cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ml/post/43729189
Stolen from r/marxism_memes
1936: The Rights the U.S. Still Won't Guarantee - Lady Izdihar (3 min 51 sex)
Constitution of the Soviet Union - 8th All-Union Congress of Soviets
This Soviet World / (Audiobook) - Anna Louise Strong (1936)

36 Comments
kittenzrulz123@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 22 pts · 170d
The funniest part is despite being deified and the US constitution immortalized they didn't except nor plan for it to last even a century, it was literally made by a bunch of inexperienced people who expected it to be replaced.
goferking0@lemmy.sdf.org · 20 pts · 170d
Founders
Conservatives and Supreme Court
deltaspawn0040@lemmy.zip · 11 pts · 170d
Even funnier, both of these viewpoints are losers. The Constitution is so difficult to amend that many of the most dramatic developments were simply the supreme Court deciding that some part of it should actually mean something else.
For example, it states that the federal government has authority over, specifically, inter-state commerce. This was never changed or amended. The reason the federal government has authority over ALL commerce now is because the supreme Court simply decided that all commerce has inter-state ramifications, and thus is basically inter-state commerce.
These fuckers can literally just say the constitution says whatever they want and they've done that so much over the last 240 or so years that one cannot read it and understand what the law actually is. Certain parts simply don't apply anymore, or mean something different, or are said to "imply" other parts that don't technically exist, but the supreme Court said they basically do. The legislature can technically amend the Constitution, but that's a bitch to do. And what the fuck does it matter when these 9 people, more than half of them very bribable, get to say the document means whatever they feel like it means, even if their reasoning is "the constitution is very correct and smart, so obviously it says things that are correct and smart. The correct and smart thing would be for it to include this policy, so it probably does."
HasturInYellow@lemmy.world · 5 pts · 169d
Where have I seen this before.... Oh right! The Bible!
kittenzrulz123@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 5 pts · 170d
Not only that many of the founders outright said that it should be completely replaced one a generation, Thomas Jefferson famously said
"I set out on this ground, which I suppose to be self-evident, 'that the earth belongs in usufruct to the living'; that the dead have neither powers nor rights over it... On similar ground it may be proved that no society can make a perpetual constitution, or even a perpetual law... Every constitution, then, and every law, naturally expires at the end of 19 years. If it be enforced longer, it is an act of force and not of right."
Quill7513@slrpnk.net · 7 pts · 169d
Jefferson is the wooorst. out here trying to make sure Haiti stays enslaved
kittenzrulz123@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 4 pts · 169d
Oh sure I don't want to imply by any means he was a good person
Cowbee@lemmy.ml · 5 pts · 170d
And yet it became ossified, seen as almost holy and static by capitalist ideologues, as though history is made by supposed "great men." That's the utility in idealism and metaphysics, and why dialectical materialism is so dangerous to the ruling class.
kittenzrulz123@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 5 pts · 170d
I personally like Luna Ois videos on dialectical materialism and historical materialism (like this one)
Cowbee@lemmy.ml · 1 pts · 170d
Yep, those are great! I have both of her books. I just wrote something simple to refer back to for personal use.
ProdigalFrog@slrpnk.net · 9 pts · 169d
Super weird that the Krondstadt sailors weren't able to make it to those meetings. You'd think they'd want to have their voices heard in something so important? đ¤
seawoowaes@lemmy.world · 0 pts · 169d
Ok tankie go read Desert and stop living in the past. You might be safe in your garden euro but the global south isn't and they overwhelmingly choose socialism. Don't even mention EZLN they are NOT anarchist. You are over there linking the fucking fed mastodon instance that gave user info to the FBI what an absolute joke
Cowbee@lemmy.ml · -4 pts · 169d
Even if the ideals of the rebellion were founded in good intentions by the sailors, fighting against the newborn Socialist State played into counter-revolutionary hands and aided the fascist White Army in the middle of a brutal civil war. The sailors placed their own interests over the broader soviet people. It was also led by Petrichenko, who one year prior tried to join the White Army, and joined the White Army after the rebellion failed and the sailors turned on the rebellion. In addition, 2 former capitalists were included in the council leading the rebellion, and they arrested 300 communists in their mutiny.
Had it been a time of peace with no internal or external pressure and the same measures employed, my feelings would be different on the matter, but the facts are that the stated aims and the methods employed by the rebels were at direct contradiction in the middle of a civil war.
Itâs not like Lenin hated Anarchists especially, Kropotkin was given a large State funeral and the largest rail station, Kropotkinskaya, was named after him. The Kronstadt Rebellion also factored in the transition between War Communism into the NEP.
Kronstadt, in the context of a bloody and brutal civil war against a dozen invading capitalist nations and a strong Tsarist white army, their demands were suicide for the socialists:
They wanted the bolsheviks to be stopped, and tie their hands and let the Tsarists and capitalists win. This was absolutely suicidal.
They wanted the bolsheviks disbanded, and replaced by SRs, mensheviks, anarchists, etc. The soviets were there, they just didn't like how they were made up. Further, the sailors that returned to the soviets were quite literally allowed to go to those meetings in 1936.
ProdigalFrog@slrpnk.net · 7 pts · 169d
Yeah, for sure, totally.
Cowbee@lemmy.ml · -3 pts · 169d
Are you being serious with this response? The Kronstadt sailors didn't want more worker control, they were unhappy that the bolsheviks had majority support and sought to eliminate the ability to elect bolsheviks in the soviets. In other words, they were upset at the rest od the working classes for rallying behind the bolsheviks. They also sought to, as I quoted, abolish all communist fighting detachments and cordons. This would have led to an immediate loss of the civil war to the White Army. I thought you sought the "objective truth about anything and everything," not "whatever conforms to my existing biases."
As for Lenin and anarchists, he disagreed with them vehemontly, see Theses on Anarchism, but at the same time he praised "red anarchists" that fought alongside the red army and even joined it. He also respected Kropotkin, even meeting with him during the revolution. They disagreed, but Kropotkin ultimately hesitantly and critically supported the revolution as it was, though not what he wanted, still the siezure of worker power from the Tsar.
Also, Kropotkinskaya.
ProdigalFrog@slrpnk.net · 7 pts · 169d
He liked the people who were subservient to his goals and chill with state authoritarianism? who knew. Wonder what happened to all those non-red Anarchists he didn't like?
Cowbee@lemmy.ml · -6 pts · 169d
The majority of the anarchists sided with the socialists over the Tsarists. Major figures like Kropotkin were protected even after the revolution. Anarchists were not hunted systematically, the ones that took up arms against the rest of the working classes were met with force, as is natural in a civil war.
ProdigalFrog@slrpnk.net · 6 pts · 169d
Good thing you're here to set everyone straight on how awesome the USSR was, especially toward Anarchists, which is super duper cool of them.
Cowbee@lemmy.ml · 0 pts · 169d
Are you allergic to addressing the points I make, by any chance? Fighting between anarchists and socialists absolutely did happen, but this wasn't a blanket order to terrorize anarchists in particular. The bolsheviks ideologically struggled against anarchism, which itself was not as popular as Marxism in Russia (the opposite of the layer Spanish civil war, where anarchism was dominant). Anarchists by and large accepted socialism, with some deciding to go against the socialists and take up arms, which was definitely met with force.
HailSeitan@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 169d
If theyâre opposed to free elections and secret ballotsâas you yourself point outâmaybe they donât in fact represent the will of the people?
Cowbee@lemmy.ml · -3 pts · 169d
The soviets did have secret ballots, and candidates were chosen by consensus building and approval voting. Soviet Democracy by Pat Sloan is a great book to describe in detail the system the soviets used for democracy.
HailSeitan@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 169d
Then whatâs the problem with item 1 above?
Cowbee@lemmy.ml · -2 pts · 169d
The fact that they wanted to make it so that the bolsheviks could not be voted for, and then immediately elect non-bolsheviks.
HailSeitan@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 169d
Thatâs not what item 1 says
Cowbee@lemmy.ml · -1 pts · 169d
Correct, item 1 does not exist in a vacuum. The other items were largely about cutting the bolsheviks out of the red army and soviets, dissolving the bolsheviks as a political entity.
BananaIsABerry@lemmy.zip · 1 pts · 169d
For the record, one of these things still exist.
(hint, it's the stupid pictured one)
presoak@lazysoci.al · -2 pts · 169d
The best way to parse that 42000 submissions is with an LLM