Is there a creeping Leninism on Libcom?

There's always been a fair number of them show up, but the current lot seem to be particularly obnoxious.

Yes, seriously worried about this invasion and they are particularly obnoxious. Some of them are masquerading as anarchists when it's quite clear they are Bolsheviks.

I'm not sure it's an invasion as such.

Though I do think there is an element of 'Entryism' as I have said before.

But, also, the Leninists and their supporters have been here for long years now.

removed: mop

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leninism

But really, this is just as much about kautskyism and by extension, marxism itself.

removed: cbb

Hypothetical: If Marx was alive and asked for a foot rub...

Serge,

You are right, it's an iceberg (if that's not too melodramatic!), it is not just the Leminists who are 'guilty' of this 'slide'.

Did I write: Leminists? Too sour by half!

Leninism is something that can be argued against quite adequately, though only if it's thought worthwhile to tediously repeat the same old conflicts and there are good arguments that there's better ways to spend one's energies. But it's just a fact that there's an area of semi-leninism that thinks bolshevism was right in its time but maybe semi-impractical now and such people seem to have a (sometimes patronising) attraction towards libcom, even if only to play the loyal opposition. But behaviour like Tom Henry's long-winded competitive egotism and petty baiting - while not generally breaching site guidelines etc - is imo a worse long-term influence on the atmosphere and tone of the place. Even though, or especially because, it's dressed up as pro-libertarian communism.

Red Marriott,

I began these discussions with a view to examining communization theory.

Not of my choosing it became an argument with S. Artesian. I have, several times, said to him that it was not him I wanted to discuss with.

Your comment above is ill-informed at best, but I suspect it is disingenuous.

This is not about me or S. artesian, it is about what politics Libcom allows to dominate it.

It is not for me to decide this, all I have done is try to make it an issue.

If what I am saying is dangerous to Libcom then of course I should be excluded.

Is Artesian less dangerous?

You say that "Leninism is something that can be argued against quite adequately", but I have not seen that happening here.

there does seem more than there used to be, although i think a lot of them are not real Leninist, even the ones who might say they are. there are a lot of people who when first becoming interested in communism become fans of the ussr and other "communist countries" and act just like the fans of tv shows, anime, harry potter etc

I've been creeping here for like 5 years.

I must've missed the party

I added that Harmen book a few years ago because it was the only book I had read with a 'socialist' overview of all human history so I thought it was interesting; but I am happy for it to be pulled if it causes offence... I also recently added another Trot book https://libcom.org/library/going-away ... about an old lefty mourning the end of 'the left' in the USA whilst driving around the nation, very well written and I found it really interesting but I don't mind if you guys want it taken down if it's against guidelines ..

vicent

I added that Harmen book a few years ago because it was the only book I had read with a 'socialist' overview of all human history so I thought it was interesting; but I am happy for it to be pulled if it causes offence... I also recently added another Trot book https://libcom.org/library/going-away ... about an old lefty mourning the end of 'the left' in the USA whilst driving around the nation, very well written and I found it really interesting but I don't mind if you guys want it taken down if it's against guidelines ..

Hey vincent, you did something fine and wonderful by posting Going Away. It's one of the finest pieces of working class fiction ever written. I dug up Sigal's e-mail address and in a brief exchange he said Kerouac's On the Road had a great influence on his novel. As I've said on libcom ad nauseum, the book is a fusion of Brecher's Strike! and Kerouac's travel adventures, all written with the backdrop of the Hungarian Revolution in '56.

To my mind, Lenin and Trotsky were counterrevolutionary state-builders. Clancy Sigal wasn't, so please don't start an Inquisition to purge libcom and exterminate the heretics.

And Jesus Fucking Christ! Chris Wright's excellent "Capitalism - further reading guide" lists 5 recommended readings by Chris Harman. Read 'em:

The Lost Revolution: Germany 1918-1923

"Globalization: The Critique of a New Orthodoxy"[/i]

Explaining the Crisis

Class Struggles in Eastern Europe

Bureaucracy and Revolution in Eastern Europe

Are you going to argue for the deletion of Chris Wright's insightful suggestions in the name of ideological purity?

And will you play Cotton Mather and burn Chris Wright at the stake too?

These posts by Tom Henry and el psy congroo are unhealthy at best and unprincipled calls -- made in bad faith -- for censorship at worst.

Which posts? Which 'calls'? I've never asked for censorship. In fact, I've protested being censored myself in the past. See here: https://libcom.org/forums/feedback-content/politically-motivated-censorship-cherrypicking-02052017

Well Tom Henry always post some interesting (if now repetitive) challenges to his assumed bottom line of theoretical agreement amongst the regular participants of the libcom milieu, but then maybe Red Marriott has belatedly identified the 'Nihilist Communist' entryism at play here!. Tom might be persuaded perhaps to branch out and comment on other aspects of how he and we might relate in practice to some of the everyday problems of collective life under capitalism that might benefit us without encouraging the claimed hidden 'Leninism' of libcom style political activity?

Hieronymous,
I never called for any books to be excluded from Libcom, I only expressed surprise that they were here.

Spikeymike,
Are you asking me to submit reports of what I do in my daily life? You first!
Did you see my post here:

https://libcom.org/blog/many-faces-snapshots-distributing-workerswildwest-15072017

Which carries on my old call for people to get involved in working class, supervised jobs as a way of connecting with what is important.

If I am to be accused of Entryism here then surely that's a recognition that this site is indeed dominated by leftism at best, and Leninism at worst?

It's OK, I am sure S. Artesian will be back here before long. Anyway, I wanted him to comment on the questions he set me that I answered. It was never about him, it was about the platform that Libcom perhaps unwittingly provides through its forums.

PS
Spikymike,
I find this a bit odd, but do you want me to go through what I think it is useful for radicals like us to do as members of the working class.
We were in the same organisation a long time ago, did I not get involved and connect politically and in class and industrial struggles?
Was I not often labelled as a workerist by middle class revolutionaries with middle class jobs?
Do you want me to explain what I am doing now at work and in my community in order to somehow prove myself to you? If so then really you should go first since it is a rather extreme request, if that's what it is.

OK Tom fair do's- good to see you engaging with the Angry Workers' comrades. I think what they do is useful up to a point. Don't need you to prove yourself to me but perhaps simply engage a bit more with the sort of problems and issues we all face and which do get mentioned on here from time to time besides the more theoretical, or dare I say 'abstract' ones, which I also share an interest in. Not sure apart from that to what extent, if at all, you still favour or engage in the same approach we partially shared in the distant past (in the UK Subversion group for instance). This thread maybe not best for us two to engage in by way of comparing past and present personal/political histories but then I chose to have a dig at your particular obsession with these latest discussion threads so I suppose I can't complain!

Spikymike

maybe Red Marriott has belatedly identified the 'Nihilist Communist' entryism at play here!.

No, I just think TH has been an arrogant baiting arsehole much of the time since he’s appeared.

But it is indeed ironic that he now complains of entryism and of the presence of an ideology – in this case leninism – on this site. Most of Dupont/letters journal’s presence here has been for years solely to periodically push their ideology of anti-struggle do-nothingism/radical-hobbyism explicitly as a critique of the dominant ethos of this site and the organisational & struggle activities of its users. Yet now they make a big noise about an ideology, leninism, being in contravention of the ethos of this site and of libertarian communism and make a big show of leaping to libcom’s defence. So yeh, looks a bit like a mirror-image opportunist entryism to push their own ideology...

Red Marriott,

Do you have to use words such as 'arsehole'? Using such insulting terminology is just the kind of baiting you claim to abhor.

For the record, and as I have said before:

I think people here should be grateful to the admins for running the forums for them, and also for archiving the texts.

I think that the library is a brilliant resource. I use it all the time.

I think the forums are not so good as a lot of people allow themselves to get all hot under the collar, use words like arsehole, and forget that this is just a discussion forum, not world war three.

I also, since being on here recently, have become really aware that the forums are dominated by very energetic Leninists, who are not effectively opposed here. I am not clear where you stand on this, but I am not asking you to say so, I think the job of cleaning up the forums should be the job of the regular posters, not outsiders like me.

What has been really odd for me, which has obviously passed you by, is that I have been one of a very small number of voices who have been defending Libcom here, and again, defending a libertarian communist line, despite my critiques of it.

Where is everyone else? Why hasn't this thread been overflowing with posts?

Forum activity is going down (almost everywhere) and during summer I'd guess many post less. It does seem that Leninist activity doesn't drop ;) You can easily see that there are only a handful of regular posters. So after your arrival one could argue libcom forums have taken a nihilist communist turn...

Red Marriott

Spikymike

maybe Red Marriott has belatedly identified the 'Nihilist Communist' entryism at play here!.

No, I just think TH has been an arrogant baiting arsehole much of the time since he’s appeared.

But it is indeed ironic that he now complains of entryism and of the presence of an ideology – in this case leninism – on this site. Most of Dupont/letters journal’s presence here has been for years solely to periodically push their ideology of anti-struggle do-nothingism/radical-hobbyism explicitly as a critique of the dominant ethos of this site and the organisational & struggle activities of its users. Yet now they make a big noise about an ideology, leninism, being in contravention of the ethos of this site and of libertarian communism and make a big show of leaping to libcom’s defence. So yeh, looks a bit like a mirror-image opportunist entryism to push their own ideology...

I wholeheartedly agree that Tom Henry is being an asshole (from this side of the pond) with his anti-entryism. Also his boogeyman claims of a Leninist takeover make him a liar as well.

Cooked, Haha! Good point.

But, and I think this has something to do with Spikymikes interpretation of the book, Nihilist Communism, people often think that it was about 'doing nothing' when this was always a provocation - we want people to attack.

Nihilist Communism is a workerist text. It says get a job in an essential industry. It says: resist the delusions and machinations of the middle class (particularly when they call themselves revolutionary) who are trained to supervise.

Hieronymous,
It is good and honest that you have stated where you stand on this. It helps the discussion.
By the way, I am not on the other side of the Atlantic to you.
I guess you have your reasons for your invective, and I guess they are stated here?

TH

Do you have to use words such as 'arsehole'? Using such insulting terminology is just the kind of baiting you claim to abhor.

No, it’s not; you just use ‘polite’ language when trying to wind people up, which makes you a devious arsehole. I very rarely use such language on here – so consider that it was calmly deliberate and that you’ve earned it.

I think people here should be grateful to the admins for running the forums for them, and also for archiving the texts.
I think that the library is a brilliant resource. I use it all the time.

OK, you’ve said this several times in the past few days, I think you’ve tried to ingratiate yourself with the admins enough now. (And it doesn’t always work as a compensation for breaching their posting guidelines.)

I also, since being on here recently, have become really aware that the forums are dominated by very energetic Leninists, who are not effectively opposed here. I am not clear where you stand on this, but I am not asking you to say so, I think the job of cleaning up the forums should be the job of the regular posters, not outsiders like me.

That is a short term a-historical assessment – there have been some recent debates where they’ve been louder, so what? And as I said elsewhere it tends to be more those with sympathies for bolshevism as appropriate in its time than those advocating vanguardism now. I don’t share their Bolshevik sympathies but don't see it as a looming takeover. If there ever was a threatened domination then ultimately the admins would have to decide how to deal with it. 10 years ago when the forums were much busier the ICC were all over here, now they’re rare birds – things come and go. But if you think your baiting behaviour is some heroic ‘saving & cleaning up’ you’re living in a Marvel comics fantasy. Imo your baiting and ‘provocation’ we’ve seen recently adds nothing good to these forums and such behaviour is bad whatever label or flag it flies.

Where is everyone else? Why hasn't this thread been overflowing with posts?

Cos others – including those with no leninist sympathies - aren’t as hysterical as you about the occasional bit of Leninism seen on a public forum? If you want to be a superhero defender of libertarian communism you’d be better off having a go at how it’s been misdefined and misrepresented by, for example, some of the Rojava supporters and anarcho-Corbynites.

Spikymikes interpretation of the book, Nihilist Communism, people often think that it was about 'doing nothing' when this was always a provocation - we want people to attack.

Right – so you’re saying to people something other than what you really mean as a way to try to manipulate their behaviour. Sounds a bit like some of your behaviour on here – and also quite like a patronising leninist ‘transitional demand’.

This thread has now moved from trying to discuss the influence of Leninism here to gripes about me.

I didn't want to contribute to this thread, as I implied previously, but people have made it about me, which is either telling or just odd.

So, if I am causing a distraction, I will withdraw.

It's true that I posted on this thread at the beginning, but that was just to clarify that I, at least, did not think that the Leninism was an 'invasion'. I wasn't intending to go into the nuts and bolts of it, that's for you and others.

But you can carry on now. Although I sense the discussion is already over and decided.

Lenin and Kautsky had a radial democratic strain that isn't worth disregarding.

Spikymike

maybe Red Marriott has belatedly identified the 'Nihilist Communist' entryism at play here!.

Tom Henry

Was I not often labelled as a workerist by middle class revolutionaries with middle class jobs?

I don't think you can get much more 'workerist' than 'Nihlist Communist'.

Devrim

donald parkinson

Lenin and Kautsky had a radial democratic strain that isn't worth disregarding.

What? Explain.

donald parkinson

Lenin and Kautsky had a radial democratic strain that isn't worth disregarding.

If anything is worth disregarding in the history of Marxism it's the vestiges of 'radical democratic' ideology.

Tom Henry

It says get a job in an essential industry.

My advice as a worker in an 'essential industry' is if you have the opportunity to avoid working in one, take it.

Tom Henry

So, if I am causing a distraction, I will withdraw.

You are, so please do.

Thank you.

Lenin was a self-described Kautskyan. Kautsky's political strategy up to WWI was basic continuation of Marx and Engels politics of fighting for a proletarian party united around a program; a set of things which would, if enacted, realize the class dictatorship of the proletariat. Marx and Engels argued, and Kautsky and Lenin defended this; that the class dictatorship of the workers took the form of an undiluted workers republic with any executive function completely subordinated to the directly elected representative bodies of the class. The workers states tasks were outlined as bringing together the means of production in order to plan production and distribution for all; thereby destroying the social basis of value (social production carried out by private producers; socialised through exchange), ending war, crises, hunger, etc.

You can see Lenin argue this line, even against Kautsky's rightward drift, in State and Revolution.

Tom Henry

So, if I am causing a distraction, I will withdraw.

you're only providing a distraction for those employing the heckler's veto.
so don't.

Pennoid

The workers states tasks were outlined as bringing together the means of production in order to plan production and distribution for all; thereby destroying the social basis of value (social production carried out by private producers; socialised through exchange), ending war, crises, hunger, etc.

Hmm...

Serge Forward

Question as it says in the title...

Background - publishing of Chris Harman's book on here (since removed) and other comments perhaps sympathetic Lenin, Trotsky, etc. I could also add the increase in support for national liberation movements (eg Rojava) and pro "Bolivarian revolution" comments.

Has there? I've seen pro Corbyn comments but they're mainly from new registrations or people logging in to slag off articles criticising them. I haven't noticed an increase in support for Venezuela there's always been a smattering of it, was there a thread or comment section that exploded that I just missed?

Rojava commentary on the site seems largely critical with a couple of exceptions (we all know who) and they've been around since 2011. I've noticed soft comments on Lenin, but there's always been a tendency among some LeftCom influenced users to view Lenin as a genuine revolutionary up to a point (and where that point ends depends on the individual) so there's always been an undercurrent of that.

And I honestly don't think I've seen any pro Trotsky comments on here, ever.

A user thought this thread to my attention via private message. Having read it, not really sure what to say. Don't think there is anything which people are requesting the admins to do as such. Is there a creeping Leninism? I don't think so.

I think that with the rise of Corbyn, and Rojava in the real world, those developments have shown a fair number of self-declared "anarchists" to be nothing more than social democrats. This is pretty standard, and it happens in waves dependent on developments in the world in general. As libcom has a cross-section of people using it, and is open for new users to register, this will affect discussion here as well.

In general things here seem to go in waves. At one point we had loads of primitivists, then we had a load of national-liberation-supporting platformists, then we had a bunch of ICC types…

That said, the dominant view on the site I think has remained pretty consistent throughout its history, which I think is actually pretty impressive considering that it is open up to anyone to register.

Some of that bunch remain....

I think Steven poses the question more fruitfully. Which is not so much whether libcom is becoming "leninist", a term which remains to be seriously defined, but whether libcom, as a particular reflection of a wider anarchist movement, is increasingly porous to the influence of "leftism", ie politics that translate the influence of the dominant ideology but wear the garb of revolution.

Also in response to Steven: if there are "waves" of visits from different tendencies, their appearance has to be linked to longer waves outside.

.

I've found that anarchists tend to be latched on to by all kinds of non-anarchist types.

I was, for a while, in a "christian anarchist" facebook Group, it very quickly got over run by free market libertarian types who consider Capitalism to be the upmost freedom. (My litmus test to see if they actually care about freedom is if they think a city privitizing a Public park and selling it to some Rich guys estate increases the freedom in that city, if they do you quickly realize what they actually mean by freedom).

On the other hand, I find very often there are some on the broad left for whome being "left" just means being anti-American, and pro-whoever-is-anti-american. To me that kind of "left" is just boring and silly. I actually don't mind Leninists IF they can defend Leninism without appealing to how terrible America is.

Well Social Democrats from Kautsky to Lenin clearly do have their defenders amongst some regular posters on this site although that is often expressed more critically as 'errors from the past' not to be repeated, rather than any suggestion that we should or could simply replicate their politics today. Such 'defenders' are generally as critical of what passes for modern day Left social democracy as any others here.
For me the strength of this site is it's understanding of 'Communism'' and the scope it provides as a library resource and discussion for the spectrum of political organisations and individuals that relate to that understanding whether influenced by anarchist and/or Marxist traditions.
Most posters (presumably other than TH) on this site consider that political organisation in the form of a party, union, group, federation, network, etc is important in contributing in the right circumstances to both the practical development of class struggle and the evolution of a communist consciousness. If you consider that to be some form of 'Leninism' then indeed we cannot escape it.

I don't think they are easy questions; I think that is the question that history posed, and that *any party* or coalition of parties would have been faced with the same concrete problems I outlined.

It's sort of like Veneuela right now; if the PSUV stepped out of the way and some Trotskyist party jumped in; would anything change? No they'd still be confronted with the international veto power of money over states dependent on the export of key commodities for state funding.

It's from this vantage point that we can judge what the Bolsheviks did and what they failed to do. But I find it hard to condemn them for not doing what they could not have done. I concede that Kronstadt was a grave mistake; indeed it is widely (I think correctly) recognized as a barometer of just how far the Civil War drove the party and the government into being an isolated bureaucracy. But I think it's also clear that this kind of isolated bureaucracy is not what Lenin argued for or envisioned.

I further think this situation doesn't derive from Bolshevik mistakes alone; of course you could say it does in a sense. They were mistaken in their assessment that a Revolution in Russia would set of a chain of successful revolutions in Europe and abroad; while it energized those movements, they almost all failed.

I definitely do *not* buy the standard liberal line (unfortunately repeated by Chomsky) that the Bolsheviks were these masters of realpolitik that hoodwinked everyone into power. That just doesn't stand up to historical scrutiny. But then again, Chomsky desires to focus on contemporary Foreign Policy history, so that's his choice.

That leaves in a position to *study the question* like many other questions; to go outside of anarchist primary and secondary sources, and to generally go outside our comfort zone, albeit with our fundamental principles in mind (in addition to principles of good scholarship).

That means we have to treat the historiography (for better or for worse) and consider what historians have to say on the subject. Follow those debates and evaluate the various arguments.

I think the U.S. Civil War metaphor is also apt because were we present we would have been far to the left of Lincoln, we would have been disappointed with his recalcitrance to abolish slavery, but how would we evaluate the revolutionary violence of the freed african americans and the union army toward the losing Slaveocracy? The answer isn't a simple "rah rah rah" but I like to think we'd have a measured response that seeks to evaluate the conditions under which this violence unfolded, it's consequences in terms of granting power to a formerly oppressed and exploited class etc.

.

el psy congroo

Platonov was a Soviet communist and a bolshevik. Theres a growing trend of western liberalism taking hardcore Stalinist or bolshevik historical artistic figures like Pablo Picasso, F. Kahlo, D. Shostakovich, etc and "rehabilitating" them as free-spirit individualists fighting "the state" (in the Hayek sense) and it is bizarre and even unhealthy/psychotic.

teh

[referring to the book cover image above]

Platonov was a Soviet communist and a bolshevik. Theres a growing trend of western liberalism taking hardcore Stalinist or bolshevik historical artistic figures like Pablo Picasso, F. Kahlo, D. Shostakovich, etc and "rehabilitating" them as free-spirit individualists fighting "the state" (in the Hayek sense) and it is bizarre and even unhealthy/psychotic.

This is a very uninformed and/or silly comment. Platonov cannot be compared to Picasso, Kahlo or Shostakovich.

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2010/feb/18/andrei-platonov-robert-chandler

Spikymike

Most posters (presumably other than TH) on this site consider that political organisation in the form of a party, union, group, federation, network, etc is important in contributing in the right circumstances to both the practical development of class struggle and the evolution of a communist consciousness. If you consider that to be some form of 'Leninism' then indeed we cannot escape it.

This is a good restatement of the question I have been asking.

No doubt these things (i.e., your list - but I would include grass roots organisations, and rank and file groups, and actions at work, things I am more interested in rather than joining a club of the like-minded who are actively involved in little genuine struggle) do indeed contribute to our perspectives on class struggle, and do indeed, if my additions are included, contribute to an escalation or diminishing of genuine class struggle, even though it is rarely the pro-revolutionaries like us who are involved in the forefront of these developments (except, too often, as brakes or diversions). As ever, the class leaves us all behind - even itself, if you see what I mean, from my materialist perspective.

The the first question is: do we believe in this idea of 'the evolution of a communist consciousness'? Just how is it evolving?

And the second question involves Marx. When we use Marx, as we are drawn to again and again (for good reason), do we think think that he ultimately concludes his materialist conception of history with the formulation that history makes us, or that we make history?

If one decides that 'we' make history then we are just liberal idealists. If one decides that there is a bit of both, as Marx seemed to imply, then, ultimately, I would contend (so therefore, this is for thinking about), the materialist conception of history must be thrown out and we become liberal idealists again.

Two texts that might be useful here:

https://libcom.org/library/death-rank-filism

https://libcom.org/library/impotence-of-revolutionary-group-international-council-correspondence-moss

zugzwang wrote, in response to Pennoid:

That said, I don't think pinning all of it on the conditions, rather than on the people in power, is something you can really get away with. I'm not convinced that anyone in power would have responded the same to the conditions the Bolsheviks were confronted with, particularly when concerning the brutal suppression of various uprisings, one of which you yourself admit was a mistake.

Yes, you have exposed the problem in Pennoid's argument here. Which is that, on the one hand she/he is arguing that the actors in the Russian Revolution were forced by circumstance into certain positions, but on the other hand they 'made mistakes'. You are right to point this out as ludicrous.

Pennoid does not know her/his historical materialism enough to avoid these contradictions (does anyone?), but the reason she/he pirouettes around here is because she/he has a political ideology and a group (life?) to defend and justify.

If the debate continues with 'trainspotters' (meaning boring ineffectual nerds of the left), as it is on Red Marriot's excellent topic and comments on Bakunin (https://libcom.org/library/a-critique-of-the-german-social-democratic-program-bakunin) then we end up stuck in mud. But perhaps the only proper theoretical debate to be had here is with the Left and the pro-Bolsheviks, since all these threads seem to devolve down to an exceptionally slim number of the usual participants?

Glad to be of help TH. Don't forget the 'dialectic' in Marx. Of course ''grass roots'', ''rank and file'' groups etc are also 'political' and at least some of those in your political 'clubs' may well also be involved in genuine class struggle (not just confined to the workplace). The political groups (or 'clubs' if you prefer) come and go and certainly over time may become inward looking, dogmatic, and generally divorced from class struggle which only rarely escalates to collectively significant levels, but such groups seem always to arise amongst at least a minority of workers, dissolve, form and reform in an effort to understand what is happening and better inform their activity. Human beings are not automatons determined by the 'laws' of capitalism in some chemical fashion, even if our behaviour is within material conditions not of our collective choosing. It is true that the results of our collective actions are not always what we consciously planned - good or bad - but they still do effect the material evolution of capitalism and change both the circumstances in which class struggle continues and perceptions of a potential communist future. I don't perceive of any long term historical evolution of communist consciousness (such as the ICC's 'subterranean maturation of consciousness') but there can be changes in the level of conscious organised activity over shorter periods of class struggle and the rediscovery of lessons from the past - both positive and negative.
Starting to ramble a bit so maybe others might add to this resurrected discussion? Sure there must be some previous discussion about the 'moss' text.

It's not a contradiction to say some problems we're exogenous to the will of either individuals or the collective bolsheviks party; or that some problems we're exogenous to the will of the entire USSR (for example, the decision of the U.S. to invade Vietnam).

That's a straight forward fact of human existence. I suspect what you intend to dispute is particular instances where some problem is written off as 'a result of material conditions'. I share that skepticism. But I repeat, denying that the destruction of Russia in a civil war and the development of stalinism was a plot by bolsheviks masters of realpolitik is not the same as calling them blameless angels.

I never said they were blameless angels. So I can't really see where you're coming from. It seems to me like you're more interested in idiotic 'camp' posturing than a sober assessment of the facts at hand. Have fun with that and all the irrelevance it holds in store for you.

As others have said, I don’t think there is creeping Leninism on libcom. Sometimes folk cannot see that history can be viewed from more than one perspective. My point of view is that Lenin seized the opportunity to grasp control of power, in the belief that the Bolsheviks were the vanguard of the working class, and in the equally mistaken belief, that the Russian revolution was the first crack in the capitalist world. In the ‘scientific socialist’ frame of reference, Germany was to be the real proletarian breakthrough to world revolution.

Having burst onto the stage of history Lenin and his party had to meet the error of their actions. As Harold McMillan once said, “Events dear boy events”. Some may find this inappropriate, though I feel it is rather like Jeremy Corbyn would find himself, if he ever became prime minister of the UK. Trapped within the state machine and capitalist economics.

I heard the other day that many, if not all, of the important decisions people make in their lives are irrational. That is to say they are based on emotion. I tried to remember how my politics emerged. Partly it was a rejection of my father’s Stalinism, though mostly I think it was the intoxicating atmosphere at the meetings dominated by the anarchists in my teens. It made me seek out and discover the ideas and history. I imagined walking with Orwell through the streets of Barcelona. Some communist friends read John Reed’s, ‘Ten Days That Shook The World’. I did, but by then I’d also read about the rebellion in Kronstadt 1921.

It makes me wonder how many apologists for Leninism are still emotionally attached to the storming of the Winter Palace, just as many anarchists are still wed to the idea that if only this or that had been different the Spanish anarchists could have somehow stopped and smashed the fascist panzers. I believe the past contains lessons though to see them, implies taking off the rose tinted glasses.

.

Couldn't it be that, broadly speaking, "libertarian communism/anarchism" IS the new Leninism?