers or modifications. So adjectiveless Socialism would necessarily argue for (in general) the following:

• The abolition of capital;
• The emancipation of labor;
• The full democratization of political power; and
• The full equity of social relations.

Sounds nice, right? Well, the definitions of each bullet point, how they relate to class struggle, and how they are best to be accomplished are what causes sectarianism among the Left. So it's really a lot harder than it looks to nail down what the basic tenets of a United Left or "Socialism without adjectives" should look like. But it's a place to start. That being said, using those (highly simplified) bullet points, we can very quickly throw out a few groups as NOT being amenable to a United Left or belonging to an adjectiveless Socialism. These even came up in the post about who you wouldn't work with:

• Liberals; they support operation within the current system which is opposed to the abolition of capital and the full democratization of political power--we cannot consider them as being on the Left.
• Stalinists; my understanding of Stalinism and its modern adherents is that the full equity of social relations and the full democratization of political power are questioned if not outright denied--no matter how "Left" they are, we cannot consider them Socialists

I'm sure there are others, but these are the ones who most readily come to mind. This is the first restriction on the definition of a United Left in this country, that not all who lay claim to the Left can be considered allies in the sense of pursuing class struggle to its inevitably revolutionary end. Hal Draper discusses this trend in his 1948 critique of Neo-Stalinists, and he is far less forgiving than I am in his treatment of whether or not they can claim to be "socialist". 

As far as the Anarchists who refused our solidarity and openly mocked it, challenging us on the merits of Marxism rather than the merits of unity and solidarity, it is the question of the third bullet that truly divides us from them: what, in a post-revolutionary society, would the full democratization of political power look like? They advocate for the complete abolition of a state apparatus upon the success of the revolution, while we (generally) advocate for a new kind of people's or worker's state. This is the rub of it. Ergo, because Anarchists do not represent a wide spectrum of the Left, a United Left can only be considered as such insofar as it unites and brings together various groups of a Marxist, Socialist, Communist variety. Anarchists can and should be admitted so long as the question of unity and solidarity trumps sectarian division on the question of the existence of the state, and we should openly support Anarchist groups and declare our solidarity with them, but in the actual formation of a United Left it is unfathomable to recommend full agency to Anarchism precisely because the definition of the state would be enough for schism.

It is an unfortunate reality that a United Left must necessarily recognize that certain groups that are historically on the Left or historically claim membership among the Left would be detrimental to a wider united front. But if we do not address these questions now, it would become harder later on to address them and address them effectively. Council Communism, Party Vanguardism, Democratic Centralism, etc. can all vie for prominence among the membership of a United Left because they all agree on the basic idea that a state apparatus in some form would exist post-revolution. But because Anarchists do not agree, these other strains would not even be able to vie for influence because the question of "state? yes or no?" would dominate everything else.

The DNA of a United Left is to be decided upon what we on the Left can agree upon in general without relying on specific definitions. This rather exoteric approach to Marxism, a self-described scientific dialectical theory, has its issues, and problems most definitely would arise from it. But far from attempting a dogmatic orthodoxy of Marxism, it is a framework in which vibrant heterodoxies can flourish and challenge each other, urging a dialectical synthesis of Marxist formulations. Without insisting on a rigid, disciplined orthodoxy, a United Left could potentially be a formidable force. It is simply a matter of finding the platforms upon which we all in general agree, which is, of course, no simple matter at all.

Theory Thursday #2

This week's Theory Thursday is the first bite into Marxist Feminism for us. As promised, we are following the list of texts presented by Draper/Lipow in their critique, "Marxist Women vs. Liberal Feminism". Their first text is a decent introduction to Marxist Feminism, a selection from August Bebel's "Woman and Socialism", written in 1879. The selection is entitled "The Enemy Sisters" and is an historical look into the development of separate Liberal and Marxist ideas on Feminism, and a good introduction to why the distinction is important.

To begin, it is important to recognize that, at the time Bebel was writing, the terms "feminism" and "feminist", when used at all, in general applied to what we would call "Liberal Feminism", since feminism as a movement had not really developed. The German term "Frauenrechtlerinnen" is utilized, instead, by those early Marxist Feminists, Clara Zetkin, August Bebel, and Rosa Luxemburg, to describe their Liberal opponents. Draper translates it as "women's-rightsters" and claims that "Liberal Feminist" isn't exactly a proper translation. I have used it primarily because a study of these early "women's-rightsters" shows that their program translated into Liberal Feminism as it matured. So, for economy of language and ease of readability, I use Liberal Feminism to describe the Frauenrechtlerinnen and modern Liberal Feminists.

The selection chosen by Draper opens with a stark accusation: legislative equality under the juridical domain does not undermine the very real exploitation of women at the hands of their husbands within the confines of the nuclear family:

"If we assume the case, which is certainly not impossible, that the representatives of the bourgeois women’s movement achieve all their demands for equal rights with men, this would not entail the abolition of the slavery that present-day marriage means for countless women, nor of prostitution, nor of the material dependence of the great majority of married women on their husbands. Also, for the great majority of women it makes no difference if some thousands or tens of thousands of their sisters who belong to the more favourably situated ranks of society succeed in attaining a superior profession or medical practice or some scientific or official career, for nothing is thereby changed in the overall situation of the sex as a whole."

This is really the core of the difference between Liberal Feminists and Marxist Feminists. In the Nineteenth Century in which Bebel was writing Liberal Feminism was principally concerned with the position of women in only a juridical sense. Bebel thereafter explains that juridical concerns can ameliorate this condition in which women find themselves, but cannot emancipate women fully, and that a full revolution in women's social and material conditions is necessary to accomplish this. It is this question of material conditions that differentiates Liberal and Marxist Feminism (and really Marxism, in general, from other political philosophies), as Bebel believes juridical equality does not guarantee social and material well-being.

"Hence it follows that all women – regardless of their position in society, as a sex that has been oppressed, ruled, and wronged by men throughout the course of development of our culture – have the common interest of doing away with this situation and of fighting to change it, insofar as it can be changed through changes in laws and institutions within the framework of the existing political and social order. But the huge majority of women are also most keenly interested in something more: in transforming the existing political and social order from the ground up, in order to abolish both wage-slavery, which afaicts [sic] the female proletariat most heavily, and sex-slavery, which is very intimately bound up with our property and employment conditions."

Here, now, having established that a focus on juridical versus material conditions is what divides a Liberal Feminist outlook from a Marxist Feminist outlook, Bebel makes a startling synthesis, that Liberal Feminism is, ultimately, a philosophical position held by women of privilege in opposition to proletarian women, making the stark class divide at the core of Marxist agitation apparent within Feminism.

"The preponderant portion of the women in the bourgeois women’s movement do not comprehend the necessity of such a radical transformation. Under the influence of their privileged position in society, they see in the more far-reaching movement of the proletarian women dangerous and often detestable aspirations that they have to fight. The class antagonism that yawns like a gulf between the capitalist class and the working class in the general social movement, and that keeps on getting sharper and harsher with the sharpening of our societal relations, also makes its appearance inside the women’s movement and finds its fitting expression in the goals they adopt and the way they behave."

He demands, therefore, that, though it is necessary to achieve juridical and social equality in all things, it is imperative to go beyond that and he intimately links the "woman question" to the "social question" and views their solutions as one and the same.

"It is therefore a question not only of achieving equality of rights between men and women on the basis of the existing political and social order, which is the goal set by the bourgeois women’s-rightsers, but of going beyond that goal and abolishing all the barriers that make one human being dependent on another and therefore one sex on another. This resolution of the woman question therefore coincides completely with the resolution of the social question."

This is also the core difference between Liberal Feminists and Marxist Feminists, today. Despite a shift from a juridical to a socio-cultural focus in modern Liberal Feminism, Liberal Feminism still insists on operating within the social and political framework of the present-day system. A cursory glance at the opponents of women's equality shows that the Republican War on Women is being led by relatively young men such as Rand Paul and Paul Ryan. Socially, the emergence of the "nice guy", awash in Ax body spray, fedoras, and the shame of the "friendzone", and the unofficially-sanctioned rape culture of high school boys and college fraternity members shows how fragile this sort of focus really is. Truly, Bebel's conclusion that the solution to the "woman question" is the same as the social question carries a great amount of gravity with it--a juridical solution to one as necessitated by a lack of juridical protection does not solve or balance the equation. A juridical solution is a necessary component, and we should support juridical measures to support and liberate women, but it is not sufficient. And this is why Marxist Feminism should be pursued, revived, and expanded. It is also why Bebel declares his solidarity with the Social-Democratic Party of his day, because

"[T]he Social-Democratic Party is the only one that has included in its programme the complete equality of women and their liberation from every form of dependence and oppression, not on grounds of propaganda but out of necessity, on grounds of principle. There can be no liberation of humanity without the social independence and equal rights of both sexes."

 In other words, there is no women's liberation without social liberation, and social independence and juridical equality of both men and women is necessary for the whole of humanity to be liberated.

Next week, we will be discussing Clara Zetkin's pamphlet "Proletarian Women and Socialist Revolution". Having a basis in the foundation of Marxist Feminism, we can move on to the practical concerns of one of Marxism's most vocal and influential feminists and her address to the Gotha Congress.

Net Neutrality is Dead

Net Neutrality is dead. Links! Love 'em. So yeah. What happened?

The FCC tried to enforce net neutrality. Verizon said "your administrative oversight doesn't apply to us as broadband providers." A US District court said Verizon was right.

...

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A telecommunications company...under the regulatory oversight of the FCC...is providing broadband service...which is also under the regulatory oversight of the FCC...is arguing that as providers (under FCC regulatory oversight) providing a service (under FCC regulatory oversight) are not under FCC regulatory oversight...and a Federal court agrees with them.

...

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The fuck?

Anyway, this isn't about the FCC or Verizon. This is about how the death of net neutrality affects our efforts as Marxists. Obviously, this can get into martyr complexes and conspiracy theories very easily, so let's try and keep out of that territory. But if you recall that Facebook already provides preferential treatment to particular political viewpoints, it's not that hard to surmise that internet providers, more necessary to our daily functioning than Facebook, would do the same.

The internet has provided unprecedented ability for revolutionary movements and Leftists to network and organize. Net Neutrality has been one of our lines of defense that we have probably taken for granted. I know the AnCaps would respond to this by screaming "Statism! The State has no business on the internet!  Bwaaah! Free Markets!", but we on the Left should have a more nuanced response. AnCom or not, the Left at least explores its options and talks rationally.

The state, whether serving only the interests of the ruling class or not, has an agenda. At its core, that agenda is existential. The state propagates itself. This is fine. This is the nature of the state. As a "statist", I see no problem with a state safeguarding its interests. But when those interests aren't really the state's interests, but corporate interests, I have a serious issue with a Federal court defending a private corporation's interests over those of the state. Because, as is pointed out in the New Yorker article linked above, this opens the doorway for internet providers to severely limit access to particular websites, blogs, etc. While the New Yorker talks about competing firms, what if, say, Verizon decided because they were no longer in charge of the ACA's healthcare exchanges they wanted to degrade access to healthcare.gov?

Under this ruling, that would be potentially legal.

So, it is extrapolated that, should the Left unite and pose an existential threat to any one or all of the major telecommunications companies that provide internet service to millions of Americans, it would follow that our blogs, websites, news outlets, organizations, etc. would lose our internet presence. It would severely cripple our ability to organize and effectively agitate outside of peer-to-peer personal interaction. The election of Councilwoman Kshama Sawant would have been intensely more difficult were she to have lost her internet presence prior to the campaign.

What are we, then, to do? The most direct action is what liberals often do--petition, petition, petition. Failing that, more direct activism and action is needed. Should we drive ourselves into the Dark Web--the fabled depths of the internet where the Silk Road and Bitcoin dwelt? Or should we defiantly stake our claim here, on the surface, and continue as we have? I don't really have answers for this except that more than ever we need to unite behind a common banner and organization so we can more actively oppose actions like this. To fail to do so will allow this potentially existential threat to materialize more fully and more threateningly. With the United Left blog barely a month old, it seems like bad timing, eh?

Hunt the Bourgeoisie

Some of you may have seen this already floating around Facebook:

It's a picture of some asshole bourgeois fuck with a dead African Black Rhino. I will let the text provided by International Animal Rescue Foundation World Action South Africa on their Facebook page tell you what's going on:

On January 11, 2014 at the Dallas Convention Center in Dallas, Texas, they will be auctioning the rights to kill and endangered Black rhinoceros and are declaring this hunt a "heroic conservation" effort, the Dallas Safari Club and its supporters are attempting to deceive a gullible public into believing this hunt isn't simply the slaughter of a rare species of rhino.  

We'll be monitoring DSC so called conservation funding and just how many "thousands" of Rhino this money made from the auction will make. Lastly but not least we are annoyed that a plane load of South African hunters traveled to America of which it has been noted (name left out) one particular South African will be bidding at the auction to take down this Rhinoceros.

According to Louisiana conservation attorney John J. Jackson, who said he’s been working on the auction project with federal wildlife officials, the hunt will involve one of five black rhinos selected by a committee and approved by the Namibian government. The five are to be older males, incapable of reproducing and likely “troublemakers … bad guys that are killing other rhinos,” he said. 

These animals are farm-raised around humans and cared for by humans only to be killed by rich hunters in what has been coined as “canned hunts.” This is simply a method that allows them to farm more for harvesting later.

This auction is nothing more than abuse of Africa’s natural resources to the highest bidder. No ethical or moral motive drives the hunt club’s actions. What DSC touts as conservation, we label destruction of a nation.

The DSC lawyer’s statements are shockingly arrogant and factually incorrect. “This is advanced, state-of-the-art wildlife conservation and management techniques,” Jackson, a Metairie, La.-based international wildlife attorney, said Wednesday. “It’s not something the layman understands, but they should. This is the most sophisticated management strategy devised,” he said. “The conservation hunt is a hero in the hunting community.” 

Yes he is correct–the hunt may be a hero in the hunting community. But it has no conservation value other than the additional killing of rhinoceros and other species by rich Americans. This guise of “conservation” is not new but seems to be the only justification the group has. 

The individuals who participate in these hunts are rich Americans and Germans-typically millionaires who could very simply donate towards the care and keeping of endangered species rather than killing them. If this club wants to be seen as ‘heroes,’ and it has such a concern for conservation, it could easily petition its rich members to save these animals by donating money, to be used towards conserving the species. 

So we continue to ask–how is handing over a sum of money for the rights to kill an animal that is nearly extinct the most sophisticated management strategy, when most South African countries are banning Trophy Hunting? 

We had to somewhat laugh when reading this statement below made by many hunters internationally and within OUR rainbow nation. 

We thank God everyday of our lives for the splendour and the beauty of our precious dark continent, called Africa! We are proud to be hunters, were taught to protect, to cherish, to love and to savour the beauty of God’s creation. We sow more than we harvest, invest more than we take, and develop more than there ever used to be. We use hunting as our ‘paypal’, for conserving, protecting and developing our natural resources. 

“Real Hunters know this, if we don’t plow back, develop, protect and invest in, we will not have a better tomorrow”. 

It will be lost to our grandchildren, the generations to follow, and all this, because of man’s greed… 

Take time to digest this please. In the mean time the "problem child" will end up looking like this.

There are no words for this except maybe "Hunt the Bourgeoisie."

Update: The winner of the DSC auction stepped forward. His name is Cory Knowlton and he is a despicable bastard. I presume he also won an entry into "The Most Dangerous Game" as a contestant, not a hunter.

Land Appropriations and Collectivization At Your Service!

So I just hopped on to share a news item with everybody, concerning the ongoing land appropriations in Venezuela for conversion into small-scale collectives, cooperatives, etc. to ensure that the Revolution is capable of providing 100% food sustainability for the country. But I found that in under a month I had hit 200 page views! Yay! Thanks guys! In the famous words of me: "I'm gettin' famous!"

Not really. But thank you all for at least taking the time to glance at things. =D

Anyway, Venezuela is expanding its land appropriations initiated by Hugo Chavez under the National Land Institute (INTI), which aims to reclaim land held by vast private estates and hand them over to the campesinos. While the opposition has said this project is an abject failure, the article points out that statistics show it has, indeed, increased over all crop-yield. In addition to this, the campesinos are preparing their first national congress to address the role of the campesinos in social change. This is Marxism in action--a unification between the laborer's occupation and reclamation of the means of production as well as their organization into political bodies.

What does this mean for the American Left? While most farms in the United States are privately owned and operated by family members, what this shows is that schemes of productive appropriations are possible and effective. It could be along the lines of employees of a major restaurant chain slowly gaining complete control over voting rights in the board of directors over a period of a few years. Facilities or policy organs within corporations could be slowly transitioned into union control. While violent revolution is the quickest way to get things in the hands of the people, the soft approach is also definitely workable in a more pluralistic society. Anyway, short post today. See you all on Thursday!

Viva Venezuela!