this post was submitted on 21 Dec 2024
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what exactly do you expect a vanguard party structure to do? this isn't the Duma and the amerikkkan electorate is certainly much more ideologically fascist than early 20th century russian peasants and the thin strata of proletarians that existed at the time. the basic leninist position on electoralism is that it's a good opportunity for agitprop and trying to get as much power as you can under the existing structures. i didn't say they have "zero intention" of winning, i said they weren't deluded enough to think that it was a possibility and therefore it must be part of a different strategy. i'm not a psl member, but i don't think they're as politically unsavvy as the lib jill stein greens.
also arguably having zero intention of winning in favor of agitprop is the primary current function of the democratic party and it's arguably been very effective at helping sideline and limit critical voices against the status quo. it's certainly the basis under which they collect donations. you can say you don't agree with the strategy, that you think there's some other better way that a marxist-leninist vanguard might attempt agitprop from withing the us amerikkkan political structure that doesn't involve running political campaigns for public office, but that's different than writing off the strategy entirely without reason and implying that they're grifting donators. like what do you think a psl donator is thinking exactly? "if all of us do this then they can win?"
edit: for the record, i think jabril has been making good points in this thread that are critical of psl. i also am generally of the mindset that they'd probably be better off attempting to actually organize workers locally.
If the purpose of the campaign is essentially just an advertisement then they could literally just spend money on targeted ads. At least that would be honest.
The American electorate primarily does not vote. And if it is ideologically anything it is incoherent.
The money they waste on the campaign would be much better spent setting up chapters in rural areas so there is a real option to the hegemonic chudness. It's also way easier to win elections when the electorate size in any race is in the hundreds not hundreds of thousands.
i can't say i really disagree with you, although i don't think campaigning is an inherently dishonest means of agitprop. i would like to again reiterate that the bolsheviks ran for and attained office to further their revolutionary goals while not planning on maintaining the existing political structures or using them to directly effectuate a coup. i am not saying that the psl is the same as, similar to, as competent as, etc. etc. as the bolsheviks; i am not comparing them in detail. i just don't think the bolsheviks were not being honest by running for seats in the Duma while planning its destruction.
that said, i am not in psl, i don't probably want to be, and therefore i have absolutely no data on what tactics might be more or less effective for them to pursue. i am not particularly convinced that it makes sense for a vanguard party to succeed in amerikkka because of the vast difference in material conditions between the dying russian empire of the early 20th century and 21st century us empire. i mostly agree with the take especially that none of the electioneering can matter if they aren't doing a very good job actually reaching workers, as jabril contends in this thread.
mostly, i just do not think the assertion without argument that donating to them if they know they won't win makes them dishonest, or without data that it is necessarily ineffective. we must make our arguments with data and without prejudice. thought-terminating cliches benefit no comrades.
Campaigning with the express intent to not win is dishonest. It is literally the exact opposite of the purpose of a campaign.
I would join tomorrow if they actually focused on local elections. And I don't mean congressional elections, at least at first, they have to start small. And not just California, or at least not in LA or SF.
I agree, but they were explicit in their intentions and they could actually reach people. We also don't have a parliamentary system, the dynamics are just not the same.
I also agree. Let's just say if their membership was something to brag about, they would.
the only, and i do mean only, issue i really have with any of the criticisms you're making is this. i don't think it makes sense to say that they have "the express intent not to win." that isn't equivalent to a realist attitude towards elections for amerikkkan third party candidates. no one but Ds and Rs are going to win national elections. to be clear: i am not commenting one way or the other on whether their strategy is appropriate or effective. it just seems to me that this is a backwards way of saying "all third party candidates are inherently dishonest." which honestly, i think there's probably a compelling argument for that position. however, i don't think it's a productive means of criticizing psl to not make that argument outright. is every donation to a third party candidate with low polling a scam initiated by the campaigner? probably, but if so we should argue that to people when making the case against a vanguard party refusing to start local instead of saying that they're doing scams because they're trying to lose.
Fair. But I don't think being dishonest about the purpose of the campaign (and really only by omission since most people would only hear that they are running, not the intent behind it) is inherently a scam. It's just a bad look. I think people look at successes in Europe and think they can just do the same things here and expect similar results. But the political structure here just doesn't allow those kind of serious 'third parties' challenges.
Obviously this isn't like an official PSL board or something but the last time there was a big thread about their campaign (that I noticed) I got huge push back for suggesting they run local candidates instead and not make a point of focusing on foreign policy positions for like school board campaigns and whatnot. Though this thread is more critical of the campaign than that one.