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Old 28th February 2009, 11:59 AM   #1
h.g.Whiz
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Karl Marx vs Marxist

I don't understand the connection between the two. Will someone please elighten joe public.
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Old 28th February 2009, 01:03 PM   #2
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Karl Marx became legendary because of the way he led the organized workers in London, and by extension in western Europe. With his piercing intellect, he chased off many impractical and whimsical theories. During all this time, he let everyone know that he was writing on his great masterpiece. It's just that it took him decades. Meanwhile, the organization he led didn't really amount to anything. But certain principles for how to organize workers remained, and came to life again in several countries, with obvious influences both on Social Democrat and Marxist-Leninist movements. It was not so much the political principles perhaps, as a certain practical sense of how to get things done.

When Marx' great 'masterpiece' was finally published, it didn't perhaps contain so much wisdom as had generally been anticipated. He certainly scored a point here and there. But, like most writers of his time, he also promulgated many theories which were more bold than correct. The problem now was that due to his legendary status, there were a lot of people who took everything in that book as almost religious truth. These became the 'Marxists'. Marx himself derided some of these as well, in the same style with which he had always fought those he considered foolish or wrong.

Personally, I believe that one major problem with Marxism was due to a misunderstanding. Marx' argued that politics should be approached scientifically. He spent countless hours studying various statistics and modified his theories accordingly. Unfortunately, many of his followers understood this to mean that Marx' specific theories where 'scientific' and that this meant that they were proven to be true and thus infallible. Although Marx could certainly appear very sure of himself, it is pretty clear that this is not what he meant with his political theories being 'scientific'.

One common criticism against Marx is that he was not a democrat, which is true. There's also no doubt that he was arguing the complete overthrowing of the European monarchies. In Marx defense though, it must be said that there were not a lot of democrats at his time, certainly not in Europe. He may have failed to be a visionary in that area, but he can hardly be blamed for the many Marxists who continued to oppose democracy long after it had been proven to work. In fact, the great historical split among Marxists - that between Social Democrats and Marxist-Leninists - was over this very issue.
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Old 28th February 2009, 01:48 PM   #3
Gregoire
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Originally Posted by Merko View Post
Karl Marx became legendary because of the way he led the organized workers in London, and by extension in western Europe. With his piercing intellect, he chased off many impractical and whimsical theories. During all this time, he let everyone know that he was writing on his great masterpiece. It's just that it took him decades. Meanwhile, the organization he led didn't really amount to anything. But certain principles for how to organize workers remained, and came to life again in several countries, with obvious influences both on Social Democrat and Marxist-Leninist movements. It was not so much the political principles perhaps, as a certain practical sense of how to get things done.

When Marx' great 'masterpiece' was finally published, it didn't perhaps contain so much wisdom as had generally been anticipated. He certainly scored a point here and there. But, like most writers of his time, he also promulgated many theories which were more bold than correct. The problem now was that due to his legendary status, there were a lot of people who took everything in that book as almost religious truth. These became the 'Marxists'. Marx himself derided some of these as well, in the same style with which he had always fought those he considered foolish or wrong.

Personally, I believe that one major problem with Marxism was due to a misunderstanding. Marx' argued that politics should be approached scientifically. He spent countless hours studying various statistics and modified his theories accordingly. Unfortunately, many of his followers understood this to mean that Marx' specific theories where 'scientific' and that this meant that they were proven to be true and thus infallible. Although Marx could certainly appear very sure of himself, it is pretty clear that this is not what he meant with his political theories being 'scientific'.......

After I left Christianity, I visited many radical groups, among these Marxist Leninists. This was not out of a desire to join, but out of a desire to understand (and also to hear and experience different opinions from my own.)

I agree with what you have written. Marxism-Leninism, although very successful for a long time, was really just a good example of an atheist religion which had abandoned critical thinking. Science and history have clearly contradicted many of its tenets, but its adherents never seemed to care.

I should point out when Bertrand Russell, a great rationalist, met personally with Lenin after the Russian revolution, he came to similar conclusions about Marxism-Leninism. He could see immediately critical thinking and reason were being abandoned with an almost religious zeal. This was in stark contrast to the other British socialists with him who really thought a socialist paradise was being created.

For this reason, I object to the commonly discussed dichotomy between religion and atheism when people argue which side has the hightest body count. Stalin's name always comes up here. To me the issue is not belief or non belief in a deity; the issue is what sort of critical thinking skills did one use to reach that conclusion.
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Last edited by Gregoire; 28th February 2009 at 01:50 PM.
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Old 28th February 2009, 02:42 PM   #4
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Unlike what Merko claims, Marx actually wasn’t much of a leader of men – unlike Lenin, by the way, but Lenin was a very poor scientist. Unlike Das Kapital by Karl Marx, Lenin’s version of ‘scientific socialism’ wasn’t particularly scientific, and with Stalin it got even worse.
According to Stephen Jay Gould less than ten mourners were present at the funeral of Karl Marx. Leaders tend to do better than that.
Interesting, by the way, that his years of study seem to be used as a reproach by Merko. Many recent articles about Origin of Species consider it to be praiseworthy that Darwin spent 20 years of study before publishing …
An Introduction to Marxist Political Economy
Ruthless Criticism
Capital #1

And as you can learn from very recent history, banks still crash, and the accumulation of financial capital just cannot emancipate itself from the production of actual wealth – no matter how much it tries. When the hedge fonds etc. come tumbling down, the crisis proves to the world that fictitious capital is quite different from real wealth.
My own stocks in Danske Bank, for instance, did only slightly better than the Icelandic GNP!

PS And in our context we probably shouldn't forget his criticism of religion&superstition:
"Religious distress is at the same time the expression of real distress and the protest against real distress. Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, just as it is the spirit of a spiritless situation. It is the opium of the people. The abolition of religion as the illusory happiness of the people is required for their real happiness. The demand to give up the illusion about its condition is the demand to give up a condition which needs illusions."
Karl Marx, Critique of Hegel’s Philosophy of Right
No wonder the added misery produced by the crisis will add to the religious sentiments of poor people who are its primary victims:
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/conten...t/322/5898/115

A better idea would be to take control of their own lives by abolishing capitalism, but growing up is hard to do ...
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"The abolition of religion as the illusory happiness of the people is required for their real happiness. The demand to give up the illusion about its condition is the demand to give up a condition which needs illusions." K. Marx

Last edited by dann; 28th February 2009 at 02:51 PM.
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Old 28th February 2009, 05:38 PM   #5
h.g.Whiz
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http://www.gopetition.com/petitions/...worldwide.html
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Old 2nd March 2009, 12:54 PM   #6
dann
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Sorry, but I don't really see the point of a petition like that.

On the highly praised accomplishments of filthy lucre.
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"Stupidity renders itself invisible by assuming very large proportions. Completely unreasonable claims are irrefutable. Ni-en-leh pointed out that a philosopher might get into trouble by claiming that two times two makes five, but he does not risk much by claiming that two times two makes shoe polish." B. Brecht
"The abolition of religion as the illusory happiness of the people is required for their real happiness. The demand to give up the illusion about its condition is the demand to give up a condition which needs illusions." K. Marx
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Old 3rd March 2009, 04:51 PM   #7
Gregoire
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Originally Posted by h.g.Whiz View Post
In my humble opinion, going back to the barter system would be bad idea.
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