Yes, so the working classes censoring the speech of liberals and fascists to prevent the restoration of bourgeois rule is absolutely in the rights of the working classes to do. A socialist state thetefore should be able to crack down on liberals and fascists, and not let their ideas fester freely.
“The censored press has a demoralizing effect. … The government hears only its own voice, it knows that it hears only its own voice, yet it harbors the illusion that it hears the voice of the people.” Karl Marx
You say it’s the “working classes” the ones censoring the speech, but you are falling into a “who watches the watchmen?” problem
Marx argued that the only way to truly defeat speech is to prove it wrong in the “light of day”
“If you do not believe in the victory of truth, you are committing a crime against truth.”
“Truth is as little modest as light… Truth is universal, it does not belong to me, it belongs to all; it owns me, I do not own it.”
Truth that requires a policeman to protect it from being challenged isn’t actually truth at all… but just some idealistic subjective point.
Again, you’re talking about Marx arguing for freedom of speech in the context of capitalist states censoring communists, and trying to apply it to socialist states censoring liberals and fascists. The “marketplace of ideas” is liberal bullshit, the one that controls the press controls which class’s point of view is espoused in society. Debate and critique happen all the time in socialist countries, just not in ways that platform liberals and fascists (and even then, sometimes that still does happen).
You’re treating Marx like a religious figure, trying to take a quote out of its necessary context and dogmatically applying it to circumstances that only arose after Marx died. Truth isn’t what “wins in debate,” it’s objective reality, and allowing the bourgeoisie as a class to dominate the press and make their point of view dominant from a misguided idea that this will “expose their flaws” shows that you’ve learned nothing from the real experience of a century of existing socialism.
Are you implying that Marx was not making general claims about the nature of truth and the state, but that instead he was being opportunistic, like a tactician only interested in defending objective truth under the particular context of the state being openly capitalistic?
Truth IS objective reality. Again, you are conflating idealist ideas of truth with material truth.
If a socialist theory is true and scientific, it should be able to dismantle a fascist argument in front of a crowd of workers. If you have to put the fascist in jail to stop the workers from believing him, you are admitting that your “truth” isn’t convincing enough to win on its own.
Marx was a scientific socialist, and developed dialectical materialism. One of the key advances of dialectical materialism, as opposed to vulgar materialism or metaphysical materialism, is that everything must be considered in its necessary context. In the context of the press and the state, Marx is advocating for the “free press” as it can only exist in the hands of the working classes, in other words as collectively owned. Marx is not arguing for everyone to be able to own the press, including capitalists and fascists, but instead the working classes.
What you are doing is erasing Marx’s class analysis from his arguments to argue for letting fascists own and run their own press and spread their ideas. The reasoning you claim to be doing so is because “truth will win in the argument,” but that’s not how debates work or are “won.” People already have their minds made up before debates happen, and are inclined to side with their percieved class interest. What you are advocating for is making it easier for fascists to organize and more difficult to stop that from happening.
The last century has proven the danger of not addressing the class nature of culture and the press. You’re using Marx as though he were a prophet and not a scientific socialist, and are throwing away his dialectical method in favor of metaphysics, in order to support fascists undermining socialism.
I think you are the one misinterpreting Marx’s context and rejecting scientific methods to truth. If you believed in the scientific method you should support open study of truth like scientific socialism does, with the will of scientifically testing the paradigm, instead of supporting the establishment of dogmatic truths through control and coercion.
Marx’s scientific socialism defends that the state -any state- is a ‘parasite’ on society (he even believed the phrase “Communist State” was a contradiction).
I agree with open study of truth, what I disagree with is giving fascists the tools to manipulate public opinion and undermine socialism.
Secondly, yes, communism is stateless. Socialism is not, though, socialism is the dictatorship of the proletariat over the bourgeoisie. This is where the proletariat strips the bourgeoisie of all political power using the state, so that class may be abolished through collectivization of all production and distribution. See Marx responding to Bakunin:
(Bakunin:) We have already stated our deep opposition to the theory of Lassalle and Marx, which recommends to the workers, if not as final ideal then at least as the next major aim — the foundation of a people’s state, which, as they have expressed it, will be none other than the proletariat organized as ruling class. The question arises, if the proletariat becomes the ruling class, over whom will it rule? It means that there will still remain another proletariat, which will be subject to this new domination, this new state.
(Marx:) It means that so long as the other classes, especially the capitalist class, still exists, so long as the proletariat struggles with it (for when it attains government power its enemies and the old organization of society have not yet vanished), it must employ forcible means, hence governmental means. It is itself still a class and the economic conditions from which the class struggle and the existence of classes derive have still not disappeared and must forcibly be either removed out of the way or transformed, this transformation process being forcibly hastened.
Socialism is not “big government,” nor is it antagonistic to the state. Socialism is the transition between capitalism and communism, when the proletariat has control of the state and uses forcible means to end class society. Socialism is a mode of production by which public ownership is the principal aspect of the economy and the working classes control the state, using it to oppress the former ruling classes and abolish class in general alongside collectivization of production and distribution.
What have you read of Marx that leads you to believe he supported free speech for fascists and was against the dictatorship of the proletariat? This is a deeply confused understanding of Marxism you have.
I agree with Marx there. But there is a massive difference between forcibly suppressing the economic power of the bourgeoisie (collectivizing their land) and suppressing the expression of ideas.
If you have already stripped the bourgeoisie of their factories and banks (or say… gone as far as to kill them), their “speech” loses its power. If a state is still terrified of “fascist manipulation” after the revolution, then the state hasn’t actually solved the material problems of the people.
A lot of socialists states failed because they were just a wolf in sheep’s clothing and didn’t actually solve the issues.
You can’t focus entirely on the base and utterly ignore the superstructure of society, otherwise you leave society open to reverting to capitalism and the disaster that becomes. Further, you cannot simply abolish class overnight, and the process of collectivization itself takes time, in both cases you must still employ forcible means to oppress the bourgeoisie while supporting proletarian science and culture.
Allowing fascist press does not weaken fascism, it strengthens it, and allows for manipulation that kicks off counter-revolution as was seen in history provoked by outlets like Radio Free Europe and Radio Free Asia (which you also linked). What this amounts to is you not taking fascism seriously at all.
Again, what have you read of Marx that leads you to believe these ideas that Marx would have supported fascist speech? Is it just that one article advocating for less censorship under capitalism, so that the working classes may more freely spread their ideas?
Yes, so the working classes censoring the speech of liberals and fascists to prevent the restoration of bourgeois rule is absolutely in the rights of the working classes to do. A socialist state thetefore should be able to crack down on liberals and fascists, and not let their ideas fester freely.
“The censored press has a demoralizing effect. … The government hears only its own voice, it knows that it hears only its own voice, yet it harbors the illusion that it hears the voice of the people.” Karl Marx
You say it’s the “working classes” the ones censoring the speech, but you are falling into a “who watches the watchmen?” problem
Marx argued that the only way to truly defeat speech is to prove it wrong in the “light of day”
“If you do not believe in the victory of truth, you are committing a crime against truth.”
“Truth is as little modest as light… Truth is universal, it does not belong to me, it belongs to all; it owns me, I do not own it.”
Truth that requires a policeman to protect it from being challenged isn’t actually truth at all… but just some idealistic subjective point.
Again, you’re talking about Marx arguing for freedom of speech in the context of capitalist states censoring communists, and trying to apply it to socialist states censoring liberals and fascists. The “marketplace of ideas” is liberal bullshit, the one that controls the press controls which class’s point of view is espoused in society. Debate and critique happen all the time in socialist countries, just not in ways that platform liberals and fascists (and even then, sometimes that still does happen).
You’re treating Marx like a religious figure, trying to take a quote out of its necessary context and dogmatically applying it to circumstances that only arose after Marx died. Truth isn’t what “wins in debate,” it’s objective reality, and allowing the bourgeoisie as a class to dominate the press and make their point of view dominant from a misguided idea that this will “expose their flaws” shows that you’ve learned nothing from the real experience of a century of existing socialism.
Are you implying that Marx was not making general claims about the nature of truth and the state, but that instead he was being opportunistic, like a tactician only interested in defending objective truth under the particular context of the state being openly capitalistic?
Truth IS objective reality. Again, you are conflating idealist ideas of truth with material truth.
If a socialist theory is true and scientific, it should be able to dismantle a fascist argument in front of a crowd of workers. If you have to put the fascist in jail to stop the workers from believing him, you are admitting that your “truth” isn’t convincing enough to win on its own.
Marx was a scientific socialist, and developed dialectical materialism. One of the key advances of dialectical materialism, as opposed to vulgar materialism or metaphysical materialism, is that everything must be considered in its necessary context. In the context of the press and the state, Marx is advocating for the “free press” as it can only exist in the hands of the working classes, in other words as collectively owned. Marx is not arguing for everyone to be able to own the press, including capitalists and fascists, but instead the working classes.
What you are doing is erasing Marx’s class analysis from his arguments to argue for letting fascists own and run their own press and spread their ideas. The reasoning you claim to be doing so is because “truth will win in the argument,” but that’s not how debates work or are “won.” People already have their minds made up before debates happen, and are inclined to side with their percieved class interest. What you are advocating for is making it easier for fascists to organize and more difficult to stop that from happening.
The last century has proven the danger of not addressing the class nature of culture and the press. You’re using Marx as though he were a prophet and not a scientific socialist, and are throwing away his dialectical method in favor of metaphysics, in order to support fascists undermining socialism.
I think you are the one misinterpreting Marx’s context and rejecting scientific methods to truth. If you believed in the scientific method you should support open study of truth like scientific socialism does, with the will of scientifically testing the paradigm, instead of supporting the establishment of dogmatic truths through control and coercion.
Marx’s scientific socialism defends that the state -any state- is a ‘parasite’ on society (he even believed the phrase “Communist State” was a contradiction).
I agree with open study of truth, what I disagree with is giving fascists the tools to manipulate public opinion and undermine socialism.
Secondly, yes, communism is stateless. Socialism is not, though, socialism is the dictatorship of the proletariat over the bourgeoisie. This is where the proletariat strips the bourgeoisie of all political power using the state, so that class may be abolished through collectivization of all production and distribution. See Marx responding to Bakunin:
Socialism is not “big government,” nor is it antagonistic to the state. Socialism is the transition between capitalism and communism, when the proletariat has control of the state and uses forcible means to end class society. Socialism is a mode of production by which public ownership is the principal aspect of the economy and the working classes control the state, using it to oppress the former ruling classes and abolish class in general alongside collectivization of production and distribution.
What have you read of Marx that leads you to believe he supported free speech for fascists and was against the dictatorship of the proletariat? This is a deeply confused understanding of Marxism you have.
I agree with Marx there. But there is a massive difference between forcibly suppressing the economic power of the bourgeoisie (collectivizing their land) and suppressing the expression of ideas.
If you have already stripped the bourgeoisie of their factories and banks (or say… gone as far as to kill them), their “speech” loses its power. If a state is still terrified of “fascist manipulation” after the revolution, then the state hasn’t actually solved the material problems of the people.
A lot of socialists states failed because they were just a wolf in sheep’s clothing and didn’t actually solve the issues.
You can’t focus entirely on the base and utterly ignore the superstructure of society, otherwise you leave society open to reverting to capitalism and the disaster that becomes. Further, you cannot simply abolish class overnight, and the process of collectivization itself takes time, in both cases you must still employ forcible means to oppress the bourgeoisie while supporting proletarian science and culture.
Allowing fascist press does not weaken fascism, it strengthens it, and allows for manipulation that kicks off counter-revolution as was seen in history provoked by outlets like Radio Free Europe and Radio Free Asia (which you also linked). What this amounts to is you not taking fascism seriously at all.
Again, what have you read of Marx that leads you to believe these ideas that Marx would have supported fascist speech? Is it just that one article advocating for less censorship under capitalism, so that the working classes may more freely spread their ideas?