By workers he clearly means labor unions. Individual people who are not engaged in the revolutionary struggle or the defense of communism should not have access to guns (or any weapon for that matter). Western leftists, particularly American ones, have liberal brain worms because they intertwined this with the second ammendment. Not everyone who is a worker should be entrusted with a fucking gun, the organizations that represent workers however should. Its the same argument with cars, are cars bad? Not inherently, but we as a society should be phasing them out. Western leftists listen to China challenge (HARD)
No he didn't just mean labor unions: https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1847/communist-league/1850-ad1.htm
Everyone should read the whole thing, but here's an examplary excerpt: "The whole proletariat must be armed at once with muskets, rifles, cannon and ammunition, and the revival of the old-style citizens’ militia, directed against the workers, must be opposed."
Marx is essentially saying that the communists need to organize and arm the proletariat ASAP and that bourgeois forces are already effectively pushing back - arming is necessary. Marx isn't talking idealistically, he's talking specifically about the need to forcefully oppose reaction to communists openly organizing against capital rather than secretly.
It's not difficult to make the case that socialists nowadays also desperately need both organization and arms. As an example, I recommend that everyone read The Jakarta Method, paying specifically close attention to the section asking survivors what they wish they'd done instead. The violence will come to us as we become a threat (before that, actually), so we need to protect ourselves and our comrades.
applying a rights-based framework to the means to take life is dumb, but also fuck kkkops, fuck gun laws, play ball
if we can't figure out a way to collectively disarm without the state monopolizing violence, then i guess we just won't collectively disarm
:meow-anarchist:
Did you forget the plural part under workers? I'm going to have to take points off Marx for not being specific enough. Z
I'm begging you all, please read the document where the quote is from. It's short and probably just as important as the Manifesto. Edit: It's so important Lenin committed it to memory please read it.
All of this assumes there's a legitimate effort being made towards a revolution, we shouldn't be acquiring guns because of a what if, they should purely be for an offensive and preemptive strike, ie we need to do the opposite of what Stalin did and invade Germany before they even invade Poland. Self defense is not the point of gun ownership for communists, war is. And if we aren't willing to use them in that context then they are useless to us.
I'm kinda drunk but I think I'm kind of in agreement? This was written predicting a revolutionary uprising of the German petty bourgeoisie who would arm then betray the proletariat (thus the proletariat would have to be willing to fight to the petty bourgeoisie with the arms supplied to them). Definitely a far flung reality from our current situation where neither class is particularly revolutionary.
I honestly think the electoral program and the insistence on workers' councils is the most interesting part of this address rather than paragraph about arming the proles. Pairs nicely with Left Wing Communism and really reinforces Lenin as an orthodox Marxist rather than some sort of derivation.
My initial comment wasn't specifically directed at you. I bring up the Address whenever I can.
Can we all at least agree that guns for self defense purposes when there are no clear ideological threats (ie feds and blackshirts aren't hunting us) is bad.
Weird to bring up China. The unions there aren’t much better than the ones in the west, they’re hardly running around with AKs liberating factories from shitty bosses. Even the CPC told the ACFTU to get their shit together.
not too hard to join the militia. good physical health and passing a socialist political exam and they let you in. if you like shooting guns thats the way to go in china. food, housing, and equipment are provided for training but no salary.
Who the fuck represents the workers besides us, besides labor unions? An atomized individual is not a worker, is not a class, they are a person, not a collective of anything. This whole stockpiling arms for the eventual war against a capitalists is purely a collective effort. If an individual is stockpiling guns they better plan on giving them to a central authority for the revolution or using then against reactionaries. Not for self defense. Self defense gun ownership is an American idea that needs to be purged from communist thought.
There are a lot of things we should be doing as a society that we aren't and spending time advocating for stricter gun control is not high on the list. Obviously we can champion many causes at once, but encouraging those on the US 'left' (because you're not convincing conservatives) that guns need more barriers will ultimately lead to a group with less means of self defense that is more easily targeted by increasingly violent chuds
The United States absolutely needs gun control, gun control for cops, gun controls for whites, guns in the hands of the lgbt and Black populations, and out of the hands of second ammendment nutjobs.
Its the same argument with cars, are cars bad? Not inherently, but we as a society should be phasing them out. Western leftists listen to China challenge (HARD)
Ah yes, China, a country with no delusional love of the car whatsoever
They also have the most high speed rail in the world and only adopted the car to catch up technologically to the west. Is there not efforts to decrease that in China? The same cannot be said for the west.
There's some efforts, but China continues to build massive highways, a move which doesn't fall in line with their climate goals.
Relax, its all central planning. Its all working towards fighting climate change eventually. What you should really be worried about is the west, they are off the rails.
With all that being said most gunowners on this website have a valid reason to own theirs.
Idealism. There are no militant unions in the US. It's individuals or nothing.
You know what would be a lot more useful than individual stockpiles of guns? A collective stockpile or guns.
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