I am a Marxist thinker AMA

[Bannedontherun]

I find myself saying this but have come back to feminism so i would like to explore my thinking with you all.

It's Engels.

Why do so many Marxists and Socialists support fascist groups? I'm thinking about, for example, Jeremy Corbyn and Hamas. These groups are anti feminist, antisemitic, homophobic and misogynist. Why wave the flag for them?

@MayaKovskaya firstly i would would not say socialists and Marxists are aligned.

Socialism to me is a concept of seeking equality through a democratic process.

Marxism is about a concept that the only way to free the majority from the oppression of the minority who get rich on exploiting other peoples labour, is to overthrow the existing structures internationally, by the workers, who used to be generally speaking organised in trade unions.

I personally do not support Hamas or the Israeli State, in these conflicts.

As a Marxist I would say, in the most simplistic terms, the current Middle Eastern conflicts are the eminence of concepts of nationhood, and the linking of humans to the national tribe, as opposed to the interests of working class people as both nations majority constituents are and will always be.

Jeremy and co support the oppressed against the oppressor as they see it.

It is difficult not to conclude that Isreal is the oppressor, but that is a well worn thread elsewhere.

Oh and i do wish that the word Fascism was not corrupted to describe anyone who one disagrees with.

@MaggieBsBoat Hello there, you saw the purpose of my post then, thanks for joining share what you want😁

Goodness. How patronising. I mistakenly thought there could be an interesting discussion as to why some on the Left support such organisations as I have described above.
No matter.
Good luck with your thread, I'm off.

Offended i am off, was i patronising? If so apologies????

@AutumnCrow I think i acknowledged Engels in a post but did not want to ignore you and your contribution, I agree with Engels as he concerned himself with women’s oppression, not to say that Marx did not.

@@FetchezLaVache no all proper tea is theft 😂

Returning to your enquiry, well differentiating between Marx, Lenin and Trotsky would be a book in itself, one that i would lack the depth of knowledge to do so.

One has to remember that the Marxist left, common activity is to split over detailed arguments.

The life of Brian film comments on this.

To me, Lenin had no business leading the Bolshevik’s to power in Russia since the vast population were not workers in an industrial nation, was mostly peasant farmer.

Marx theories lead him to. Posit that the most likely place for the workers revolution was Britain. Before the rise of the trade union movement i might add.

Trotsky was a leader of workers- the red army who began the revolt.

The book animal farm is a critique of Russia as most will know.

Marx was a philosopher, theorist and our first economist, in fact he invented it.

Not patronising at all. Your answer was relevant to the question I thought.
As Rosa Luxemburg once said. There's nowt as queer as folx.

Carry on, you are doing grand, I'm enjoying your thread.

@larklane17 awe thanks, starting an AMA should come with a brain over exercising, health warning.

I am enjoying it but am back from a meal had two glasses of wine < hic >,

Do i get an award for attracting a flouncer to my thread? Please

What’s AMA?

How do you feel about how Karl Marx treated his wife and daughters?

Je suis marxiste, tendance Groucho.

Has anyone heard of Hegel? It was once suggested i was somewhat Hegelian in my thinking. ( he was an exiled Iranian) I had to tramp off down to the Central City library, what a rabbit hole that was. Realised i was a bit thick in comparison to some people.

Anyway @MaggieBsBoat really got why i posted (at bedtime) What i took away from my early experiences was a new way of thinking.

I suppose i could call it looking at this world politically as if I was not in it. Above so to speak.

i live in this world and all its structures, i have a life in this world, i want a life not entirely dedicated to my politics.

so I wanted to see if I still held a line.

Hi @Bannedontherun
I have just discovered the mostly prewar Left Book Club which published some interesting works including several books by GDH Cole.

The reason I find them fascinating is that many of the books were theorising about whether there may be a Second World War; & what the outcome may be (from a left wing perspective) when as readers from the 2020s obviously we know the outcomes!!

Also my Grandad joined the Communist Party in Manchester in 1931-2. He was 18 years old & street homeless. With other men he was paid in hot meals to break up meetings & marches of Moseley's Fascist Blackshirts. I'm quite proud of that.

One of my great grandfathers (born 1880 ish) was a Scottish docker, also a Communist & a Trades Unionist; he attended the Tolpuddle Martyrs rally every year that he could manage to get there.

I would say I'm a Socialist, and a liberal rather than a radical feminist.
To be fair I don't understand much about Marxism.

I don't think true Communism works as a system because.. you know, unfortunately the negatives of human behaviour get in the way.
I do own a copy of Engels 'Condition of the Working Class' as many of my family were from the Victorian Salford Slums that he wrote about.

Because they're not exclusively for non-Marxists. Corbyn isn't a Marxist though, he's a democratic socialist who believes the state can operate better.

@sommerjade great to meet you thanks for contributing, i love what you have told us.

My grandparents were in the young communist party which was part of the Labour Party my gran’s family were part of the CO-OP, grandad was a Fabian until grandma sorted him out lol.

@YellowAsteroid Hi i was very tempted to ignore your post for the purposes of creating an enigma about my Mumsnet eminence.

But of course as a proper Marxist i cannot lie, which often used to get me in to trouble.

@Bannedontherun
My grandad who joined the Communists in 1931 met my Nan during ww2 while he was a soldier (he joined up in 1933 because the promise of 3 regular meals a day & a roof over his head was too tempting for a literally hungry young man).
My 11 years younger Nan was from a small shopkeeper background; definitely not a Communist, and even worse idolised Churchill who my Grandad had been brought up to hate as he'd set the troops on the striking dockers.. his father had been a docker (also a bare knuckle boxer).
So Grandad voted Labour and Nan actually voted Tory!! They despised each other's politics; which as they got married in 1945 after literally just 2 dates, they never thought to discuss along with other topics.
They basically cancelled out each other's vote at elections! How they lasted 58 years together (& endured her affairs plus his heavy drinking) when they had nothing at all in common is beyond me.

I feel personally a bit betrayed as a Labour voter by the current government- they've purged all the old school socialists and it shows. The actual caring politicians never get anywhere these days.

Yep, you get the rare and coveted Ashley Wilkes award. ;-)

no @larklane17 I don't remember that- I got pissed off with WV and read Spare Rib, as well as other home produced magazines like WIRES
https://www.grassrootsfeminism.net/cms/node/533
but still hung around the edges of various left wing groups, you have reminded me of a notorious evening (maybe May Day?) which tried to bring together traditional TU leftists and studenty socialists and this middle aged man lecturing us about how 'you've got to get the lads interested in socialism its no good going on about queers'
outed myself now with such a specific quote although I'm sure the attitude was ubiquitous

The latter is terfy. The former is not.

the SWP think they can draw in the youth by supporting trans rights