"breaking new liberals are ignorant" i know this isnt new to us but i couldnt resist and entered a political discord server and debated with someone on why Lenin wasnt anti-semite? and why Marx wasnt anti-semite either especially considering how his father is jewish himself...and then the guy switched to how the soviet union was anti-semitic because they seized synagogues belongings? and i tried to explain why this wasnt directed at jews but rather religious institutions as a whole because of the power they held in the russian empire....he also used the "muh authoritarianism, vanguard party authoritarian" which ofcourse he would mention not knowing that reactionary movements would have eleminated the revolutionary progress made if it werent for the vanguard party protecting it. He then proceeded to compare the vanguard party to israel because i said the vanguard party and with it the people need to hold all power to protect the revolution which he translated into "yuh but if you are anti-israel that means that israel should also protect itself from the palestinians for its survival" (him being pro-israel). Funny thing is that he considered himself a socialist eventhough he admitted to not like marx and called himself a pre-marxist socialist? He also admitted to never have read theory and this is the part that annoys me the most: He called himself a socialist.....
Everytime i try to be reasonable with these people they pull out the most randome take out of their asses and i try to educate them but they mock me. All i can hope for is that they will become class-conscious and be enlightened about the all the trash propaganda they have been fed...but aslong as this isnt the case if fear they will need to face the wall if they keep being the enemies of the people
most of the time, debating online is just useless. frustrating. pointless. who cares if somebody is wrong on the internet.
true, its a guilty pleasure of mine tho....idek why, the sheer shock of being exposed to these radioactive amounts of bullshit make it hard to look away...like a car accident
yes, it's the same for everybody. and sometimes you just encounter positions that are just so pure lunacy that you feel the URGE to say something. Hours wasted, goals forgotten, loved ones sitting in houses with each other distracted all day by technology made by the hands of other poor souls in sweat shops in a foreign land.
And the reason they hold those completely nonsensical opinions is because they know people can't resist telling them how wrong they are. They do it for attention. And there are a lot of people like that out there, especially young people, because they aren't getting the attention they need in their real life, so they fish for any kind of attention, even people calling them dumbasses on the internet, because they're so desperate for it.
The fools talk much more than the wise. I wonder about just blocking most of the people I don't find interesting. Then I could only see writings from sensible and interesting people.
Maybe there is a technical solution, which doesn't require so much effort by the user.
Liberals will not give ground in actual conversations, you must deconstruct the world around them a little at a time. Its not something you can do yourself. It takes a lot of moving parts for them to confront their internal biases.
I have learned the hard way, just try to ignore them, because they will dig in their heels and be as stubborn as we are.
for your own mental health, set some limits on how much you engage with this sort of thing
it's fine to make an effort post/response on occasion, but do not assume you are going to convince anyone really, just write for the lurkers
do not get drawn into the shit, just make your points/refutations as clear and concise as possible
the internet traffic flows based on a 'best effort' protocol, so just make a best effort if you feel compelled, but don't keep getting 'baited' by shit libs
Plant the seeds. Don't get dragged into a protracted argument if it doesn't turn into a good faith conversation. Take a deep breath. It's ok. Things take time.
I tried to write that in 200 paragraphs and the comrade above said it beautifully in a single one. Listen to them.
Funny thing is that he considered himself a socialist even though he admitted to not like marx and called himself a pre-marxist socialist?
Any time someone identifies with some outdated or obscure ideology you already know the conversation isn't going anywhere useful.
No no no, let me continue to argue with a guy who describes himself as a "neo-bonapartiste"??????
Egoists are hilarious. Like, cool, buddy, you managed to find the most individualist ideology, so individualist in fact that nobody but you fucking cares!
I had to deal with one of them in my local group years back. To the point where they straight had Engel's drawing of Stirner as their profile pic, and i just replied with "nice egon spengler avatar dude".
At least Spengler was fighting actual, literal ghosts rather than dropping his particle thrower, calling the very concept of ghosthunting the real spook and then leaving the city to be ravaged as if he had completed his job.
Still very funny.
Yeah, to no surprise they became an "anarcho-nihilist" or whatever. Still never showed up to the meetings.
I just checked their profile (it's been almost a decade now) and they describe themselves as "anti-political" lmaooooooo
Maybe went to therapy and realized their political interest was consistently leading them down utterly depressing ideological rabbit holes. 🐇 🕳
Sounds like they're still working on the part where they keep that shit to themselves, though. "Anti-political" lol. At least "nonpolitical" is a rather neutral term. How does one fight "politics"? Death to anyone with political inclinations of any kind? Re-education centers where they teach the politicals to grill?
Show
Here is a song from egoist https://invidious.io.lol/watch?v=-p0IjnBhG10
neo-bonapartiste
People really go out of their way to call themselves fascists without calling themselves fascists.
does "neo-bonapartiste" mean his partner cheats on him and he has to let it slide so he doesn't look weak?
I migrated here from Reddit because half of my comments was paraphrasing Marx and Lenin.
The fight is not fought and won in debates online, as much as liberals love to think that. It is a slow process that will take decades of real changing material conditions and we are in the second century of that struggle. But history is inexorably heading in the direction of a victory for comrades and liberals will go the way of the Roman slave owners or the feudal lords. Or I guess to be more accurate, they will go the way of the bootlickers of Roman aristocracy or the bootlickers of feud lords.
I honestly think those kinds of debates are useless. They tire you, make you sad and despondent, and accomplish nothing. We don't bring people over with angry arguments with liberals about how Marx felt about jews. We don't make progress on the revolution by dunking on liberals online on minutia about the history of the USSR.
Let's take a look at how it played out in the past we could have some pointers on what is an useful controversy.
When Lenin debates Kautsky in writing, does that resemble what we do in online debates? When Marx debates Proudhon, is it the same thing we are doing? I would argue that it isn't at all.
First of all, Marx and Lenin are engaging with people they perceive to be in the same camp as they are. They are not debating hostile outsiders. They are addressing what they perceive to be errors within the same movement. They also do, of course, address theoretically and practically the actual enemies of their camp. But they rarely do so nominally and point by point. They do so more generally, when building their own theory.
Second of all, they are doing so in long form writing. Not point by point argument with immediate response. This is important. It allows you to build an actual argument, enriched with data, enriched with a thorough reading of the thesis of the person you're addressing. It also doesn't have the same dynamics where the other person can move goal posts freely.
Third, were them hoping to convince their opponents? Was mit directly addressed to the other side in hopes of bringing them over? They weren't.They were writing to an audience that will read both texts and hope to make that audience see the problems with the thesis the other side is defending and propose alternatives. The audience is the target to be convinced, not the opponent. If they see the error of their thinking, good! But that's not likely to happen by the very nature of debate.
I think we should emulate this. And this is what I see, for example, online agitators doing (for example on YouTube). They don't engage directly with the liberals. They collect the liberal thought they see online and respond in long form, with a thorough take down, well supported by data and theory, aimed at the audience, not at the people they're responding to.
Also, we need to remember that liberals are not on our camp. Addressing them is not a weeding out of errors by our comrades that we hope to prevent from spreading. They are our enemies. Remember they are the ones that will side with the bourgeois state to kill us, like they did with Rosa Luxemburg and Karl Liebknecht.
I understand that it's difficult to resist when you see people saying shit online and not respond. I do it all the time myself. It's also not without value to not allow the shit to stand there to be read by people without response. But I would advise you to only do so if you have the time and fortitude to engage non-emotionally with it, without any hopes of convincing the other person, but only of not allowing the record to go on without correction. Remember: you're not talking with that person. You're talking to someone reading that thread. Disconnect emotionally from the process because this will take a toll on you.
Repeating: online angry debate have never and will never bring anyone over to our side. Nobody ever became a socialist after being "convinced with facts and logic" in an angry online debate. As I said, if it has a function, it's only function is to not allow the other side to have full control of the online record.
But where and how do we actually convince people? I'd argue that it is one-on-one conversations and with a lot of love and patience. Spend your energy talking one-on-one with people. Listen to them, understand their problems, and discuss the problems they bring to you. Stick to topics they care about. Don't dump a bunch of theory and history of the USSR on their head. Patiently listen and use theory to guide you on how to address the things they complain about and show them that there's an alternative world that is possible. Point their anger towards the real problems that prevents this world from existing. Do this and this person will naturally come towards socialism. And do it out of love and care. With a patient attitude. It's not a debate anymore. You're talking to a fellow worker about making their life better. You're not trying to win a debate. You're trying to win a person.
And most important of all: don't sacrifice your mental health in the process. Burning yourself down trying to debate liberals online will not accelerate the revolution. It serves no purpose but wearing a motivated comrade down. And that's to their advantage.
If they are unsure of themselves and amicable, engage with respect, patience, and compassion. If they are sure of themselves and are only seeking to smugly school you or attack you for sport, do not engage, unless you suspect there are silent onlookers who may be swayed by your words.
Have you questioned why they argue so vociferously on the side of Israel and not Palestine? Why do they identify with one and not the other?
It could be they don't understand, or it could be they do understand and side with the entity that represents them and their interests most.
He was jewish himself and my guess is that he just likes the idea of a jewish settler-state and will therefore perfrom mental gymnastics to justify israels actions agaisnt the palestinians
