Black Power, White Power, and Class Warfare

I think that this is the perfect opportunity for these organizations to broaden their base. Instead of becoming vehicles for the liberation of only black people, become genuine working class liberation movements. Bring in the working class of all colors. Broaden your base. Reach out to your brothers of all colours.

That is our only hope!

And while you're at it, get rid of that anti-semite Farrakhan.

From your keyboard to God's eyes!

great article latour, now lets see if you get ripped like I would If I did this instead of you.


MM

Thanks to the both of you for your nice comments! I half expected a massive flame war when I woke up today.

Latour you are slipping into the realm of statist ideals and existentialism. Buddy, you just opened a can of worms lol.

That said I think we can expect more instances of Toledo to happen. The insecurity of globalism has translated into insecurities which manifested into the skinheads marching. In my opinion this is exactly the type of stuff Chomsky talks about as people of all sorts rebel out from excessive state pressure. More calls for domestic military intervention both at home and abroad are examples that the insecurity affects everyone. Remember when Martin Luther King was the black response to continued oppression. I think we can make a case for the white man as well nowadays. Point is I see this type of advocacy as the result from invasive, heavy handed statism.

This statism has gone unchecked since the terrorist attack. In some ways the revival of neo-nazi ideals mirrors the rise of islamic militarism within musilim countries. No one expected it. No predicted the damage to social injustice from reversed socialism.

One could easily make splinter arguments of social inequality and the rise of globalism. The failure of economic development to trickle down to the disenfranchised. The rise of state as a response to terrorism and the erosion of ideals. Hey the list goes on and on...

Like I said, can o'worms...

Now, to mention the unmentionable words (or, drop the c-bomb), class warfare. For years, the ruling class has remained almost exclusively white in North America, and the poor working class has consisted of a disproportionately high number of minorities.

Um, tell that to the Asians.  Tell that to L. Douglas Wilder.  Tell that to the Congressional Black Caucus.

And it is not Class.  It is economic strata.  England has Classes.  America has lower, middle and upper incomes.

Poverty as oppression, yadda yadda. Gah, you guys need new books to read. I keep seeing early 20th century images of class, so stereotyped as to be useless, satirical. The poor people are in factories turning out Model As and whalebone corsets and the rich are all wearing white tennis outfits and dancing the Charelston.

It's boring, frankly. If I could once in my life see an article from this sort of perspective that really, accurately looked at what class means, maybe it would make sense to me. Sadly, everyone who is socially concious seems to be stuck reading Marx in some F. Scott Fitzgerald alternate reality...

"And it is not Class. It is economic strata. England has Classes. America has lower, middle and upper incomes."

Exactly, and there are people in the middle and lower classes that are far more parasitical and damaging to the poor than many who earn high incomes. These classist perspectives of society are just as abusivly stereotypical as any you get from fundamentalist Christians. Christians look at the world through the filter of the Bible, armchair socialists look at it through 100 year old radical literature...

armchair socialists look at it through 100 year old radical literature...

About 150 year old now.

Reply By: little_whipPosted: Thursday, October 20, 2005This fear of an imaginary horde of minorities rampaging through the streets is Tell the victims, (both black and white) of the Toledo riots, the New Orleans looting, and just about any law abiding citizen who lives in a predominantly black neighborhood that the 'rampaging hoards' are all in their imagination.Hah.Easy to say, living in lily-white Canada.

I'm not saying that minorities don't commit crimes, or that riots and looting don't happen. Yes, Toledo got a bit out of control, but it started out as a rally against hatred of them. You had a group of people come down and spout off all this racist, hateful garbage, and another group of people rallying against hatred. Of course, eventually things got out of control, but it wasn't so much of a united horde of exclusively minorities destroying everything in its path, more of a few bad apples mixed in with them.

What is not all in the imagination is groups like the KKK and the Nazis and their long history of beatings, killings, lynchings and hate crimes.

BS, you have a good point. Marx's teachings are almost 150 years old now, and there are a lot of things that happened that he couldn't/didn't predict. I am starting to feel that although a lot of them are still valid, they are in dire need of an update.

But, you have just inspired me to write something, which I will work on over the winter, or at least once these damn midterms are done.

LW, this was a crowd of 600 in a city of over 300,000. That's like 0.2 percent. If you had every (or at least the majority) of black people out in the streets smashing stuff, then I would agree wiht you, there is a rampaging horde. But here, there are just a few people pissed at the Nazis and the police who were (supposed to) protect them and allow them to march and spout off all this hate directed against them, getting out of control. It's not a united horde of all the minorities in Toledo trying to destroy the city and everyone in it.

So, should the Nazis be allowed to bait away and vent their bile, do you think, and yell their racist epithets? Or should we just tell them no; it's not proper to do that?
If that's the case, I think we should also let the blacks know that it's not proper to bait whites, either. But for some reason, it often seems to be.

I am starting to feel that although a lot of them are still valid, they are in dire need of an update.

Yeah, an update...yeah, that's what they need. How about an update that keeps 100 million people from dying in the name of Communism? That would be a nice update.
How about an update that admits that the whole shebang doesn't work unless you can find a country where human nature took a hike and everyone is willing to earn the same amount of money no matter what their contribution to society? That would be a nice update.

Do I sound jaded? I think I sound jaded....so sorry....

Yeah, an update...yeah, that's what they need. How about an update that keeps 100 million people from dying in the name of Communism? That would be a nice update. How about an update that admits that the whole shebang doesn't work unless you can find a country where human nature took a hike and everyone is willing to earn the same amount of money no matter what their contribution to society? That would be a nice update.Do I sound jaded? I think I sound jaded....so sorry....

That is a major problem. Most socialist thought in the 20th century has been corrupted by people like Lenin, Stalin and Mao, and the Soviet Union. So far, the only real major experiments in worker control were in Yugoslavia under Tito (despite a fairly undemocratic rule, people still visit his shrine to remember the good times), some experiments in Chile under Allende, and Chavez seems to want to head down that path as well. But to say that it "doesn't work" is a bit of a misconception; yes, it was a miserable failure in the USSR, but it worked reasonably well in Yugoslavia under Tito, and they were headed in a socialist direction in several countries is Latin America, with popular support, but before too many major changes were implemented, the leaders were overthrown or assassinated with the help of the CIA.

Besides, if you blame the deaths of people at the hands of Stalin on Communism, can I blame the deaths of people at the hands of Hitler, Imperial Japan, Pinochet, etc on capitalism? If so, I would wager that capitalism has a pretty high death count as well (10 million for Hitler, 10 million for Leopold II of Belgium (in the Congo)...).

Most socialist thought in the 20th century has been corrupted by people like Lenin, Stalin and Mao, and the Soviet Union.

Perhaps, but not Marxist thought. Marxism was always supposed to be about violent class conflict and the suppression of the old ruling order after their assets are seized. It is difficult to see how you can do this without then defending your revolution from counter-revolutionaries and foreign enemies - a potentially lethal combination. And that means gulags, a secret police, the authority of the "Party" over the rule of law, executions without trial, terror. Then you need a bureaucracy to 'manage' those seized assets 'in the name of the people'. Always. And everywhere (everywhere that it has ever been tried). So, Lenin, Marx and Mao never corrupted Marxist thought - they just provided the know-how.

Tito? Ah yes, the leftists who have the decency to be embarrassed about Marxist tyrants whose hands are dripping with blood are always on the lookout for a 'good revolutionary', one who hopefully didn't murder too many people. Over the decades the focus changes: "OK, Stalin was a bastard, but what about Mao? Oh, he killed millions too?, Well, there's always Tito. Oh, the Kocevje massacre? Yes, I guess that was a bit gruesome. Hang on, I think there might be a decent Marxist dictator in..., what's the name of that place again?". At the end of that road you are basically placing all your hopes for humanity in someone like Ceausescu or Kim Il Sung.

can I blame the deaths of people at the hands of Hitler, Imperial Japan, Pinochet, etc on capitalism?

The only one that pretended to be Capitalist was Pinochet.  Hilter was Socialist, and Japan, as you point out, imperialist and a Monarchy.  So to answer your question, no you cannot.

That is a major problem. Most socialist thought in the 20th century has been corrupted by people like Lenin, Stalin and Mao, and the Soviet Union. So far, the only real major experiments in worker control were in Yugoslavia under Tito (despite a fairly undemocratic rule,

---latour999

See, my problem with modern Communists/Socialists is this: they seem to think "well, okay, yeah....it was a miserable failure is Russia, China and Cuba...everywhere it's been tried, it hasn't really worked all that well. But maybe....just maybe....if we make some changes here and there, it will. If we do this....maybe we'll try that....."
But see, that's exactly what Stalin thought; exactly what Mao thought...Pol Pot...."the promised Utopia isn't emerging, so we'll make a few changes....we'll do this....try that......by gosh and by golly, we'll find some way to make it work..." and people died. By the millions. Unnecessarily.
What, a million in Cambodia alone.....between 30 and 50 million in Russia during the collectivization drive; exact numbers of dead from China's Great Leap Forward under Mao still aren't available (and the only reason for this is because Mao still has yet to be utterly villified in his country the way Stalin eventually was in his). How many died in Czechoslovakia during the "Prague Spring" of 1968, when Soviet tanks rolled in to crush the fledgling democratic movement there?

Tito still needed the Russians behind him to stay in power, after all, just as did Castro, who, since 1991, has had to go begging for help from other sources because Communism has ruined Cuba in ways that Battista couldn't have imagined.

It doesn't work the way it's supposed to....get over it.

Hilter was Socialist

Though I appreciate the support, I kind of have to differ with you on this, Doc.

Adolf Hitler was not a Socialist; he saw Socialism, you could say, as the 'red-headed stepchild' of Communism, which he hated even more than he hated Democracy.
The only reason he didn't change the name of the NSDAP was that he, being the master of manipulation that he was, understood that Socialism was popular in Germany at the time, and the party would be more likely to draw supporters if the people were left to assume that Socialism would be part of the Nazi party's official policy.

I suppose Hitler could have been called a Capitalist, but only on grudging terms. Capitalism grows and works best in Democracy, of course, and he hated with passion all elements of Democracy.

Adolf Hitler was not a Socialist; he saw Socialism, you could say, as the 'red-headed stepchild' of Communism, which he hated even more than he hated Democracy. The only reason he didn't change the name of the NSDAP was that he, being the master

No, now explain how the Third Reich was not Socialist? He may not have liked it, but he sure practiced it!

I can't explain it, I just know what I've studied all these years. Hitler did thngs hs own way. What can I say?
Socialism is a conceit of the left, and he was about as faaaaaaaaaaaar right as one could get.
Now, that's not to say that, perhaps quasi-Socialist policies weren't instituted under his rule, but knowing what I know, I'd say he probably didn't think much of it.
I'll put it this way: it may have indeed been Socialism (no private property, state control of every aspect of life, etc.) but maybe he consciously didn't consider it as such. He was nuts, whattaya want?

The only one that pretended to be Capitalist was Pinochet. Hilter was Socialist, and Japan, as you point out, imperialist and a Monarchy. So to answer your question, no you cannot.

Hitler was not a socialist, and imperialism, monarchy and capitalism aren't mutually exclusive (for example, England).

Tito still needed the Russians behind him to stay in power, after all, just as did Castro, who, since 1991, has had to go begging for help from other sources because Communism has ruined Cuba in ways that Battista couldn't have imagined.

Uh, the Soviets didn't like Tito and all. And I'm not disputing that he has blood on his hands, I'm saying that the Yugoslav system of worker self-management was a fairly good system, and a step in the right direction. If you can head in that direction in a democratic system, then you would have real freedom.

I think one of the problems with Marxism is that it assumes that there will be a violent revolution, and the bigger the revolution, the bigger the change. My theory is that a revolution need not be violent, it could be a democratic revolution (like the Bolivarian Revolution), or one of noncooperation (like the Indian independance movement).

Hitler was not a socialist, and imperialism, monarchy and capitalism aren't mutually exclusive (for example, England).

He was a socialist in name and in deeds.  As I said, you may not have liked his brand of it, but Nazi Germany was anything but capitalistic.

As for your comparison to England, it does not wash as England had already adopted a parlimentarian form of government, leaving the monarchy as a figure head.  That was not the case in Japan.

He was a socialist in name and in deeds. As I said, you may not have liked his brand of it, but Nazi Germany was anything but capitalistic.

hitler was a fascist... a brand of national socialism. he definitely was NOT a socialist.
nazi Germany was not capitalistic... you are right there... but it surely was not a socialist economy...it was a fascist one.

He was a socialist in name and in deeds. As I said, you may not have liked his brand of it, but Nazi Germany was anything but capitalistic. hitler was a fascist... a brand of national socialism. he definitely was NOT a socialist. nazi Germany was not capitalistic... you are right there... but it surely was not a socialist economy...it was a fascist one.

Sorry doc mano got you on this one. Hitler most definetly was a "fascist" just like his buddy Mussolini.

Sorry doc mano got you on this one. Hitler most definetly was a "fascist" just like his buddy Mussolini.

Fascism and socialism are not mutually exclusive since they deal with different aspects of a country.