Comradeship // Freechat

As much as I agree with you, I would be careful with saying "I will never stop being a communist" and "they just weren't socialist enough". When I left a religious cult there came very similar arguments from people who are still in it now. They "will be Christian forever" and anyone who leaves the church "just didn't believe enough"

Note that I do in fact agree with you here, it seems strange to change your analysis of the world and believe that all opinions are equal and valuable. They aren't. But we also need to be aware of ourselves and our susceptibility to propaganda from the other side too. We are not immune and it's important to show caution.

i mean, socialists usually are too good and ex-socialists were too agreeable to the capitalist lies in some aspects for their own good, that's why the movement is infiltrated by reactionaries

The thing you described is the beauty and cruelty of the ideology. Ideology is not about a fixed body of thought, like the liberals like to explain, but ideology is always evolving, adapting and changing. Ideology is necessary for the maintenance of a given society, and it's a set of beliefs we collectively develop to justify and explain the things we see.

So the liberal ideology says we live in a democracy, with free speech, with different opinions to be respected, with the ability of the people to choose their representatives, with separation of powers, where people are able to ascend socially based on merit and skill. So if society is so good, why do we want to change it with a violent revolutionary process?

However, the reality shows a ton of cracks in this ideology. As we are seeing with the recent persecution Charlie Kirk event and Palestine genocide, free speech is conveniently ignored when it touches a nerve. The free press and social media are owned by big corporations, hedge funds or banks, making the media a big marketplace where narratives circulate based on interests of capital. Democracy, which means government of the people, don't actually confers any power to the people. Representatives have no accountability, they can promise all sweet things when campaigning, but do the opposite after elections. Separation of powers is a big lie, oligarchs, legislators, top brass officials and judges go to the same social spaces, exchange favors and close agreements without any oversight of the people. Law finds all kinds of obstacles to be enforced when the powerful are involved, but has a lot of leeway to shut inconvenient protestors.

So, why do we sustain the ideology, when knowing that most of it is a big lie? Because not following it has material consequences. Our jobs can be taken away. Our personal property can be taken away. Our freedom can be taken away. Our family can be taken away. So we prefer to believe in the lie rather than facing the consequences of going against it. We prefer fiction to not suffer from reality. We prefer many times to blame the powerless for the failure of the system, so we cowardly take comfort in our little power syndrome to crush the people below us.

The only way to crush ideology is by building power outside of the superstructure. Only when we have power to materially crush capital, we will have power to crush ideology.

Respectfully...

In the case that you describe with your father, and in the case of many compatible-left folks who fizzle out in the imperial core, the truth is so simple it's kind of pedestrian.

Many are pushed left due to having a basic capacity to see and hear the world around them. The injustice and oppression of the system are extremely patent, and when they're young and haven't been exposed to as much propaganda simply by virtue of not being around it long enough, they gravitate towards whatever flavor of "left" is seen as acceptable.

Then, some time goes by. They don't know a lot, but they see what they see. The left failing to gain headway. The discourse being what it is. The propaganda framing everything for them in a way that makes superficial sense. And they drift.

Parliamentary politics are especially attractive to those who have the "politics as a lifestyle" approach, because "all ideas can be heard". Plus, their material interests are more likely to align with the system, the more wealth they have.

Very simply put: it seems to me that your father was unprincipled. Don't get me wrong. He sounds like a genuine, good person. But it really seems that his understanding of the positions he claims to hold were, and are, paper thin. And thus, so is his commitment.

Based on what you're saying, he never learned enough to truly understand the position he claimed to hold. He was an anarchist because he saw the injustice of the system, and the cool kids who had something to say on the topic called themselves anarchists. He didn't learn enough to either move beyond that, or to really entrench himself. He "joined anarchism" based on vibes, and when the vibes changed, he followed them where the machine guided him.

Among a ton of other reasons, this is why we bang on about reading theory so much. For all that our hearts burn with the injustice and cruelty of it all, for all that we are committed to the cause of the working class... If we don't understand what's going on, if we don't keep learning until we have a real grasp on how the system does what it does and why it is what it is, at some point we'll be led astray.

personally the reasons i've seen far more often for people shifting away from communism/socialism etc. are:

• their material conditions improved, de-radicalizing them
• they became disillusioned with the failures of local orgs/parties

Liberalism is the one that forced its "ideology" on Vietnam, Korea, Indonisia and Lybia and so many other nations. The "liberal" capitalists are the ones who forced money into parliamentary politics.

Sounds like your dad and your teacher were "anarkiddies" who never read any political theory. If you read like just the smallest amount of theory you realize that socailism isn't about forcing your ideas on everyone else it is about fighting back against the dictatorship of capitalism.

The only reason to stop being a socialist is because you never were or because you don't give a fuck about anyone else and just want what is in your own personal interest.

It’s not that they didn’t have faith. They simply didn’t read or understand Marx, most of the time.

I think there's many paths for this to happen, nearly all of them mentioned here in the thread. But I'll add one I haven't seen mentioned here, but definitely in real life. They haven't really stopped believing in something like a peoples ownership of the means of production, but they figure going from current system to that system is gonna be disruptive for a while and they have things they care about / take care of.

Not in the material sense of what if I lose my third truck but more in the sense of throwing a molotov at the cops probably sounds a lot more enticing as a 20 year old than as 35 year old with kids to take care of.

That’s another reason I am very skeptical of “Western Leftists”, by which I mean dem-socs and anarchists. They are often the “Ben Shapiros” of the Left, just arguing for entertainment, and this makes them quick to abandon as they get older and less interested in drama. I think this camp is excessively idealistic as well, I’ve heard claims like:

“Socialism is just workers voting in the work place”

or that “you can vote away the capitalism”

or that “USSR wasn’t real socialism,”

or “Successful socialism is Scandinavia and Universal Healthcare.”

Whenever I hear these claims I instinctively get suspicious of the person. I feel like these are the people that are eventually saying “you’ll be left in your younger years and move right as you age,” because they didn’t read any theory and just hopped on a bandwagon to be contrarian, it could have easily been ben shapiro politics too.

I don't think its about a strength of belief. I think their material conditions were comfortable, and they realized that in order to actually do a revolution it would require dismantling the systems that currently provide them with comfort, and so they didn't want to do that.

You can categorize this under, "Sure socialism would be nice, but I'm not willing to do anything to actually make it a reality."

This is simply a result of people not wanting to rock the boat, and taking the path of least resistance. Were their material conditions more dire I am sure they would have been a lot less reluctant to take action.

I can't speak on that reasoning in particular, but I think there's another, possibly bigger reason. They don't think dialectically.

There's a good video (here:https://youtu.be/LONtgVNaa7A ) that talks about the trial of the Chicago 7, the Aaron Sorkin movie, and the hippies. You'll notice how the hippy member fo the Chicago 7 who didn't die (edit: oops, mixed them up. It was Jerry Rubin, the one who did die) in a car accident, ended up becoming a yuppy. Why was this? He supported Castro, was radical, etc. But the key thing is that he didn't think dialectically. He didn't see any change from him becoming radical, so he de-radicalized and became an investment banker.

I think that's the main reason for a lot of former socialists (who were actually socialists. Some say they were "a full blown lefty" because they liked Obama a bit). They still look at the world through a liberal lense even when trying to achieve a socialist goal

i think that a lot of former socialists were socialists because of peer pressure. (at least in europe) in university there are a lot of socialist clubs, reading groups etc., and some people hang out in them because they are lonely, not because they believe in the cause or something.

Similarly, I've heard the whole

You'll grow out of it.

and

I was also a socialist when I was your age.

Basically treated like a phase.

Edit:

But I'm trying to read and understand more beyond just the podcasts and YouTube videos by The Deprogram or Diego Ruzzarin

When I see certain communist personalities in history who later become staunch anti-communists, I am led to believe that it comes down to poor theoretical formation or, as you and star have both mentioned, there was no interest or "belief" in Marxist theory in the first place. Or else, why would many Eastern Europeans who actually lived under AES and received formal education and a rigorous formation in Marxism, would overnight just go completely against it?

Some people have ideology tied to their emotions, which we all do to different extents and which can be useful when it comes to praxis and mobilising large masses of people. But emotions are not fixed and can fluctuate, which is why it is important to contain them within a theoretical framework. This is why I have been striving to read and study theory extensively; because, like you, I can't and don't want to see myself as anything other than a communist in the future.

Well, I’m just a lurker here, and an ignorant one at that, and I don’t have a strong political label for myself. It depends on what context we’re talking about. I do know that I move further left the older I get (I was told the opposite would happen, but here we are).

I can’t speak for others, but for me, I have a strong distaste for conflict and for getting myself involved in other people’s business. I don’t actually want to be politically involved at all.

Really, what I want from politics is the right and privilege to be left alone, and I want that right and privilege for all others as well. That’s my utopia.

Sadly, the world is full of people who want to exploit others, coerce others, and extract wealth from others by any means necessary (not to mention dump filth into our air and rivers without restraint). And there are also control freaks with weird religious agenda and so on who want to exert control over other people’s private lifestyle decisions.

My politics isn’t about making people do something. It’s about making people stop doing something, basically.

I don’t know if I’m a socialist or not. My desire to curtail corporate power, and state power, comes from the desire to curtail exploitation and control-freakery, period.

What don’t want to do is to replace a Fascist dictator (who wants me at a factory stamping widgets for private profit) with a Communist dictator (who wants me stamping widgets for the state or whatever).

So, I don’t know. I have learned a lot from you guys though. Thanks for letting me lurk.