cross-posted from: https://lemmygrad.ml/post/297928
As you have all noticed, this seems to be a point of contention here. This is a good thing, since it means someone will learn something.
Now we seem to be all over the place, with this general area of thought, provoking many questions. Whether or not PatSocs are socially conservative, what is position on social conservatism? Many of us are very young, both in age and ML experience, so an online discussion would be a great learning tool.
- Are socially conservative individuals allowed to be apart of the leftist movement?
- A. Are socially conservative individuals victims of bourgeois propaganda? -B. If socially conservative people are turned away by the left, where do they go? -C. How high of a position would a social conservative be allowed in a ML party? -D. How has or will MLs educate socially conservative folk? -E. &tc, &tc.
What exactly is Patriotism? -A. Does patriotism depend on culture? -B Is possible for a distinction between patriotism for a country and wanting to abolish the state? -C. Is patriotism corrupted in the Core? -D How have post imperialist countries with Communist experiments built patriotism? -E. &Tc &TC
Who even are the PatSocs? -A. If the label is too convuluted, should we make a distinction between Maupin and American exceptionalists? -B. Who of the leaders do we consider MLs? -C. Should patriotic socialist be distinct from socialism or is inherent in socialism? -D. How much do WE even know if PatSocs? -E. &Tc, &tc
We can look at the USSR and GDR for these questions. Remember the Hammer and Sickel came from somewhere.
Things to look out for about the US: -It is the imperialist power, AND a settler state. -Low levels of cultural development -The culture that is there is taken from marginalized groups. -Americas are the most propagandized people in the World. -It is huge and incredibly diverse
More questions about the US could follow: -Should the US be balkanized? If so how does patriotism be built in balkanized regions? -How does land back go about? Will indigenous countries emerge, and if so should we reconsider American MLs as different MLs for the Regions in North America. -If see different nations and regions in North America how does that affect culture? Is the question of how we view the land a prerequisite to discussing patriotism, is it contradictory to call yourself an American Patriot if you decide to divide up the land until regions?
There is so much potential for deep political for North American based Comrades, this is a rabbit hole I do want to delve into. I'll cross post this to GZD but I want it mainly on Leftist Infighting.
https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1892/letters/92_01_06.htm
Ah yes. Marx was right, you know. What he did not seen, because he couldn't, although he predicted it somewhat, was imperialism. As usual, the difference is quantitative, not qualitative. What Sakai suggest is basically "end of a history" for the part of class struggle, an undialectic nonsense.
What are you even talking about? Sakai has anti-imperial aims like every other communist and sprinkles Lenin quotes throughout his work. It is not un-marxist to believe that the United States cannot be rehabilitated. Lenin was right about the class contradictions in the US but he was objectively wrong in his optimism of the American working class given that western socialism failed where socialism in the global south didn't.
https://www.marxists.org/archive//lenin/works/1912/dec/07.htm
https://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1916/oct/x01.htm
Compare with Sakai, who sounds almost exactly like Lenin but with a little Gramscian twist to account for the failures of 20th century western socialism:
I can also quote mine Lenin to "prove" various things. Like Martov did for example, or Trotsky.
I just can't see where is this sakaism leading. To Black Hammer? To race war either instead or combined with class war? Nor i nor any other ML negates the importance of issue of race in USA, but Sakai just writes off majority of population of US. Also again, Sakai wrote his book in 1983. Even if it was 100% true back then, conditions changed dramatically in 1991, though it did added to his narration, so growing popularity of his book in 2010 up till now is understandable given the decades of the "end of history" but now the situation is changing.
Overall, we will see. I just hope that no one hopes for sudden change in US. It will come but as the dead center of imperialism, it will come last. Or maybe not last, who know. I don't and book from 1983 certainly not either. Even Lenin was sometimes terribly wrong about major things less distant in time, like he predicted revolutionary victory in Europe in 1918+.
Tbh, I think the crux of his analysis, which mirrors mine, is that the US can be fixed BUT it will require a lot of white people to get their heads out of their asses and stop acting like self-centered labor aristocrats. In the absence of some kind of mass epiphany of racial solidarity, the US is going to be plunged into straight fascism before things get better. We're watching it happen right now.
I agree with this too, just i didn't understood Sakai's book like that.
Also to add, i havent read Sakais book, but i do know that the group that really popularized it, MIM (Maoist Internationalist Movement) were an extremely secretive Gang of 4 maoist third worldist group. They believed that USSR and Deng Xiaopings China were social imperialist, capitalist and revisionist, that the Cultural Revolution and the Gang of 4 were great, and that white americans are all exploiters and will never be proletarian (which is unmarxist bs as you already said). This group was very secretive and dissolved in 2008. There are a lot of conspiracy theories about them and J Sakai.
Sakai have some good points, especially for the time when he wrote this book, but somehow sakaists never noticed it's 2022 and end of history has ended and the situation is changing.
Also i am really bewildered how anyone who even heard about dialectical materialism can took the Sakai conclusion for granted.