i like that the op ignore the mass protests in bolivia, the class between the MAS supporters and the military, the arming of the protesters, that MAS is an actual labour party that actually cares about is people, and most importantly MAS organized the protests instead of denouncing them, link
The American left has gone from "Vote for Biden as the lesser evil" to "Vote for Biden to change things for the better" really fucking fast. It's pathetic. This is why I distrust any kind of "poll" that claims young people are turning to socialism in America. I'm so fucking pissed that the entire basic-ass socdem Bernie movement was immediately hijacked by a few self-serving asshole grifters looking for a cushy job at the DNC.
Even their analysis is off though
Biden isn't even the lesser evil Trump is .
Biden is the more effective evil and the bourgeoisie don't like Trumps chaos and destabilisation of the 2 party bipartisanship and how he doesn't bother to couch US's blatant violent imperialism in rosey rhetoric ("What? You think we don't kill people?" - "We're staying in Syria for the oil").
If you were a principled socialist and you were forced to vote for either the Republicrats or Demicans - you would vote Trump as he discredits bourgeois democracy, is incompetant in foreign policy and is too ADHD riddled to sit through proper CIA reports. All of this helps nations that are directly under threat of US imperialism whilst it helps the workers movements in nations "allied" (read: hostages) to the US by discrediting US as an ally.
If the idea of voting for Trump disgusts you....Why would you vote for Biden? You should be voting for PSL who are being politically persecuted. But yeah... Communists in the 1920s didn't come up with the concept "Social-Fascism" because SuccDems aren't fucking traitors at every turn they get
Firstly, it is not true that fascism is only the fighting organisation of the bourgeoisie. Fascism is not only a military-technical category. Fascism is the bourgeoisie’s fighting organisation that relies on the active support of Social-Democracy. Social-Democracy is objectively the moderate wing of fascism. There is no ground for assuming that the fighting organisation of the bourgeoisie can achieve decisive successes in battles, or in governing the country, without the active support of Social-Democracy. There is just as little ground for thinking that Social-Democracy can achieve decisive successes in battles, or in governing the country, without the active support of the fighting organisation of the bourgeoisie. These organisations do not negate, but supplement each other. They are not antipodes, they are twins. Fascism is an informal political bloc of these two chief organisations; a bloc, which arose in the circumstances of the post-war crisis of imperialism, and which is intended for combating the proletarian revolution. The bourgeoisie cannot retain power without such a bloc. It would therefore be a mistake to think that “pacifism” signifies the liquidation of fascism. In the present situation, “pacifism” is the strengthening of fascism with its moderate, Social-Democratic wing pushed into the forefront.
J V Stalin, Concerning the International Situation
Absolutely.
In Russia with capitalist restoration for the first time since the Black Hundreds you saw neonazis hunting migrant workers in Moscow. In the land of the USSR that knew 50+ ethnicities all working in harmony....Migrants were being hunted by neonazis.
You saw Russia become a haven for White Supremascist movements and you saw marches in celebration all over Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Ukraine for their nazi collaborators which they continue each year
In the West we saw the utter collapse of the Workers movements and a roll back of all the workers rights we won. One of the older Communists in my party spoke of how everythings gone - how British workers used to get 2 15 minute tea breaks per 8 hour shift and I was gobsmacked at that.
What I'm trying to say was written a lot more nicely by Stalin and Parenti
“What would happen if capital succeeded in smashing the Republic of Soviets? There would set in an era of the blackest reaction in all the capitalist and colonial countries, the working class and the oppressed peoples would be seized by the throat, the positions of international communism would be lost.”
~ J. V. STALIN, Speech at The Seventh Enlarged Plenum of the E.C.C.I. (December 1926).
The overthrow of Eastern European and Soviet communist governments was cheered by many left intellectuals. Now democracy would have its day. The people would be free from the yoke of communism and the U.S. Left would be free from the albatross of existing communism, or as left theorist Richard Lichtman put it, “liberated from the incubus of the Soviet Union and the succubus of Communist China.”
In fact, the capitalist restoration in Eastern Europe seriously weakened the numerous Third World liberation struggles that had received aid from the Soviet Union and brought a whole new crop of right-wing governments into existence, ones that now worked hand-in-glove with U.S. global counterrevolutionaries around the globe.
In addition, the overthrow of communism gave the green light to the unbridled exploitative impulses of Western corporate interests. No longer needing to convince workers that they live better than their counterparts in Russia, no longer restrained by a competing system, the corporate class is rolling back the many gains that working people have won over the years. Now that the free market, in its meanest form, is emerging triumphant in the East, so will it prevail in the West. “Capitalism with a human face” is being replaced by “capitalism in your face.” As Richard Levins put it, “So in the new exuberant aggressiveness of world capitalism we see what communists and their allies had held at bay” (Monthly Review, 9/96).
Having never understood the role that existing communist powers played in tempering the worst impulses of Western capitalism, and having perceived communism as nothing but an unmitigated evil, the left anticommunists did not anticipate the losses that were to come. Some of them still don’t get it.
The most nihilistic take on earth is being a leftist and thinking Joe Biden is your ally in any way shape or form.
at that point you are pretty much accepting that you will never see socialism in country
Yep, to these idiots being a socialist means being a liberal who's got even more liberal guilt than usual.
Go read the moronic comments in that reddit thread and then come back and admit you're wrong.
The first three top-level comments all point out how Bolivians did a lot more than just show up at the polls. Here's the next comment:
Maybe it’s privileged of me to say but I have transgender family who are terrified of a second trump term. We all know Biden is a shit head scumbag but anyone arguing that he’s EXACTLY the same as Trump is just ignorant. You’re not cooler and edgier than everyone else because you’re not going to vote. You can vote for a lesser evil and also continue to work to dismantle capitalism. I’d much rather protest and organize and push to unionize workplaces under Biden than under trump.
Agree with that or not, it sure isn't portraying Biden as some ally to the left.
Agree with that or not, it sure isn’t portraying Biden as some ally to the left.
No, it's not, not even close:
We all know Biden is a shit head scumbag
You also don't organize and protest under a president who's an ally:
I’d much rather protest and organize and push to unionize workplaces under Biden
We should not be bending over backwards to invent reasons to be pissed at other leftist communities. That's the definition of wrecker shit.
Wrecker shit is ignoring the plain meaning of something as obvious as "Biden is a shit head scumbag" and insisting that the leftist who said that is actually "nationalist, chauvinist, [and] racist."
What is wrecking if not ignoring what someone says to accuse them of having unspoken bad intentions?
They’re arguing that Biden is the lesser evil
Which means they're not portraying him as an ally. That was my original point.
which again, is only true if non-American lives are worth less than American lives
That assumes Biden will be worse for non-Americans than Trump, which is highly debatable. For example, if you're Iranian, and you went from a significant diplomatic agreement under Obama to nearly being invaded by Trump, you might think Biden is the lesser evil.
Here's what I initially responded to:
Go read the moronic comments in that reddit thread [about "thinking Joe Biden is your ally in any way shape or form"]
I pointed out that this did not seem to be the common sentiment, and gave a high-profile example of someone saying Biden sucks (i.e., is not an ally). We should not be mischaracterizing other leftsists' positions.
I'm not going to debate you about semantics or about every other comment in that thread.
such an infuriating take. I'll be so happy when all this vote shit is over in a couple weeks.
Dems losing would be funnier IMO. We'll get a bunch of bizarre cope articles in the lib media and they'll jump straight to blaming us.
my mom wants trump to win just to see the dems faces, and she is a pro-allende chilean
oh i see the problem here americans think they are a democracy which they are not like also maybe on bolivia you could say that literally last election their vote was ignored so america could put anez in there so kinda makes this argument a bit shitty i feel i don't know
Bolivians got MAS elected because of their historic struggle with a goverment of rich whites oppressing them with Evo being the end of that, if they were like the gringos they would have voted for the conservatives to keep the fascists out, harm reduction have been nothing but a brainwashing tactic to keep the American proletariat down
my favourite argument in that thread is the "well capitalism is bad, but we can't remove fascism, vote" which is wrong on it's face like no we did remove fascism for a while capitalism is still here worse than ever
yeah, the US fits the most of the points of the UR-fascism test, no way taking out trump makes the US a non-fascist state
The USA have been a fascist state since 2000, no electing of centrists will change that, if anything some one like biden will keep the status quo of it because he likes it
the main diference between dems fascism from the ones the republicans use, is that the dems are secular and dont like the racism that much, its still fascism tho
they don't realize that fascism is not a thing a strongman president declares, or a coup is staged and suddenly fascism happens, nor is it a thing that is immediately recognized, like yesterday's thursday and today's the day that fascism finally happens. it does not move at the same pace for everyone. for someone who was held at the border during the obama years, they probably already lived under fascism for all they know. maybe someone in the future will recognize the trump term as fascism proper, or maybe someone will draw that distinction earlier even.
what they say when they say you should vote to stop fascism, is that they haven't felt the brunt yet, and don't want it to happen to THEM. they would readily throw anyone else under the bus of fascism so they can be saved from it.
Tfw your stupid imperialist empty head thinks Movement for SOCIALISM and the american Democratic party are the same fucking thing. Because Joe Biden's political program is so radical that if he gets elected he's going to be couped and have to flee the country and illegitimate coup government will attempt to make his party illegal. I'm really, incredibly fucking smart. Vaush is a PUA.
libs and socdems like to think biden or heck even bernie are democratic socialists when their policies are at best basic socdems, in reality democratic socialism can only get elected in the global south, an even then they are threaten by coup (bolivia and allende), get imprison (lula in brazil) or embargo (venezuela)
That's been the most annoying thing, this rhetorical shift to cope with how absurdly fucking right wing America already is. I've seen people bring up the quote from the communist manifesto about siding with social democrats for temporary gains, or the quote from Stalin about social democracy being a wing of fascism, and I'm here thinking, when the fuck did anyone conclude that Biden was even a succdem? Or this fucking horseshit meme equating a fucking third world indigenous party explicitly building towards socialism with the center right imperialist bourgeois capitalist party.
This dickhead has governed as a reactionary for a half fucking century, we all know exactly who he is and how he's going to govern and it's certainly not as a succdem. Succdem would be a significant improvement, almost like that's why (some) communists held their noses and backed a succdem in the primary! But no since it's too horrifying to accept that those are our circumstances we have to shift everything to the left: bourgeois pig Biden is now a succdem, succdem Bernie is now a dem soc. And everyone to the left pointing all this completely obvious shit out are nihilists. Wonderful, you love to see the delusions of liberalism driving everyone insane.
bolivian military was literally killing people, and the mas people fought back and won through strategy and resilience. but if you told american left liberals that they had to blockade roads and use weaponry like the bolivian protestors, they'd call you a psycho larper.
The democrats and MAS are also diferent, the dem are pro-social fascism and MAS is a labour party
Let's not even mention the plurality of parties, and the absence of fucking electoral college shit, nor THE FUCKING OBVIOUS FACT THAT AÑEZ AND ALL THE OTHER NEOLIBERAL LATAM SCUM ARE TOTALLY ALIGNED WITH EVERY FUCKING BIDEN POLICY.
Americas situation is not even close to comparable to bolivias. in addition to what else my v smart comrades said, let's break down the timelines to really roast these people.
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Bolivian quite literally got couped after socilaists won the first election. Let's compare that to what happened to bernie in the primaries. Its a bit insulting to compare a mass media induced push away from socialism to the military seizing total power and killing the president's dog, but lets just say that effectively, imperialists interfered in both elections to stop socialists.
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In bolivias case, mass ground movement pro-socialism and democracy protests that people lost their lives at. Quite literally life or death fighting. In americas case the protests we had were months after bernie was forced out and for racial justice. The people who participated in the black lives matter movement were not part of one united political ideology other than stop killing black people, and even some of the libs there still subscribe to the "bad apples" or "reform not defund" ideology. So while the blm protests are 10/10 good, not comparable to Bolivia.
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Bolivia repeatedly delays the election after getting couped. Bolivians fight this in the streets for months. years. They eventually put enough pressure to finally get more elections. The popular socialist party that people have been fighting for wins overwhelmingly.
So I guess if you totally ignore both actual facts and delude yourself into thinking biden is on the left and getting repressed for it, yeah they're totally the same. Otherwise the way I'd compare this to bolivia is "its like bolivia except no pro-democracy protests and after we got couped they allowed us to vote in their imperialist elections to choose one of two amerikkkkan imperialists"
tl;dr - western "leftists" please stop comparing your bourgeoisie imperialist party to actual socialists who have to fight and die thanks :)
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Ah yes vote for objectively worse carlos mencia so we don't get dwayne elizondo mountain dew herbert camacho i definitely understand politics
Imagine if they did all of that and decided not to do the election part because of cool kid treehouse politics
the class between the MAS supporters and the military
They put aside their differences to learn English together. Wholesome.
At least Anarchists here in latin america know to put their vote where their mouth is and don't participate in elections
When newspaper Leftists say that Social Democrats aren't real Communists
and then the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party overthrows the Tsar.
Stuff like this shows that labels don't mean anything compared to what a group actually does.
It's also a really bad take from libs that online leftists say "voting doesn't matter". Voting in general under bourgeois liberal democracy in the Imperial Core? Yeah, it's kinda pointless, but that relates to the very specific time, place, circumstances, material conditions, etc that we are living in in this moment. And voting between Biden and Trump doesn't matter because we will basically be in the same place in 2024 with either of them. But I'm still voting this year because there are several ballot issues that will have a significant material impact on people in my state. And for the people of Bolivia, they live in an entirely different set of circumstances, voting in this particular election might matter while the US presidential election might not. There's a lot more nuance here but doubt that libs will understand that
But I’m still voting this year because there are several ballot issues that will have a significant material impact on people in my state.
:100-com:
Examining the limits of voting by itself is good; oversimplifing this into "voting bad lol" is not.
to me the main problem of voting in the USA is believing the "harm reduction" lie, all it does is either de-radicalize you or makes you lose hope in the socialist movement
But harm reduction is sometimes real. If Lyft and Uber can't fuck over drivers to the extent they currently do, that undeniably helps people right now. There is nothing more harmful to a socialist movement than not supporting immediate, material improvements in working conditions. Why would a worker join your movement if you can't even do that?
The way to keep small gains from de-radicalizing the movement is education. We have to provide the broader ideological framework, we have to show the big picture, we have to make the case that as long as capitalism exists all worker gains will constantly be under attack.
the main critism of this take, is that is saying both bolivia and the USA are the same ignoring the material reality of both, if you want to vote in the US election i wont criticize you , but to think voting out fascism in a country that has slowly become a social fascist state since 2000 and only throught just one presidential election is a lib take
Oh I agree, my point is that circumstances are different enough in the US and Bolivia that they can't really be compared. And we will definitely never be allowed to vote out fascism or vote for socialism here in the US. I'm not voting for Biden or Trump but I do want to vote to give the middle finger to Uber/Lyft as well as support workers rights, as well as get rid of the loophole that lets a lot of commercial real estate owners (landlords basically) get away with basically paying very little tax.
