• AchillesUltimate
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    1
    arrow-down
    8
    ·
    1 year ago

    I’ve read everything in both those links and either I didn’t understand it or it was plainly contradictory and bad.

    First, I never saw any reason that the group of people who make up the new government would serve the people. Not once was there a reason that a dictatorship for the proletariat would actually be for the proletariat. In fact, it seems like the exclusive role of the government is to oppress somebody, and the proletariat’s a really easy target. Even if you and all your friends pick up arms, overthrow the government, and try to set up a state that acts in the interest of the people, your new government is going to be made up of people who act in their own self-interest, and the interests of the government as a whole will reflect that.

    The idea of the state withering away, as I understand it, is based on the idea that the state is an instrument of oppression by one class against another, and when a classless society emerges, the state will lose its purpose and role and then slowly vanish. BUT the very fact that there is an oppressive state (that’s busy oppressing the remnants of capitalism) means that there’s a class divide (rulers and ruled, oppressed and oppressed, that whole shebang). Thanks to the immeasurability of when the capitalists have been defeated (Lenin stated that he couldn’t know by what practical measures the defeat of capitalism will be known) the oppressive state is going to stick around indefinitely, oppressing more and more people.

    In simpler terms, there’s some dictator in charge of the dictatorship of the proletariat (or at least, there are high ranking members in it). During the extinguishing of capitalism, this dictator will have lots of power and authority granted to him by the people. He won’t want to lose it. This man will do everything in his power to maintain total domination for himself forever. He will create imaginary threats, oppress people, frighten them, manipulate narratives, concentrate more power, punish insurrection, whatever it takes. If he doesn’t, someone who will will take his place. This is human nature, the human nature you see in the bourgeois.

    Secondly, the idea that the state is created by one of the two classes to oppress the other is either not true or a self-fulfilling prophecy. Was Genghis Khan a false mediator? The state exists because people in pre-history had really big armies and wanted to control people to obtain wealth and power for themselves. It turned out that people being alive and prosperous was really helpful for that, so states started supporting that, so people often submitted. This isn’t the bourgeois creating a state to adjudicate disputes between them and the proletariat in the former’s favor, it’s just militaristic (or perhaps political or social) conquest.

    I had lots of other problems with both the articles you linked, especially the article from Liberation School, but I don’t really want to write a full paper on the errors of communism.

    Instead, let’s bring it back to the idea of freedom of the press. If the state is a purely oppressive tool used by one class to oppress another, a state-controlled press is bad. It doesn’t matter who you’re oppressing, or who you’re claiming or actually doing it in the name of, it’s bad because the result is truth is thrown out in favor of manipulation.

    In a post-class society (I don’t think that this is possible, but that doesn’t matter right now) you actually would have a free press, because there’s no government or state restricting it, and this would be great. However, something like this wouldn’t come about through state oppression and control of the media. In fact, this dictatorship for the proletariat having power over the news ensures that there’ll always be stories about the new, evil things capitalists are doing that your loving dictator needs more money and authority to squash.

    • cfgaussian@lemmygrad.ml
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      8
      arrow-down
      1
      ·
      1 year ago

      So…your whole argument boils down to “human nature”. Wow, very original, i’m sure none of us has ever heard that before.

      • AchillesUltimate
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        1
        arrow-down
        7
        ·
        1 year ago

        Not really

        -no one ever showed me why a dictatorship for the proletariat would be for the proletariat (adjacent to human nature, since there’s the assumption that they wouldn’t be) -a dictatorship for the proletariat would never wither away because its existence ensures the existences of an oppressor and oppressed, on top of never being able to tell when its intended job is completed -humans don’t want to sacrifice control (absolutely human nature, but I want to list it here as well just to list all my arguments) -governments aren’t exclusively the tool of oppression for the use of a separate class -if governments are purely oppressive, granting them control over media is always bad -in a society on the brink of becoming a post-class society, control over the press would be the perfect tool to perpetuate idea that more oppression is needed (again human nature adjacent, since there’s the assumption that governments would want to do that)

        If my argument were entirely based on my idea of human nature though, what part of human nature am I wrong about?

        • relay@lemmygrad.ml
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          3
          ·
          1 year ago

          If there is no Bourgeoisie or the government explicitally restricts the Bourgeoisie from controlling the media, who else but the proletariat would control the media?

          Just because some people want to oppress others to feed their weak egos doesn’t mean that all of humanity wants that. I think most people actually want to live in a society that takes care of them, and in turn will love to help out and serve society. Once it becomes the norm to look out for the collective interest instead of self serving behavior, self serving individuals will either need to learn to adapt, hide or get ostracized by society.

          Human nature is not static. Human nature is reacting to the conditions they live in.

          • AchillesUltimate
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            1
            ·
            1 year ago

            The government, but I don’t think the line between the bourgeoisie and the proletariat is that clean. I think the definitions of these classes is pretty fuzzy.

            I think you underestimate the number of people who want power, and the variety of reasons someone might want to be an oppressor (wealth, control, security, status, fame, respect, not to mention people who think they’re doing the right thing). It only takes a handful of people anyway, and those are exactly the types of people that would be drawn toward working in the government so that they can oppress the remaining capitalists.

            Even if you managed to make the kind of classless society you’re talking about I suspect that oppressive systems would grow out of it. Think of something like an HOA, people trying to control others “for the good of the community”. Without an authority structure above it, I suspect it would grow and bloat, granting itself more power and authority as time went on. Eventually you’ve got a new oppressive government explicitly built by people who want to control others.

            Getting that from an HOA might be ridiculous, but HOAs demonstrate the desire for control I think is all too common.