If you don't agree that people can willingly stop consuming racist propaganda, and consequently that they are currently willingly consuming racist propaganda, what alternative is there? Cheering on for genocide and colonialism is absolutely a personal failing on the part of the people doing it. They have no excuse with the amount of correct information available to them.
When a doctor gets a patient addicted to opioids because he was paid by the Sackler family, is it the patient’s fault when he eventually turns to heroin? When an woman moves back in with her abusive boyfriend after he half-assed an apology for hitting her for the 4th time in one week, is the woman not a victim?
These are not equivalent examples. Addiction is not the same as being abused. Addicts obviously need help and shouldn't be punished for their addictions, but they do cause material harm to others. If a drunk driver kills someone, he is very much still at fault, despite the societal pressures that push him toward addiction. A certain level of individual responsibility does exist. Similarly, westerners that fund and cheer for genocide because they are racists are very much responsible for their own behavior. This doesn't mean we shouldn't work to build a society where we stop things like this.
The reason people buy into propaganda is not only as a coping mechanism (although that can be a factor). Many buy into it to justify their privileged lives that are only possible due to the oppression of the Third World and the internal colonies in the settler colonial states. Even with the declining standards of living, most people in the west live a lot better than the majority in the rest of the world. They want to believe all the racist propaganda about the rest of the world to justify their own ways of living.
Look at what Che said with regard to the liberation of Latin America in 1954 (source):
Given this background, with American reality being what it is, it’s not difficult to suppose what will be the attitude of the working class of the North American country when the problem of the abrupt loss of markets and sources of cheap raw materials is definitively posed.
This is, in my opinion, the stark reality facing Latin Americans. In the final analysis, the economic development of the United States and the need of its workers to maintain their standard of living means that our struggle for national liberation is not waged against a given social regime, but rather against the whole nation, bound as a bloc by the iron-clad supreme law of common interest, over their domination of the economic life of Latin America.
Graph comparison:
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I am not trying to frame westerners as “innocents” here
Comparing this to victim-blaming, and comparing their situation, as you have above, with abuse victims would suggest otherwise. If they're not innocent, but also aren't guilty by your standards, what are they? If you say they cannot make the choice, wouldn't that imply that they are innocent?
But how is each individual supposed to find out the truth?
How did any of us? How was the theory of Marxism developed in the first place? We all started researching due to a variety of reasons. We rejected the propaganda narratives and put in the time and effort to educate ourselves, we made a choice. No one did this for me, I did it by myself and for myself because I knew things had to change and went to search for answers. Coming to someone, asking questions, and learning from the answers in a choice we make. Communist propaganda and organizing also plays a big role here, of course, but there are already plenty of resources out there which any person in the west can access. We aren't asking them all to be Marxists on their own, we are just asking them not to be actively racist.
The racist westerners in question are constantly exposed to many narratives that run counter to western propaganda and they actively ignore them or try to "debunk" them. How many people do you see every day on social media writing off any story that goes counter to their set position? They actively reject the truth because their interests run counter to it - look at the graph above. They don't want these things to change, similar to this. There are still plenty of regular people in the west that do not cheer for genocide and do not make excuses for SS members, there are still plenty of people in the west that do support Palestinian liberation that aren't communists. There are plenty of people that just aren't informed who would listen to and accept the true facts when presented with them, but these are not the same people that cheer for and spread racist propaganda.
Of course, in the longer term, everyone would benefit from socialism, and we know that, but the average person doesn't - that's something for us to work on. Our methods cannot only be debunking propaganda, we have to offer a better alternative to the current system. But we cannot force people to listen to us. We have to entice them to join us, and not just through rhetoric, but also through action. Still, we cannot remove the responsibility from individuals that willingly go along with genocidal propaganda when there is so much counter-propaganda available (like the current situation with Gaza where a section of the west is cheering for genocide). We will most probably never be able to radicalize the ones cheering for genocide today.
I was typing up a big response to this and your other responses but I really think our disagreement comes down to philosophical questions about free will, what it means to be "guilty" and to what extend one is responsible for their own actions when considering the influences of their environment.
Comparing this to victim-blaming, and comparing their situation, as you have above, with abuse victims would suggest otherwise. If they're not innocent, but also aren't guilty by your standards, what are they? If you say they cannot make the choice, wouldn't that imply that they are innocent?
Good question, would it? That's the core problem. If I point a gun to your head and say "Call someone a racial slur" and you do it, is it your fault? Now what if your parents tell you to call someone a racial slur or they'll kick you out onto the streets and you do it, is that your fault? If all your friends tell you to call someone a slur or they won't talk to you again, is that your fault? What if just one friend tells you to do it? Where do you draw the line between environmental influence and individual agency? And if you're not at fault, are you innocent?
This is not a gotcha, I have no answer for this.
Yes it does, but that doesn't stop everyone from deviating. Plenty of people deviate and even go directly counter to it. Again, in your model of propaganda, why and how are any of us communists then? Being a communist runs directly counter to nearly all incentives and falls directly under state repression. I think you give too much credit to the propaganda machine of the west and too little to the actual people, whether they buy into it or not.
This is related to the other thing. If you asked me, I'd say we deviate because we're in different situations, different circumstances led us down different paths and had our lives gone slightly differently, we could be the ones cheering on genocide in Palestine just as easily. To me, correct me if I'm wrong, it seems like you'd argue otherwise. Do you think if some Elon bootlicker on twitter had lived your exact same life, same parents, same school, same job, that their views would differ from the ones you hold now? Why do you think we became communists?
I have thought about this and I think it's beside the point. I think we need to take another step back because we've gotten lost in random hypothetical examples which don't really matter here.
Dialectical materialism is not compatible with free will, but it's also not compatible with a mechanical determinism where only outside forces act to direct us. We are parts of the dialectic of history and it makes us just as we make it. We take action against those who stand opposed to communism. We condemn and fight them, while trying to get as many people over to our cause as possible. The point here is that we are not subjects external to history and only directed by it, nor do we freely choose our path without the effect of our material conditions.
I agree that it's not of our free will, but we are still parts of the whole, and it is through us that our history happens. We (social humans) live in our societies, we labour and produce, we interpret those relations of production into ideology, we struggle and fight for liberation. We organize and produce the propaganda and counter-propaganda - all shaped by our material conditions. In doing so we try to influence other people one way or the other. The theories that explain most accurately the actual laws that direct society and history, the ones that push forward the progress of history, these being class struggles and Marxism (dialectical materialism), we recognize as correct.
When our scientific understanding of propaganda informs our tactics which then most effectively get people over to our side, that is the correct theory of propaganda. The people choosing racist propaganda when plenty of the opposite is available are of course doing so due to their class position (and race, etc. and material conditions in general). It's not a free choice, but it's one they're making rationally, they aren't being brainwashed. That is the point of the article, and that is the point I interpreted from the original post. That people are not being manipulated insidiously by a propaganda machine that infects them as a virus infects a host, but that their ideology is influenced by their material conditions, and their beliefs are accordingly formulated rationally. This simply means that many westerners in particular are racist, but it's a rational choice (not a free one) they made based on their conditions, it wasn't imposed into them by brainwashing. Both their racism and the racist propaganda exist due to the same material conditions and social relations. For these same reasons, they are against us and everything we stand for, and we are against them in our political activity. For a variety of reasons, certain people make the opposite choice or even become communists, for whatever reason, people do choose not to buy into the propaganda.
The point of pointing this out is that we can rationally influence people if we approach them correctly, that the fight against propaganda is very winnable, and not a hopeless battle we are destined to lose because of some magical mode of operation of propaganda. This part is where the willing acceptance of propaganda comes into it. There are plenty of contradictions in the interests of each person - these are generalized to the level of classes (or other social groups in particular situations) - which in sum determine what that person is susceptible to buy into. The ones that most fervently cheer for genocide, we will never be able to convert because they will never make the choice, but there are plenty of others we can - those that are not buying into the racist propaganda, or are doing so only lightly, passively. Most of these people currently don't really care one way or the other, but the point is that we can make a lot of them care if we approach them correctly - we can get them to choose our side. Many of these people are already making the choice to educate themselves more and are discovering communism and similar theories.
It seems like we should have different standards of complicity when it comes to imperial core populations: the highest for those who gain the most benefits from imperial hegemony (e.g. white people), and then a lower one for those with fewer. There are certainly black neoliberals/fascists around, but there's a different story from self-interest for an Uncle Ruckus. Although it can maybe be said that they simply incorrectly think that they will benefit and act on that, at some level people know where they stand.
I agree generally, especially in terms of material gain to these people and potential reparations, but I also think that personal guilt should be determined on a case by case basis. However, every racist white westerner screaming about Hamas terrorists right now, when plenty of people are sharing actual correct information, is definitely complicit and is purposefully ignoring the evidence he is being given. Similarly, the outrageous stories about the DPRK that are circulated by the various CIA outlets or Yeonmi Park are simply too ridiculous for anyone to actually believe and take seriously, yet until recently people mostly shared them with glee. People go along with them due to other reasons, not an actual belief. Stories about Xinjiang are also not shared because people actually care and tried to inform themselves about the situation, but only due to (real or perceived) material gain (or even just emotional satisfaction) that the people sharing them get.
If you don't agree that people can willingly stop consuming racist propaganda, and consequently that they are currently willingly consuming racist propaganda, what alternative is there? Cheering on for genocide and colonialism is absolutely a personal failing on the part of the people doing it. They have no excuse with the amount of correct information available to them.
These are not equivalent examples. Addiction is not the same as being abused. Addicts obviously need help and shouldn't be punished for their addictions, but they do cause material harm to others. If a drunk driver kills someone, he is very much still at fault, despite the societal pressures that push him toward addiction. A certain level of individual responsibility does exist. Similarly, westerners that fund and cheer for genocide because they are racists are very much responsible for their own behavior. This doesn't mean we shouldn't work to build a society where we stop things like this.
The reason people buy into propaganda is not only as a coping mechanism (although that can be a factor). Many buy into it to justify their privileged lives that are only possible due to the oppression of the Third World and the internal colonies in the settler colonial states. Even with the declining standards of living, most people in the west live a lot better than the majority in the rest of the world. They want to believe all the racist propaganda about the rest of the world to justify their own ways of living.
Look at what Che said with regard to the liberation of Latin America in 1954 (source):
Graph comparison:
Comparing this to victim-blaming, and comparing their situation, as you have above, with abuse victims would suggest otherwise. If they're not innocent, but also aren't guilty by your standards, what are they? If you say they cannot make the choice, wouldn't that imply that they are innocent?
How did any of us? How was the theory of Marxism developed in the first place? We all started researching due to a variety of reasons. We rejected the propaganda narratives and put in the time and effort to educate ourselves, we made a choice. No one did this for me, I did it by myself and for myself because I knew things had to change and went to search for answers. Coming to someone, asking questions, and learning from the answers in a choice we make. Communist propaganda and organizing also plays a big role here, of course, but there are already plenty of resources out there which any person in the west can access. We aren't asking them all to be Marxists on their own, we are just asking them not to be actively racist.
The racist westerners in question are constantly exposed to many narratives that run counter to western propaganda and they actively ignore them or try to "debunk" them. How many people do you see every day on social media writing off any story that goes counter to their set position? They actively reject the truth because their interests run counter to it - look at the graph above. They don't want these things to change, similar to this. There are still plenty of regular people in the west that do not cheer for genocide and do not make excuses for SS members, there are still plenty of people in the west that do support Palestinian liberation that aren't communists. There are plenty of people that just aren't informed who would listen to and accept the true facts when presented with them, but these are not the same people that cheer for and spread racist propaganda.
Of course, in the longer term, everyone would benefit from socialism, and we know that, but the average person doesn't - that's something for us to work on. Our methods cannot only be debunking propaganda, we have to offer a better alternative to the current system. But we cannot force people to listen to us. We have to entice them to join us, and not just through rhetoric, but also through action. Still, we cannot remove the responsibility from individuals that willingly go along with genocidal propaganda when there is so much counter-propaganda available (like the current situation with Gaza where a section of the west is cheering for genocide). We will most probably never be able to radicalize the ones cheering for genocide today.
I was typing up a big response to this and your other responses but I really think our disagreement comes down to philosophical questions about free will, what it means to be "guilty" and to what extend one is responsible for their own actions when considering the influences of their environment.
Good question, would it? That's the core problem. If I point a gun to your head and say "Call someone a racial slur" and you do it, is it your fault? Now what if your parents tell you to call someone a racial slur or they'll kick you out onto the streets and you do it, is that your fault? If all your friends tell you to call someone a slur or they won't talk to you again, is that your fault? What if just one friend tells you to do it? Where do you draw the line between environmental influence and individual agency? And if you're not at fault, are you innocent?
This is not a gotcha, I have no answer for this.
This is related to the other thing. If you asked me, I'd say we deviate because we're in different situations, different circumstances led us down different paths and had our lives gone slightly differently, we could be the ones cheering on genocide in Palestine just as easily. To me, correct me if I'm wrong, it seems like you'd argue otherwise. Do you think if some Elon bootlicker on twitter had lived your exact same life, same parents, same school, same job, that their views would differ from the ones you hold now? Why do you think we became communists?
I have thought about this and I think it's beside the point. I think we need to take another step back because we've gotten lost in random hypothetical examples which don't really matter here.
Dialectical materialism is not compatible with free will, but it's also not compatible with a mechanical determinism where only outside forces act to direct us. We are parts of the dialectic of history and it makes us just as we make it. We take action against those who stand opposed to communism. We condemn and fight them, while trying to get as many people over to our cause as possible. The point here is that we are not subjects external to history and only directed by it, nor do we freely choose our path without the effect of our material conditions.
I agree that it's not of our free will, but we are still parts of the whole, and it is through us that our history happens. We (social humans) live in our societies, we labour and produce, we interpret those relations of production into ideology, we struggle and fight for liberation. We organize and produce the propaganda and counter-propaganda - all shaped by our material conditions. In doing so we try to influence other people one way or the other. The theories that explain most accurately the actual laws that direct society and history, the ones that push forward the progress of history, these being class struggles and Marxism (dialectical materialism), we recognize as correct.
When our scientific understanding of propaganda informs our tactics which then most effectively get people over to our side, that is the correct theory of propaganda. The people choosing racist propaganda when plenty of the opposite is available are of course doing so due to their class position (and race, etc. and material conditions in general). It's not a free choice, but it's one they're making rationally, they aren't being brainwashed. That is the point of the article, and that is the point I interpreted from the original post. That people are not being manipulated insidiously by a propaganda machine that infects them as a virus infects a host, but that their ideology is influenced by their material conditions, and their beliefs are accordingly formulated rationally. This simply means that many westerners in particular are racist, but it's a rational choice (not a free one) they made based on their conditions, it wasn't imposed into them by brainwashing. Both their racism and the racist propaganda exist due to the same material conditions and social relations. For these same reasons, they are against us and everything we stand for, and we are against them in our political activity. For a variety of reasons, certain people make the opposite choice or even become communists, for whatever reason, people do choose not to buy into the propaganda.
The point of pointing this out is that we can rationally influence people if we approach them correctly, that the fight against propaganda is very winnable, and not a hopeless battle we are destined to lose because of some magical mode of operation of propaganda. This part is where the willing acceptance of propaganda comes into it. There are plenty of contradictions in the interests of each person - these are generalized to the level of classes (or other social groups in particular situations) - which in sum determine what that person is susceptible to buy into. The ones that most fervently cheer for genocide, we will never be able to convert because they will never make the choice, but there are plenty of others we can - those that are not buying into the racist propaganda, or are doing so only lightly, passively. Most of these people currently don't really care one way or the other, but the point is that we can make a lot of them care if we approach them correctly - we can get them to choose our side. Many of these people are already making the choice to educate themselves more and are discovering communism and similar theories.
It seems like we should have different standards of complicity when it comes to imperial core populations: the highest for those who gain the most benefits from imperial hegemony (e.g. white people), and then a lower one for those with fewer. There are certainly black neoliberals/fascists around, but there's a different story from self-interest for an Uncle Ruckus. Although it can maybe be said that they simply incorrectly think that they will benefit and act on that, at some level people know where they stand.
I agree generally, especially in terms of material gain to these people and potential reparations, but I also think that personal guilt should be determined on a case by case basis. However, every racist white westerner screaming about Hamas terrorists right now, when plenty of people are sharing actual correct information, is definitely complicit and is purposefully ignoring the evidence he is being given. Similarly, the outrageous stories about the DPRK that are circulated by the various CIA outlets or Yeonmi Park are simply too ridiculous for anyone to actually believe and take seriously, yet until recently people mostly shared them with glee. People go along with them due to other reasons, not an actual belief. Stories about Xinjiang are also not shared because people actually care and tried to inform themselves about the situation, but only due to (real or perceived) material gain (or even just emotional satisfaction) that the people sharing them get.
Or maybe both parts of the dialectic are mechanistic/deterministic? 🤔