The PCF is genuinely so bad that they regularly get outflanked on the left by Mélenchon
Eurocommunism and its consequences has been a disaster for the human race.
Here in the UK several communist parties frequently think they need to pander to chuds and reactionaries as a means of getting them to support communism. They see the working class as a caricature of a man in a pub drinking beer shouting "ennnnnnglan'" and spewing endless amounts of obscenities. As such when they see the negative reaction from the working class reactionaries it tends to move the party rightwards to try and appeal to them. This is why terfism has been pandered to among the UK communist parties, among other things like anti-migrant sentiments.
I see the same thing happening here. Communists trying to appeal to reactionaries move their party rightwards and throw minority groups under the bus while doing it.
What is the result? Does it cause some of these working class reactionaries to like the communists and start being leftists? No, practically never. What it does instead is reinforce their reactionary views, reinforcing their rightist tendencies. When communists move right to try to appeal to these people, everything moves right.
It is a behaviour that I believe we desperately need to criticise in the european left and attempt to stop.
The same way we stop a lot of other mistakes occurring in the left. Articles, propaganda, content, being loud and complain-ey about it for long enough until that thing propagates throughout the left and is repeated over and over by others. Everyone here knows that they've been directly influenced by an article they've read, or a comment they've seen or a meme that has stuck with them at one point or another. This influence is carried by these people into the parties, and they repeat those things that influenced them among people that may not have seen them.
It's not quick. But it happens if everyone agrees to repeat that shit often enough, to write about it, to criticise it and to push it.
If what you mean is whether there is a non-idealist way I'm not sure. This seems to be the kind of thing that can only be changed with words.
Education certainly can be. And I would consider this education in a theory that the strategy being employed is wrong, and should be righted.
Fucking shit take from the French. Lenin supported the Anarchist revolt even though it lost. As did Luxemburg and it cost her her life.
But if you do support spontaneous revolts even when you think they fail, people join your cause, and you are ready for next time.
What's the connection between the anarchist revolt and Luxemburg's murder? I don't know very much about her history.
Sorry, I didn't complete the sentence. Luxemburg did a similar thing to Lenin, Supporting the Spartacist uprising in 1919 even though she and her faction suspected it was unready and pushed for delaying in at least 6 months. Uprising failed (though only just, the SPD had to ally with reactionaries to prevent it), she was killed.
The SPD might be the second worst political party in history that I know of.
But if you do support spontaneous revolts even when you think they fail, people join your cause, and you are ready for next time.
That's very doubtful as a universal statement.
That's true, it does depend on the nature of the crackdown, and overall on the ability of the Vanguard to radicalise demoralised reformist members of the revolt.
At least Pôle de renaissance communiste en France (PRCF) exists.
Hoe much support do they have and do they matter politically at all?
Is someone who disagrees with the line of the PCF still better off joining IT and attempt to change it or is this PRCF more than just a powerless sect that nobody cares about or likes?
They are more than three thousand strong and are growing quite well in comparison to the PCF, who's been bleeding thousands of members per year.
They actively participate in everything a Leninist Party of a New Type should and take every opportunity to humiliate the social fascists of the PCF - something American communists should learn to do - by being a party of the French working class.
Trying to retake parties hijacked by right opportunists and social fascists has continually been a failure in western communist parties. Attempting to reform them from the inside via the democratic process is akin to chickens trying to vote the jackals out of the henhouse. In the years between party congresses the jackals use their power to purge the most outspoken communists, liquidate party organs and material assets, then finally gut and amputate the organization structure of the party's rank-and-file until they're reduced to glorified county club meetings.
take every opportunity to humiliate the social fascists of the PCF
That just makes them sound annoying
Yeah you had me until "social fascist communists", I advise you to drop that, it was unserious in the 30s and it's unserious now, there's a reason the USSR stopped using it.
there's a reason the USSR stopped using it.
That reason is called the popular front against fascism, when fascism won over social democracy and threatened to massacre countless millions of people.
I will not disguise my open disgust and cold hatred for these succdem sheepdogs in communist clothing. Ruthlessly and relentlessly and unreservedly polemicizing against them as they are the greatest stumbling block in the path to rebuilding the Communist parties of the west.
Of course there's also the caveat that I like calling suckdems social fascists because I'm a petty bitch on a shitposting website so I don't really mind being called unserious right now even though this is a somewhat serious talk
Completely disagree, the overwhelming majority of the "old school" communist parties have been completely hijacked by the new left that emerged during the sino-soviet split and collaborate with the Dictatorship of bourgeoise the bourgeoisie in action while uttering communist sounding epithets.
Let's also go over the fact you literally know nothing about the PCRF and came into this discussion with the intent of completely dismissing them in favor of the PCF - a party who's leadership and majority membership has totally rejected and denounced the Soviet experiment and has steadily adopted utopianist and rightist elements into itself in order to compete with the succdem French Parti socialiste, which they're still failing at - while blathering on about how it's "extremely annoying" to combat the right-opportunism that has entrenched itself into the corpses of the old parties of the west
Finally, on labor movements. I'm going to assume you're some sort of European, so your rightist eurocommunist "old parties" still has its ties to the trade unions. Ties that have been steadily rotting year by year as those parties retreat from drawing new blood from the working class and recruit and empower new leadership from the same pool of the bourgeois-educated intelligentsia the rest of the European parliamentary parties draw from.
On the off chance you're a Yankee that's had his head buried in the sand, the American old party had its ties to the trade unions torn apart by the trade unions and the State during the second round of communist purging to the point it had to go underground and leave a great void in its wake to only be filled with a great smattering of new left parties all competing to see who can grow the fastest. This great rending of the old party's ties to the American labor movement was so severe that in order to bring in enough new blood into the Party in order to sustain it into the future the leadership of the party chose to reorientate itself and begin to directly draw from the intelligentsia and groom them into the future leaders of the party. As the lead up to the disaster of '91 occured and in the massive void left behind by the destruction of the Soviet Union, a section of the future leaders of the old party attempted to stage an ideological coup in order to seize control of the party and direct it to follow the path of the European rightists. Quite obviously that impatient section failed, but ultimately the rightists won and liquidated the party until it was the current shell that it is today in the manner I discribed in an earlier comment above.
Yeah like I said annoying, this is the same stuff I get from anarchists but anti-revisionist-y.
Also I hope it wasn't you, since you were a mod the last time I checked, removing my comments?
Alright, we can call them imperialists-who-also-like-welfare, it's all the same. People who are only concerned with getting treats and not with correcting the structure of society for others who suffer do not need to have their feelings respected.
You say it was unserious in the 1930s but it was already thoroughly vindicated in 1919 when the SPD collaborated with the proto-Nazi freikorps to have the KPD leadership murdered.
Alright, we can call them imperialists-who-also-like-welfare
You just seem to think that welfare IS imperialism even when talking about communist parties that, literally, denounce imperialism. It's unserious, and you're giving uo trying to convince working class people (including the ones in these protests) that you can meaningfuly make their lives better
You say it was unserious in the 1930s but it was already thoroughly vindicated in 1919 when the SPD collaborated with the proto-Nazi freikorps to have the KPD leadership murdered.
That's completely anachronistic, THAT was the event that LEAD TO third periodism. You don't retroactively "vindicate" third periodism in Germany, where it had by far the worst result, by pointing to the, albeit understandable, reason that motivated it. It was a bad policy that's not hard to understand it ended up with the soviet union, which the "social fascism" formulation was intending to benefit, COMPLETELY DESTROYED, even if the nazis WERE deafeated it was a failure on part of the communists to have let hitler come to power and permanently knee-cap the USSR against the USA.
Do you just disagree with trying to govern and giving people shit they want? Like, imagine you actually have to convince someone normal, "give you health care? that would be mere opportunism I'd rather give you revolution!", that's not what people are looking for right now and more important than that you can't give them revolution they're not even on your side yet, you said it yourself the revolutionary fervor isn't there (or anywhere really) so trying to will it into existence without showing the working class that YOU can give them shit YOU, is just going to make people hate you and, maybe correctly, regard you as unserious. So why support you, the real communist with no mass support, and not the, blegh, "social fascists" communists with at least some remaining connection to the labour movement?
The USSR stopped using it because of an alliance with social democracy that is impossible in its present form.
Yeah said alliance which proved that the whole "social fascist" formulation was, for the most part, silly, and a bad management on part of the comintern. It was silly to apply it everywhere during third periodism and it generally, outside of america where the CPUSA broke with the democrats for the first time and China where mao just ignored it to ally with the kmt, had terrible results.
Even though I AM generally against too broad fronts right now, it's still a silly formulation to bring back and especially to apply it to the remaining parliamentarian communist parties. I mean if they are "social fascists" what are liberals, just fascists? Then what are the organizations to the right of them "mega fascists"?. Silly.
Do you just disagree with trying to govern and giving people shit they want? Like, imagine you actually have to convince someone normal, "give you health care? that would be mere opportunism I'd rather give you revolution!", that's not what people are looking for right now
But what do you do when the concession literally is not possible without either revolution or the threat of it? Conversely, what do you do with people who want to be given a ladder so they can pull it up after themselves?
Are you this committed to tailist bullshit in the name of the "Masses" that you're laundering your positions through?
Yeah said alliance which proved that the whole "social fascist" formulation was, for the most part, silly
This is historical revision. Fascist projects can and do and did come into political conflict with their liberal former-allies, as the Nazis did when they invaded countries that had literally been financing them prior to that point. Allying with them to oppose their political enemies does not prove that it wasn't their shitty ideology that enabled the fascists to snowball in the first place.
I don't like the wording of that quote because I find it awkward, but the text it is pulled from is essentially correct and kind of stunning relative to the year it was produced.
But what do you do when the concession literally is not possible without either revolution or the threat of it?
I don't think that's the case right now, I think there's a lot you can do if you were willing to govern.
Conversely, what do you do with people who want to be given a ladder so they can pull it up after themselves?
I don't know what people you are talking about but if it's "the people" in first world countries generally I also don't think that's the case, much less so if we're talking about the parlamentarian communist parties.
Are you this committed to tailist bullshit in the name of the "Masses" that you're laundering your positions through?
Meaningless statement, I want to improve people's lives as best as I can that's my position. You tell them you don't want that and see how the look of disdain they give you.
Allying with them to oppose their political enemies does not prove that it wasn't their shitty ideology that enabled the fascists to snowball in the first place.
I don't disagree but that isn't my understanding of what calling someone, especially someone on the far-left today, a "social fascist" means
It's because they aren't in charge of it just like in 1968, it needs to be their revolution
What did you think could've come out of 68 if the students had succeeded? Who wanted to take power, what would they have done?
Genuine question
As far as I understand there was no real goal or leadership. It was various protests being brutally put down which led to an 11 million worker strike in response. The government was honestly the ones driving everything along, putting down every protest in the way they did and provoking a hasty response from various sectors of the left
If the party was an actual threat to capital, it would've been Gladio'd by now.
It was, back when the PCF and PCI integrated the post-war popular front governments the US made it a point that they had to be purged from the governments for the country to receive Marshal money.
Still waiting for the breathless coverage of the USA’s totalitarian authoritarian stalitankie 1984 soft power wolf warrior diplomacy
Do communist parties disavow this stuff to save their own skins and avoid reprisals? I’m not saying that would excuse it, just trying to understand what’s going on here.
Sometimes this and sometimes just because they are snobbish pricks who are mad that the riot is being done incorrectly, as though that is an indictment of literally anything other than the failure of the organizers to channel the unrest more effectively (i.e. it's not the fault of the rioters struggling to do something).
Oh yeah, and like awoo said sometimes it's tailist bullshit to pander to reactionaries.
You can simply not say anything, while pushing for some flavor of police reform/thorough cleaning. You don't need to repeat the almost dogwhistle "burning shit down is bad and uncivil". Shut up and talk about how all the Vichy police commanders died without ever standing trial or shit like that
Every day I get closer to becoming the forest bunker Maoist copy pasta
Is that different from the Building 7 Maoist copypasta? Then again, I think that one lived in a blown-out tank . . .
With all the failures of the European left, sometimes it feels like a miracle that the Bolsheviks actually figured things out.
I think it's anachronistic to compare the current or the post-war euro left with the bolsheviks. The bolsheviks struck first because they were up against a weak bourgeousie and a populace overwhelmingly against continuing a war that they were the only ones (besides the SRs) completely in favor of ending (and also because they had been illegalized so the normal way of attaining power was blocked to them), no amount of "figuring things out" makes to same conditions apply to any european country today, and no amount of larping makes any online ML today a bolshevik, unironically these old school official communist parties are closer to that bolshevik tradition than anyone else.
As hard as you write it it is wrong. For example in 1922 the CP France did create a forum to connect anti colonial activist in colonies, French included. However there were colonial aspects in some "communist" organizations within French (more than just the colonial/euro/racist suberstructure mindset). Lets not burn all French communists.
Lets do underline though that "communist parties" in France often mean left-liberal or social democratic, not revolutionary or parliamentarian communist parties.
Here is the the PCF's official statement, translated into English. their statement is very cordial, basic, and liberal in its tone. They basically want the cop convicted swiftly and they want the public to remain calm and nonviolent.
https://www-pcf-fr.translate.goog/pour_la_verite_et_la_justice_pour_nahel?_x_tr_sl=auto&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=en
click me
Last Tuesday, in Nanterre in the Hauts-de-Seine, a roadside check operated by two police officers led to the death of Nahel, killed by a shot in the chest from one of them.
Faced with the death of a 17-year-old, the emotion of the country's communists is immense. We extend our condolences to the family and loved ones of the victim. We salute the massive, dignified and serene mobilization last Thursday in Nanterre and support the mayor, Patrick Jarry and the entire municipal team.
After the first hearings, the police officer responsible for the shooting was indicted for intentional homicide and placed in preventive detention. We call for all the light to be shed on the control and the murderous shooting of the policeman as soon as possible so that justice is served.
Failure to comply should not result in death! The law of 2017, which widens the possibility of use of their weapon by police officers, must be repealed. The communist parliamentarians had voted against, denouncing the possible excesses. Racist acts and remarks, pointed out by the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, against young people by certain police officers must be severely punished. The public debate must open to engage as quickly as possible a progressive policy, of proximity, for public peace with a republican police force close to the citizens, with the service of their waitings and their needs.
On security, as on all public policies, millions of inhabitants, young people, employees, are abandoned by the Republic and have no right to respect, dignity, justice, decent housing, education, culture and recreation, and quality employment.
This situation is no longer bearable! It is the result of decades of neoliberal policies, in the service of capital and to the detriment of the workers of the country, and of discrimination.
The PCF supports “the appeal for popular youth” carried by several unions and associations demanding “an ambitious plan” to respond to all the problems it faces.
The PCF calls for a Grenelle for the equality of territories and against all discrimination, bringing together all the actors and actresses of the municipalities and neighborhoods concerned, so that finally a policy commensurate with the challenges is decided and implemented with them.
On Tuesday, July 4, we will present the first proposals that we are debating, including:
A progressive policy of proximity to public tranquility. A plan for republican equality for all inhabitants by the return of public services in all our municipalities. A youth pact that engages the nation on major issues such as education, work and employment, social policies.We share the anger of all those who have seen the terrible images of control and shooting broadcast on social networks.
It calls for a powerful and peaceful mobilization to obtain truth and justice for Nahel.
It can in no way legitimize the violence of recent days!
We strongly condemn all violence against persons and property, the firing of mortars and Molotov cocktails, which have disrupted the lives of thousands of residents of working-class neighborhoods, and the looting of businesses.
The degradation of town halls and street furniture in our municipalities, our children's schools and other public services, associative equipment (neighborhood center, social center, etc.), police stations in our neighborhoods, employees' personal cars , seriously penalize the families directly affected and the entire population.
The perpetrators of these crimes must be arrested and brought to justice.
Not only does this violence in no way serve truth and justice, but we can see how it is used today by reactionary forces, in power, on the right and on the extreme right, to stigmatize entire neighborhoods qualified by some from “foreign enclaves” when they are, like all territories, a part of France, of its wealth, of its strength; consider all young people as delinquents when only a few degrade, ransack, loot to the detriment of all; reduce the life of these neighborhoods to the sole manifestation of violence; or even sow the seeds of civil war, as two police unions recently did, a declaration with seditious accents which must lead to sanctions. We oppose bans on demonstrations,
The PCF brings its support and solidarity to all the inhabitants affected by the violence, to the families penalized by the destruction of services, to the emergency services, to the police officers and to all the volunteers of the associations, the public officials and local elected officials mobilized to protect and respond to the demands of the population.
It is time to guarantee the safety of our fellow citizens and to meet the social needs of the inhabitants.
It's time for the Republic everywhere and for everyone. A republic with a massive development of its public services which guarantee the effectiveness of its principles: Liberty, Equality, Fraternity.
For truth and justice for Nahel, against all violence, let's unite!
French Communist Party.
Paris, July 1, 2023.
