version
Well-known member
What is?
Do we really want out?
K-Punks criticisms are false.
john eden
male pale and stale
It depends on how you think class consciousness develops, really. The evangelical model is that you stand on a street corner and bellow at people with a megaphone and they hear what you say and become communists. Or you do this through publishing or whatever.
Actually that doesn't really do it though. Class consciousness develops through class struggle, through building power in our workplaces and communities. Unfortunately we live in a time where that mainly isn't happening, where there have been successive defeats.
Which I said upthread.
version
Well-known member
What do you two think of Byung-Chul Han's thing about "auto-exploitation" hampering class consciousness under neoliberalism?
"As an entrepreneur of the self, the achievement-subject is free insofar as he or she is not subjugated to a commanding and exploiting Other. However, the subject is still not really free because he or she now engages in self-exploitation and does so of his or her own free will. The exploiter is the exploited. The achievement-subject is perpetrator and victim in one. Auto-exploitation proves much more efficient than allo-exploitation because it is accompanied by a feeling of liberty. This makes possible exploitation without domination."
"As an entrepreneur of the self, the achievement-subject is free insofar as he or she is not subjugated to a commanding and exploiting Other. However, the subject is still not really free because he or she now engages in self-exploitation and does so of his or her own free will. The exploiter is the exploited. The achievement-subject is perpetrator and victim in one. Auto-exploitation proves much more efficient than allo-exploitation because it is accompanied by a feeling of liberty. This makes possible exploitation without domination."
Agreed but he was smart enough to leave behind Zizek's style of provocateur sit on the couch with the psychoanalyst therapy. Something in Zizek - I guess the idea that as part of an intellectual vanguard he could exalt or criticise the proles (depending on his mood at the time) don't forget his near racist dismissal of modern hip hop!
Load of bollocks, self-employment existed prior to neoliberalism, globally on a much bigger scale. But I don't have time to get into it here. Remember that the proletariat springs out of the conversion of artisans into workers with a lack of means of production.
version
Well-known member
Is anything of Zizek's worth reading, in your opinion?
version
Well-known member
There was greater class consciousness prior to neoliberalism too though, wasn't there?
john eden
male pale and stale
Yeah it's not new. Self-employment obscures a bunch of different modes of employment as well. For example the supposed self-employment of Uber drivers was shown to be a complete sham. Whereas management consultants are by definition self-employed but their working situation is so different you can hardly group them under the same banner.
The hd where I catalogged the zizek books I read is at home in England. Worth reading? yeah for the shitposting troll aspect, sure. politically? Absolutely nothing at all.
Well you've answered why would anyone be a communist today haven't you? This very topic is debated amongst left communists. My answer is yes and no.
E.G:
libcom.org
N.B: I don't fully agree with this article. but these debates are occurring and have been for 50 years+.
Unions against revolution - G. Munis
A critique of trade and syndicalist unions from a communist perspective by G. Munis.
N.B: I don't fully agree with this article. but these debates are occurring and have been for 50 years+.
john eden
male pale and stale
I think @version might enjoy Monsieur Duponts "Nihilist Communism". It basically argues that being an active communist is generally a complete waste of time and that holding revolutionary ideas excludes you from being a member of the proletariat.
libcom.org
Nihilist communism - Monsieur Dupont
A critique of optimism - the religious dogma that states there will be an ultimate triumph of good over evil - in the far left.
version
Well-known member
How do you get that to extend beyond communities and workplaces? I get the impression you can convince people to work together within a given company or community, but they may not see it in political terms and it won't necessarily extend to them supporting people from other industries if they decide to go on strike.
I'm reminded of David Simon talking about how he had an argument with someone about universal healthcare in the US and how they viewed everyone paying in at the particular place they worked at to cover healthcare as completely different to that happening on a national scale.
version
Well-known member
What do they propose instead?I think @version might enjoy Monsieur Duponts "Nihilist Communism". It basically argues that being an active communist is generally a complete waste of time and that holding revolutionary ideas excludes you from being a member of the proletariat.
Nihilist communism - Monsieur Dupont
A critique of optimism - the religious dogma that states there will be an ultimate triumph of good over evil - in the far left.
I think Third may have recommended me this before. I recognise the cover.
john eden
male pale and stale
Well it's through solidarity really. This is easier with workplace struggles because support somewhere else in the supply chain can directly affect your ability to stop work happening in your workplace ("blacking" goods so they don't arrive at your factory, for example).
So it can be through struggle that you see that there are links, things you have in common with workers elsewhere.
john eden
male pale and stale
Nothing
