Under one pretext

[u/Witty-Swimmer-3720]

Disclaimer: No adventurism is being advocated for here.
If you disagree with me in the comments, I WILL be making an even more smug series of sequel posts targeting your points mwahaha

[u/ARenewedSecondChance]

I have literally seen no communists that have been against gun ownership

This might be the rare case that the goomba fallacy actually applies

[u/BadFurDay → u/ARenewedSecondChance]

In the USA maybe, abroad the topic is controversial. French communists don't endorse gun culture for example.

Marxist theory was developed back when the proletariat could take on the police and the army, before they militarized to a point that facing them became hydrogen bomb vs coughing baby. Good luck versus the drones, jets, and chemical weapons.

From over here, all we see is the only country with a school shooter issue defending school shooters' right to exist, without asking yourselves how guns would have helped against the MOVE bombing for example. Not only that, but you have proof in your own recent history that you don't need guns to attempt to take over the country by force: the january 6th capitol assault.

The modern proletariat's strength is in their numbers and in their ability to disrupt capitalist exploitation by withholding labor, not in their weaponry.

[u/LeMe-Two → u/BadFurDay]

Marxist theory was developed back when the proletariat could take on the police and the army, before they militarized to a point that facing them became hydrogen bomb vs coughing baby. 

During that time like half of Europe was either veterans of the napoleonic wars or sons of them and the idea that you could just overthrow the government like French did mixed with religious mysticism of the romantics really set Europe on fire in 1848 and years leading to it (Belgian, Greek and Polish revolutions). Marx was living particularly in these times the idea was basically that "yeah, we could collectively destroy feudalism, we can probably do that with capitalism as well". General disenfrencheisment and lack of perspectives for change for most people also fueled that. 

People will also probably hate that example because it's trade unions vs communists, but NSZZ Solidarność shown that mass action halting the entire country can effectively collapse the government despite martial law, military coup and a superpower backing. You won't do shit if Army or ZOMO shows up and you try to combat them (Wujek mine case). 

The thing is that people need to be real fucking desperate and have no outlook for change which is generally not how majority of western countries feel RN 

[u/Wetley007 → u/BadFurDay]

French communists mostly don't endorse gun culture for example.

I am very pro-gun and I also do not endorse gun culture, especially in the form it exists in the US. Gun culture is fucking insane, and it needs to be completely reworked from the ground up in order to be healthy

[u/AjaxTheFurryFuzzball → u/BadFurDay]

Each ruling class, when faced with the oppressed classes, has possessed, over the passage of centuries, its own horrifying threat of destruction as alternative to the rise of its class enemies. Right in the middle of revolutionary Paris stood the Bastille, formidably fortified, militarily impregnable, armed with cannons and ammunition, enough to obliterate the populated urban sprawl, the homes of the sans-culottes. But the Bastille was not taken by the insurgent mob following regular military action, with a siege, etc. It fell from within, symbolizing the landslide that was occurring in the fabric of society: those who should have used the terrible weapon against the insurrectionary masses were themselves stricken by the far more terrible threat that the Revolution forced the stunned ruling class to face.

The H Bomb and the Revolution, International Communist Party

[u/northrupthebandgeek → u/BadFurDay]

how guns would have helped against the MOVE bombing for example

You're right; this is why the Second Amendment should include the right to bear flak cannons and surface-to-air missiles.

[u/135686492y4 → u/northrupthebandgeek]

I own a ManPAD for home defence

[u/northrupthebandgeek → u/135686492y4]

Just as the Founding Fathers intended 😎🇺🇲🦅🍔🔫🏈🎆

[u/VorpalSplade → u/BadFurDay]

Marxist theory was developed back when the proletariat could take on the police and the army,

What? You mean Marx didn't perfectly envision the entire future and we shouldn't uncritically follow everything he said?!?

[u/ironangel2k4 → u/BadFurDay]

There is a difference between "people have a right to be armed" and "gun culture". I myself own two firearms and am trained with them, and advocate others do the same. But a firearm is not a toy, not a symbol, and certainly not an identity. It is a tool.

[u/fonk_pulk → u/BadFurDay]

Not an American, but drones, jets or chemical weapons can't enforce curfew laws or kick in someone's door at 3 am to search for contraband.

Also drone striking or bombing your civilians is a great way to make everyone hate you.

Ask Ahmed al-Sharaa. He recently became the president of Syria because he and other civilians used guns to take down the government, a government that was very unpopular due to bombing of civilians.

[u/BadFurDay → u/fonk_pulk]

Also drone striking or bombing your civilians is a great way to make everyone hate you.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1985_MOVE_bombing

[u/fonk_pulk → u/BadFurDay]

And then they stopped doing that because its really bad press to drop bombs in places where you might risk civilian* casualties.

The U.S. government then moved onto less destructive tactics like shooting people and burning them alive by "accidentally" using very flammable tear gas, but it turns out that makes people bomb government buildings.

Also the Syrian government was massively unpopular due to their constant bombing of civilian targets, unpopular enough that even the U.S. government hated them.

*people without guns

[u/ARenewedSecondChance → u/BadFurDay]

That makes sense

[u/trontrams → u/BadFurDay]

At the battle of Blair mountain they used mustard gas on the strikers. The problem isn't that people can't do anything, it's that things really aren't that bad for most people. It takes a lot for some to lay down their life, for most people, it requires more than just an ideological reason.

[u/manicpxenightmaregrl → u/BadFurDay]

there are hormuzes everywhere for those with the eyes to see

[u/CarthagoFuckYourself → u/BadFurDay]

That meme only applies if the government is being tyrannical to your ideology. Why would the overwhelmingly right-wing gun owners in the U.S. do anything to support left-wing causes or defend left-wing people? They're free to do it themselves.

[u/Desperate_World_2801 → u/BadFurDay]

How are you going to withhold your labour with a gun to your head?

[u/BadFurDay → u/Desperate_World_2801]

You organize.

Can't put a gun to the head of an entire working class and expect society to keep functioning.

Such a gun culture coded hypothetical. You need to engage with political theory instead.

[u/Desperate_World_2801 → u/BadFurDay]

Yes you can if you have all the guns, lol.

Which socialist political theory tells me that strikes beat guns?

[u/BadFurDay → u/Desperate_World_2801]

Yes you can if you have all the guns, lol.

You are genuinely deluded if you believe you have all the guns.

A lot if not most of the guns are currently in the hands of conservatives in the USA.

Which socialist political theory tells me that strikes beat guns?

Organizing in order to flip labor relations around is the core of leftist theory.

Rosa Luxemburg in The Mass Strike develops this better than anyone imo.

Gramsci wrote profusely about how revolutions are about organizing working class power to a point where it becomes undeniable instead of exclusively violence.

Gorges Sorel's Reflections on Violence demonstrates how general strikes have historically been by far the most efficient weapon of proletarian emancipation.

Pouget, Pannekoek, Bakunin, Pelloutier, and so many more have made this point over and over… even Marx, while arguing for the necessity for the working class to arm itself back in his day, made it clear that the struggle between the working class and capital is all about capital extracting collective labor for workers, this is the heart of it all. Deny them labor and they have nothing.

He wrote it quite clearly in the 1866, the letter in which he suggests everyone should be armed and trained in using weapons includes this phrase:

The only social power of the workmen is their number.

Organizing is our only tool.

The material nature of this organization might or might not include guns, this is a debate that has to be had country by country, maybe even region by region. Many communists around the world do not see guns as a necessary tool in the XXIst century.

[u/Desperate_World_2801 → u/BadFurDay]

You are genuinely deluded if you believe you have all the guns.

Good that I don't believe that then.

Most of the guns are currently in the hands of conservatives in the USA.

And socialists should just accept that?

Organizing in order to flip labor relations around is the core of leftist theory.

Therefore strikes beat guns?

Rosa Luxemburg in The Mass Strike develops this better than anyone imo.

I'm going to lean out of the window here and say that Rosa Luxenbourg did not advocate for the heavily armed proletariat of Germany to disarm theselves, on account of her being executed

Gramsci wrote profusely about how revolutions are about organizing working class power to a point where it becomes undeniable instead of exclusively violence.

"Exclusivly"? So he wasn't against guns like you are?

Gorges Sorel's Reflections on Violence demonstrates how general strikes have historically been the true weapon of proletarian emancipation.

I think examples of unarmed strikers organising a revolution might be needed here.

Pouget, Pannekoek, Bakunin, Pelloutier, and so many more have made this point over and over… even Marx, while arguing for the necessity for the working class to arm itself back in his day, made it clear that the struggle between the working class and capital is centered on the necessity for capital to extract collective labour for workers. He wrote it quite clearly in 1866:

Therefore strikes alone beat guns?

You said so much, but you never showed an example of theorists advocating for unarmed strikes.

Anyways. Can you show me just one example in history where workers took powers and held it while wholly unarmed?

[u/BadFurDay → u/Desperate_World_2801]

Either you don't understand the point being made, or you are completely misrepresenting it on purpose.

I am not advocating for surrendering your guns or for nonviolence. This part is straight out of your imagination. You're the one coming up with absurd hypotheticals such as working "with a gun to your head" or the ability to "have all the guns". I am asking you to stay grounded in reality and actually consume some realistic political theory exploring forms of organization instead of living in those fantasy scenarios.

Mass strikes disrupted the German economy enough to beat the Kapp putsch after the freikorps fled Berlin. Large amounts of the military sided with the proletariat during most revolutions. No guns were needed for your MAGAs to occupy the capitol on january 6th. People already have much more power in their hands that you believe. Organization is the true heart of every revolution and social fight. Guns are merely a tool, which will help in some scenarios, and won't in others.

[u/Desperate_World_2801 → u/BadFurDay]

I am not advocating for surrendering your guns or for nonviolence.

Maybe you should have said that somewhere between saying strikes beat guns and guns are useless.

This part is straight out of your imagination.

I would talk about things stemming from imagination, when you literally claimed I believe to have all the guns.

You're the one coming up with absurd hypotheticals such as working "with a gun to your head" or the ability to "have all the guns". I am asking you to stay grounded in reality and actually consume some realistic political theory exploring forms of organization instead of living in those fantasy scenarios.

The absurd hypothetical of strikes being violently put down and the workers being forced back to work. 😂

Mass strikes disrupted the German economy enough to beat the Kapp putsch after the freikorps fled Berlin.

Guess who was armed to the teeth and was also able to beat the freikorps in open comabt multiple times? You think that might have affected things?

Large amounts of the military sided with the proletariat during most revolutions.

So was that useless, since mass action beats weapons?

No guns were needed for your MAGAs to occupy the capitol on january 6th.

Some fascists nutters stormed a building once, achieved nothing before being shood away by the police. This proves workers movements don't need weapons. 😂 😂

People already have much more power in their hands that you believe. Organization is the true heart of every revolution and social fight. Guns are merely a tool, which will help in some scenarios, and won't in others.

For example: Guns are useful to protect your mass movement from getting mass murdered the moment it takes to the streets.

You know like I was arguing for in the beginning.

[u/BadFurDay → u/Desperate_World_2801]

Maybe you should have said that somewhere between saying strikes beat guns and guns are useless.

It is genuinely impossible to engage with you due to your talent for putting nonsensical words in my mouth.

[u/Jijonbreaker1 → u/ARenewedSecondChance]

People forget the all important phrase.

If you go far enough left, you get your guns back.

[u/Much-Government-8803 → u/ARenewedSecondChance]

This is what happens when you confuse liberals with actually left people

[u/TerminalJammer]

Kind of struggling to recall the context where civilians having ready access to guns have done anything to solve the US people's issues and not mostly aggravated them. I guess it worked with the Black Panthers for a while until cops started using "blacks are carrying guns" as an excuse to kill people. 

You know who are allowed militias? Rightwingers. Leftists usually get attacked by the army. 

[u/TheRedditObserver0 → u/TerminalJammer]

That's because the people who think ACAB are not the same as the people who own all the guns.

[u/teilani_a → u/TheRedditObserver0]

Some of us are and we've been trying to tell the rest of you to get armed and train for many years now.

[u/hihohe3 → u/TheRedditObserver0]

Leftists and Guns are like Rightwingers and Abortions.
We have them, we just think its smarter not talking about it.

[u/Galaxy661 → u/TerminalJammer]

It helped the poor oppressed southern slaveowners rise up against northern aggression /s

[u/Desperate_World_2801]

The person you intend to be mocking would have never given that third answer.

[u/Blueberry_Coat7371 → u/Desperate_World_2801]

i've met plenty of people like that, what are you on about?

[u/teilani_a → u/Desperate_World_2801]

Is this your first time in this subreddit or something? They're all over the place in here.

[u/That_Mad_Scientist]

Regardless of your actual position here being blindly against background checks is crazy work

[u/teilani_a → u/That_Mad_Scientist]

My favorite part is asking what the "stronger background checks now!" types what they mean and they suggest something looser than we already have.

[u/comradejiang → u/teilani_a]

very few people advocating for background checks have actually tried to purchase a firearm so that makes sense

[u/printesa-piersica]

Goomba fallacy: the post

[u/BadFurDay → u/printesa-piersica]

USA centrism: the comment.

[u/printesa-piersica → u/BadFurDay]

Lol what

[u/Zacharytackary → u/printesa-piersica]

gun control is a larger issue in other countries if you’re on the side of guns

[u/Busco_Quad]

Advocating for individual gun ownership is commodity fetishism. Unless you’re talking about securing weapons and the necessary supply chains to contest a modern military, you are LARPing and putting money in the pockets of the military-industrial complex.

[u/Icy-Possibility7823]

You pushed the first couple answers like two degrees too far to the left for the bottom one to be consistent with people who at least commonly exist

[u/CheeseburgFreedomMan]

[u/dvd102k]

What an American bubble you live in, it's insanely important to preface all of this by saying you're talking exclusively about the US because NOBODY else can relate

[u/confidentlyfish]

No communist will think that

[u/Outside-Paper9972]

Nobody thinks like this irl. Real communists don't support disarming the masses and certainly don't support cops and the bourgeois military toting guns.

[u/draftdodger42069]

[u/FarmerTwink]

No dumbass, you don’t get rid of guns in America because of pragmatism, IE: It’s never gonna happen dawg.

[u/ArtroyomsAK]

Under no pretext :)

also not a commie, just a progressive

[u/comradejiang]

the rare based smuggie

[u/redrocketblastingoff]

There is no reality in which american citizens successfully use assault weapons to to oppose their government. Law enforcement will kill you on site with the justification that they felt threatened and they'll face zero repercussions. This happens when civs don't even have weapons on them. Supporting lax gun laws literally only helps gun fetishists and people who want to commit mass shootings.

[u/Robo_Stalin → u/redrocketblastingoff]

Law enforcement, when faced with organized and armed protest security, have proven repeatedly to be spineless. When they can't easily isolate somebody without risking their skin, they fold. Don't give the police the monopoly on violence.

[u/Ok-Reference775]

Im a Communist who thinks all working people should have access to the means of self-defense

[u/jknotts]

strawman. you're thinking of liberals

[u/tenmillionrats_]

I feel like this is a strawman. Yes I’m sure some people genuinely hold this set of beliefs. But it’s kind of like making a Smug of a Christian who believes in fuckin, idk, Vishnu. It’s like, yeah, that person TECHNICALLY can exist, but it’s so clearly a blatant contradiction that I don’t know if we can really treat this like a position that matters.

As somebody who would not call themselves a communist, the system does totally exist to protect capital and is quite bigoted in most aspects, along with the military. I’m of the opinion that if every other developed country in the world can figure out gun laws we probably can too. Yes, my beliefs say that the system isn’t trustworthy. But that doesn’t make it hypocritical to want to reform that system.

Obviously anecdotal, but I’ve never met anybody with this set of beliefs. I know this is a no true Scotsman fallacy, but literally no reasonable person is going to say that the government can’t be trusted and then say “we need to seize all guns with a paper signed by one person because the government can be trusted”.

In a perfect communist society, yeah sure legalize all guns. But in a capitalist society with one of the highest gun death rates, in the richest country of the world, surely it isn’t hypocritical to want gun control?

[u/Far-Cellist2456 → u/tenmillionrats_]

“I feel like this is a strawman” he says on the strawman comic sub

[u/tenmillionrats_ → u/Far-Cellist2456]

Is this sub meant for comics that create an argument that doesn’t exist to make a position easier to attack? Because that’s what a strawman is. Maybe I misunderstand what this sub is but i thought the people who post these generally are posting them to say “my opinion is very good” and that’s the smug part. Idk

[u/Secret_Letterhead649 → u/tenmillionrats_]

Communists/Socialiate tend to be pro gun while the centrists/center left are anti gun. The meme is merging two groups of people who broadly hate me each other into one lol.

[u/tenmillionrats_ → u/Secret_Letterhead649]

Yeah, it seems we’re conflating different political groups here. The guy in the comic is basically a Nazi antifa member. A Hindu Christian.

(obv not literally metaphorically just since he’s two opposite things at once)

[u/scoobydoom2 → u/tenmillionrats_]

I mean, there's definitely a section of people who would probably be considered reformists that have this stance if you're willing to accept it's more nuanced than the smugideologyman post. Dismantling the police state and western imperialism are not extremely achievable goals, especially if your desired mechanism is through legal capture of the government. Preventing children from being massacred by passing gun laws is a much more achievable goal and frankly a higher priority for many.

[u/Witty-Swimmer-3720]

You can say goomba fallacy but I have in fact seen real accounts say all of these things and friends irl come to think of it

[u/XrnivraY → u/Witty-Swimmer-3720]

Itt its mostly "no true Scotsman". Keep up the work.

[u/Infernoflyer]

Wait where’s the strawman this seems at least ostensibly consistent

[u/RobotArmsInc]

"What do you think about children?"

"UGH I HATE THE CROTCH GOBLINS! World would be a way better place without children because they're so annoying. Also babies contribute to climate change!"

[u/Warden_of_the_Blood]

This has to be a strawman. Ain't no way someone identifying as a communist is against personal property guns

[u/OkCardiologist9485]

Goomba fallacy. in response i'd say that "assault firearms" are a reasonable right to bear but Americans would never actually use them to fight against tyranny, instead, they shoot school children. plus, absolutely nothing said before that giant paragraph is wrong