#blackshirts and reds

[communistkenobi]

reading blackshirts and reds. 1) having a great time 2) I remember Toscano in Late Fascism gives a bunch of definitions of fascism and one of them was that fascism is bourgeois class consciousness. applying that label to fascism seems to be pretty productive while reading Parenti

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

Painting by Lesley Oldaker.

* * * *

All conservative ideologies justify existing inequities as the natural order of things, inevitable outcomes of human nature. If the very rich are naturally so much more capable than the rest of us, why must they be provided with so many artificial privileges under the law, so many bailouts, subsidies and other special considerations - at our expense? Their "naturally superior talents" include unprincipled and illegal subterfuge such as price-fixing, stock manipulation, insider training, fraud, tax evasion, the legal enforcement of unfair competition, ecological spoliation, harmful products and unsafe work conditions. One might expect naturally superior people not to act in such rapacious and venal ways. Differences in talent and capacity as might exist between individuals do not excuse the crimes and injustices that are endemic to the corporate business system. 

~Michael Parenti (Book: Blackshirts and Reds)

[Philo Thoughts]

[ddarker-dreams]

Hi, do you have an updated masterlist? I am new here and I came from your Yandere Aventurine fic that is soo good! But I noticed that fic is not in your masterlist, so I am wondering if I missed any other HSR fics as well.

Thanks!

ANONNN i'm so sorry 😭 i haven't updated my masterlist in ages. however! i'm taking off work all of next week, so i'll have precious free time at long last 😌 i intend on fixing my masterlist up/doing as much writing as i can then! i've longed to be a hermit ever since my hermit privileges were rescinded. i'll be in my natural habitat shortly.

[khizuo]

best thing about marxist literature is how everyone loves tearing into people they think are wrong lol. the great tradition begun by marx himself

[sexuallyactivepopes]

but seriously all you’re doing when you use the term “tankie” unironically is showing that you get all of your info about “leftism” from the likes of vaush/breadtube and have never bothered to actually open a book and read theory in your life and you should be embarrassed of yourself lmao

[aspensmonster]

In the United States, for over a hundred years, the ruling interests tirelessly propagated anticommunism among the populace, until it became more like a religious orthodoxy than a political analysis. During the Cold War, the anticommunist ideological framework could transform any data about existing communist societies into hostile evidence. If the Soviets refused to negotiate a point, they were intransigent and belligerent; if they appeared willing to make concessions, this was but a skillful ploy to put us off our guard. By opposing arms limitations, they would have demonstrated their aggressive intent; but when in fact they supported most armament treaties, it was because they were mendacious and manipulative. If the churches in the USSR were empty, this demonstrated that religion was suppressed; but if the churches were full, this meant the people were rejecting the regime’s atheistic ideology. If the workers went on strike (as happened on infrequent occasions), this was evidence of their alienation from the collectivist system; if they didn’t go on strike, this was because they were intimidated and lacked freedom. A scarcity of consumer goods demonstrated the failure of the economic system; an improvement in consumer supplies meant only that the leaders were attempting to placate a restive population and so maintain a firmer hold over them. If communists in the United States played an important role struggling for the rights of workers, the poor, African-Americans, women, and others, this was only their guileful way of gathering support among disfranchised groups and gaining power for themselves. How one gained power by fighting for the rights of powerless groups was never explained. What we are dealing with is a nonfalsifiable orthodoxy, so assiduously marketed by the ruling interests that it affected people across the entire political spectrum.

– Michael Parenti, Blackshirts And Reds

every western 'china watcher' should be forced to get a more useful job like birthday clown or kindle erotica writer or living statue or something

[stop-entropy-lie-down]

every time you admit biden has done something bad you end the sentence with 'but...' . you are very quick to insult and bemoan the existence and actions of donald trump but defend biden every time i bring up the genocide. is it perhaps because you think the democrats are The Goodies and will forgive anything they do. perhaps it is because the lives of foreigners are less valuable to you. or i should say, non-whites, as we are in england.

[neil-gaiman]

hi! i hope you’re having a good night! i was wondering what the significance of crowleys blue shirt and red tie in the 1941 flashbacks mean? they usually wear all black, so i was just wondering if it meant something :)

It meant that Crowley was not going to let anyone mistake him for a Blackshirt during WW2.

[pissplasmicpantom]

while fascism easily produces justifications for colonialist & imperialist violence, & fascist states in history have engaged in such violence before, it is not the originator of colonialist or imperialist violence, nor is it the only ideology capable of justifying the deployment of colonialist or imperialist violence

if u wanna critique the usa for the violence its built upon, u need to acknowledge that that violence was wrought in the pursuit of life, liberty, and property; u also need to acknowledge the historical relationship between liberalism & fascism, where fascist groups run a final defense for the nation's capital against encroaching socialist movements (michael parenti's blackshirts & reds digs into this if u wanna learn more)

to call any state that has done massacres as simply "fascist" is to water down the utility of it as a meaningful descriptor of an ideology, & gives leeway to other ideologies that have had genocides & ethnic cleansing done under their banner; genocides & ethnic cleansing done throughout the world & for several centuries even, in the case of liberalism

[hermetichermethermes]

So apparently this is about the world cup or something but I deadass thought it was a rather funny meme about Fascist states and imperialism from world war 2

[communistkenobi]

its so awesome when they just come right out and say it

[mesetacadre]

hi, i hope you dont mind me asking this question! i often come across lists of reading recommendations for communists, and they are usually focused entirely on communist theory. which is important and im already on that, but i wonder if you also have recs for learning about history? especially the history of the soviet union, but also other past and present socialist states. i sometimes find myself reading theory and understanding the concepts in a vacuum, but with very little understanding of the historical context they were written in, if that makes any sense. and id like to get a basic grasp of the history of various socialist projects that isnt just the typical western "the ussr was evil!!!!" thing

Hi, historical context is indeed very important for works of theory, especially if it's more than a hundred years old. Lenin's What is to be Done, for example, is very conditioned by its historical context of Russia still being predominantly feudal, with only a timid appearance of the proletariat in St. Petersburg and Moscow, and therefore the very first trade unions, which he talks about. The understanding of these texts is amplified, and quite often enabled by knowing at least the basic historical context. Below I'll list the historical works I've read (and others) with some commentary, but I encourage anyone who has something to add to do so, since I am as of only recently getting more into historiography.

Anything by Anna Louise Strong (I've read The Soviets Expected it (1941) and In North Korea (1941), there's also The New Lithuania (1941), The Stalin Era (1956) and When Serfs Stood Up in Tibet (1959) for example). Her works, which I'd consider primary sources since they are written from her own experience witnessing events and talking to a lot of people, are extremely useful if you wish to form an idea about how some aspects of socialist states worked. The limitation of her works also resides in this specificity and closeness, these are not works that present a broad view of long processes, but a slice of the present with the sufficient historical context. They are still very, very good.

The Open Veins of Latin America (Spanish versrion), by Eduardo Galeno (1971). This one is focused on the history of imperialism in Latin America, how it evolved from the moment the first Spanish foot touched ground to the time it was written in (It talks about Allende before he was assassinated but after achieving power, for example). Perhaps it's not exactly what you're looking for, but it contains very important general context for any social movement that has happened since 1492 to 1971

The Triumph of Evil, by Austin Murphy (2002). I have mixed feelings about this book. While it insists on this weird narrative of absolute evil, which IMO takes away a lot of value from the overall points made, it is an astonishingly in-depth analysis of the economic performance and general merit of socialist systems against their capitalist counterparts. Most of the book is dedicated to comparing the GDR to the FRG, and both the economic and social data it exposes was very eye-opening to me when I read it about 2 years ago. If you can wade through the moralism (especially the beginning of the introduction), it's a gem. I've posted pictures of its very detailed index under the cut :)

Blackshirts and Reds, Michael Parenti (1997). Despite the very real criticisms levied against this book, like its mischaracterization of China, it is still a landmark work. Synthetically, it exposes the relationship between fascism, capitalism and communism.

Red Star Over the Third World, Vijay Prashad (2019); The Russian Revolution: A View from the Third World, Walter Rodney (2018). I'm lumping these two together (full disclosure, as of writing I'm about four fifths of the way through RSOtTW) because they deal with the same topic, Prashad being influenced by Rodney as well. Like both titles imply, they deal with the effects the October revolution had on the exploited peoples of the world, which is a perspective that's often lost. Through this, they (at least Prashad) also talk about the early USSR and how it functioned. For example, up until reading Red Star, I hadn't even heard of the 1920 Congress of The Toilers of the East in Baku, or the Congress of the Women of the East.

From here on I'll link works that I haven't (yet) read, but I have seen enough trusted people talk about them to include them

How to Cast a God into Hell: The Khrushchev Report, by Domenico Losurdo (2008). This one talks about how the period of Stalin was twisted and exaggerated through destalinization.

Devils in Amber, by Philips Bonoski (1992). This is about the Baltics and their historical trajectory from before WW1 to the destruction of the USSR (I'm not very sure on those two limits, perhaps they fluctuate a bit, but it definitely covers from WW1 to the 60s)

Socialism Betrayed, by Roger Keeran and Thomas Kenny (2004). This one deals with the process leading up to and the destruction of the USSR itself.

The Jakarta Method, Vincent Bevins (2020). This is about the methods the US used in the second half of the 20th century to stamp out, prevent, or otherwise sabotage communist movements and other democratic anti-imperialist movements.

I know some of these aren't specifically about socialist states, which is what you asked, but the history of its opposition is just as important to understand because it always exists as a condition to these countries' development and policies chosen.

[stillnaomi]

Left anticommunists find any association with communist organizations morally unacceptable becauseof the “crimes of communism.” Yet many of them are themselves associated with the Democratic party in this country, either as voters or as members, apparently unconcerned about the morally unacceptable political crimes committed by leaders of that organization. Under one or another Democratic administration, 120,000 Japanese Americans were torn from their homes and livelihoods and thrown into detention camps; atomic bombs were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki with an enormous loss of innocent life; the FBI was given authority to infiltrate political groups; the Smith Act was used to imprison leaders of the Trotskyist Socialist Workers Party and later on leaders of the Communist party for their political beliefs; detention camps were established to round up political dissidents in the event of a “national emergency”; during the late 1940s and 1950s, eight thousand federal workers were purged from government because of their political associations and views, with thousands more in allwalks of life witchhunted out of their careers; the Neutrality Act was used to impose an embargo on the Spanish Republic that worked in favor of Franco’s fascist legions; homicidal counterinsurgency programs were initiated in various Third World countries; and the Vietnam War was pursued and escalated. And for the better part of a century, the Congressional leadership of the Democratic party protected racial segregation and stymied all antilynching and fair employment bills. Yet all these crimes, bringing ruination and death to many, have not moved the liberals, the social democrats, and the “democratic socialist” anticommunists to insist repeatedly that we issue blanket condemnations of either the Democratic party or the political system that produced it, certainly not with the intolerant fervor that has been directed against existing communism.

Blackshirts and Reds by Michael Parenti

[txttletale]

i realize that my last post might be a bit overwhelming and doesn't give a starting point, so here's a truncated version of the highlights in a vaguely recommended reading order:

friedrich engels, principles of commmunism

karl marx, wage labour & capital

friedrich engels, socialism: utopian & scientific

rosa luxemburg, reform or revolution?

vincent bevins, the jakarta method

v.i. lenin, the state & revolution

v.i. lenin, what is to be done?

walter rodney, the russian revolution: a view from the third world

michael parenti, blackshirts and reds

v.i lenin, imperialism: the highest stage of capitalism

eduardo galeano, the open veins of latin america

walter rodney, how europe underdeveloped africa

frantz fanon, the wretched of the earth

kwame nkrumah, neocolonialism: the last stage of imperialism

zak cope, the wealth of (some) nations

karl marx, the german ideology

edward herman and noam chomsky, manufacturing consent

elaine scarry, the body in pain

michel foucault, discipline and punish

ed. stuart hall, representation: cultural representations and signifying pratices

christian fuchs, theorizing digital labour

[determinate-negation]

Hi! sorry to bother you but I would like to understand the links between liberal democracy, capitalism, and fascism and was wondering if you could talk about it more or suggest some readings around it, thank you so much.

blackshirts and reds by michael parenti is probably the best introduction to some of these concepts imo, its not the most historically detailed tho. libgen link here

palmiro togliatti's lectures on fascism are about the role of the liberal parliamentary system in setting the grounds for fascism in italy, it also has some lectures on characteristics of fascist propaganda and tactics

this is a bit of a tome and i havent read the whole thing although im familiar with the argument, but the weimar republic: the crisis of classical modernity by detlev peukurt illustrates some of the contradictions in liberal democracy and modernity that lead towards fascism. herbert marcuse's essays on technology war and fascism are also pretty good

and not to self promote but i posted some essays i wrote on italian fascism and its relation to capitalist markets and commodities, and fascisms relation to imperialist economic policy. the references in my bibliography might be useful

also gonna link @estrellasrojas essay from a while back on fascism

[contemplatingoutlander]

Is It Fascism? A Leading Historian Changes His Mind.

Robert Paxton thought the label was overused. But now he’s alarmed by what he sees in global politics — including Trumpism.

When the foremost historian on fascism, Robert Paxton, who has been reluctant in the past to apply that label to Trump, finally admits that Trump IS a fascist it's time to pay attention.

This is a gift🎁link so you can read the entire article. Below are some excerpts.

Jan. 6 proved to be a turning point. For an American historian of 20th-century Europe, it was hard not to see in the insurrection echoes of Mussolini’s Blackshirts, who marched on Rome in 1922 and took over the capital, or of the violent riot at the French Parliament in 1934 by veterans and far-right groups who sought to disrupt the swearing in of a new left-wing government. But the analogies were less important than what Paxton regarded as a transformation of Trumpism itself. “The turn to violence was so explicit and so overt and so intentional, that you had to change what you said about it,” Paxton told me. “It just seemed to me that a new language was necessary, because a new thing was happening.” When an editor at Newsweek reached out to Paxton, he decided to publicly declare a change of mind. In a column that appeared online on Jan. 11, 2021, Paxton wrote that the invasion of the Capitol “removes my objection to the fascist label.” Trump’s “open encouragement of civic violence to overturn an election crosses a red line,” he went on. “The label now seems not just acceptable but necessary.” [...] This summer I asked Paxton if, nearly four years later, he stood by his pronouncement. Cautious but forthright, he told me that he doesn’t believe using the word is politically helpful in any way, but he confirmed the diagnosis. “It’s bubbling up from below in very worrisome ways, and that’s very much like the original fascisms,” Paxton said. “It’s the real thing. It really is.” [emphasis added]

Remember, fascism typically involves a cult of personality. Hitler was wildly popular with ordinary Germans.

It's no coincidence that Trump is so obsessed with the numbers at his rallies.