3 ms·

>Wage slavery lead to Marxist revolutions. Any material to back up this wild claim?

sp332 13y ago
Nope, not even one link. Edit: well OK maybe a little one https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socialism_in_the_usa#Two_steps_back.2C_one_forward https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socialism_in_the_usa#Two_steps...
- LekkoscPiwa 13y ago
  I'm sorry, I must be blind. Could you please cut & paste a passage from the link you provided that support the claim that: "wage slavery lead to Marxist revolutions" What I'm interested in is: 1. Name of the revolutions. 2. Their place. 3. Their date. 4. Professional historian who claims that the "wage slavery" lead to the events in points 1-3. (not a communist with an agenda) I assure you that the Marxist (or rather Bolshevik) revolution in Russia in 1917 wasn't caused by "wage slavery". As any other communist revolution too. Probably you watch too much KGB-TV... sorry RussiaToday.
  - dragonwriter 13y ago
    > I assure you that the Marxist (or rather Bolshevik) revolution in Russia in 1917 wasn't caused by "wage slavery". Sure it was. Wage slavery -> the work of Marx (alone and with and Engels) -> core of the propaganda basis for the Bolshevik revolution (with suitable adaptations to be applied in a something other than an industrialized, democratic, capitalist environment.) Now, it wasn't a proximate cause, but... Aside from that, I suppose, you could look at the generally-less-violent process by which virtually every state even approximately meeting the necessary preconditions for Communism in Marx's work has adopted a substantial subset of the platform laid out in the Communist Manifesto as a form of "Marxist revolution" that is more like the Green Revolution or the Industrial Revolution than the Bolshevik Revolution; in that case, "wage slavery" was more of a proximate cause than it was of any of the various violent revolutions driven by Leninism/Stalinism/Maoism, et al.
    - LekkoscPiwa 13y ago
      wow, even more wild claims without providing sources. I lived in communistic country, trust me workers were exploited much more in the communism than in capitalism. They had to work for free in gulags (slave labor), they had to work overtime (i.e. 16 hour shifts), the child labor was common. And any complaints regarding this were equaled to anti-communistic act of treason and punished with jail time. Ever heard of Dear Leader and North Korea? I think you got it backwards. You really did. The revolution of workers against the communistic rule is ultimately this what destroyed communism in the Eastern Block. Solidarnosc was a trading union fighting against communism. If communism was so great for workers why they were the ones who lead the revolution against it in places like Poland? Communism is much more worker unfriendly system than capitalism. So, yep, you got it opposite. There were workers revolutions against communism and not capitalism. But because communism is a religion, you won't listen to these arguments based by facts in recent history, you'll keep mumbling about Marx, so I'll leave you with that. It's like trying to explain to a Catholic that a virgin can't give a birth to a child.
      - dragonwriter 13y ago
        > I lived in communistic country, trust me workers were exploited much more in the communism than in capitalism. I don't trust you on that point. I would agree that countries that claim to be "communist" exploit workers far more than workers are exploited in modern mixed economies like those in most of the West, of course, but that's somewhat beside the point of the discussion. First, because no one claimed anything to which that is directly relevant, and second, because, while the modern west is often called "capitalist", it bears little resemblance in economic system to the system in the 19th century whose critics (notably, Marx) coined the term "capitalism" to refer to, differing from those systems largely by having adopted, on top of the old capitalist system, a number of reforms, many of which are straight out of the Communist Manifesto. > The revolution of workers against the communistic rule is ultimately this what destroyed communism in the Eastern Block. Sure, largely. That doesn't make it any less true that the exploitation of workers under capitalism was the source of Marxism and a proximate cause for the adoption of many policies that were part of the original Communist program as near-universal policies throughout the developed world by Social Democrats/Democratic Socialists, and that the same dissatisfaction was a less-proximate contributor to the "Communist" revolutions of Lenin and his ideological heirs. > If communism was so great for workers why they were the ones who lead the revolution against it in places like Poland? I don't recall anyone arguing that "communism was so great for workers". Arguing that capitalism being so bad for workers was one of the causes of the development and spread of Communist ideology is not equivalent to arguing that Communism, as implemented by Lenin et al., was "good for workers". It does not even require the weaker claim that Leninism was better than 19th capitalism for workers. > Communism is much more worker unfriendly system than capitalism. So, yep, you got it opposite. Well, except that you are the only one who is arguing about the topic of whether Communism is more worker friendly than capitalism, on either side.

sp332 13y ago

Nope, not even one link. Edit: well OK maybe a little one https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socialism_in_the_usa#Two_steps_back.2C_one_forward https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socialism_in_the_usa#Two_steps...

LekkoscPiwa 13y ago
I'm sorry, I must be blind. Could you please cut & paste a passage from the link you provided that support the claim that: "wage slavery lead to Marxist revolutions" What I'm interested in is: 1. Name of the revolutions. 2. Their place. 3. Their date. 4. Professional historian who claims that the "wage slavery" lead to the events in points 1-3. (not a communist with an agenda) I assure you that the Marxist (or rather Bolshevik) revolution in Russia in 1917 wasn't caused by "wage slavery". As any other communist revolution too. Probably you watch too much KGB-TV... sorry RussiaToday.
- dragonwriter 13y ago
  > I assure you that the Marxist (or rather Bolshevik) revolution in Russia in 1917 wasn't caused by "wage slavery". Sure it was. Wage slavery -> the work of Marx (alone and with and Engels) -> core of the propaganda basis for the Bolshevik revolution (with suitable adaptations to be applied in a something other than an industrialized, democratic, capitalist environment.) Now, it wasn't a proximate cause, but... Aside from that, I suppose, you could look at the generally-less-violent process by which virtually every state even approximately meeting the necessary preconditions for Communism in Marx's work has adopted a substantial subset of the platform laid out in the Communist Manifesto as a form of "Marxist revolution" that is more like the Green Revolution or the Industrial Revolution than the Bolshevik Revolution; in that case, "wage slavery" was more of a proximate cause than it was of any of the various violent revolutions driven by Leninism/Stalinism/Maoism, et al.
  - LekkoscPiwa 13y ago
    wow, even more wild claims without providing sources. I lived in communistic country, trust me workers were exploited much more in the communism than in capitalism. They had to work for free in gulags (slave labor), they had to work overtime (i.e. 16 hour shifts), the child labor was common. And any complaints regarding this were equaled to anti-communistic act of treason and punished with jail time. Ever heard of Dear Leader and North Korea? I think you got it backwards. You really did. The revolution of workers against the communistic rule is ultimately this what destroyed communism in the Eastern Block. Solidarnosc was a trading union fighting against communism. If communism was so great for workers why they were the ones who lead the revolution against it in places like Poland? Communism is much more worker unfriendly system than capitalism. So, yep, you got it opposite. There were workers revolutions against communism and not capitalism. But because communism is a religion, you won't listen to these arguments based by facts in recent history, you'll keep mumbling about Marx, so I'll leave you with that. It's like trying to explain to a Catholic that a virgin can't give a birth to a child.
    - dragonwriter 13y ago
      > I lived in communistic country, trust me workers were exploited much more in the communism than in capitalism. I don't trust you on that point. I would agree that countries that claim to be "communist" exploit workers far more than workers are exploited in modern mixed economies like those in most of the West, of course, but that's somewhat beside the point of the discussion. First, because no one claimed anything to which that is directly relevant, and second, because, while the modern west is often called "capitalist", it bears little resemblance in economic system to the system in the 19th century whose critics (notably, Marx) coined the term "capitalism" to refer to, differing from those systems largely by having adopted, on top of the old capitalist system, a number of reforms, many of which are straight out of the Communist Manifesto. > The revolution of workers against the communistic rule is ultimately this what destroyed communism in the Eastern Block. Sure, largely. That doesn't make it any less true that the exploitation of workers under capitalism was the source of Marxism and a proximate cause for the adoption of many policies that were part of the original Communist program as near-universal policies throughout the developed world by Social Democrats/Democratic Socialists, and that the same dissatisfaction was a less-proximate contributor to the "Communist" revolutions of Lenin and his ideological heirs. > If communism was so great for workers why they were the ones who lead the revolution against it in places like Poland? I don't recall anyone arguing that "communism was so great for workers". Arguing that capitalism being so bad for workers was one of the causes of the development and spread of Communist ideology is not equivalent to arguing that Communism, as implemented by Lenin et al., was "good for workers". It does not even require the weaker claim that Leninism was better than 19th capitalism for workers. > Communism is much more worker unfriendly system than capitalism. So, yep, you got it opposite. Well, except that you are the only one who is arguing about the topic of whether Communism is more worker friendly than capitalism, on either side.