Capitalism is when no food and no teeth to chew food. Got it. Renting teeth when?

Roll credits already ffs

I’m still a baby ML

A baby ML that imho understands DiaMat and ML better than many ultras. Keep it up, comrade

Well… If by “anti-revisionist” one means “anti-Gorbachev” - I’m all in.

…Why is anti-China marxism so big?..

If you were a CIA operative, working out the details of, say, COINTELPRO, and knowing there is a substantial amount of Marxists and communist-leaning people out there… AND one of your goals was to demonize the AES states… Wouldn’t you want to tear off a chunk of potential revolutionaries and defang them, turning them into armchair communists who never achieved anything and who always criticize everyone who did?

Bear in mind that a lot of those are in the West. Parenti spoke ostensibly about leftcoms/ultras (and left-anticommunism). This gets a few people off your mind, making the situation safer for the capitalist state machine at home.

“Neither Washington nor Moscow Beijing” shit

Sure thing. I don’t exactly remember where I got that from, it’s been cited in different articles. But here’s one of the places you can find it, it’s down there in the Reference section - number 12

You got it

No. I’m sorry, I’ll just stop here. It would be better to finish this conversation, I don’t like the way it is going.

I don’t, please don’t presume what I know. Please explain yourself, in good faith

All I said was that we needed to learn Khruschev’s side of the story and then you started arguing against historical research. Bravo.

Another strawman. I didn’t argue against historical research, all I said was memoirs alone aren’t enough to give you a full picture. In any case, the analyses do take into account Khrushchev’s memoirs.

You’re still not pointing out where I did that.

I did, several times. You did it here: …So you’d read Mao but not Khruschev and, therefore, you don’t know Khruchev’s own argument, just your own personal strawman of the man, for all you know… Sure, just take Mao’s word for it even though he was known for getting a lot of shit wrong during this era lol…

You criticize me “taking Mao’s word” and “not reading Khrushchev’s own argument”, implying that is the sole reason why I criticize Khrushchev by creating a caricature of him and criticizing that caricature. I did not do that, I repeated multiple times where my viewpoint comes from.

You’ve changed the topic several times.

You do realize that the entire thread is publicly visible. I don’t understand what you are doing here.

memoirs alone are not a reliable source

The point doesn’t stand because we don’t know that due to the difference in character.

What is it that we don’t know (due to the difference in character)? I am genuinely lost. What does that mean?

You’re not pointing out where the strawman is; you just vaguely alluded to my supposed strawman.

I did. Right here: “…So you’d read Mao but not Khruschev… Sure, just take Mao’s word for it…” - this implies that what you are saying is this - my views on Khrushchev derive solely from Mao’s opinion, and thus it is wrong to just take Mao’s word on it. I never implied that my views on Khrushchev are based on Mao’s views, thus your criticism (this one - “…So you’d read Mao but not Khruschev… Sure, just take Mao’s word for it…”) attacks a distorted version of my reasoning. The real reason I criticize Khrushchev is not because Mao or whoever, but because of historical analysis of the specific policies that were enacted under his leadership, and of the consequences we’re witnessing today.

So far, you’ve managed to divert the discussion.

Let’s see… The post was about Khrushchev, you centered around the Sino-Soviet split. When I pointed out Khrushchev’s responsibility for it, you brought up the Russian Revolution as though that somehow excuses him and not merely explains the ideological school of his. Then when I pointed out that Mao was right in harshly criticizing Khrushchev’s revisionism (as history proved us) - you started attacking Mao as though the fact it was “late Mao” somehow made him wrong, even though,again - history proved it with USSR being overthrown. Then I explained point by point what Mao said, and compared that to the actualities of USSR’s history. You then used an “ad hominem” argument here - “Have you read Khruschev or are you just quoting Mao here?”. Suddenly my words are discredited because I didn’t read Khrushchev, as though I was obliged to. Then it is me who created a strawman.

Is it really me who is constantly diverting the discussion?

Okay, but Khruschev’s not Gorby.

The point stands - memoirs alone are not a reliable source, his or Gorby’s. Conceptually

strawman of the man

That’s not a strawman. A strawman would be me distorting Khrushchev’s words and attacking a distorted version of them to suit my purposes. I’m not doing that, I am looking at history - what Khrushchev actually DID, and then I draw conclusions from that. Mao has nothing to do with this.

…So you’d read Mao but not Khruschev… Sure, just take Mao’s word for it…

Ironically, it is you who created a strawman - you are trying to criticize me as though the only driving factor of my criticisms of Khrushchev is “well, Mao said corn man bad so I accept that uncritically”.

We have Khruschev’s memoirs and speeches and supplementary theoretical texts lol

Memoirs alone will not give you the full picture - rather, they will give you someone’s viewpoint, however distorted it might be. One must inevitably compare that to other information.

Gorbachev, for instance, claimed in his memoirs that “Glasnost unleashed forces they could not control”. That was at the very least very dishonest - he himself went to great lengths and encouraged criticism of the CPSU through the same media he handed over to Yakovlev and other anti-communist forces. What good would it do reading this part of his memoir if you don’t have other sources of information to verify it against?

Have you read Khruschev or are you just quoting Mao here?

Stop deflecting. And stop blindly downvoting everything. It’s not about reading Khrushchev, on its own it would not do you any good. It’s about looking at history and seeing which decisions and which policies lead to which consequences.

From the look of it, you’re either emotionally invested in defending Khrushchev, or slandering Mao, or just being petty. Mao said certain things, history has shown us those things were correct regardless of who said them. It’s not only my viewpoint, or Mao’s, or anyone specific, really. No amount of reading Khrushchev would change that, it has nothing to do with it.

The USSR being overthrown doesn’t make Mao correct for the reasons cited. Why would it?

Let’s see.

Mao pointed out the fact that class struggle continues under socialism. Khrushchev abandons the importance of class struggle, DotP and proclaims that class differences are all but resolved. What happened? Not only were they not resolved, but because of his dubious economic policies a certain stratum within the USSR was born who would then become the main material force behind the overthrow of the USSR.

Mao also pointed out that petit bourgeoisie mentality may still be able to penetrate the ranks of the party and seep through the political apparatus. That is exactly what happened (for further info - read Roger Keeran’s book).

He also said that external forces will never abandon their efforts in destabilizing a socialist society. As we saw with policies enacted by Carter and especially Reagan with their whole SDI shtick - the US and the West were never interested in peaceful coexistence; they wanted to “spend the USSR into bankrupcy”. They proposed one-sided deals for disarmament, which to their shock Gorbachev accepted while gaining nothing in return.

Mao was right because history proved him right. This isn’t vague, this is historic fact

Because history proved the theory - when the USSR was overthrown precisely because of the things I cited.

“For a very long historical period after the proletariat takes power, class struggle continues as an objective law independent of man’s will, differing only in form from what it was before the taking of power.

After the October Revolution, Lenin pointed out a number of times that:

a) The overthrown exploiters always try in a thousand and one ways to recover the “paradise” they have been deprived of.

b) New elements of capitalism are constantly and spontaneously generated in the petty-bourgeois atmosphere.

c) Political degenerates and new bourgeois elements may emerge in the ranks of the working class and among government functionaries as a result of bourgeois influence and the pervasive, corrupting influence of the petty bourgeoisie.

d) The external conditions for the continuance of class struggle within a socialist society are encirclement by international capitalism, the imperialists’ threat of armed intervention and their subversive activities to accomplish peaceful disintegration.

Life has confirmed these conclusions of Lenin’s.

In socialist society, the overthrown bourgeoisie and other reactionary classes remain strong for quite a long time, and indeed in certain respects are quite powerful. They have a thousand and one links with the international bourgeoisie. They are not reconciled to their defeat and stubbornly continue to engage in trials of strength with the proletariat. They conduct open and hidden struggles against the proletariat in every field.”

This is a piece I took from ProleWiki. Mao’s criticisms derived from Lenin, he didn’t add anything out of this world. If you say my correctness depends on me declaring something to be correct, please point to a specific thing from the text above and explain your disagreement, other than “this was Late Mao, so I don’t care”

We did. It’s just that he lied a lot