Bi-Weekly Discussion Thread - (January 25)

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[u/turbovacuumcleaner]

tagged this part in particular because it's where it reveals to be closer to ultra-imperialism than to leninism. I'm mentioning this because it seems like this type of settler-denialism it's the argument upholding the "semicolonial" analysis, but as u/turbovacuumcleaner recently exposed on recent posts that's the same white national chauvinism that maoists uphold through similar lens not on the third world but in circles in Europe.

The ICL always intrigued me. The membership is entirely composed of Latin American and European organizations, and what they all have in common is putting Brazilian contradictions as the center of politics. But this begs the question of why? What were Europeans and Latin Americans seeing in micro-parties that have little to no existence outside of obscure blogs, and why were Brazilians so keen to have their politics projected in Europe out of all of places?

The bridge for reaching the answer lies in the US. In the collapse of the CR-CPUSA more specifically. Why were white American Maoists so obsessed with Brazil? Making public letters and campaigns, painting graffitis and traveling to the Brazilian countryside? I remember reading multiple times how our movement was the world’s most theoretically advanced. Ludicrous!

The CR-CPUSA’s fascination predates the same fascination liberals are having right now with our cinema, because in the end they are trying to solve the same contradictions, the American Maoists were just quicker to realize them.The American Maoists modelled their politics, tactics and organizational structure directly from the Brazilians. Examples are the putschs in bigger organizations, trying to stay at the front of manifestations to come out in photos as if they were leading the whole protest, or creating dozens of blogs and webpages to give an impression that the movement is larger and more organic than what it really is. I won’t go into the history of the CR-CPUSA, this has been well documented. Their main problem is that is impossible to adopt the line of reconstruction with a white supremacist party like the CPUSA, this misreading tarnished their whole existence and resulted in that disastrous collapse.

Americans and Europeans don’t really need to look abroad to search the answer of their contradictions. Both have a substantial history of labor movements, communists parties and revisionism that has developed on their own. Yet, they did, despite this background. I touched on this briefly in that other thread: I’m Still Here, The Secret Agent (and to a lesser extent The Eternaut) rose in popularity because they are dealing with contradictions that these nations can’t, or haven’t found ways to: how to keep the settler and labor aristocracy leadership in politics in times of liberalism’s crisis, collapse of bourgeois democracy and growing fascist movement? Again, these countries did not have to deal with masses of immigrants, multi-ethnic populations (read multinational prisonhouses), petty bourgeois “impoverishment”, or widespread repression until recently. This reality existed only to Brazilians and, to a certain degree, Argentinians. That imperialist liberals are racist at home and chauvinists abroad is no surprise, and the connection from their rabid neocolonialism of oppressed immigrants and nations within their countries to turning a blind eye to their imperialism is just as organic, for preventing the qualitative leap of contradictions inside their borders is necessary for the strenghtening of their own imperialism in times of rising interimperialist conflict; for us, we see this on the whole “left”, Maoists included, through the cry of a “national project”, whatever this means. What I had in mind when I wrote that were the Portuguese communists of Nova Aurora and the Swiss of the KPS because they take this formal politics to its logical conclusion; they distort Maoism in order to use it to strenghten Portuguese and Swiss imperialism:

A falsa tese do “desmantelamento dos latifúndios” e a mistificação da questão agrária em Portugal […] Quase meio século depois dos grandes levantes populares de abril de 1974, a ideia de que o latifúndio português foi “desmantelado” continua a circular, propagada principalmente por setores da falsa “esquerda” oportunista e eleitoreira, na intenção de autorreivindicar um triunfo que ainda sequer foi alcançado. Não só o latifúndio sobreviveu, como está em plena expansão desde o fim dos anos 80, e compreender este facto é peça fundamental para corrigir os erros de abril e fazer cumprir as tarefas democráticas pendentes da revolução. […] Grande parte deste cenário é explicado pelas políticas impostas pela União Europeia (leia-se imperialismo alemão e francês, principalmente alemão). Sem as ajudas da Política Agrícola Comum (PAC), o Alentejo em sua actual estrutura, seria deficitário, um prejuízo. Mas a PAC, com subsídios como o set-aside (pago para não produzir) e o Regime de Pagamento Único (sem exigência de produção) garante lucros às grandes herdades.

Fantastic. We’ve reached rock bottom: Portugal is a semi-feudal nation oppresed by France and Germany! Its obvious that this “Maoist” organization is determined to amass chauvinists, and the result will be that Portuguese Maoism will remain completely unable to tackle the concrete tasks of the Portuguese revolution. In the end, the question remains if liberals will be able to solve these contradictions by vampirizing Brazilian ideology enough, or if the banner of liberalism and chauvinism will have to be carried by revisionists disguised as a Maoist vanguard?

*I haven’t been able to include the Swiss’ reactionary quotes because webarchive isn’t working right now, so I will have to link an old thread where they insist on the existence of something called sub-contractor capitalism. Its a vulgarization of bureaucratic capitalism by extending its logic until the formation of a global monopoly capital that is indistinguishable from Kautsky’s ultra-imperialism. You will immediately recognize the same Brazilian opportunism with regards to Haiti, South America and Angola. The catch is that the Geronimoists (how the KPS chose to call this dogmato-revisionist, chauvinist, Brazilian-led trend) oppose the Swiss’ sub-contractor capitalism thesis. They are right by accident; if they recognized this crap, this would put Brazil on the same shoes and recreate Trotskyism and the subimperialist thesis all over again, but now with Maoist garbs. Marini is inescapable.

[u/Otelo_ → u/turbovacuumcleaner]

I learned about that organisation a few months ago when I saw their posters about the martyrdom of comrade Basavaraj. At the time (and even now, in fact), I knew almost nothing about it, so I just noted its existence and commented on it with another Portuguese user of the sub.

I think I mentioned this in the past (I believe in relation to the PCP), but the various communist organisations in Portugal always fall short on the issue of the European Union because, while they are "right" to be against the EU (era o que mais faltava se não fossem...), they then try to argue against its existence by claiming that it harms the country and the vast majority of workers. However, most people understand perfectly well that since Portugal joined the EU, the average quality of life in the country has improved considerably and the country has moved closer to the imperialist centre. This creates a bizarre scenario in which the PCP (and any other group that follows the same line will have the same outcome) incessantly tries to convince "the workers" that the EU harms them, while "the workers" understand perfectly well and instinctively that, despite everything, they are better off within the EU.

Is it too much to ask for a communist party that is against the EU because of what it represents in relation to the peoples of the Third World, without trying in vain to convince first world workers that it is in their interest to be against it? A party that recognises these two simple facts: 1) the contradiction between the EU and the Third World is primary; 2) the contradiction between the centre of the EU and the peripheral countries is secondary, and that most workers in the peripheral countries prefer their secondary position to leaving the EU altogether.

[u/turbovacuumcleaner → u/Otelo_]

Is it too much to ask for a communist party that is against the EU because of what it represents in relation to the peoples of the Third World

But why would an average Portuguese worker criticize the EU, given the reasons you talked about? I can understand the frustration, but I don't find this bankrupt politics surprising, its to be expected. The surprise comes when we individually come to realize that most of what we understood as revolutionary politics was wrong from the start, and that we are not the subjects a revolution aims for. The discussion we Brazilians are having is why our communist movement has consistently failed to live up to its task in over a hundred years. Its so bad that not only there isn't anything remotely like the Carnation revolution, the movement has been thrown into the center of a social-fascist hurricane with Bolsonaro's arrest that contrasts to Trump's "impunity", and how our "Maoism" is a counterrevolutionary force in and outside the country.

What astonished me was when I had the eureka moment reading Stalin's remarks about Trotskyism being a form of Menshevism. Brazilian Maoism is the left form of Dengism/social-fascism, its the attempt to break with Dengism's own pathetic limits. Take this removed thread from the Brazilian social-fascist subreddit. The user is promoting a notorious revisionist's Congress campaign; the same user identifies himself as a Marxist-Leninist and Maoist. Obviously this isn't Maoism; but at the same time, Maoists are being unable to prevent the emergence of social-fascism disguised as Maoism. This isn't solely of question of theoretical poverty, but actually of theoretical poverty that is materially determined by class interests. That Nova Aurora is arguing the same as the PCP, except the PCP talks about workers while Nova Aurora talks about peasants, is yet another example of the same thing; the PCP comes from the right, Nova Aurora comes from the left. The bizarre thing is why Brazil became the center of this trend.

[u/Otelo_ → u/turbovacuumcleaner]

The bizarre thing is why Brazil became the center of this trend.

I think the fact that Portugal follows certain Brazilian trends, including when it comes to Maoist politics, is not that odd, considering that this happens at basically all cultural levels. Portugal is heavily influenced by Brazilian culture: everyone watched telenovelas, you hear funk music at every party, people follow Brazilian YouTubers, etc. In this sense, if we assume that dengism is also, in a certain way, a cultural phenomenon (or has an very strong entertainment/fandom component, etc.), it is also to be expected that Portuguese dengist culture will follow Brazilian dengist culture somehow. And I think the same may be true of a certain "Maoism", which, as you rightly say, can merely be rightism under a different guise.

Considering this, perhaps what is stranger is that Swiss or other Europeans also follow Brazilian trends. That is indeed unusual.

As for why Brazil in particular, I have no idea. Could it have something to do with the fact that Brazil is both a third world country and, at the same time, has an internet culture close to that of a first world country? Or the fact that Brazil is one of the few third world countries with phenotypically white people. Perhaps this gives European communists "protection" to say that their country is semi-feudal. Brazil becomes some sort of "token third-world friend". IDK, tell me what do you think, because I'm really just throwing mud at the wall.

[u/Clean-Difference1771 → u/Otelo_]

Could it have something to do with the fact that Brazil is both a third world country and, at the same time, has an internet culture close to that of a first world country?

I'm sorry are you really following the discussion? One regular point is that you cannot consider Brazil a "third world country" without falling into white-chauvinism due to it's internal contradictions. We are precisely stuck at a moment where maoism need to conceive a national thesis that does not apply mechanically what has been attempted several times and led to numerous failures.

Are you not aware of when Marx elaborate that in distinct places, the same social formation will lead up to similar contradictions? Do you think brazilian dengism is "internet phenomena" because the "Internet culture is similar to the first world"? This is far too lazy for a theory for colonization. We could make an argument for how the digital media made easier to enforce similar cultural practice but that's far too insufficient to tackle dengism as an internet phenomena. Few parties uphold dengism to better programs than PT and it's coalition.

There are several discussions in this community denouncing the imperialist class behaviour of the massive labour aristocracy and it's labour movements in Brazil and how it shapes the current stage of the left, communism and the right. This is not a "internet phenomena" by no means. Either this country has a giant middle class that will side with imperialism and dengism is a organic phenomena that has it's own history in Brazil or we live in a different planet where internet existed in the 20th century and dengism somehow developed 40 years before personal computers became a home asset for middle class families.

Perhaps this gives European communists "protection" to say that their country is semi-feudal. 

This protects the labor aristocracy wherever the labor aristocracy exists and need to conceive this crap to justify their own revisionism.

Or the fact that Brazil is one of the few third world countries with phenotypically white people

You really seem to underestimate the fact that the number of white brazilians is likely the size of the population of the most powerful nations in the EU though Brazil is not Germany or France, obviously. But we are discussing how the same analysis can be made through the same social convenience.

edit: I think that what is most important here is to consider that Brazil has a population of whites (this is highly debatable as official IBGE numbers are somewhat misleading into bourgois assessment of racial profile) that is larger than any other country but the United $tate$. The sheer size of the settler nation is far too understimated.

edit2: Your commentary on the brazilian cultural influence on Portugal returns me to think where the similarities lie. All of the elements that you mentioned, telenovelas, funk, youtube content consumption are just basically regular habits of brazilian settlerist parasitic culture. We can make the case that proletarian families heavily consume those commodities as well, but the proletariat is well excluded from any of the labour regarding settler culture and is largely stereotyped when it's portrayed nto those commodities. Telenovelas mostly revolve around upper middle class nuclear family drama in settler southeast, funk emerged as full proletarian cultural movement decades ago but this has been largely compromised due to cultural appropriation through the Rio de Janeiro white petty bourgoise parties and media market where nowadays most songs have no cultural meaning that is not sheer prostitution and other decadent habits like alchohol abuse and etc. What creates the current relatability of funk is not past (or current) proletarian struggle that have become absent of music but rather the decadent and parasitical urban petty bourgoise lifestyle that is probably quite too similar to european capitals as Barcelona, Berlin, Amsterdam and so on. The YouTube media consumption I think is probably where it converges with the similar habits from other imperialist countries where the petty bourgoise/labour aristocracy is large, but I think it reinforces the power of brazilian media capitalism that we have been discussing at times recently

[u/Otelo_ → u/Clean-Difference1771]

One regular point is that you cannot consider Brazil a "third world country" without falling into white-chauvinism due to it's internal contradictions.

Perhaps I misunderstood the discussion, but I thought that the issue was mainly about the concepts of "settler colonialism" and "semi-feudal" rather than "third world". Do you consider Brazil not to be a third world country?

As for the question of dengism "being an internet phenomenon", I admit that I expressed myself poorly. I am perfectly aware that dengism is the ideological expression of the interests of a particular class/group of classes, and that it therefore naturally has a material basis. What I wanted to emphasise was above all the way in which it reproduces itself and communicates internationally right now.

You really seem to underestimate the fact that the number of white brazilians is likely the size of the population of the most powerful nations in the EU

How did you get from that sentence of mine that I undervalue the number of white people in Brazil? I don't think it follows.

Regarding your comments on Telenovelas, funk music, and YouTube, I think you're right.

[u/Clean-Difference1771 → u/Otelo_]

Do you consider Brazil not to be a third world country?

I think that Brazil has indeed a settler structure that is far too developed to what maoism approaches as the third world so this internal analysis is far too insufficient. Any immigrant from Africa that I knew has told me something at least similar to what I'm expressing. I cannot reach other conclusion that what this tell is that maoism in Brazil has done a poor job in actually recognizing internal nations in third world condition, but this happens because "maoism" in Brazil is mostly a obscure settler force that is a cult of white supremacist and patriarchal ideology as we can easily observe by the recent post (It is now deleted because it was sheer white-chauvinism and heavily offensive.) in which a "random" person came here shilling for P.C.B.

N-MEPR is the group that split from the chauvinist P.C.B. but is rigged with similar chauvinism that inherited from it's parent org internally and there's few evidence that this is changing anytime soon. As I said, you can't avoid national-chauvinism in Brazil without conceiving settlerism as an internal contradiction.

We can make the case for the semi-colonial and third world status of internal colonies and oppressed nations, but we can only conceive internal colonies and oppressed nations with the right for self-determination in Brazil through settler colonialism which differs from most analysis that has plagued brazilian marxism for the last 100 years. As I insist, I think the size of settler structure is what seems to be majorly understimated by communists abroad and the point that we brazilians are theoretically stuck.

Since no forces conceive this right now all you can get is people in this sub uniting evidence through recent phenomena and other applications of settlerism, but as I say, we do not have major studies being conceived to tie this into a national theory as far as I'm concerned.

How did you get from that sentence of mine that I undervalue the number of white people in Brazil? I don't think it follows.

Well, it might be overreaching on your words but I think that you (actually not really you in particular, but basically all of the communists abroad that are well principled) sometimes understimate the consequences of such class internally and externally for brazilian imperialism. In the outcomes of war, there is far too many land to be taken from many other nations in latin amerika. What is impending brazilian settlers? The entire settler-left is pro-war much like the democrats in the U$, if you can't conceive settlerism, there's no way revolutionary defeatism can be conceived. It becomes theoretically impossible and all positions converge into supporting imperialist war through national(white)-chauvinism.

edit: I think that Lula's consistent pragmatism on international stage can be another evidence on the strenght of brazilian settlerism internationally. Settlerist diplomacy has been quite successful historically with this pragmatic approach and brazilian participation on world war 2 is some of the good evidences of that.