Why do some communists hate "liberals"?

liberals are procapitalist

'Liberal' means bourgeois; what should we do: love them, whilst they hate us? Be reasonable!

[YouTube]u52Oz-54VYw[/YouTube]

It's a video. Might not be viewable to you. Try this: Phil Ochs - Love me I'm a liberal

You'll find communists and anarchists take a dim view of liberals. You might want to have a look at some of the Libcom intro pages to give you a better idea of the general political direction on here: introductory guides

timthelion

What exactly do you mean "procapitalist"? Is it inherent in the word "liberal" to be capitalist? Like in that you would like to forbid trade? AKA, be antiliberal in your revolution?

liberalism is a pro capitalist position, i'm an anarchist i wish to abolish capitalism and create a communist society, if this happened trade would be impossible, it wouldn't need to be explicitly forbidden because the conditions needed for it wouldn't exist

Schmoopie

'Liberal' means bourgeois; what should we do: love them, whilst they hate us? Be reasonable!

not really, liberalism is a political position, the bourgeois is the class that owns the means of production in a capitalist society

timthelion

Having grown up in the US, I know two types of politics: Right wingers and liberals. And the liberals certainly were not "pro-capitalist". They may not have been radicalized, but do comunists only speak to radicals? If the building was on fire, and half the occupants were just waking up, rubbing their eyes, and asking why their alarms had gone off so early, would you become angry with them for denying the existance of the flames? Are those the liberals which marxists refer to?

in the US the political spectrum is presented as varying between two different extremely right wing forms of capitalism, anti capitalists don't fit on this spectrum.

if you want to know what Marxists mean by liberals you'll have to ask Marxist

if your using firefox and viewing a https web page it hides all none https elements like embedded youtube videos, you can disable this from the padlock on the address bar

Schmoopie wrote:

'Liberal' means bourgeois; what should we do: love them, whilst they hate us? Be reasonable!

not really, liberalism is a political position, the bourgeois is the class that owns the means of production in a capitalist society

Historically, you are correct. Liberalism was originally one faction of the bourgeoisie and it's counterpart was protectionist. However, the liberal faction has proved victorious and hence liberal and bourgeois can now be viewed as synonymous. I think in the United States liberal has a different connotation but I would need enlightening on that matter.

I'm not the most tolerant of people but will nevertheless work with all sorts, liberals included. I don't hate them but would never actually trust them. Still, what people call themselves is not always representative of how they'll act in a pinch. I know people who define themselves as liberals wouldn't dream of crossing a picket line and have encountered so called anarchists who have scabbed.

Schmoopie, I gather the term liberal in the US generally means vaguely leftish.

timthelion

But what really gets to me, is the impression one gets when one hears someone say that they will never work with a liberal. Since "liberal", derived from "liberty", in its core means someone who is tolerant. Do communists and anarchists not like tolerance, or is it just the overly comfortable pseudocaring of the mainstream left that gets to them?

Ya know, for someone who seems to invent words on a post-by-post basis, you get pretty caught up in semantics. Also, Kaczynski, WTF?

Anyway, I think most liberals have their hearts in the right place and - since in reality - most people are liberals of some stripe, of course most anarchists work with liberals once they break out of the mold of political organizing.

That said, establishment liberals and liberal organizations (the fucking Democratic party for fuck's sake) and tied up the functioning of capitalism and serve to channel class struggles into the realm of manageable politics. I mean, think about taking the anger and direct from Wisconsin a few years back and channeling it into a recall elections. Fuck working with those douches.

timthelion

OK, but there is a difference between non-existant and forbidding. As an example, I don't like the idea of artificially imposed property rights, in which the state mandates the ownership of a song or a piece of land. However, that isn't the same thing as forbidding ownership. For example, in North Korea, they put people in jail for engaging in trade. I wouldn't want that. Indeed, I don't really see any problem with people exchanging vegitables on a street corner. Personally, I just want massive artificial legal structures like international megacorps to not exist. Right now, those structures are mandated by the state (I cannot go and squat the supermall, the police will kick me out). But even in a non-hierarchical society, a person could defend their own home against intruders. Would you forbid them from doing so?

Are you sure you're not an an-cap? Would you defend your rental property if I tried squat it?

timthelion : define liberal.

liberal as a catch-all term used by Republicans to criticise their political 'opposition' doesn't mean much and has already been dealt with by others.

Incidentally in France liberals are very right-wing.

The root of the word is interesting but it doesn't always affect the actual meaning. The word libertine comes from the same root (and in history was used to criticise free-thinkers as sexual deviants. Interesting from a historical point of view but I'm not going to start calling myself a libertine)

.

Agree with Serge #14

I’ve heard liberalism in the UK described as the political legacy of the aristocracy.

At base they have a contempt for anyone ‘in trade’, employers and employees. They feel it OK to use trade to further their interests as long as they do not have to dirty their own hands. They patronizingly feel there is no need for economic strife if only everyone honestly tries to see everyone else’s point of view. The cake is big enough for all to get a slice, if people were not so greedy.

So politics is reduced to a question of ‘morality’ with liberals as the arbitrators. See Bertrand Russell as an example, well-meaning and clueless. Someone described him as Britain’s wisest fool.

I gather the term liberal in the US generally means vaguely leftish.

Thanks, good definition.

When we hate, we hate something within us; hatred only hurts our selves. When we can transform hate into positive action, it is no longer hate. Pompous ass!

I like this take on the absurd/hypocritical nature of liberalism:

‘Now, I’m liberal, but to a degree
I want ev’rybody to be free
But if you think I’ll let Barry Goldwater
Move in next door and marry my daughter
You must think I’m crazy!
I wouldn’t let him do that for all the farms in Cuba.’

(Bob Dylan, I Shall Be Free No.10)

Liberalism was the ideology of the bourgeoisie. It's the ideology of property and parliament.

radicalgraffiti

if your using firefox and viewing a https web page it hides all none https elements like embedded youtube videos, you can disable this from the padlock on the address bar

thank you, i've long wondered why i can't see some posts on these threads.

timthelion

radicalgraffiti

timthelion

What exactly do you mean "procapitalist"? Is it inherent in the word "liberal" to be capitalist? Like in that you would like to forbid trade? AKA, be antiliberal in your revolution?

liberalism is a pro capitalist position, i'm an anarchist i wish to abolish capitalism and create a communist society, if this happened trade would be impossible, it wouldn't need to be explicitly forbidden because the conditions needed for it wouldn't exist

OK, but there is a difference between non-existant and forbidding. As an example, I don't like the idea of artificially imposed property rights, in which the state mandates the ownership of a song or a piece of land. However, that isn't the same thing as forbidding ownership. For example, in North Korea, they put people in jail for engaging in trade. I wouldn't want that. Indeed, I don't really see any problem with people exchanging vegitables on a street corner.

north korea has markets
http://carnegie.ru/2016/02/03/resurgence-of-market-economy-in-north-korea/ithc

http://www.reuters.com/article/us-northkorea-change-insight-idUSKCN0SN00320151029

timthelion

Personally, I just want massive artificial legal structures like international megacorps to not exist. Right now, those structures are mandated by the state (I cannot go and squat the supermall, the police will kick me out). But even in a non-hierarchical society, a person could defend their own home against intruders. Would you forbid them from doing so?

obviously no one should be criticised for defending them self, but the american idea that its ok to shoot someone to "defend your property" is disgusting. But in a communist society why would someone even want to burgle someone house? or are you afraid they want to live in your basement? no one wants to live in you basement.

timthelion

Having grown up in the US, I know two types of politics: Right wingers and liberals.

hi tim, another yank here. i know what you mean, please remember that most of the posters here are from other countries and don't have this political history. they have had strong leftist/socialist (i.e. statist) political parties in a way that the US hasn't had in a century.

"liberals", as i define it, are concerned with individual liberties within capitalism. a liberal will be very satisfied that a guy with one african parent, or a woman, can be president. that's where it ends. there's no class analysis, or if there is it reaches only so far as claiming that "classism" is a bad thing, we should be respectful of the poor/unskilled laborers as well as anybody else, but the idea that the relations created by capitalist economics should be uprooted is quietly but firmly rejected.

i don't know that communists "hate" liberals but i at least certainly get fed the fuck up with them.

As for my rental property, AKA, my basement,

Wait, you rent out your basement to a bank? And you make a enough money from this meager "moist" space that you don't have to work?

If you were to live in my basement for a number of years, would you, over time, gain a sense of belonging there. Would you feel violated, if, at some point, someone were to break in and start living there, or move your stuff around, or take something, or destroy it?

You mean like if my landlord decided to kick me out or sell the property on or something like that? Yeah, I'd be pretty pissed.

I'm making the world a better place, by assisting the bank in lending money to the poor renters, thus allowing those same poor renters to pull themselves out of the renter forever cycle.

Wow. And you judge others for eating palm oil, do you?

Liberals dont have limitations so as political ideology liberal person is narcissistic everything goes-attitude. Sexual perverts are liberal usually. Writing is fun, now I can analyse their personality when communist are forced to psychiatry, to talk to doctors, about their opinions. Vice versa, some cultural phenomenons are mirror images from others, and can be analysed as mental diseases but it is mean we cant control peoples minds what they talk, different thing what they publish in public, some limits to liberals toooooo

Sexual perverts are liberal usually.

Finally, someone who can think outside of their soapbox; what a blessed relief.

Excusemua
social office force me to take student loan that i can go to doctor ND THEY COVER EXPENCES, I took loan for rent and social office bays bills. Came activist and give advice: loose your credit information, dont pay library loan book back inform it to lost, then social office has to give your rent money to you pay your bills and some get hobby too. Have you live in socialism where criminal is king ? I can give other this kind of go around the law whit social benifits examples, have not used them but can write book about it.

Liberalism was the ideology of the bourgeoisie. It's the ideology of property and parliament.

The freedom that is referred to in the word 'liberal' is the limited sense of, freedom of trade, in contrast to the previous period of class society in which trade was restricted. From our perspective, the trade we are primarily concerned with is trade in our labour power.

The question is more properly termed: why do some communists hate the bourgeois?

And my answer to that question is: we don't; they hate us. The reason they hate us is because they fear us; and the reason they fear us is justifiable because we are going to kill them. However, we are not killing their flesh but their form of existence, and ours—wage labour.

Classic liberalism is that there
- Should be a state protecting the capitalists privilege
- That people should be excluded from controlling the means of production and only a few privileged capitalists should have this privilege.
- That trade should be as free as possible, so that the capitalists can get as rich as possible
- And last that people has certain rights which would prevent the state from being too powerful (like freedom of speech) so the state doesnt interfere with the capitalists way of life.

I dont know if there is more. That would be classic liberalism

Then classic liberalism developed into social liberalism which is influenced by Keynes and
Neo-liberalism which is laissez-faire capitalism was influenced by Margaret Tatcher and Ronald Reagan with his trickle-down economics.

It can be concluded if you are against capitalism you are also against liberalism.
It can be concluded if you are libertarian you are also against liberalism

SRQ

but can write book about it.

That's debateable.
I'm sorry but it's very unclear what you are trying to say.

I think on libcom there is the view that rank and file liberals are unmatured socialistists. whereas the liberal philosophy, here, is tossed away as capitalist worldview, because that's what it is. there are some liberals who have socialist underbellies, and then there are dogmatic liberals who actually justify the market and institutions and law and such.

So, I think there's a lot going on in that post.

The first is that action often precedes consciousness and, as such, we probably shouldn't get so caught up in how people self-identify politically - especially if we're actually looking to organizing with our fellow members of the workers class and not just other self-identified lefties/anarchists/activists/whatever.

The second, I guess, is what you mean by "rank and file". Do you mean politically committed liberals - members of the Democratic Party or whatever? Or do you mean people that hold reformist views of capitalism? Cause if it's the latter, we damn well better hope that those people can come to a class analysis of the world because those sorts of opinions, I would imagine, make up a huge majority of the outlook of the working class at this point history.

naturally, I meant the many people believing in reform. which means, those people who want a better world, but just do not have the same critical edge as communists do, but are possibly receptive to an anti-capitalist movement.

The Pigeon

naturally, I meant the many people believing in reform. which means, those people who want a better world, but just do not have the same critical edge as communists do, but are possibly receptive to an anti-capitalist movement.

There has been people in the past who were critical of capitalism but didnt had a class analysis. What they believed in was class collaboration. Later these same folks became fascists.

SRQ

Writing is fun

it certainly is.
SRQ i went to the site in your profile. it appears to be in finnish (maybe estonian). are you from finland?

without going into psychology: communists - in their development of their ideas/insight/positions - usually start out as liberals.

True that. I certainly was one.

It depends entirely on context. 'Liberal' means something very different, in different places. I will be speaking strictly to the contemporary, American usage. In this context, it refers to the center-left. I can understand this to some degree. Liberals are not radicals. They also often play a significant role in establishing, and reinforcing the boundaries of 'acceptable' thought. However, as Yourmum points out, if the socialist left is to make converts, the most likely candidates are liberals. Also, if we are to build movements, and coalitions, liberals/progressives are primarily the individuals that we would be building those coalitions with. Furthermore, to put it in perspective, conservatives beliefs are significantly more incompatible with, and antithetical to our own, comparatively speaking, therefore if anyone is going to be the target of our ire, besides the ruling class, and the political class, and the functionaries of the state, it should be them.

Incidentally, I've noticed a weird phenomenon among the radical left, which is the total inverse of the opinions I've just articulated. For a certain category, or categories of radicals the degree of contempt actually seems to rise as one moves leftward, ideologically, with the greatest ire reserved for other ostensible radicals who have committed some perceived ideological sin. This type tend to obsess over abstract virtues like 'purity.' I think these people are deeply confused, and totally counterproductive. If one spends all ones' time attacking radicals, why not just become a cop, or something?

I can't agree with all of the last post. As I see it the liberal class are far more prevalent and effective as the sturdy foundation of capitalism. This is what makes them so reprehensible to me.
I've never been a liberal myself although many comrades of mine started on their political path so I definitely agree with that part. But sure, in my long time as an 'anarchist' I have spent most of it as a holder of many views that are dubious to say the least.
Anyways, I was out walking with Mrs Fence the other day and we saw a gang of six skinheads kicking the shit out of a liberal. 'Are t you going to help?' She said. 'No' I replied, 'the skinheads seem to be making a nice job of it without me.'

NGNM85 #44

‘Also, if we are to build movements, and coalitions, liberals/progressives are primarily the individuals that we would be building those coalitions with. ’

If your politics are based on a class analysis of capitalism it may be possible to work with liberals in very limited ways, though to be in a coalition with them will never work out well. As someone is being used as a useful idiot.

As far as working with other ‘radicals’, they come in all guises, to the right and left. This to me is not about maintaining ‘political purity’, rather it is political incompatibility with the politics of Leninists and other authoritarians. Libcom has many examples of how ‘comradely’ these people are in practice.

Good post, Auld.

On a broader point, we're not going to achieve any sort of success by simply uniting politicos - no matter how broadly we're willing to define a shared set of politics.

We're gonna have to move beyond this sort of political organizing and, instead, find effective ways to reach out to those around us who have shared material interests. The politics can come later. If once we're organized, liberal or lefty groups want to offer support, that's fine, but it's in a supporting role, not by building a coalition of political groups with often contradictory goals and means for achieving them.

Chilli Sauce

Good post, Auld.

On a broader point, we're not going to achieve any sort of success by simply uniting politicos - no matter how broadly we're willing to define a shared set of politics.

We're gonna have to move beyond this sort of political organizing and, instead, find effective ways to reach out to those around us who have shared material interests. The politics can come later. If once we're organized, liberal or lefty groups want to offer support, that's fine, but it's in a supporting role, not by building a coalition of political groups with often contradictory goals and means for achieving them.

Stunningly accurate. Well said old chap.