David f,

Thanks for itemising the recommendations in the Communist Manifesto.....but where is the passage where Marx recommends the setting up of gulags and the forced labour and murder of millions....did you leave that one out?

And as you often indulge in your own ridicule of Christianity and other religions, it should be clear to you that humans are adept at manipulating and critiquing ideologies to suit their own agenda - hate-filled bigotry is unfortunately part of the human condition.

Poirot

The fact that Marx failed to think through the necessary logical consequences of his theory is no excuse.

As I have shown, the reason he didn't correctly predict the totalitarian chaos that followed from attempts to implement socialism - as Mises did *before* they happened: http://mises.org/pdf/econcalc.pdf
is because Marx didn't *think through* the consequences of abolishing calculation in terms of profit and loss.

The reason is, as I have shown above, because Marx simply assumed that socialism would follow capitalism by an inexorable law of history, the only evidence or reason for which was his own inner voice. But not only is socialism not inevitable, it's not even *POSSIBLE*. That's the bit you keep on not getting, instead circularly preferring demonstrable falsehoods.

Since communism and socialism both have as their fundamental desideratum the socialisation of the means of production, and since according to Marx the definitive means of production is labour, then it follows that communism and socialism must entail the ownership and control by the state of all labour, if capitalism is to be abolished.

But the utility of labour is *not* to be calculated in terms of profit and loss - that's the whole point of the exercise. Since the ultimate decision is to be exercised by the state, then there is no alternative than the total power, centralised decision-making, planned chaos, abrogation of human freedom, and abuses that happened. If the state decided that disposing of its human resources in a certain way is optimal, what objection could anyone have on the ground of human freedom that was not automatically ruled out by Marx's theory that any such objection could proceed only from vicious bourgeois "ideology" - exactly the objection that you throw in my face every time you defend the bullying of central planning from my arguments in favour of liberty - except you say "neo-liberalism" instead of "bourgeois"?

Any system that depends on the whim of the overall decision-maker to get it right, is not a good system.

Marx was a Marxist, and fully as arrogant, clueless and anti-social as all socialists.

But Poirot, that's precisely the point about the dangers of trying to construct - even if by another name - a Utopia: you can't control or predict human behaviour from one day to the next, so how can you prescribe the withering-away of the state, the dictatorship of the proletariat, the voluntary sharing of all possessions, and so on, generations in the future ? Should John Lennon's adolescent, and brainless, 'Imagine' have been our anthem: no religion, no countries, no possessions - then, what ?

Yes, Marx and Engels repeatedly criticised 'Utopian Socialism', but in Engels' 1877 pamphlet on the subject, purporting to shine a light on both, 'Socialism: Utopian and Scientific', there is extremely little said about 'Scientific Socialism' - the great bulk of the pamphlet is devoted to castigating Utopian socialisms of various sorts.

But you don't actually achieve, as it were, the construction of, and justification for, an ideological position by demolishing its rivals (where have we seen this method of 'argument' before ?): you have to put a case for your preferred ideology forward and defend it. After all, Marx and Engels, not to mention Lenin and Mao and Uncle Tom Cobbley and all, all expected the 'people', en masse, to devote their lives, literally, to this ideology, so it really should have been able to justify that devotion and sacrifice. And one can rubbish the ideologies of one's enemies all one likes, it may not prove one's own ideology is in any way more authentic or efficaceous, not by one iota.

[TBC]

[contd.]

So what do we do now ?

Marx has been dead nearly 130 years, and capitalism has been through many phases since he died. The traditional working-class has been replaced to a large extent by contractors and service workers.

And most damning of all of course, has been the atrocious history of socialist revolutions. One has to ask, can 'dictatorship' ever carry the day ? Does dictatorship of the proletariat, of the workers and peasants, always degenerate into a dictatorship of the PARTY of the workers and peasants, and from there to a dictatorship of the 'executive committee', and thence to a dictatorship of the Beloved Leader ? Is that any better than a system run by the Mafia ? Or any other patronage, or patrimonial, system ?

And must millions be exterminated for being historically class enemies ? For what ?

Seriously, how different is that from the worst forms of fascism ?

No, there must be something better, better than capitalism, socialism and fascism. Are we up to the task ?

Joe

Dear Poirot, I do not ricicule Christianity or other religions. They have been a rallying point, a binding force and have given hope to people. However, religion is a mixed bag. It also can incorporate bigotry. Since the words attributed to Jesus can inspire bigotry it was wrong to say as the author of the article did that Jesus was not responsible for what his followers did.

I agree with you that hate-filled bigotry is part of the human condition. So is murder. However, I think hate-filled bigotry and murder are not good things. Most humans are neither hate-filled bigots nor murderers. Marx was a hate-filled bigot who inspired murderers. The corpses were no accident.

The Manifesto contains: "You must, therefore, confess that by "individual" you mean no other person than the bourgeois, than the middle-class owner of property. This person must, indeed, be swept out of the way, and made impossible."

It doesn't take too much imagination to see that as a recipe for murder. Lenin's Cheka murdered people solely due to their class identification.

Squeers asked me to read the article. I did. It does not negate the Manifesto nor Marx's expressed bigotry. If it could be shown that Marx did not write the words attributed to him that would cause to rethink my position. As it is his words condemn him.

Dear Joe (Loudmouth),

A better world is possible.

I think most of us are up to the task.

It is you and I as global citiznes who need to put
aside our narrow self-interests and work together
as friends if there is to be a world for thos
humans and other animals who follow us.
Our world leaders are beginning to start taking
notice of the vast army of experts who are willing
and able to guide us through the coming difficult years.
A better world is possible. It will take effort.
It will be difficult, but it will be worth it.