Date: Sun, 18 Aug 1996 18:10:56 +0100
From: hariette-AT-easynet.co.uk (hariette spierings)
Subject: Welcome back "Mother Courage" malecki - roll out the firing squad!



>> Adolfo
>
>Could you clarify this and other statements you made in this
article?
>Perhaps offer a few examples where you think this has happened.
>
>A large segment of the population partipates in, even depends
on, the
>"underground" economy, and a good number end up in prison. Some
do this
>out of necessity, others as an alternative to the drudgery of
wage labor.
>Do you consider these people your enemy? Morally bad? If so, do
you think
>their moral character is innate, that it will persist under the
changed
>material conditions of the proletarian dictatorship? as your
comment about
>"such conduct will not be tolerated" seems to imply. 
>
>And what about "even more stringent punishments"? Do you think
prisons
>and other forms of punishment, as they currently exist
throughout the
>world, are too humane?
>
>
>Paul
>pcg-AT-panix.com
>

I think you are mis-reading what I said, Paul.  The question is
not to see such people as enemies or friends, but to see their
class position as distinct to that of the proletariat - the only
consistent revolutionary class.

The lumpen elements - because that is what you are describing -
are an inevitable product of capitalist relations.  That much we
agree. The question is how the "Left" has come to envelop them
with an aura of "heroism"?  How the lumpen is seeing, in some
quarters, as the "revolutionary class".  How the education of the
proletariat - the duty of marxists - is seen by some people as
education on the "ways of the lumpen" and the "values of the
lumpen".

The lumpen, as Lenin long ago pointed out, can be won over to the
revolutionary cause, and some INDIVIDUALS can indeed play a role
and even transform themselves into proletarian fighters precisely
by repudiating their own past.  Howver, as a class (or section of
the population) they are a most inestable element - precisely due
to their petty bourgeois outlook - which the proletarian
dictatorship must certainly guard against letting get hold of the
tiller of the state or the Party at ALL times, and moreover after
the seizure of power.

It is also well know that the ideology which sustains this
"glamourourisation" of criminal life as some sort of "heroic
anti-capitalist" struggle is very much rooted in the liberal
philistinism of the petty bourgeois mentality.  That as far as
the revolutionary organisation is concerned, the unchecked
presence of such elements contributes to liberalism and to the
"we are of the left for better or worse" mentality, putting in
the same sack the proletariat and the lumpen, the genuine
Marxists and the maleckis.  Moreover, such opportunism, as with
all opportunism, "facilitates the tasks of the Zubatovs" in
lenin's own words.

In order that such elements from the lumpen who show willingness
to work for the revolutionary cause do not become "enemies" of
the proletariat and can be brought into the revolutionary camp
with any degree of confidence, the strictest vigilance is
necessary, and particularly, to fight against the liberalism of
those promoting the view that it is enough to be in a bourgeois
jail, no matter for what reason, to be a "heroic figure".  That
corresponds well to social-democratic "Robin Hood" type of views,
but not to those of real and serious marxist revolutionaries such
as Lenin.

Consider Lenin's words:

"......it is not difficult to see that during every transition
>from capitalism to socialism, dictatorship is necessary for two
main reasons, or along two main channels.  Firstly, capitalism
cannot be defeated and erradicated without the ruthless
suppression of the resistance of the exploiters, who cannot at
once be deprived of their wealth, of their advantages of
organisation and knowledge, and consequently for a fairly long
period will inevitably try to overthrow the hated rule of the
poor; SECONDLY, every grat revolution, and a socialist revolution
in particular even if there is no external war, is inconceivable
without internal war, i.e. civil war, which is even more
devastating than external war, and involves thousands and
millions of cases of wavering and desertion from one side to
another, implies a state of extreme indefiniteness, lack of
equilibrium and chaos.  AND OF COURSE, ALL THE ELEMENTS OF
DISINTEGRATION of the old society, which are inevitably very
numerous and connected mainly with the petty bourgeoisie (because
it is the petty-bourgeosie that every war and every crisis ruins
and destroys first), are bound to "reveal themselves" during such
a profound revolution.  AND THIS ELEMENTS OF DESINTEGRATION
cannot "reveal themselves" otherwise than in an increase of
CRIME, HOOLIGANISM, CORRUPTION, PROFITEERING AND OUTRAGES OF
EVERY KIND.  To put this down requires time and AND REQUIRES AN
IRON HAND".


And Lenin continues, describing the true proletarian policy
AGAINST everything that the maleckis of this world stand for
(CRIME, HOOLIGANISM, CORRUPTION, PROFITEERING, AND OUTRAGES OF
EVERY KIND) in this lapidary fashion:

"There has not been a single great revolution in history in which
the people did not instinctively realise this and did not show a
SALUTARY FIRMNESS by SHOOTING THIEVES ON THE SPOT.  The
misfortune of previous revolutions was that the revolutionary
enthusiasm of the people, which sustained them in their state of
tension and gave them the strenght to SUPPRESS RUTHLESSLY the
ELEMENTS OF DESINTEGRATION, did not last long.  The social, i.e.
the class, reason for this inestability of the revolutionary
enthusiasm of the people was the weakness of the proletariat,
which ALONE is able (If it is sufficiently numerous, CLASS
CONSCIOUS AND DISCIPLINED) to win over to its side the MAJORITY
of the working and exploited people (the MAJORITY of the poor, to
speak more simply and popularly) and retain power sufficiently
long to suppress completely all the exploiters AS WELL AS ALL THE
ELEMENTS OF DISINTEGRATION"

Quotes are from V.I. Lenin  "The Immediate Tasks of the Soviet
Government" (Collected Works, Vol 27, page 200)

That is what I meant, and examples of these are "tens of
thousands and even millions" in Lenin's own words.  What I mean
is that without exposing that the claims to "Leninism" of the
maleckis's are the claims of the ELEMENTS OF DISINTEGRATION which
Leninism would have RUTHLESSLY SUPPRESSED, Marxist here are only
sucking their thumbs and exposing their own liberalism!


Adolfo Olaechea  

  




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