Hi! Long time lurker, first time poster. Been discussing stuff with MLs of all stripes recently, and have come across a common statement used by a lot of Maoists which frustrates me.
They seem to always fall back on statements like "The CPC allows billionaires in their ranks, so they are revisionist."
Maoists have often used this as a kind of "gotcha" argument against more traditional MLs, or "Dengists" as they love to label us.
It's frustrating, because...I don't disagree really, allowing members of the bourgeoisie to hold political power is pretty much the definition of revisionism. The problem is, this feels more like a way to silence dissent or discussion rather than facilitate it. Feels like an overly simplistic hard line that simplifies history into binary divisions. Often followed by an implied "China is revisionist, therefore Maoism is the only working form of socialism."
I'm reaching out to people to see if anyone has any ways to combat this, in a way that encourages discussion rather than it just devolving into insults or truisms hurled back and forth without thought.
The wierd thing with this argument is that there isn't even a clear contradiction with the very basis of Mao's action and theory. Just look at the flag of the PRC : it is a reference to a speech where Mao defines the four classes of Chinese society that converges towards the Party (hence the four stars pointing at one big star). Those four classes are, obviously the proletariat and peasantry, but also the urban bourgeoisie and the national bourgeoisie. Note that there is no ambiguity on what bourgeoisie means here, since there is two dedicated stars to include both the intellectual and cultural elite but also the national-level property owners.
If the national bourgeoisie is represented on the flag of the PRC as a class that is united with the others around the Party then why would they be barred from entering the party like every citizen who's able to pass the test.
Mao was never about pressing the Communism button and destroying the national bourgeoisie, he was about building the ship that will eventually lead the people to Communism after a long trip where the national bourgeoisie has a role to play.