don't vote.

[matt romney]

to shakur:

(12-16-2011 06:32 AM)Laz Wrote:  here's my opinion on voting to reform and reformism as a whole.

even if you do vote for the lesser of evil, you are simply delaying the inevitability of the other evil. how? imagine the democrats as one boot, republicans as the other. sure, the democrats may apply less pressure than the GOP. they may allow us breathing room. they may be benevolent when suits them. but the boot is still on our neck. and the american voter recognizes a boot, recognizes oppression, recognizes evil even if it is the lesser of two. what they forget however, is the greater body of the boots, the bourgeois.

next election, they are voting the incumbent out. even if the alternative is worse. meanwhile, the few the recognize the root of oppression have to battle bullshit like "if you don't vote, you can't complain." fuck that. i'm not going to perpetuate and validate this. especially when the impact is miniscule and ultimately absent.

it is the job of those who happened upon the cause of such oppression to educate others. go to the masses with pamphlets, go out there with flyers, with events, with conversation, community organization, etc. seek to change the system, not simply alternate the faces of the monster. protest, march, mic check, occupy, sit in, freedom ride, hold rallies.

and if you get a clear shot on the owner of those boots, shoot that motherfucker.

but voting will forever be a counterproductive attempt. reformism will never work applied to a system made by- and for- the bourgeois. we can wait on bourgeois benevolence. we can wait for segregation to obsolete itself among the ruling class, the vietnam war to no longer be politically viable, we can wait for the Japanese interment camps to be no longer needed. we can wait for SOPA, the defense bill, the Patriot Act, the wars, etc to fade away into irrelevancy. the whole of industrialized America’s politics can be defined as populist swings met by the bourgeois; the pendulum being the displeased voter. the reason the republican candidates act so crazy is because their base has radicalized into extreme conservatism; politically, its quite brilliant. we can wait for the pendulum to swing back towards liberalism as it wrecks havoc for another decade or so. we can wait for times to improve so the capitalists compensate back. just hold out your hands and wait at the ballot box.

but i doubt that will happen. the American economy is going downhill, the brakes are cut, and the driver is blindfolded by Newscorp, religion, and jingoism. fascism is an extreme reaction of capitalism, and in the words of trotsky: “The historic function of fascism is to smash the working class, destroy its organizations, and stifle political liberties when the capitalists find themselves unable to govern and dominate with the help of democratic machinery.” and for the bourgeois to maintain their power hold, that is looking more and more likely.

there needs to be a fundamental shift from liberal reformism as a whole. we see what has happened. obama is nearly neoconservative, the only thing keeping him from being the GOP’s candidate is the sheer insanity of their own fundamentalists. clinton was no better. its capitalism in its hideous tyranny, nothing can be changed from inside.

voting will give small concessions to voters but will do nothing to change anything. we may see a short spurt of benevolent bourgeois behavior but only at their convenience. don't get me wrong, voting in local elections is terrific. this may surprise you, but i support and am involved in the campaign for a mass party of labor despite my reservations because I believe you can have a political party as a militant and revolutionary force, delivering relief to the people and encouraging a new system. see the russian political parties before lenin and trotsky emerged.

Quote:The years of preparation for revolution (1903-05)

The approach of a great storm was sensed everywhere. All classes were in a state of ferment and preparation. Abroad, the press of the political exiles discussed the theoretical aspects of all the fundamental problems of the revolution. Representatives of the three main classes, of the three principal political trends -- the liberal-bourgeois, the petty-bourgeois-democratic (concealed behind "social-democratic" and "social-revolutionary" labels [2]), and the proletarian-revolutionary—anticipated and prepared the impending open class struggle by waging a most bitter struggle on issues of programme and tactics. All the issues on which the masses waged an armed struggle in 1905-07 and 1917-20 can (and should) be studied, in their embryonic form, in the press of the period. Among these three main trends there were, of course, a host of intermediate, transitional or half-hearted forms. It would be more correct to say that those political and ideological trends which were genuinely of a class nature crystallised in the struggle of press organs, parties, factions and groups; the classes were forging the requisite political and ideological weapons for the impending battles.

The years of revolution (1905-07). All classes came out into the open. All programmatical and tactical views were tested by the action of the masses. In its extent and acuteness, the strike struggle had no parallel anywhere in the world. The economic strike developed into a political strike, and the latter into insurrection. The relations between the proletariat, as the leader, and the vacillating and unstable peasantry, as the led, were tested in practice. The Soviet form of organisation came into being in the spontaneous development of the struggle. The controversies of that period over the significance of the Soviets anticipated the great struggle of 1917-20. The alternation of parliamentary and non-parliamentary forms of struggle, of the tactics of boycotting parliament and that of participating in parliament, of legal and illegal forms of struggle, and likewise their interrelations and connections—all this was marked by an extraordinary wealth of content. As for teaching the fundamentals of political science to masses and leaders, to classes and parties alike, each month of this period was equivalent to an entire year of "peaceful" and "constitutional" development. Without the "dress rehearsal" of 1905, the victory of the October Revolution in 1917 would have been impossible.

The years of reaction (1907-10). Tsarism was victorious. All the revolutionary and opposition parties were smashed. Depression’ demoralisation, splits, discord, defection, and pornography took the place of politics. There was an ever greater drift towards philosophical idealism; mysticism became the garb of counter-revolutionary sentiments. At the same time, however, it was this great defeat that taught the revolutionary parties and the revolutionary class a real and very useful lesson, a lesson in historical dialectics, a lesson in an understanding of the political struggle, and in the art and science of waging that struggle. It is at moments of need that one learns who one’s friends are. Defeated armies learn their lesson.

Victorious tsarism was compelled to speed up the destruction of the remnants of the pre-bourgeois, patriarchal mode of life in Russia. The country’s development along bourgeois lines proceeded apace. Illusions that stood outside and above class distinctions, illusions concerning the possibility of avoiding capitalism, were scattered to the winds. The class struggle manifested itself in a quite new and more distinct way.

The revolutionary parties had to complete their education. They were learning how to attack. Now they had to realise that such knowledge must be supplemented with the knowledge of how to retreat in good order. They had to realise—and it is from bitter experience that the revolutionary class learns to realise this—that victory is impossible unless one has learned how to attack and retreat properly. Of all the defeated opposition and revolutionary parties, the Bolsheviks effected the most orderly retreat, with the least loss to their "army", with its core best preserved, with the least significant splits (in point of depth and incurability), with the least demoralisation, and in the best condition to resume work on the broadest scale and in the most correct and energetic manner. The Bolsheviks achieved this only because they ruthlessly exposed and expelled the revolutionary phrase-mongers, those who did not wish to understand that one had to retreat, that one had to know how to retreat, and that one had absolutely to learn how to work legally in the most reactionary of parliaments, in the most reactionary of trade unions, co-operative and insurance societies and similar organisations.

The years of revival (1910-14). At first progress was incredibly slow, then, following the Lena events of 1912, it became somewhat more rapid. Overcoming unprecedented difficulties, the Bolsheviks thrust back the Mensheviks, whose role as bourgeois agents in the working-class movement was clearly realised by the entire bourgeoisie after 1905, and whom the bourgeoisie therefore supported in a thousand ways against the Bolsheviks. But the Bolsheviks would never have succeeded in doing this had they not followed the correct tactics of combining illegal work with the utilisation of "legal opportunities", which they made a point of doing. In the elections to the arch-reactionary Duma, the Bolsheviks won the full support of the worker curia.

The First Imperialist World War (1914-17). Legal parliamentarianism’ with an extremely reactionary "parliament", rendered most useful service to the Bolsheviks, the party of the revolutionary proletariat. The Bolshevik deputies were exiled to Siberia. [3] All shades of social-imperialism social-chauvinism, social-patriotism, inconsistent and consistent internationalism, pacifism, and the revolutionary repudiation of pacifist illusions found full expression in the Russian emitter press. The learned fools and the old women of the Second International, who had arrogantly and contemptuously turned up their noses at the abundance of "factions" in the Russian socialist movement and at the bitter struggle they were waging among themselves, were unable—when the war deprived them of their vaunted "legality" in all the advanced countries -- to organise anything even approximating such a free (illegal) interchange of views and such a free (illegal) evolution of correct views as the Russian revolutionaries did in Switzerland and in a number of other countries. That was why both the avowed social-patriots and the "Kautskyites" of all countries proved to be the worst traitors to the proletariat. One of the principal reasons why Bolshevism was able to achieve victory in 1917-20 was that, since the end of 1914, it has been ruthlessly exposing the baseness and vileness of social-chauvinism and "Kautskyism" (to which Longuetism [4,5] in France, the views of the Fabians [6] and the leaders of the Independent Labour Party [7] in Britain, of Turati in Italy, etc., correspond), the masses later becoming more and more convinced, from their own experience, of the correctness of the Bolshevik views.

The second revolution in Russia (February to October 1917). Tsarism’s senility and obsoleteness had (with the aid of the blows and hardships of a most agonising war) created an incredibly destructive force directed against it. Within a few days Russia was transformed into a democratic bourgeois republic, freer—in war conditions—than any other country in the world. The leaders of the opposition and revolutionary parties began to set up a government, just as is done in the most "strictly parliamentary" republics; the fact that a man had been a leader of an opposition party in parliament—even in a most reactionary parliament—facilitated his subsequent role in the revolution.

In a few weeks the Mensheviks and Socialist-Revolutionaries thoroughly assimilated all the methods and manners, the arguments and sophistries of the European heroes of the Second International, of the ministerialists [8] and other opportunist riff-raff. Everything we now read about the Scheidemanns and Noskes, about Kautsky and Hilferding, Renner and Austerlitz, Otto Bauer and Fritz Adler, Turati and Longuet, about the Fabians and the leaders of the Independent Labour Party of Britain—all this seems to us (and indeed is) a dreary repetition, a reiteration, of an old and familiar refrain. We have already witnessed all this in the instance of the Mensheviks. As history would have it, the opportunists of a backward country became the forerunners of the opportunists in a number of advanced countries.

If the heroes of the Second International have all gone bankrupt and have disgraced themselves over the question of the significance and role of the Soviets and Soviet rule; if the leaders of the three very important parties which have now left the Second International (namely, the German Independent Social-Democratic Party, [9] the French Longuetists and the British Independent Labour Party) have disgraced themselves and become entangled in this question in a most "telling" fashion; if they have all shown themselves slaves to the prejudices of petty-bourgeois democracy (fully in the spirit of the petty-bourgeois of 1848 who called themselves "Social-Democrats")—then we can only say that we have already witnessed all this in the instance of the Mensheviks. As history would have it, the Soviets came into being in Russia in 1905; from February to October 1917 they were turned to a false use by the Mensheviks, who went bankrupt because of their inability to understand the role and significance of the Soviets, today the idea of Soviet power has emerged throughout the world and is spreading among the proletariat of all countries with extraordinary speed. Like our Mensheviks, the old heroes of the Second International are everywhere going bankrupt, because they are incapable of understanding the role and significance of the Soviets. Experience has proved that, on certain very important questions of the proletarian revolution, all countries will inevitably have to do what Russia has done.

Despite views that are today often to be met with in Europe and America, the Bolsheviks began their victorious struggle against the parliamentary and (in fact) bourgeois republic and against the Mensheviks in a very cautious manner, and the preparations they made for it were by no means simple. At the beginning of the period mentioned, we did not call for the overthrow of the government but explained that it was impossible to overthrow it without first changing the composition and the temper of the Soviets. We did not proclaim a boycott of the bourgeois parliament, the Constituent Assembly, but said—and following the April (1917) Conference of our Party began to state officially in the name of the Party—that a bourgeois republic with a Constituent Assembly would be better than a bourgeois republic without a Constituent Assembly, but that a "workers’ and peasants"’ republic, a Soviet republic, would be better than any bourgeois-democratic, parliamentary republic. Without such thorough, circumspect and long preparations, we could not have achieved victory in October 1917, or have consolidated that victory.

http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/wo...c/ch03.htm

but when it comes to bullshit like voting kerry over bush or expecting to change things primarily through reformism:

Quote:The problem with conformists will always be that when you try to change the system from within, it's not you who changes the system. It's the system that will eventually change you.

-immortal technique

[shakur420]

(01-03-2012 01:27 AM)Sean Wrote:  I'd say not voting is really taking part in democracy. You're voicing your opinion in a way.
"None of you are worth voting for" "I'm not happy with this system" etc.

Some non voters may be politically apathetic but perhaps the apathy is a reflection of disenfranchisement.

Totally agree. That's exactly what I'd tell the fucks who said "if you don't vote, don't complain". My choice not to vote is my vote. Now, I feel I should vote cause at least it might do something for a few people, but I still don't accept this argument at all. Voting for a face every few years is not being "politically active", lol. In fact, I'm sure that there are many people who are pretty active, politically, who don't vote. They organize fundraisers, charity drives, food banks, get involved in community meetings and stuff. Voting, especially in our systems, is like the least politically active thing you could do. It's like making Kraft Dinner and calling yourself a chef.

[High Nigga Pie]

Um Laz, how simple minded are you, no offense? Voting is the most miniscule of reformist actions. MLK was a reformist, so was Malcom X, so was Ghandi, so was Lennon, so was Roosevelt. There are probably many others I do not know/ can't remember. Very few revolutionary uprisings that did not reform/ educate, ended in success. Reformism isn't necessarily only fixing the system; it could also be used as a preparation to revolution. If your idea of reform is voting, then you need to reevaluate what reform means.

EDIT: Conformity is not reformism, its conformity.

[Notorious1994]

(01-03-2012 01:42 AM)The Stoned Raj Wrote:  

(01-03-2012 01:34 AM)Notorious1994 Wrote:  

(01-03-2012 01:29 AM)1871 Wrote:  I get it now Notorious - you are that grey man in the picture on your sig who is scratching his beard and thinking did that man on the stage shove that fucken sword up my asshole.

the fuck?

Again, not voting is not going to solve anything. It's not a step. It's not progress. It's not helping any cause or pushing solution. It is a non-solution to problems that if for some reason being pushed

This whole thing seriously makes no sense. You want educated, enlightened and enformed voters specifically not to vote or be politically involved?

That's the stupidest thing I've ever heard. Vote, and in the meantime try to make more people informed.

You keep assuming that voting=progress and that voting=being politically involved. Voting for either of those corporate parties is outright irresponsible and by voting for either of them you are showing you are not politically versed because you must have no concept of what they are intending for your class of people.

Your vote represents your choice. If you vote, you are saying that this person is the correct person to represent the people of the United States and worthy of being the president. To try and educate and inform people of the atrocities of this government while still voting in corporate parties perpetuating a corporate agenda is the worst hypocrisy.

This argument is pointless based on the fact that nobody gives a fuck if you vote. Ever since the 1960 voter turnout has been at a median of 50%, meaning half the people don't vote anyways. Now what you guys are doing is targeting the smart, informed voters and trying to convince them to drop their vote. You leave the vote to the misinformed and uneducated.

Do you think ANYONE gives a shit if only 30% votes? 25%? They aren't going to shut down the government just because of low turnout. All you've done is hand over the control of who gets into power to the ignorant instead of the informed.

Again, people need to fuck off with this "hypocritical vote" or "reformism" philosophical bullshit. It's nice to sit around in a circle and jerk off about why we don't like either parties, but that doesn't get shit done

Draw the line between political philosophy and progressive action.

[1871]

Lazarus. That was 100 years ago. And there was a civil war

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nestor_Makhno

[matt romney]

(01-03-2012 01:34 AM)Notorious1994 Wrote:  Again, not voting is not going to solve anything. It's not a step. It's not progress. It's not helping any cause or pushing any solution. It is a non-solution to problems that if for some reason being pushed

it will solve more then voting, which is only serving to perpetuate the myth of bourgeois help. it has a negative effect and erodes the rights, liberty, and welfare of the working class. however working with the unions, grassroots organizations, and protest movements for a class and revolutionary consciousness will be a step towards solving the crisis of capitalism. which i am currently doing at different levels and hope to increase.

[High Nigga Pie]

Voting is progressive action? I see. So jerking off is coitus now?

[matt romney]

(01-03-2012 01:53 AM)YaelTheGreat Wrote:  Um Laz, how simple minded are you, no offense? Voting is the most miniscule of reformist actions. MLK was a reformist, so was Malcom X, so was Ghandi, so was Lennon, so was Roosevelt. There are probably many others I do not know/ can't remember. Very few revolutionary uprisings that did not reform/ educate, ended in success. Reformism isn't necessarily only fixing the system; it could also be used as a preparation to revolution. If your idea of reform is voting, then you need to reevaluate what reform means.

EDIT: Conformity is not reformism, its conformity.

LOL. malcolm x was a fucking revolutionary. roosevelt was a bourgeois bastard, gandhi was a fool and supported class stratification, lennon was a better philosopher then political thinker (i do so love you), and MLK went socialist in his final days. and you obviously don't read what i post if you believe i'm saying all of reformism is incorrect.

---

fuck gandhi was a revolutionary too, as ironic as that is

[ClichéGuevara]

Vote every few years
Hope whoever you voted for will vote for policies that you agree with

How is this progressive?

[The Stoned Raj]

(01-03-2012 01:54 AM)Notorious1994 Wrote:  

(01-03-2012 01:42 AM)The Stoned Raj Wrote:  

(01-03-2012 01:34 AM)Notorious1994 Wrote:  

(01-03-2012 01:29 AM)1871 Wrote:  I get it now Notorious - you are that grey man in the picture on your sig who is scratching his beard and thinking wtf did that man on the stage shove that fucken sword up my asshole.

:-

the fuck?

Again, not voting is not going to solve anything. It's not a step. It's not progress. It's not helping any cause or pushing solution. It is a non-solution to problems that if for some reason being pushed

This whole thing seriously makes no sense. You want educated, enlightened and enformed voters specifically not to vote or be politically involved?

That's the stupidest thing I've ever heard. Vote, and in the meantime try to make more people informed.

You keep assuming that voting=progress and that voting=being politically involved. Voting for either of those corporate parties is outright irresponsible and by voting for either of them you are showing you are not politically versed because you must have no concept of what they are intending for your class of people.

Your vote represents your choice. If you vote, you are saying that this person is the correct person to represent the people of the United States and worthy of being the president. To try and educate and inform people of the atrocities of this government while still voting in corporate parties perpetuating a corporate agenda is the worst hypocrisy.

This argument is pointless based on the fact that nobody gives a fuck if you vote. Ever since the 1960 voter turnout has been at a median of 50%, meaning half the people don't vote anyways. Now what you guys are doing is targeting the smart, informed voters and trying to convince them to drop their vote. You leave the vote to the misinformed and uneducated.

Do you think ANYONE gives a shit if only 30% votes? 25%? They aren't going to shut down the government just because of low turnout. All you've done is hand over the control of who gets into power to the ignorant instead of the informed.

Again, people need to fuck off with this "hypocritical vote" or "reformism" philosophical bullshit. It's nice to sit around in a circle and jerk off about why we don't like either parties, but that doesn't get shit done

Draw the line between political philosophy and progressive action.

Exactly, your vote doesn't matter. It has no purpose, it is part of the sensation to make people feel involved in a system that does not give a fuck about their opinion. If you think voting is progressive action you are mistaken, because if it goes against the plans of corporate America, you're vote ends up in the same place as Floridian votes in 2000. If you wanna represent your ideals with a vote for some corporate pawn, like I said you can knock yourself but I'm not taking part in this bullshit game, and I'm not gonna advocate it.

[High Nigga Pie]

Yet Malcom and Ghandi did fucking nothing. MLK helped his fellow man. And I stopped reading what you say because it is not even in sentence form and because whenever you say reformism, you only talk about voting, there is nothing else for me to conclude.

[matt romney]

(01-03-2012 01:57 AM)1871 Wrote:  Lazarus. That was 100 years ago. And there was a civil war

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nestor_Makhno

i'm confused on your point. referencing history is great evidence and i'm saying that political parties were a platform for revolution.