The inquiry below was never responded to - to my knowledge, by the author advancing what seems to be a very individualized understanding of Marx concept of the dictatorship of the proletariat and the revolutionary process as it is unfolding in real time America. The strength of communist is in our collectivity. If we do not make allowances for each other to be wrong and adopt an approach of castigating one another, collectivity becomes harder to achieve. In my opinion a list such as this can help collectivize and harmonize who we understand the writings of Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin, as well as other relevant leaders in the history of the communist movement. I do agree that it is useless and counterproductive to call each other deviants even if a comrade happen to be wrong on an issue. One must decide if the purpose of dialogue is to cure a "sickness" or kill the patient. Labeling comrades is not a theoretically convincing argument. Waistline
In a message dated 12/23/2010 1:41:37 A.M. Eastern Standard Time, _jayp...@gmail.com_ (mailto:jayp...@gmail.com) writes: Dear Mark Scott, Please let us not start distributing certificates to each other regarding our understanding of Marxism; that is just a pointless exercise. You say you have not compared Stalin with Trotsky. That is why I requested you to re-read what you had written. I merely tried to interpret what conclusions would have been drawn by any unbiased observer from that response of yours. Elsewhere, you have actually said as follows: "If he [Melvin] really did have a real indignation why has he never criticized Stalin or the Bolsheviks regarding the assassination of Trotsky? Was not Trotsky a traitor to the working-class and the dictatorship of the proletariat?" By your unthinking utterances are you not trying to implicate Stalin in the assassination of Trotsky (which is exactly what Stalin's worst enemies have been trying to do for the last several decades)? Such unwarranted insinuations are the result of your repeated attempts at giving centrality to the issue of "armed violence" without understanding the need for the communists to win hearts and minds of the working people - the working class and the peasantry - for the success of the revolution. It is the bourgeoisie and the landlords, who are primarily dependent on "armed violence" to sustain their domination. Of course, the working class will have to neutralize the existing "State power" and create its own "State power" to thwart all attempts at counter-revolution. However, for a working class party the ultimate source of power is the mass support of the working people. Without such mass support its hold over "State power" can vanish any day as happened in the Soviet Union when the latent counter-revolutionaries manged to establish control over "State power" with hardly a murmur of protest from the working class in the then Soviet Union. The concept of "dictatorship of the proletariat" should not be crudely equated with some kind of brutal military dictatorship. It is essentially a concept to explain the phase of "State power" during the long transition from the stage of socialism to the stage of communism. One cannot understand the concept of "dictatorship of the proletariat" without understanding the role of the "soviets". You have clearly evaded all my queries regarding the role of the "soviets". Am I "twisting" and "distorting" facts of history or are you closing your eyes to the facts of history? One can carry on an informed debate only if one attempts to get the basic facts right; uninformed debates just end up in throwing abuses at each other. I have no interest in mud-slinging. Jayaprakash _______________________________________________ Marxist-Leninist-List mailing list Marxist-Leninist-List@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxist-leninist-list
