The Essence of the Left

[Algeroth]

And what those ideas were? Honest leftism spelled to the last letter. «Left singularity». Zhang Xianzhong's ideology was written on the «Stele of seven kills», he formulated it himself:

The heaven gives to men countless goods.
Men have not anything to thank the heaven.
Kill. Kill. Kill. Kill. Kill. Kill. Kill.

Change «Heaven» to «Nature» or «Society» (or whatever is popular in the leftist trend now) and you get a universal manifesto for every left movement in history. After «intelligentsia» Xianzhong moved to poor people whom he cut arms, legs and ears for insufficient gratefullness. A little later he started to flay his own comrades. Xianzhong dispeopled the province Sichuan. From three millions of people only several tens of thousand have left alive. Everyone else he exterminated with artificial hunger, torture and mass murders.

If you think leftists need sound ideologies, mass society or industrialization to reach heights of Pol Pot, you are mistaken. If you think that the goal of left movements is something other than 殺 殺 殺 殺 殺 殺 殺 you are also mistaken. In the left system of morality the price of human is based on his «piety». The more one hates himself and others of his kind - the better. To harm your own social class to please the masses is good. To betray you nation by supporting other -- even better. As far as I see it, currently the highest degree of leftism is environmentalism: when a leftist tzadik reaches the level of self-condemnation when he begins to hate the very biological essense of his kind and values plants and animals more than humans."

So, let's discuss. I think he have covered most points of Leftism. What do you think? Is there anything to add?

I don't feel like going through all the eleven pages of this thread, even if it is a RD thread, sorry.

Did someone told Snorrius that no such stele existed and followed from that that means that the Essence of the Right is misinterpreting of the Left, ignorance of history, lying and feelings of total hopelessness due to their deep-rooted inferior complex?

If not, I'm calling dibs on that.

 

[Snorrius]

Somehow i doubt imperial Russia was a high point for the average Russian living in it.

It was decent for the time, certainly better than under later Leftist rule with its brutal equalizing policies. But I take Imperial Russia as a source of inspiration, not as exace example to follow -- we can learn from the past but we should follow the (higher) spirit, not the letter. Let Erik von Kuehnelt-Leddihn speak:

There is no need to go to the other extreme and to believe that the knowledge of the three R's is basically destructive, but nothing is more stupid or irrealistic than to judge the level of other countries by the number of illiterates. Accepting such standards one has to put Latvia higher than France, or the Germanies of 1890 higher than the German World of 1810. Imperial Russia had a far larger percentage of illiterates than the American Middle West yet she produced such men as Dostoyevski, Myerezhkovski, Vyereshtshagin, Tolstoy, Tshaykovski, Solovyov, Pushkin, Rimsky-Korsakov, Turgenyev, Skryabin, Mendeleyev, and Mussorgsky.

Imperial Russia was the highest point of Russian culture, and it is culture we go to for inspiration. USSR while able to maintain military might, was unable to produce any meaningful discourse, decent ideas, or strong intellectual leaders. This is the fate of Leftist nightmares and daymares as they weed everything extraordinary and turn persons to herd.

 

[Borachio]

Hmm. I'm really not sure that you can judge the whole corpus of "leftist" thought by the experience of Soviet Russia, an undoubtedly anti-intellectual totalitarian regime.

 

[Snorrius]

Hmm. I'm really not sure that you can judge the whole corpus of "leftist" thought by the experience of Soviet Russia, an undoubtedly anti-intellectual totalitarian regime.

Soviet Russia and other brutal Leftist regime are an example what happens when you try to make unequal society to be equal fast. But there are (already) an examples of totalitarian regimes which got slowly and more peacefully almost to the point where USSR of 70s was (which already was not brutal and controlled survived intellectual dissenters mostly by denying access to mass media, academia, using Komsomol pickets, denying good jobs, by popular opinion and, in some cases, using psychiatry to place dissidents into hospitals as mentally disabled, and also by driving undesired "elements" from the country). For example, Sweden.. A great place to live, if you only need a quiet life, not so good if you want a semblance of intellectual freedom.

The similar process are going in other European countries, and USA as well (they are just a bit behind).

 

[Hygro]

Again, you are assuming those with ideal ends will take extreme means to get there rather than merely approaching the ideal through more moderate means. That is where you need to stop waiving around the pitchfork and put it to the more productive use of scooping up and tossing out some straw.

Nice

 

[Snorrius]

Did someone told Snorrius that no such stele existed

I do not think we are discussing existence of the said stele but rather why this "programme" (whoever the real author is) fits Leftism so well, and whether author whom I quoted is correct enough or something lacks.

 

[Senethro]

I do not think we are discussing existence of the said stele but rather why this "programme" (whoever the real author is) fits Leftism so well, and whether author whom I quoted is correct enough or something lacks.

Leftists in crazed screeds: KILL KILL KILL KILL KILL KILL KILL

Leftists in reality: 40 hour working week

 

[JollyRoger]

Somehow i doubt imperial Russia was a high point for the average Russian living in it.

But it had great elites who didn't have the nasty power ideals of egalitarians.

 

[gay_Aleks]

Unfortunately, for one reason or another, the evil egalitarians had like, a lot of guns.

 

[jackelgull]

I do not think we are discussing existence of the said stele but rather why this "programme" (whoever the real author is) fits Leftism so well, and whether author whom I quoted is correct enough or something lacks.

Excuse me, what world do you come from? Because it certainly isn't this one if you believe leftists revel in death and destruction.

I consider myself part of the moderate left. To me that implies a meritocracy- a system where everyone regardless of back ground get what they get because they truly deserve it. Not some sort of pseudo-leftism which advocates the killing of the privileged-no I want the privileged to be privileged because they truly deserve it. That means creating more opportunities, that means everyone gets a good education, and yes that means paying taxes for welfare, because poverty is the worst form of violence and no one deserves that.

 

[gay_Aleks]

Excuse me, what world do you come from? Because it certainly isn't this one if you believe leftists revel in death and destruction.

I consider myself part of the moderate left. To me that implies a meritocracy- a system where everyone regardless of back ground get what they get because they truly deserve it. Not some sort of pseudo-leftism which advocates the killing of the privileged-no I want the privileged to be privileged because they truly deserve it. That means creating more opportunities, that means everyone gets a good education, and yes that means paying taxes for welfare, because poverty is the worst form of violence and no one deserves that.

That means you're from the moderates, and as history teaches us, these never live to the end of the revolution.

Which will inevitably happen. It always does.

 

[Domen]

Somehow i doubt imperial Russia was a high point for the average Russian living in it.

The point is that states don't exist in a vacuum deprived of space and time. Each of them exists or existed in a certain global reality and timeframe. Compared to other countries of the time, living conditions in imperial Russia could be a high point. On the other hand, I doubt that living conditions in Lenin's Bolshevia were good compared to other countries of the same time. Snorrius can really be right here.

The same is the case in other Communist states. When we compare Communist Poland to pre-WW2 Poland, living conditions improved. But relative to capitalist states of Western Europe, Communist Poland was going backwards. In 1938 Portugal, Greece, Spain or Italy were not better off than Czechoslovakia, Poland or Hungary. And in 1990 the former four were much wealthier than the latter three.

 

[Snorrius]

The point is that states don't exist in a vacuum deprived of space and time. Each of them exists or existed in a certain global reality and timeframe. Compared to other countries of the time, living conditions in Russia could be the high point. On the other hand, I doubt that living conditions in Lenin's Bolshevia were good compared to other countries of the same time. Snorrius can really be right here.

Nicely put. Leftists, for some reason, are incapable for grasping this simple point -- they always measure everything against some ideal which does not even exists. This approach may have its place in religion and spirituality but have little place in secular context. Probably, it proves that Leftist ideologies are substitute religions for spiritually challenged.

 

[JollyRoger]

There is nothing wrong with attempting to move towards an ideal - though using religion as justification to crash planes into buildings is not the right approach. If Russia had stayed Tsarist, how would it compare to other countries today?

 

[useless]

Again, I'm sure the average Russian peasant or Serf, subject to famine, the harsh climate and forced conscription by the Russian army, had brilliant lives.

 

[Traitorfish]

what the hell is happening in this thread.

 

[Gary Childress]

what the hell is happening in this thread.

Not sure Traitorfish but it sounds like the world has turned pretty dark and sadistic. I was looking at some of the stuff showing up in here and there is a very scary aspect to it.

I would suggest caution for the rest of us who still have some sanity and moral values.

 

[Domen]

Economist G. Wójtowicz in his book calculated Polish GDP per capita during 1000 years of history as % of avg Western European GDP per capita in each period.

This approach measures well-being in relation to other countries in each period (not in relation to modern times). The result is that in 1938 Poland had 42,7% of WE GDP when measured within 1938 borders (including backward eastern lands), and 49,6% when measured within post-1945 borders.

In 1946 due to wartime destruction greater than elsewhere that figure decreased to 36,1%, but then it increased to 53,4% by 1950.

However, after 1950 it was a near-constant decline, with 39,9% in 1982 and eventually just 1/3 by the time when Communism collapsed.

After the collapse of Communism decline continued until 1991, reaching 28%, the lowest point ever in history, after which it started to catch up.

In year 2007 Polish economy reached 49,2% of Western European GDP - close to 49,4% in 1790, soon before the final Partitions.

Now it is year 2014 and already by 2012 we reached 61% - a slightly higher level than after the "Deluge", in times of King John III Sobieski.

 

[Snorrius]

If Russia had stayed Tsarist, how would it compare to other countries today?

Well, we can not know for sure, but there plenty of European monarchies have left to extrapolate, and no one of them fare particularly bad. Even if it would move slowly with rest of the world towards Left politically, it would be spared from disasters which led to harsh intellectual and cultural decline of Russia. I think by this year it would be a constitutional social-democratic monarchy similar to other European monarchies.

 

[JollyRoger]

So it would have moved leftward and gotten better?