violence

ok, I see the argument

cruelty

who the fuck is arguing that cruelty is necessary?

Yes, revolution is certainly necessary, but if you live in the imperial core you can at your option take comfort for now that it probably will not come to where you are for quite some time. In that time countless acts of structural and actual violence are visited upon the working class all over the world by the bourgeoisie. I hope at the very least that when a revolution does occur or has occurred in your own country or elsewhere you will investigate before you speak and not rush to condemn it simply because it happens to be violent, as all successful revolutions will be to some extent. It is also almost certain that the scale of violence required for such a revolution is less by orders of magnitude than the scale of violence required to maintain and extend the capitalist world system.

Marxists would love a non-violent way to achieve lasting positive social change. Unfortunately every time they try it results in fascists taking over, killing them (and hundreds of thousands of Marxist adjacent people) and rolling back any positive changes made. Scary 'authoritarian' communism has a rationale which its supporters have came to after hard lessons.

There are obviously ways to organise your community and achieve positive changes there, but the system we exist in is rigged and such action can only go so far.

Ignore people if their only motivation is violence on their class enemy. They are terminally online or children or both.

The people murdered by imperialism and poverty don't get to choose whether they like violence or not

Do you view socialism/communist society as a reward for people like heaven is to Christians? 'cause it's not. It's a social necessity. You don't need to martyr yourself and no one in the actual-marxist movement is asking you to. Advancing the social dialectic is something that happens whether you want it to or not, so you might as well be pushing it in the better direction since there's no other option.

There Is No Alternative To Marxism.

Why do you feel anxious about the purported necessity of violence?

I highly recommend you to check out the first half of Pedro Ross's book "How the worker parliaments saved the Cuban revolution". It's a very passionate retelling of the community organizing to help each other and confront the odds during a very dark and difficult time (the Periodo Especial, after the illegal and antidemocratic dissolution of the USSR).

I also recommend you to listen to The Stalin Eras series by ProlesPod, they have an episode where they detail recountings about food commissars during war-induced famine literally starving to death while being in charge of the food, because they understood that feeding the peasants who'd bring in next year's harvest was more important than feeding themselves.

However: It's also very relevant that there's (rightfully) a propagandistic effort by communists such as myself not to outright promote violence for violence's sake, but to showcase that peaceful idealism is definitely abused by the ruling classes and injected into leftism. I hate violence, but I hate even more that we live in an eternal spiral of it, and that the movements that tried to distance themselves from taking arms (see Allende) ended up crushed and on the receiving end of much worse violence.

Socialist history is chuck full of acts of selfless love. Hexbear is a bit irony-poisoned and that works differently on different people, I personally enjoy it, it fosters a very direct and confrontational atmosphere where ruthless criticism is often welcome (I agree we may be too much sometimes)

I'm never going to be able to participate actively in a violent revolution. I could protect my family and loved ones with violence if necessary but I'm just not that person. Fortunately, there are people who can.

If you want to be able to help your comrades if and when the time should come, there is plenty need for non-combatants. If you live in a rural area, lean to farm. If you live in a city, learn first-aid!

I think the majority opinion on the site has long been the idealist position that sadism toward reactionaries is cool and good, which is simply backwards, but that needs to be separated conceptually for the inarguable necessity for violence to establish socialism because the masters of society, the owning class, will on the whole not simply surrender their power. If socialism could be established peacefully, that would be better, but either way torture, punitive execution (rather than the wartime necessity of killing actual threats to the revolution) and so on do not advance socialism.

Are you doing organizing work irl? Your descriptions sound like lots of interactions with terminally online people.

At the risk of seeming ridiculous, let me say that the true revolutionary is guided by a great feeling of love. It is impossible to think of a genuine revolutionary lacking this quality.

-- Che Guevara

I mean, the necessity for violence is a purely structural issue that will have different qualities in different contexts. Its really important to have a concrete basis for revolutionary change, and my ignorance will lead to some speculation and back of the napkin googling. So please have some patience and take this as examples not as concrete basis for action.

Like, in the Netherlands, you live in a social democracy, 16% trade union membership. Based on the level of organization of the workers and relative social safety of your working class, the particular quality of resistance will more likely take the form of strikes,worker organization and demands than "Molotovs". You were turned into a leftist by your own experiences, you are a reflection of your environment. Revolution isn't a bloody coup but a transformation of social relations of production.

On the other hand, the Netherlands is the beneficiary of economic partnerships with South Africa which defeated legitimate apartheid but still bears the hallmarks of severe racial exploitation. As long as your social democracy exists as a function of neo colonial exploitation, as social democracies most often do, socialist transformation of your country is impossible. Likely, violent militant and nonviolent political resistance will be necessary in South Africa, and as closely combined as the two economies are, the working class of the Netherlands will have to function as part of the global working class, in solidarity with workers who are most heavily exploited, in order to achieve that transformation.

This is a question of worker consciousness, which is 1:1 with the question of vanguard/worker leadership. When discussing consciousness, we have to think about it as a structural phenomenon rather than a set of personal opinions, as it is often framed.

I catch shit from more politically and militant minded comrades all the time, because my approach is largely pedagogical. I think that self-development, which is itself a form of revolutionary change, can be uncomfortable. It often does not mean finding a group that tells you that all your opinions are valid, it does not mean being part of a collective that you never criticize and who never criticizes you. What gives us optimism and the feeling of accomplishment is engaging directly in the work of class struggle. If you're engaging mostly with memes and takes, then you're probably prioritizing the wrong groups. In my own practical work, most of my heavy book and theory study gets consumed by reading dozens of long political position, tactics and strategy papers per month, and long form responding to them, discussing, and disseminating the highlights. I still like memes and takes for entertainment value, but I also know a lot of comrades who kinda hate that shit and discourage it over practical discussion and engagement.

So from my perspective, I think many of your attitudes bear the hallmarks of leftism and practical mindedness. You might have to mix up your routine somewhat and take on some more IRL organizing work to feel a sense of connection to the struggle, and doing so might be just what you need to feel more connected to revolutionary transformation of society.

anything short of revolution is not just not good enough, but worse than doing nothing.

This bothers me often on this site. The gleeful sneering at anyone attempting to enact any immediate and material positive change in the imperial core and beyond. So fucking happy with their own cleverness for noticing every contradiction or compromise. Anything short of an army large enough to topple the richest countries in the world organizing itself in an empty field like a flash mob, with no cultural change preceding the formation of this grand army because that would be an incrementalism, is a pathetic waste of time and anyone with any hope of a slightly better world for the marginalized within the core is an imbecile to be mocked.

I was talking with someone on here this week about how the Nicaraguan revolution very explicitly tried to limit violence and executions, and mandated a max prison sentence (for any crime) of 30 years. And they based this on their Christian faith, and what they believed to be the most faithful interpretation of this.

Contrast this to online left spaces, and principally western online spaces, which have a lot of people whose politics looks like posting (self-crit to myself here too). The impotency of the western left, combined with the counter-insurgent nature of the Internet in general, I think breeds extreme opinions, even if they’re “in jest”. I definitely feel those ways myself sometimes, but I think the only real solution is engaging with people physically, directly, and in common cause. The internet is corrosive and is designed to be, and I think we have to develop habits and discipline to combat this in ourselves. Which ultimately necessitates logging off.

Adding to the "is this people online?" crowd.

I lean leftwards because I want more people to get the help, dignity and peace they need and deserve. Now I feel a wave of being told to "harden my heart" and I feel scared and isolated.

Harden your heart against whom? Who is telling you this?

I don't have it in me to become a martyr and estrange myself from most people any further,

I'm taking "martyr" here in a figurative sense, but no you don't have to isolate yourself from people to be effective. I would argue it's counter productive, unless you are working on something that requires secrecy.

I get nervous with the leftism I see so often expressed as wanting the bad people suffer,

I don't think wanting people to suffer is "leftism". It can certainly be people on the left expressing anger and hurt.

and that anything short of revolution is not just not good enough, but worse than doing nothing.

I think this is short signted. What is revolution anyways? One violent clash and the world is fixed? No, it's going to take a lot of different people doing a lot of different things. Isn't mutual aid a revolutionary act?

And then I have constant guilt that I'm judging people more discriminated than me for how they express things; that my fears aren't valid and expressions of privilege.

Is this online? It's not about you. Let people be angry. They have reason to be angry. If you take it personally, maybe ask (yourself) why? Are you harbouring guilt for participating in something harmful? Can you stop doing it? Can you turn this into something positive, maybe amplify the voices of the less privileged without adding in your own voice, so that others can hear and learn?

If it's not online my response is mostly the same unless it's someone you have a relationship speaking to you directly. In that case, maybe try and understand why they are telling you these things. Are they asking you to change? Are you a trusted person they are venting to? Etc.

By now I'm feeling emotional burnout, I get annoyed by any respone that isn't in-depth analysis because it just feels like watching the same responses happening over and over and never going anywhere.

It's okay to take a break, comrade.

I get nervous with the leftism I see so often expressed as wanting the bad people suffer, and that anything short of revolution is not just not good enough, but worse than doing nothing.

This is, in my opinion the problem with online leftism. I don't think people should suffer. Bloodshed will have to happen, but I think wanting someone to suffer rather than rehabilitated or just dead is a brainworm that must be excised. Likewise, while revolution must happen at some point, how it happens is going to be different in every country. Communism is a science, and the material conditions matter. I understand people's disappointment with the DSA politicians in America, but I think in the imperial core it is a good sign that they are popular. It shows that the people want progress. And when people fail to deliver in promises because they folded to capitalism, leftists can still capitalize on that disappointment. Leftists groups will certainly continue to be crushed by the state, but the more minds are changed, the power can be taken away from it.

hypothetically, a lot of people are needed to provide emotional, medical, food, legal support, at no point in any revolution more than 10-20% of people were engaged in fighting as in movie fighting, with guns and stuff taking positions. in protests some people provide masks or food or first help. nor is there physical resistance in the usa, if you are there, so thats pondering the orb.

and successful violent revolution won’t be military anyways, it will be waves of stochastic incidents

focus on decreasing profit rates, the porkies will provide the rest