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Marxism Destroyed the Dialectic : Comments
By Gilbert Holmes, published 27/9/2010Marx poisoned modern political philosophy because he didn't understand the dialectic
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Posted by Poirot, Tuesday, 28 September 2010 8:27:44 PM
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Hegel: "For it is in the nature of humanity to press onward to agreement with others; human nature only really exists in an achieved
community of minds." I see Hegel's view of freedom as a recipe for tyranny. Hegel's freedom was humanity working together as an organic whole in agreement on its eventual goal. The logical consequence is that the dissenter is an outcast. There is no room for the person who disagrees with or does not belong to the dominant paradigm. The gulag, the concentration camp, the graveyard and the crematorium are the destination for those who are not regarded as belonging to the volk or the vanguard class. Hegel was influenced by Joachim of Fiore who saw society in three stages the stage of the father: Edenic peace, the stage of the son: human conflict, and the stage of the Holy Ghost: the millennium. Hegel also saw society in stages reaching an apotheosis. His apotheosis was the Prussian state. The followers of Hegel divided into right Hegelians who were predominantly German nationalists and left Hegelians the most prominent being Marx. Marx's three stages were primitive communism in an economy of scarcity, class struggle and the apotheosis of advanced communism or the classless society in an economy of plenty. Neither right Hegelians nor left Hegelians gave a damn about the individual. The 'freedom' defined by Hegel would be found by serving state, party or class. Human rights which were the protection of people against the state were unnecessary. They were bourgeois affectations. The mounds of corpses produced by the fascist statists and the Marxist statists were a logical outcome. Hegel's philosophy is consistent with the statist philosophies of Marxism and fascism. The state will wither away when human kind is in agreement as there is no necessity for it. Conformity reigns supreme, and there is peace in the graveyard. I think the world would be far worse had the USA not prevailed over the Marxist left Hegelians and the fascist right Hegelians. Posted by david f, Tuesday, 28 September 2010 9:26:02 PM
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David f,
I'd just like to address your ignorance first. Not to mention your willingness to slander those that you don't understand. Maybe you should take Squeers advice and do a bit more reading. There is a good article on the Internet Encycopedia of Philosophy at http://www.iep.utm.edu/hegelsoc/ Here we are told that "Hegel emphasizes the need for strong central governance, albiet without complete centralized control of public administration and social relations." and, "...the social realm of individual autonomy where there is significant local self goernance. The task of government is not to thoroughly bureaucratize civil society but rather to provide oversight, regulation and where necessary, intervention." A balance between stable, effective government and freedom for individuals/local autonomy for communities. That could be used as a definition of democracy! Poirot, Hegel developed a complex, multi-levelled analysis of the entirety of existence, all based around the three-part, dialectical structure. I doubt if anyone exists that comprehends or would be able to explain the whole of Hegel's theory. My personal feeling however, is that Marx was probably overly critical of the spritiual aspect of Hegels work, rather than Hegel being overly focussed on it. You can think of different paradigms or mindsets that emerge within our society. (through a dialectical process of course.) You can also see dialectical tensions within the actual institutions of the society. Our thoughts will feed into our social structure and our social structure will feed our thoughts. Marx was focussed on the latter at the expense of the former. By suggesting that Marxism destroyed the dialectic, what I mean is that the strong association of the dialectic with the Marxist school's version of the concept has inhibited exploration of the concept in non-Marxist applications. Posted by GilbertHolmes, Tuesday, 28 September 2010 10:44:53 PM
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Peter Hume, Thanks for saying it was a good article. So many criticisms were starting to get me down. As usual, however, we do have a few points of difference. Personally I think that Lao Tzu would be turning in his grave if he knew that you were using him as a champion of laissez-faire.
Perhaps it will help you to understand my thoughts a bit more if I say again that I believe that both competition and cooperation are good if they are working in balance with one another, but either will be negative if it is expressed in the extreme. Within ourselves, we can be positively both strong and gentle or negatively aggressive or weak. Also, there is an old concept associated with yin/yang philosophy. That is 'that in the extreme, the yin will flip over and become the yang and the yang will flip over to become the yin.' (my words) You can see this in a heavily authoritarian government that controls everyone so that they are all acting together for a common outcome. This can be seen as cooperative is one context but is obviously competitive in another. Likewise determining what is yin and what is yang within any given polarity will be entirely dependent on perspective. By the way, pursuing free trade via Ricardo's theory of comparative advantage to it's logical conclusion would result in a situation whereby everyone was being controlled to do what they are relatively best at. Let's have an end to both lassez-faire and communistic extremism. Posted by GilbertHolmes, Tuesday, 28 September 2010 11:18:13 PM
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Oh, grok, thank you: I needed a good belly laugh.
Especially your previous post about how Marxists are going to solve the problems of the world, etc. etc. Yep, great to see how wonderfully all those Marxist states worked out ... You also provided me with a good snigger-fest with your verbal dexterity, shifting goalposts so fast it fair made one's eyes water, and using a good many words to say exactly nothing at all. Posted by Clownfish, Tuesday, 28 September 2010 11:37:02 PM
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Dear Gilbert Holmes,
Hegel's ideas could be used as a basis for democracy. However, democracy was incompatible with his idea of freedom. It is not nice to make an ad hominem attack and call someone who disagrees with you ignorant. I criticised your essay but did not call you names. I would appreciate the same courtesy from you. The fact is that the followers of the two Hegelian branches had an inordinate ability to make corpses. The Nazi made corpses are remembered, but the Marxist made corpses are somehow the result of an experiment gone wrong. They were once living people. However, they were seen as class enemies or deviants and eliminated. Marx wrote in the Communist Manifesto what he thought of human rights: "By this, the long-wished for opportunity was offered to "True" Socialism of confronting the political movement with the socialistic demands, of hurling the traditional anathemas against liberalism, against representative government, against bourgeois competition, bourgeois freedom of the press, bourgeois legislation, bourgeois liberty and equality, and of preaching to the masses that they had nothing to gain, and everything to lose, by this bourgeois movement. German socialism forgot, in the nick of time, that the French criticism, whose silly echo it was, presupposed the existence of modern bourgeois society, with its corresponding economic conditions of existence, and the political constitution adapted thereto, the very things whose attainment was the object of the pending struggle in Germany." Bourgeois society had produced a number of reforms that Marx thought would be unnecessary in his utopia. The pending struggle in Germany refers to the fact that Marx at that time thought the communist revolution would come to Germany, but Germany was taken over by other followers of Hegel who were also good in making corpses. If one eliminates the protections that have been set up against the tyranny of the state as the Hegelians did there is little to prevent mass murder. The mounds of corpses produced by the Hegelians were a direct result of putting his philosophy into practice. Posted by david f, Wednesday, 29 September 2010 12:48:19 AM
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Marx, from what I've read, turned Hegel's dialectical theory the other way up. Hegel referred to the force that drives history along as "world spirit" or "world reason". Marx believed this was "upside down". He thought "material" change - particularly those caused by economic forces - was the main force that caused the changes that drove history along. He thought that these form the "basis" of society, while the "thinking" institutions formed the "superstructure", so that the material realm supports the thinking realm in society and they interact dialectically.
I'm only learning, but I can't see how Marx destroyed the dialectic - would you (or anyone else) care to elaborate?