Know the enemy. It makes sense. It always did. Marxist writing is prone to be turgid, long winded waffle. This makes it a useful tool for confusing those who want to be part of the movement. It can also confuse the writers or, at least betray their own muddle headed thinking. Here are some of their catch phrases. Do they make sense? Read for yourself. Think for yourself. Decide for yourself.
Democratic Centralism
QUOTE
Democratic centralism is the name given to the principles of internal organization used by Leninist political parties, and the term is sometimes used as a synonym for any Leninist policy inside a political party. The democratic aspect of this organizational method describes the freedom of members of the political party to discuss and debate matters of policy and direction, but once the decision of the party is made by majority vote, all members are expected to uphold that decision. This latter aspect represents the centralism. As Lenin described it, democratic centralism consisted of "freedom of discussion, unity of action."
UNQUOTE
Lenin really wanted unity of action as long as he was doing the deciding. The trappings of democracy concealed the dictatorship. He wrote about it in What Is to Be Done?
False Consciousness
This is Engels' bright idea; that we are too stupid to know what is good for us, that we should go for communism with its monstrous butcher's bill, the 85 - 100 million murderers written up in the Black Book of Communism.
Surplus Value
QUOTE
Surplus value is a concept used famously by Karl Marx in his critique of political economy. Although Marx did not himself invent the term, he developed the concept. It refers roughly to the new value created by workers in excess of their own labour-cost, a value which Marx said was appropriated by the capitalist as gross profit, and which is the basis of capital accumulation.......For Marx, the gigantic increase in wealth and population from the 19th century onwards was mainly due to the competitive striving to obtain maximum surplus-value from the employment of labor, resulting in an equally gigantic increase of productivity and capital resources. To the extent that increasingly the economic surplus is convertible into money and expressed in money, the amassment of wealth is possible on a larger and larger scale (see capital accumulation and surplus product).
UNQUOTE
You could call it profit. It is a simple enough idea.
Wage Slaves
This one makes sense but Marx kept quiet about Tax slavery, a more dangerous reality.
Class Struggle
QUOTE
Class struggle is the active expression of a class conflict looked at from any kind of socialist perspective. Karl Marx and his friend Friedrich Engels wrote "The [written] history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggle". He said that Proletariats were being exploited by the middle class. Marx's notion of class has nothing to do with social class in the sociological sense of upper, middle and lower classes (which are often defined in terms of quantitative income or wealth). Instead, in an age of capitalism, Marx describes an economic class.
UNQUOTE
People were not concerned about their classes as much as they were about their families, nations or even, sometimes their football teams.
Proletarian Internationalism
QUOTE
Proletarian internationalism, sometimes referred to as international socialism, is a Marxist social class concept based on the view that capitalism is now a global system, and therefore the working class must act as a global class if it is to defeat it. Workers should struggle in solidarity with their fellow workers in other countries on the basis of a common class interest.Proletarian internationalism is closely linked to Marxist goals of world revolution, to be achieved through successive or simultaneous communist revolutions in all nations. Marxist theory is that world revolution would lead to world communism, and later still, stateless communism.
Marxists regard proletarian internationalism as the antonym of bourgeois nationalism but the term has been subjected to different interpretations by various currents of Marxist thought.
UNQUOTE
Class matter more than family, friends, country. That is the idea behind this.
Bourgeois Nationalism
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Bourgeois nationalism is a term from Marxist phraseology. It refers to the alleged practice by the ruling classes of deliberately dividing people by nationality, race, ethnicity, or religion, so as to distract them from possible class warfare. It is seen as a divide and conquer strategy used by the ruling classes to prevent the working class from uniting against them (hence the Marxist slogan, Workers of all countries, unite!).
UNQUOTE
Blaming Capitalist Swine of the Establishment is the theme. It is fairly absurd. Institutions are formed more or less in line with human abilities, with their inclinations.
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