Occupy scared the shit out of bankers. It's no mistake that pop culture became obsessed with divisive issues immediately afterwards.
this post was submitted on 22 Feb 2024
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Europeans think racism is stupid, but then bring out the hitler energy for Romani.
Fuck that’s good!
When they're talking about big pharma and other companies controlling peoples lives and how the people that control them conspire to keep the rest of us in line...... Then start talking about Jews...
I mean marx also talks about the Jews and the Christians. I thought the position was that religion helps reinforce class society.
He more talked about Judaism and Christianity, but it was relatively minor compared to actual class analysis and additionally was most famously brought up as a response to antisemetic bullshit that supported the false idea that Jewish people were controlling all of the banks and all of the money and were the source of all problems.
Marx spoke of Religion as a component of classism, not as a replacement for it, unlike what modern anti-semites do.
I was told marx was an antisemite. That's what people say about leftists in general it seems.
It's easy for people to cherrypick with groups.
There are tons of antisemitic leftists. I've had to heavily curate my social media because of them, and I'm lucky because that's all I've had to do (eg, I'm not being chased across college campuses or doxxed for belonging to a synagogue or have people waiting outside of my door to hound me immediately).
But there are tons of leftists who aren't as well.
Leftism has become co-opted as way for people to virtue signal and rationalize things they want to believe. The right is definitely seizing on this strife. But historically, there's nobody the left likes to fight more than other leftists.
And the meme at the top about immigrants... that isn't new. The USSR was famous for establishing ethnostates and it carries over to modern day. Sure, you could immigrate. But it isn't like workers held hands and ignored the differences. The pressure was there, but perhaps not the wage pressure. Out groups were still blamed for things like shortages and service degradation, just like today. Nor a defense of anti immigration, but people seem to think the problem exists in uneducated or unenlightened people close to be leftwing. Nope, it's our cohort. We are watching it in real time right now.
Marx was Jewish himself, and wrote a fiery response against an antisemetic piece. He advocated for Jewish liberation.
Source?
Read Marx's On the Jewish Question. It's a response to the extremely anti-semetic The Jewish Question, and Marx basically goes through all of its bullshit and concludes that while religion is used by Capitalism to reinforce itself, he advocates for emancipation of religious people themselves. He was an atheist of Jewish descent.
When hes a white male and doesnt understand the repression he faces isn't the only important.
For real though, repressing minorities is a tool which at the moment capitalists use to get days of unemployed, wage slaves or to split the working class. By fighting the capitalists you can help minorities, but you dont nessescarily do so.
It's important to remember, that discrimination predates capitalism and won't automatically perish by fighting the class war but by fighting it in solidarity and activley addressing all kinds of unfair and unethical behaviour together.
If you make that face when a women talks about being denied an abortion or a subaltern not able to participate in discourse, you haven't understood solidarity and won't get very far.
I mostly think one facilitates the other. Helping the poor helps in the sens they can then fight discrimination more effectively.
And that's why we could think we should start by solving the more recent problem of classes first.
To be honest the lines between the two fights probably blurs to thoses who wants both because they value equality first right?
But it's also true that it doesn't apply that well to everything completely. Abortion is indeed a very good example.
I also was on this track for a while, but the more you actually take part in the movements, the more you see realistic opportunities, the more you understand how damn interwoven all these issues are.
Its not about "this first" or "that first" its about working towards a better world TOGETHER AND IN SOLIDARITY.
Its not even that you should overcome one or the other first, its that its onlz possible to address one issue by also addressing the other. We can't have a (real and good) socialist society without overcoming racism, sexism etc, and we can't (really) overcome racism sexism etc without overcoming capitalism.
Realising this means fighting together on solidarity, not downplaying the discrimination others must live through.
I do agree on your emphasis on solidarity, but in a different way.
I think we see this interweaving especially in movements and realistic actions. Because people have values that connect the two together, as well as connecting us. Solidarity is such a value, as well as equality.
But, technically i think the world isn't very restrictive on what ideas can work together. Technically we can have socialism with racism or sexism, it's just a less common point of view in our cultures. And same for a capitalism that's not discriminatory, that's might be harder to achieve but it's a real stance, based on other values...
I think the main problem for leftist in general is that we must also learn to accept some differences in our point of views. Even being able to fight with people that doesn't share said values.
That's the solidarity we lack the most, with differences regarding our opinions.
I think that's what get rid of this what's "first" idea, as well as having multiple fights, all more powerful and with less hollow debates.
Rarer and rarer are the movement that do that correctly in my opinion. We form communities based on our strong values which is great.
But capitalists or politicians thrive on this drawback of having strong values. They use it to pit us against each other. Inside the left, and also by radicalization of both left and right ideologies. Though media like internet especially.
Okay, I think we have different definitions of socialism. In my book that's a fair society where everyone gets the stuff he needs and gives the stuff he can. Can't really make this work fairly with racism and sexism can you?
Sure you can change the political system (from unbound parliament to bound council) but that not a society changed from capitalism to socialism.
But I think this is a question of definition, more important is the question of "can you have capitalism without discrimination" and I really don't think so. You need the army of unemployed so your system doesn't collapse and you can't have an army of unemployed if you don't have some reason why they should suffer.
Also capitalism literally works in the way, that you get played as low as possible, so discriminating people to pay them less is so encouraged by the system, that it is practically build into the system .
On everything you said after that: "amen"!
The city where I grew up in England is over one quarter South Asian. There was friction between the “sides”, but what few noticed was that actually no-one was doing very well. The city had been abandoned by the government long ago.
Bradford?
Everytime
Not a word.
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