RE: Commie says hi!
April 23, 2015 at 9:43 am
(This post was last modified: April 23, 2015 at 9:44 am by Red Economist.)
Thanks for the warm welcome everyone. I'm never 100% sure what to expect, so I'm happy to see it's been good so far.
I'll try to get back to you on some of your points and questions. if i miss something, my apologies as it's not intentional.
Theists and religious people can be communists, but they can't be Marxists as Marxism is inherently atheist (when it's logically consistent at least). There are exceptions as there always is, which is Islamic Marxism which started in central asia in the 1920's and 30's and spread amongst academic circles for a bit. the latter had a vague influence over Islamism/political Islam, and they borrowed the Leninist theory of the vanguard and state. I don't know too many details other than there was actually an influence.
There were also the "god builders" in the early bolshevik party and in Russia in the 20's who wanted to turn communism into a religion; it was a fascinating idea and for a breif period there were some odd experiments (e.g. babies weren't baptized but were "octobered"). I have had some sympathy with them but it was not overall consistent with Marxist ideology at a philosophical level as Lenin pointed out. it's rests on the same ideas as saying atheism or science is a faith.
I've been a communist sympathizer for nearly ten years, and it is only recently that I've started to "understand" it. I think Marxism is widely misunderstood and misrepresented, but that is a reflection of the complexity of "dialectical" thinking. I think Stalin won over his opponents, notably Trotsky, as he took the more pragmatic root; Socialism in one country was the best they could do at the time although it did strongly diverge from the original internationalist goals of communism as a movement.
I wouldn't chuck liberalism out just yet as there is a long way to go before communism- or indeed any alternative system- becomes credible. Stalinism (or Marxism-Leninism) was what worked and it is where any future communist ideas are going to have to drawn from. I nevertheless hope that any future communist system would be less bloodthirsty. From an intellectual point of view, that Marxist-Leninist also worked out the ideology more and so I'm drawing from them a lot.
Despite being a Trotskyist in my very early days, getting closer and closer to being a Marxist-Leninist/Stalinist by default. I think you're friend made a wise choice as being a Stalinist has the advantage of sticking with more orthodox ideas and learning the history and also having be honest enough about the mistakes that were made. the latter is hard and being an out and out supporter of Stalin, etc is political suicide, but there are good reasons to be skeptical about how far the history can be evaluated according to western-liberal moral standards particularly when you consider the influence of Judea-Christian morality which would be incompatible with atheism and materialism.
I'm probably going to add that site to my favorites and read large chunks of it, so thanks.
I'm still unsure exactly how communists became so confident that they could dismiss religion altogether, and it seems to be something more appropriate to an 19th century belief in the power of science than today. we are a lot more uncertian of ourselves.
Ironically, I couldn't use the "unfalsifiable" position as when Karl Popper developed it, he specifically used it against the Marxist philosophy of History (and psychoanalysis). The difference between a weak and a strong atheist appears to be whether atheism- as an objective truth- can be 'known' at all.
I think most people would support a communist-socialist model for an ideal society if they believed it was possible. As Marxism is materialist, the same set of questions regarding objective knowledge of atheism come into play regarding objective knowldge of ethics, future social development and the nature of man. For the most part, it is believed that consciousness or spirit is believed to be outside of the realm of sense-perception and hence scientific inquiry, so there are major philosophical issues regarding the possibility of communism.
(see below for reply on 'human nature'; it's easily the most common objection to Communism)
The "human element" in a system of government is the belief that people are inherently selfish and therefore tend towards political corruption in a communist society. At it's most basic, the idea of "human nature" is equivalent to the "soul" and therefore has deeply theological roots; the selfishness of man in liberal politics is partly derived from the idea of original sin in Christianity and the belief that the pursuit of pleasure is immoral/sinful. mankind worst kept secret is that power is exhilarating, enjoyable and a major-turn on, so for my part I've borrowed ideas from Wilhelm Reich and Erich Fromm (both Freudo-Marxists) to look at the psychology involved as Marxism itself doesn't have a clear statement of the problem or it's solution.
Trying to show that the soul, and therefore it's distant intellectual cousin, 'human nature', doesn't exist is hard. It is however possible to argue that they are an illusion, in so far as it is assumed that this 'nature', the essence of man is supposed to be fixed irrespective of the time and place people live. individuals change and develop over their lifetime, and society's clearly evolve in their moral understanding. the conundrum is "revolutions" which are massive leaps in moral understanding and social development. I'm confident there is an answer, but I'm not 100% confident of what it is. Wilhelm Reich argued that Fascism was the product of the repression of healthy sexuality and it then being sublimated into sado-masochistic sexual perversions. I think the same rationale can be at work behind explaining communism's capacity for violence, irrationality and corruption. that's my best guess so far.
The Soviet Union had some real problems trying to work out a consistently atheist/materialist view of nature and it meant that science became highly politicized. From a historical point of view, it's fascinating, but- if I actually had a better knowledge of the scientific concepts- is also intriguing because it conflicts with current ideas regarding the big bang, genetics, quantum mechanics and in some ways evolution.
I lean towards a live and live attitude towards Fascists as there is no point trying to point score on the internet (unless it's some hideous). I'm friends with a Fascist on religious forums and ironically I seem to be the only person he doesn't fall out with. good humor and tongue in check references to being corrupted by power keep keep the conversation civil. he's not a racist though and when you take that out of the equation communists and fascists can get along up to a point; we arrive at similar conclusion but from totally opposed premises about the nature of the world. it depends on the person and the ability to respect each other even when we disagree.
Hey, Hatshepsut. Yeah, we share them in common; I was on Revleft too. I signed up a couple of years ago, but only really got active a few months last year. I left and after a while decided to use religiousforums.com instead. it has been a lot of fun and there are a lot of great people on there, but it is very limited for subjects relating to atheism.
HEY D!
I'll try to get back to you on some of your points and questions. if i miss something, my apologies as it's not intentional.
(April 23, 2015 at 4:04 am)Dystopia Wrote: Hey Red, welcome to the forums.
It's good to have a Marxist on board to share a different viewpoint on things. Personally I grow skeptical of liberalism, the founding system of our societies, and as such I'll pretty much vote for anyone who wants to rebuild everything from scratch - If that happened to be a Marxist, so be it. I think Marx, like Darwin, was greatly misunderstood. One thing I agree with communists is that those who control the means of production and the economy control society - No doubt about that.
What do you think of Stalin's idea (let's leave the violence he did aside for a while) to build communism inside one country following a more nationalistic idea as opposed to Marx's internationalist proposal? Do you think communism inside a country has higher chances to work? I have a Stalinist friend in real life.
BTW, do you think theists and religious people can be communists?
Well, I hope you stick around and reply to more threads.
Theists and religious people can be communists, but they can't be Marxists as Marxism is inherently atheist (when it's logically consistent at least). There are exceptions as there always is, which is Islamic Marxism which started in central asia in the 1920's and 30's and spread amongst academic circles for a bit. the latter had a vague influence over Islamism/political Islam, and they borrowed the Leninist theory of the vanguard and state. I don't know too many details other than there was actually an influence.
There were also the "god builders" in the early bolshevik party and in Russia in the 20's who wanted to turn communism into a religion; it was a fascinating idea and for a breif period there were some odd experiments (e.g. babies weren't baptized but were "octobered"). I have had some sympathy with them but it was not overall consistent with Marxist ideology at a philosophical level as Lenin pointed out. it's rests on the same ideas as saying atheism or science is a faith.
I've been a communist sympathizer for nearly ten years, and it is only recently that I've started to "understand" it. I think Marxism is widely misunderstood and misrepresented, but that is a reflection of the complexity of "dialectical" thinking. I think Stalin won over his opponents, notably Trotsky, as he took the more pragmatic root; Socialism in one country was the best they could do at the time although it did strongly diverge from the original internationalist goals of communism as a movement.
I wouldn't chuck liberalism out just yet as there is a long way to go before communism- or indeed any alternative system- becomes credible. Stalinism (or Marxism-Leninism) was what worked and it is where any future communist ideas are going to have to drawn from. I nevertheless hope that any future communist system would be less bloodthirsty. From an intellectual point of view, that Marxist-Leninist also worked out the ideology more and so I'm drawing from them a lot.
Despite being a Trotskyist in my very early days, getting closer and closer to being a Marxist-Leninist/Stalinist by default. I think you're friend made a wise choice as being a Stalinist has the advantage of sticking with more orthodox ideas and learning the history and also having be honest enough about the mistakes that were made. the latter is hard and being an out and out supporter of Stalin, etc is political suicide, but there are good reasons to be skeptical about how far the history can be evaluated according to western-liberal moral standards particularly when you consider the influence of Judea-Christian morality which would be incompatible with atheism and materialism.
(April 23, 2015 at 4:08 am)robvalue Wrote: Hey there red, welcome
To me, the best argument for strong atheism is to attack the claims. Except for trivial claims such as "the sun is God", at least one of these is almost certainly true:
-The concept of God is not well defined
-The concept and/or claim is unfalsifiable
In either case, the claim is irrelevant and useless so can be dismissed. It's based on a stance called ignosticism. Check this out for much more detail:
http://www.strongatheism.net/library/ath...gnitivism/
I don't know much about politics and such, but I think an ideal society would follow a communist/socialist model. However, human nature does not currently seem compatible with it.
I'm probably going to add that site to my favorites and read large chunks of it, so thanks.
I'm still unsure exactly how communists became so confident that they could dismiss religion altogether, and it seems to be something more appropriate to an 19th century belief in the power of science than today. we are a lot more uncertian of ourselves. Ironically, I couldn't use the "unfalsifiable" position as when Karl Popper developed it, he specifically used it against the Marxist philosophy of History (and psychoanalysis). The difference between a weak and a strong atheist appears to be whether atheism- as an objective truth- can be 'known' at all.
I think most people would support a communist-socialist model for an ideal society if they believed it was possible. As Marxism is materialist, the same set of questions regarding objective knowledge of atheism come into play regarding objective knowldge of ethics, future social development and the nature of man. For the most part, it is believed that consciousness or spirit is believed to be outside of the realm of sense-perception and hence scientific inquiry, so there are major philosophical issues regarding the possibility of communism.
(see below for reply on 'human nature'; it's easily the most common objection to Communism)
(April 23, 2015 at 4:56 am)pocaracas Wrote: Welcome Red!
I think all those communist regimes failed because of the human element in them.... how can you remove that from any form of government is beyond me, so we're left with this crappy liberalism/capitalism, tempered by some weak socialism that can be found throughout Western Europe... seems to get the job done, even if it consistently deteriorates the people's ability to live comfortably... Then you get a revolution and it all starts over... some lose a lot of money, others gain... most improve a bit only to then start the declining road all over again.
The "human element" in a system of government is the belief that people are inherently selfish and therefore tend towards political corruption in a communist society. At it's most basic, the idea of "human nature" is equivalent to the "soul" and therefore has deeply theological roots; the selfishness of man in liberal politics is partly derived from the idea of original sin in Christianity and the belief that the pursuit of pleasure is immoral/sinful. mankind worst kept secret is that power is exhilarating, enjoyable and a major-turn on, so for my part I've borrowed ideas from Wilhelm Reich and Erich Fromm (both Freudo-Marxists) to look at the psychology involved as Marxism itself doesn't have a clear statement of the problem or it's solution.
Trying to show that the soul, and therefore it's distant intellectual cousin, 'human nature', doesn't exist is hard. It is however possible to argue that they are an illusion, in so far as it is assumed that this 'nature', the essence of man is supposed to be fixed irrespective of the time and place people live. individuals change and develop over their lifetime, and society's clearly evolve in their moral understanding. the conundrum is "revolutions" which are massive leaps in moral understanding and social development. I'm confident there is an answer, but I'm not 100% confident of what it is. Wilhelm Reich argued that Fascism was the product of the repression of healthy sexuality and it then being sublimated into sado-masochistic sexual perversions. I think the same rationale can be at work behind explaining communism's capacity for violence, irrationality and corruption. that's my best guess so far.
(April 23, 2015 at 4:26 am)Alex K Wrote: Welcome to the forums!
Finally a communist to compensate for all the Nazis!
Kidding, kidding, great to have you here. Looking forward to your defense of Marxist natural philosophy.I'm always weary of philosophy of nature by people who didn't even live to really see modern physics and biology
The Soviet Union had some real problems trying to work out a consistently atheist/materialist view of nature and it meant that science became highly politicized. From a historical point of view, it's fascinating, but- if I actually had a better knowledge of the scientific concepts- is also intriguing because it conflicts with current ideas regarding the big bang, genetics, quantum mechanics and in some ways evolution.
I lean towards a live and live attitude towards Fascists as there is no point trying to point score on the internet (unless it's some hideous). I'm friends with a Fascist on religious forums and ironically I seem to be the only person he doesn't fall out with. good humor and tongue in check references to being corrupted by power keep keep the conversation civil. he's not a racist though and when you take that out of the equation communists and fascists can get along up to a point; we arrive at similar conclusion but from totally opposed premises about the nature of the world. it depends on the person and the ability to respect each other even when we disagree.
(April 23, 2015 at 8:42 am)Hatshepsut Wrote:(April 23, 2015 at 4:00 am)Red Economist Wrote: I'm currently active on ReligiousForums.com and ...
Howdy. Or should I say jj.tj "be come." We probably have three forums in common though I quit using ReligiousForums.com and RevLeft. Nothing against them. The former is just too "loud" and the latter too invested in political ideology unlikely to fly in the USA and which I only partly concur with. I'll probably quit this one soon as well, when I get bored of it.
Do enjoy.
Hey, Hatshepsut. Yeah, we share them in common; I was on Revleft too. I signed up a couple of years ago, but only really got active a few months last year. I left and after a while decided to use religiousforums.com instead. it has been a lot of fun and there are a lot of great people on there, but it is very limited for subjects relating to atheism.
(April 23, 2015 at 9:16 am)Deidre32 Wrote:(April 23, 2015 at 4:00 am)Red Economist Wrote: Greetings Atheist Forums,
I'm currently active on ReligiousForums.com and thought I might get involved here to be around more of my fellow atheists. I am a strong atheist, but currently thinking over how I can establish that as true and what it's implications would be. I am a communist in that I accept Marxist philosophy of nature (dialectical materialism) and society (historical materialism). There aren't many Communists left, so I'm ok with disagreeing with people and respecting others views so long as it's relatively civil.
I will save some time by saying that I am not an apologist for Stalin/Mao/Pol Pot etc and a great deal of my time is spent trying to understand why they did what they did and how far it was an inherent characteristic of the system/ideology as a way to find out if it could have been done better. I am familiar to many anti-communist criticisms (and have read F. Hayek's Road to Serfdom from cover to cover) and whilst they often true to a greater or lesser extent, they are often very simplistic and rely on specific political/philosophical assumptions which I don't share as a Marxist. As such I am not an orthodox Marxist, but share enough in common with those who went before to call myself a 'commie'.
I look forward to debating everyone here and learning things from you.
regards,
Red.
I know you! Yay, you've joined here! Welcome
HEY D!
