Amihan Malaya, a fraternal Maoist-Third Worldist organization
Monkey Smashes Heaven and Shubel Morgan announce our firm unity in designating Amihan Malaya a fraternal Maoist-Third Worldist organization. Red salute to the comrades of Amihan Malaya!
This designation by MSH and SM is based on our respective principles of unity and our mutual upholding of MSH’s Sunrise declaration of Maoism-Third Worldism. We consider Amihan Malaya to have met and have exceeded the bar of unity in all these respects.
This joint announcement is being presented first at Shubel Morgan because the seed that now bears full fruit as Amihan Malaya was that of Maoist-Third Worldist agitational art. Shubel Morgan knows that pattern of communist germination well. Like we know the backs of our own clenched fists. And having this very particular communist affinity for the work and growth of Amihan Malaya, Shubel Morgan’s should be the first comradely hand warmly extended in fraternal recognition to these advanced Third World comrades.
One of the most anemic attacks on Maoism-Third Worldism, in a sea of only anemic attacks, goes this way: First Worlders can’t be parasites, can’t be enemies of the world majority, can’t be not-proletarians because they then, among other things, wouldn’t be revolutionary … so there wouldn’t be anything for First World “revolutionaries” to do. So Maoists-Third Worldists get accused of “despair” and “giving up on the struggle.” We get accused of putting so-called First Worldist “revolutionaries” out of a job. Such attacks are lame in both legs. First, a correct class analysis does not proceed from the needs of these fake “communists” for meaningful employment. A correct class analysis proceeds from the demand of the international proletariat for a true materialist accounting of friends and enemies. Currently, the correct international class analysis is that First Worlders are objectively the undeniable enemy of the Third World. Secondly, this attack is lame in claiming that Maoists-Third Worldists of First World origin, with their “own” populations as enemy, have therefore precious little to keep themselves occupied besides a bit of thumb twiddling now and then. The most cursory glance at the concrete manifestations of Maoism-Third Worldism today gives the lie to that lame First Worldist claim.
But then this whole line of attack is unmistakably a conscious lie on the part of its practitioners. These liars know all too well that we vigorously promote the struggle for communism, and they know all too well that the struggle for socialism that we vigorously promote absolutely entails the invasion and occupation of their darling First Worlder sanctuaries by the military dictatorship of the international proletariat. So we do have a pretty specific plan. And there’s plenty to do. And of course there’s little for Maoists-Third Worldists, siding as we do with four fifths of the world’s population, to despair of. There’s lots for us to be jubilant about as the prospect of First Worlder defeat becomes more clear.
Sometimes the conscious liars will expose themselves and admit various of the above truths about Maoism-Third Worldism - that we do promote proletarian struggle, that we do have a plan with plenty of job opportunities, or that we are generally jubilant in our revolutionary outlook. But these admissions are then only the prelude further accusations: we are not “internationalists,” they then say, because we have a bad plan for struggle, because we offer only opportunities for people to do bad things, and because we’re jubilant for decidedly bad reasons. This is what the conscious liars mean in denying that we are “internationalists” - that we’re promoting a decidedly bad outcome for their parasite populations. Which can’t really be parasites, because then they’d be the enemy of the world majority, and therefore not terribly revolutionary, and then First Worldist “revolutionaries” would be out of a job … and round we go again.
So, in its gross anemia this particular attack on Maoism just barely makes it through each day alive, so sickly is its grip on material reality.
But.
Maoists-Third Worldists are first of all Marxist scientists. And Marxist historical materialism tells us that sometimes a grain of truth can be harbored within the lamest of bogus lies.
Well, there was a grain of truth in this particular constellation of bogus lies. That grain of truth was just this: until Maoism-Third Worldism, the primary role of actual proletarian revolutionaries was somewhat indeterminate. The predecessors of Maoism-Third Worldism were certainly not without a clue as to the possible revolutionary tasks of the politically advanced in the First World. There were lots of possible things to do, and various cells took on a multiplicity of tasks with proletarian energy and determination. But in all this the principal revolutionary task for true communists of the First World wasn’t defined and advanced.
With the declaration of Maoism-Third Worldism that particular deficit has been cleared up.
Which brings us to our new fraternal comrades at Amihan Malaya. Because Maoism-Third Worldism makes it crystal clear that the current primary task of the handful of genuine First World communists is the dissemination of the ideology of the international proletariat, Maoism-Third Worldism, amongst the Third World masses. Many other tasks remain valid and pressing. But above all these is the responsibility for these communists behind enemy lines to promote and serve the Amihan Malayas of the Third World in organizing their own proletariats to defeat the international parasites of the First World.
And Amihan Malaya is providing an exemplary model for Third World comrades in the promulgation of Maoism-Third Worldism amongst the Philippine masses. From translating Maoist-Third Worldist works to Tagalog, to creating their own Maoist-Third Worldist propaganda, to their ever vibrant Maoist-Third Worldist agitational artwork, the comrades of Amihan Malaya have been relentless in their promotion of the international proletariat’s spiritual atom bomb that is Maoism-Third Worldism. In recognizing Amihan Malaya as an ideologically fraternal organization we say above all that we are proud to serve the revolutionary needs of these comrades and all budding Amihan Malayas worldwide raising the revolutionary sun of the international proletariat.
Red Salute!
Our sun rises! Victory to Maoism-Third Worldism! The future is ours!
That Hate Amerikkka Beat
DVD - mininova: That Hate Amerikkka Beat
On “On the Theory of the Productive Forces,” Part 6b
Some comments recently posted at Monkey Smashes Heaven will be helpful in focusing our thinking in this concluding article of the “On the Theory of the Productive Forces” series.
The first comment is actually a reader’s response to Part 5c of this series. In that part we said:
The Chinese Communist Party claimed they could build socialism while embracing the international theory of the productive forces as powered by the first world labor aristocracy. Maoism-Third Worldism calls that out right here and now as bullshit. Today even Third World forces professing People’s War claim they can achieve proletarian victory without an all out fight against the first wordlist ideology that was instrumental in defeating socialism in China. In Part 6, Maoism-Third Worldism calls out those bullshitters as well.
Here are excerpts from the reader’s response:
The Third World ‘bullshitters’ you are talking about often don’t know about conditions in the Western countries. … Also, part of the Maoist etiquette tends to be that you don’t pass judgment on how people are struggling in other countries. … Attacking Maoist leaders right, left and centre for not endorsing your not yet fully developed line is likely to be rather unproductive.
Now, Prairie Fire at MSH has already provided a comprehensive rebuttal to this bullshit first worldist response. The problem of “not knowing” about the extreme parasitic wealth of the first world populations, Prairie Fire points out, is not one of epistemology but one of ideology. There has been no significant proletariat in the imperialist first world for at least the greater part of a century. This is simply not news. It is as well not news that the primary contradiction in the world has been and continues to be between imperialism and the oppressed nations. And, finally, it should not be newsworthy to actual communists that the first responsibility of communist leadership is to distinguish friends from enemies, which of course means knowing the enemy. The international proletariat, as we’ve said, steadfastly maintains that expectation of all communist leadership.
The above bullshit response pretends to make excuses for what the writer wants to fabricate as terminally naive Third World shock and awe at first worlder riches, but this is only one silly argument in a series of silly arguments in the service of making excuses for continuing to peddle the international Theory of the Productive Forces to the world’s oppressed and exploited majority. According to the division of labor for selling this lie to the international proletariat, most of imperialism’s ideological resources are apportioned to selling the lie outright: look, look, look at how rich first worlders are, just forget class struggle and you can live like that too! Within the ICM, though, the ideological responsibility becomes that of making “communists” appear as delusional morons who think they can keep first worlder parasitism a secret from the oppressed by running around whispering to any who might spill the beans, “shhh! don’t tell!” So the writer tells the Maoists-Third Worldists “shhh! don’t tell!” because of some phony “Maoist etiquette” against calling out revisionism. Or “shhh! don’t tell!” because centuries of first world parasitism on the Third World don’t constitute the basis for a “fully developed line.” Or “shhh! don’t tell!” because we’ll just be “attacking Maoist leaders” willy nilly (”right, left and centre”). Or “”shhh! don’t tell!” because it’ll be “unproductive.” And so fucking on. And so fucking forth.
Well, as we said, Prairie Fire has already pegged this nonsense for the nonsense that it is. We review it here firstly because it’s a fine example of the fake “left’s” assigned role for TOPF promotion within the ICM, which we’ll need to talk about later. But it also does touch on the question of just how do Maoists-Third Worldists say to Third World leaders of people’s wars that if they are promoting the first world labor aristocracy they are speaking counter-revolutionary bullshit to their people? Which we need to talk about now.
Because after great consideration we can only conclude that the most productive way of saying this to these leaders is to say that, in all proletarian honesty and frankness, if you are promoting the first world labor aristocracy you are speaking counter-revolutionary bullshit to your people, and to the international proletariat generally. Speaking bullshit thusly would include lying about the enormous wealth of the first world populations and the imperialist superprofit rape of the Third World from which that wealth derives. Speaking bullshit thusly would also include remaining silent and agnostic on first worlder parasitism - such silence speaks volumes of international Theory of the Productive Forces bullshit. Speaking bullshit thusly would of course further include even the most creative sorts of fence-sitting on this life and death issue of proletarian ideology. In fact, to the extent that any communists are not providing fierce leadership against the international TOPF and the first world labor aristocracy they are speaking the bullshit of counter-revolution. It’s just that simple and there’s absolutely no way around it that is genuinely communist.
In Part 6a we said as much to the advanced forces in the Philippines. At MSH, Prairie Fire has said as much to the advanced forces of India in the excellent article, “Indian movements won’t connect the dots … yet.” Here we say it to the advanced forces leading people’s wars worldwide. If you are not leading your people directly, and the international proletariat by example, in struggle against the imperialist ideology of the Theory of the Productive Forces and the first world labor aristocracy you are objectively bullshitting about struggling for socialism.
That said, then, let’s move on to considering a second comment posted at MSH. A comrade provided an article documenting the responses she received from some “communists” when she presented them with the Maoist-Third Worldist political line on the first world labor aristocracy. The article is well worth a read since the “communist” responses pretty much cover the gamut of flimsy attempts at refutation that so-called “leftists” can muster against Maoism-Third Worldism. We’ll make use of just one of these here. It’s short, but it packs in more opportunism in the service of defending first worldism than you might think possible in a single sentence. The “communist” response to the comrade regarding Maoism-Third Worldism was this admonition:
Don’t listen to ghosts that hide behind the internet and have not applied these things anywhere to test their validity.
Here, all in one brief sentence, the first worldist “communists” show that in their rush to defend first world parasitism they’re prepared to opportunistically abandon:
(1) the ideological proposition that class struggle exists and thus the need for security is real
(2) the scientific proposition that truth is independent of the speaker
(3) the basics of logic, which says that if “ghosts” are those you know nothing about, then you cannot simultaneously claim to know something about them, like for instance their practice
And those are just for starters. We could go on and on with this rich sample of what passes for argumentation among first worldists, but (2) above suits our purposes for advancing to our final comments here, so we’ll focus on that bit of wisdom that seems to elude so many “communists” these days.
“Don’t listen to ghosts that hide behind the internet …” So, on an anomyous web page is written the equation, 2+2=4. But, a lifelong and trusted friend says to you, “2+2=5.” What to do? The “communists” above would without hesitation highly recommend to you the second equation.
Sure, it’s the venerable logical fallacy of argument from authority. The truth or falsity of a proposition exists and is verified independently of its proponent. “Communists” who want to charge Maoists-Third Worldists with being “ghosts” aren’t just employing a bad argument; they’re employing no argument whatsoever. Worse, they’re promoting the abandonment of science altogether, which should be a big tip off that they are not communists at all but rather poser first world apologists.
But, and here’s the real reason we’re even entertaining this “leftist” poser crap, the fact is that the Maoist-Third Worldist “ghosts from the internet” are in reality not 100% ghosts, and they’re certainly not as ghostly as they’d like to be. Even the casual reader can readily ascertain, for instance, that much of Maoism-Third Worldism has arisen in and continues to derive from the first world.
Pricelessly, we get the same dumb non-argument from authority leveled at us in a gotcha! tone from the yahoo white nationalists of the first world “left.” “Oh yeah, well I can tell you’re from the first world just like us, so I guess you’re parasites too! So there!”
And with this current set of articles we expect more of the same from the defenders of the first world labor aristocracy but with a newer twist on the attribute that supposedly vitiates our arguments, like, “you’re not from the Third World so how can you say anything about the Third World or its leaders?” Or maybe, “you’re not leading a people’s war so what right do you have to speak to those who are?” Again, fortunately for the international proletariat, the truth of Maoism-Third Worldism - the truth that the international Theory of the Productive Forces is the primary imperialist ideological weapon aimed at the world’s oppressed and exploited - does not cease to be true because of some attribute of its promoters. The objective truth of Maoism-Third Worldism ensures that it will remain the ideological weapon of choice for the international proletariat to defeat imperialism regardless its own geographical origin or that of its adherents.
On the other hand, we could always seek refuge in the same bogus argument from authority and ask, who better to assess the class structure of the imperialist first world and disseminate that first hand knowledge to the international proletariat than first worlders themselves? Who in the world knows these parasitic bloodsuckers better?
But the first world John Browns speaking the truth about parasitism are today proportionally no more than in John Brown’s own time. The first world overwhelmingly speaks first worldism to the oppressed, so it would do the Maoist-Third Worldists no good to opportunistically encourage listening to first world authority even if we were disposed to opportunism.
So we’re left with promoting Marxist science to the international proletariat and its leaders. Today Marxist science is Maoism-Third Worldism. For the world’s oppressed and exploited, anything else claiming proletarian science entails a completely unacceptable level of bullshit.
On “On the Theory of the Productive Forces,” Part 6a
It is over 30 years now since the revisionists slaughtered socialism and restored capitalism in China. We have just concluded a section of this series that exposed one of the primary ideological weapons used against the Chinese people in accomplishing the murder of socialism in the People’s Republic - the international theory of the productive forces powered by the first world labor aristocracy. We saw there that even otherwise genuine Chinese Maoists, indeed, most of China’s best Maoists, were accomplices to this despicable crime against socialism and the international proletariat. Most of China’s best Maoists were complicit in ideologically disarming the Chinese masses in the face of imperialism’s fusillade of first worldism.
It’s critical that this process of ideological disarmament be understood with absolute clarity. So let’s go over it again.
Most of the best Chinese Maoists promoted the first world labor aristocracy as oppressed and exploited, and thus as class allies of the international proletariat. But China’s educated elites, those with the influence to accomplish ideological dissemination, knew from experience and study that this class analysis of the first world was a lie. Much of the Chinese Communist Party itself had roots in these educated elites, who already knew quite well that the first world populations were, across the board, among the richest people in the world. So the lie of first worlders as exploited promulgated by the CCP constituted winking at parasite wealth by denying it.
And this denial flashed the green light for the further cancerous spread of the international theory of the productive forces amongst the Chinese masses. What could be the problem with wanting to live at the economic level of “ordinary” first worlders if those good folks were themselves “downtrodden” and “exploited”? In denying first worlder wealth, and its bloody imperialist origin, most of China’s best Maoists were with a wink and a nod giving a deadly thumbs up to imperialism’s false promise of parasitic living - the amerikkkan way of life - for the world’s exploited majority. It was a deadly thumbs up for the bullshit explanation of first worlder wealth, the international theory of the productive forces.
This constituted the ideological disarmament of the Chinese masses. The pernicious offering of the international TOPF, recall, is essentially this: forget class struggle and you can live like first worlders, like amerikkkans. There is not even an ideological hair’s breadth between that reactionary formulation and “to get rich is glorious.” Even China’s best Maoists had been marketing the first formulation among the Chinese masses for years by winking at parasite riches. Is it any wonder that the second wasn’t then a terribly hard sell?
Now, we’ve gone over this process of the international TOPF contributing to the destruction of Chinese socialism because grasping that inglorious process is of paramount importance if the worldwide struggle for socialism is to be victorious. Grasping that inglorious process is, in fact, of such paramount importance that communists have had to define an entirely new stage of Marxism, Maoism-Third Worldism, just to take account of and combat the first worldist ideology which fuels the international TOPF. You want 21st century communism, you got it: Maoism-Third Worldism.
The best Maoists in China were then the world’s most advanced communists. And without doubt worldwide there were few if any communists then doing any better on the question of the first world labor aristocracy and the international TOPF. The international proletariat knows that the Chinese Maoists were absolutely no worse on this most critical issue than the rest of the ICM, which was universally and totally fucked up when it came to first world parasitism.
But, and this brings us right to today, the international proletariat reserves the right to expect more of the advanced. Because they’re positioned to see further. The international proletariat honors the advanced with its greater expectations.
And right now the international proletariat has, 30 years on from the bitter defeat of Chinese socialism, a primary burning concern on which its expectations turn. And the high expectation in regard to that burning concern which the international proletariat currently places on today’s advanced communist forces is that those forces must be fighting with every muscle and bone to not ideologically disarm their own proletariats and oppressed nations with precisely the same fucking imperialist lie of the international theory of the productive forces as powered by the first world labor aristocracy that, uncombatted as it was, could probably have taken down socialism in China all on its own.
And that’s not all. The international proletariat places the expectation on these advanced forces that they constitute the advanced international leaders of the proletariat’s ideological offensive against this deadly imperialist lie, by far the most powerful weapon the imperialists have ever had in their ideological arsenal. The first task of the advanced always is to point out and lead the attack on the main enemy.
Today the international proletariat expects the Third World forces conducting people’s war to be those advanced detachments of communism. Of necessity ruthlessly realistic, the international proletariat expects little other than revisionism from those first worldist formations calling themselves “communist” while fronting for their own parasite constituents. Likewise the international proletariat places no expectation other than betrayal on the Third World comprador cohorts of these first wordlists such as the Prachanda clique. (1)
But the international proletariat, in honoring the advanced Third World forces conducting people’s war, expects much more from those forces. Specifically and concretely, the international proletariat today expects of these forces, for instance, better than this:
In the US and other imperialist countries, the monopoly bourgeoisie are using all kinds of maneuvers to deflect attention from the root causes of exploitation and oppression and to push down the working class, immigrants, the youth and women. They play up and generate chauvinism, racism and fascism in order to divide the working class and to pit the people in the imperialist countries against those in other countries. They use the mass media and various forms of entertainment to conjure the illusion of democracy and deflect public attention from the most important social issues.
But the working class and the rest of the people in the imperialist countries are fighting back. There have been widespread strikes by workers, protest rallies and marches by migrants and militant street actions by the youth in various imperialist countries. We can anticipate greater protest mass actions against monopoly capitalism on international and domestic issues in the months and years to come. The current crisis of world capitalism will further worsen. (2)
As we stated, today the international proletariat expects the advanced forces to be proletarian leaders of the ideological struggle against the theory of the productive forces and the first world labor aristocracy, not leaders in peddling this deadly lie to the oppressed and exploited as does the above bullshit fantasy of an exploited first world “working class” in rebellion. Such leadership demands calling out this nefarious ideology itself, and, as we’ll further clarify in Part 6b, calling out those within the advanced forces who peddle it.
(2) http://www.josemariasison.org/jumi02/inps/speech2ilpsaus.htm
On “On the Theory of the Productive Forces,” Part 5c
The “Hate America Campaign.” That’s what the United Snakes State Department called China’s offensive to eradicate bourgeois ideology in the ranks of the educators.(1) Would that those reactionary goons have been correct.
The Chinese Communist Party’s struggle to ideologically re-educate the educators began before liberation in the areas under CCP control. After liberation this effort became an all out nation-wide campaign.
Political classes were set up at all universities and all members of the universities - administrators, professors, students, and all staff - were required to attend. Similar political classes were initiated at primary and secondary schools. Revolutionary dramas were staged in the schools and other proletarian agitation was conducted. Criticism and self criticism sessions were held in which teachers were encouraged to examine their bourgeois ideas. Students were encouraged to criticize backward thinking of teachers. During school holidays teachers were required to attend special political classes. “Revolutionary universities” were established for the sole purpose of intense re-education of the educators. Teachers were also sent out into the villages to learn from the masses and to propagate proletarian ideology.(2)
Much of this campaign of ideological remolding was in name aimed at the “love America” ideology rampant among Chinese educators.
But … Well, here’s a representative example of the political line of the CCP in this campaign. This is from one professor’s self criticism.
Because of my worship-America and pro-America ideology, I forfeited my national stand during the anti-Japanese war and fell into the embrace of American imperialism. … When I spent my first four years in the United States, I was able to see only the superficial things, like the skyscrapers, the motorcars, and the shamelessly dissolute and free-spending life of the exploiting class, but not the tragic oppression of the toiling people by the monopolistic capitalists. I did not realize that the exploiting class had to squeeze the broad masses of the American people and to steal their fruits of toil before they could afford to live a free-spending life.(3)
This self criticism echoes the complaint of the Deputy Minister that we reviewed in Part 5b, that Chinese teachers “do not see the poverty of the American working people.” Here’s yet another educator who overlooked the amerikan proletariat. Who was right there in amerikkka for four entire years and still somehow missed that overwhelming majority of impoverished “American working people.” Who somehow in all those years just hadn’t come across the “tragic oppression” of those “broad masses” of “toiling people.”
The political line of the Chinese Communist Party in the educational rectification campaign (as in all other spheres) was just this: against imperialism and imperialists, for the general populaces of the imperialist nations, because those general populations were exploited “toiling people.”
This political line entailed the assumption that hundreds of thousands of Amerikan and European trained Chinese educators had each one just had a bit of bad luck in not encountering a first world proletariat in all their travels and studies. That was surely an odd coincidence of oversight, but it could be rectified by educating them (and the Chinese masses generally) as to what they had so curiously missed. So they were told by the CCP that an amerikan proletariat exists. They were told that “the exploiting class had to squeeze the broad masses of the American people and to steal their fruits of toil.”
Comrade Mao himself held this line. So, when criticizing those educators and other elements of Chinese society who spread the ideology of “love-America,” Comrade Mao himself formulated the accusation like this:
They are the very people who have illusions about the United States. They are unwilling to draw a distinction between the U.S. imperialists, who are in power, and the American people, who are not …(4)
The distinction demanded by the CCP line on the first world was in fact the demand for a trumped up class analysis that indicted the imperialists as exploiters but exonerated the first world labor aristocracy as exploited.
Here, of course, Comrade Mao is criticizing the line that exonerates the imperialists by not distinguishing them from their “good”, “exploited” populaces. Tragically, by explicitly letting the first world labor aristocracy off the hook, Comrade Mao’s and the CCP’s line implicitly lets imperialism itself off the hook. If the vast wealth of the first world aristocracy is denied, then the source of this wealth - the extent of imperialist super-profit extraction from the Third World – must perforce be denied.
And that vast first world labor aristocracy wealth was denied by the CCP, which just flat lied to the Chinese people in claiming that amerikkkans and other first worlders were “laboring masses” and “great” people.
As Maoists-Third Worldists we cannot shirk our duty to the international proletariat by calling this trumped up class analysis anything other than a flat-out lie on the part of the CCP. We cannot pretend the CCP was somehow unaware that first worlders were among the world’s richest people. Whole generations of China’s elites, responsible for imparting information about the world to the young, had known and preached about the rich “American way of life.” Hell, we’ve already seen that Peng Zhen, mayor of Beijing and Secretariat of the CCP Central Committee, made widespread Chinese knowledge of first world labor aristocracy wealth the very basis of his own nefarious push for capitalist restoration.
In the context of such widespread knowledge of first worlder wealth, the CCP’s false claims about “laboring masses” could only serve as a stamp of approval for imperialist parasitism, a wink and a nod at first world labor aristocracy exploitation of the Third World. The CCP’s fabricated first world class analysis opened wide the door to a bogus “acceptable” explanation of first worlder wealth, the theory of the productive forces.
We are not at this point prepared to claim that the CCP’s promotion of first world labor aristocracy ideology was the most powerful force paving the road to capitalist restoration in China. We’ve already acknowledged the ongoing presence of other reactionary ideologies in China against which the genuine Maoists of the time were forced to contend. At the same time, we question whether even feudalism, bureaucrat capitalism, and Confucianism combined could begin to offer the illusory payoff of material riches (in exchange for forgetting class struggle) held out by the bloody hand of the international theory of the productive forces as powered by the first world labor aristocracy.
To be sure, we are only in the infant stage of investigating and analyzing the role of the pernicious ideology of the international TOPF to the defeat of socialism in the People’s Republic. That we are only now initiating such critical studies is itself a testament to the victory of this imperialist ideology over the ICM throughout the last century.
But the international proletariat is done with the deadly revisionism that waves the red flag with one hand and the reactionary flag of the first world labor aristocracy with the other. It is past time to name names and call out the bullshit.
The Chinese Communist Party claimed they could build socialism while embracing the international theory of the productive forces as powered by the first world labor aristocracy. Maoism-Third Worldism calls that out right here and now as bullshit.
Today even Third World forces professing People’s War claim they can achieve proletarian victory without an all out fight against the first wordlist ideology that was instrumental in defeating socialism in China. In Part 6, Maoism-Third Worldism calls out those bullshitters as well.
(1) The “Hate America” Campaign in Communist China (Washington, D.C: Office of Intelligence Research of the United States Department of State, 1952) cited in Stuart Fraser (Ed) Chinese Communist Education: Records of the First Decade (Nashville, 1965), p.140.
(2) Hsia, Adrain. The Chinese Cultural Revolution (New York, 1972), pp. 78-80.
(3) Chou P’ei-yuan, ‘Criticizing My Decadent Bourgeois Ideology’ in Stuart Fraser (Ed) Chinese Communist Education: Records of the First Decade (Nashville, 1965), p.142.
(4) Mao Tse-tung, ‘Cast Away Illusions, Prepare for Struggle’ in Selected Works of Mao Tse-tung (Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 1969), vol. IV, p. 428.
On “On the Theory of the Productive Forces,” Part 5b
In 1964, Chinese newspapers reported that … in major cities like Shanghai and Peking, and even in distant provinces such as Shensi and Shansi, numerous young people were going about with long hair, pointed shoes and tight trousers. … Other aspects of western culture also found favour with a section of Chinese youth at that time. … These young people had become ‘degenerate, disaffected’ and politically unreliable.
By and large, the children of former capitalists did not follow the western fashion; they were always suspect, and so could not afford to expose themselves in this way. And, in fact, it was the young people with socially acceptable class affiliations – above all, the sons and daughters of senior functionaries - who flaunted their bourgeois and western tastes. (1)
We’re still examining the possible contribution of the international (first world labor aristocracy) theory of the productive forces to the defeat of socialism in China. In Part 4 the guts of this bourgeois ideology was shown to be the bogus promise: forget class struggle and you’ll get to live like amerikkkans, like the richest people on earth. Then in Part 5 we spotlighted the mayor of Beijing, Peng Zhen, as pushing a revisionist, capitalist restorationist line which was in fact dependent upon the international TOPF for its efficacy. We said there that Peng’s line indicated some significant buying into this fallacy of first worldism amongst the Chinese masses – otherwise international TOPF-based lines such as Peng’s would have no hope of gaining traction.
That analysis was all quite reasonable but its end assertion – that the ideology of first worldism was probably widespread amongst the Chinese masses – was still mainly a product of logical conclusion rather than factual examination. The italicized article above, however, appears to provide concrete historical evidence of that same conclusion, at least within a particular section of the Chinese people. The “degenerate, disaffect” youth depicted in the Chinese news reports were not aping the reactionary culture of Chinese feudal lords or even that of Chinese capitalists. They were emulating “ordinary” first world labor aristocrats, “ordinary” rich amerikkkans. So yes, those 1964 reports do appear to be some confirming evidence that to some significant degree first world labor aristocrat thinking was prevalent in China.
But perhaps this love-amerikkka ideology was anomalous in China, a brief flirtation with the international TOPF confined to this particular section of the people.
Not so. Take a look at just one extremely influential sector of Chinese society, education. This is then Vice-Minister of Education, Tseng Chao-lun:
For the past hundred years, American imperialism has not only been carrying out the most blatant sort of military, political, and economic aggression, but, what is far more pernicious, it has always employed a small part of the spoils derived from the Chinese people for the establishment of missionary schools … in an attempt to achieve the spiritual enslavement of Chinese children and youths through the dissemination of poisonous pro-America, revere-America, and fear-America sentiments. (2)
Complementing the cultural aggression of the amerikan-sponsored schools within China was the bourgeois schooling of Chinese educators in the first world itself.
In 1922 China adopted the American system of education. From then onwards her university teachers received a “bourgeois” education, either in China or - in the majority of cases - in the USA or Europe. These university teachers then trained the secondary and primary school teachers. As a result, nearly all Chinese educationalists came to acquire a “bourgeois” mentality: they admired the “bourgeois” culture of America and Europe for its economic, technological and scientific advancements, and its political freedom. (3)
At the time of liberation, then, the Chinese educational corps was in fact awash in love-amerika ideology. And so much so that two years after liberation the Deputy Minister of Education, reporting on the “pro-America, worship-America, fear-America mentality” of Chinese teachers, would state frankly that
… not a small number of teachers in higher educational institutions are still preserving strong European-American reactionary capitalist-class thoughts, especially a tendency to worship the American Capitalist class. Even now they still stubbornly worship the mode of living of the Anglo-American capitalist class, especially the so-called “American way of life.” They admire American wealth (they do not see the poverty of the American working people) … (4)
Let’s remove the parentheses from that last statement: They admire American wealth – they do not see the poverty of the American working people. Of course not. The “American way of life” so worshiped by China’s educators was not that of the amerikkkan super-rich and the yacht club set but that of “average” amerikan “workers,” the majority of whom, we’ll continue to point out, were among the world’s richest people - there was no poverty to be seen. It’s absolutely critical to understand this about China’s educational corps. Their own “education” in the first world had not taught them a longing to be big capitalists squeezing the lifeblood from their “own” first world populations of subsistence-living proletarians. They learned “only” the longing to live like the “regular folks” of those first world populations – that was the “American wealth” and “American way of life” of their ideological aspirations. The Chinese educational corps, across the board, had acquired, and were intent on disseminating, nothing more or less than first world labor aristocracy ideology. They were thoroughly infected with the lie of the international theory of the productive forces.
So, far from being anomalous, those “degenerate, disaffected” Chinese youth in 1964 were symptomatic of a much more widespread first world labor aristocracy cancer in Chinese society, extending at the time of liberation at least throughout the nation’s educational ranks.
To be sure, the first worldism prevalent in China was not the only reactionary ideology inherited by the People’s Republic from the old society. Feudalism had prevailed for thousands of years. China’s bureaucrat capitalism had been around for a hundred years. But, we will argue in Part 5c, the ideology of the first world labor aristocracy was a viciously powerful reactionary vehicle for accomplishing the restoration of capitalism in China, and it was an ideology that the Chinese communists not only failed to combat, but in fact promoted.
(1) Hsia, Adrain. The Chinese Cultural Revolution (New York), p.69.
(2) Tseng Chaolun, ‘The Disposal of American-Subsidized Schools is the First Task on the Cultural Front Now’ in Stuart Fraser (Ed) Chinese Communist Education: Records of the First Decade (Nashville, 1965), p.98.
(3) Hsia, p.38.
(4) Chien Chun-jui, ‘The Key to Reform of Higher Education’ in Stuart Fraser (Ed) Chinese Communist Education: Records of the First Decade (Nashville, 1965), p.123.
Maoism-Third Worldism celebrates International Women’s Day, March 8, 2008: Smash the first world!
(from MSH)
Celebrate International Women’s Day; Smash the First World!
March 8th, 2008 is International Women’s Day. It is important to recognize that women’s liberation is a necessary step on the road to socialism and communism. Liberation movements that put women’s liberation on the back burner fight with one hand tied behind their back. It is in this spirit that we honor the role of women in the liberation struggle.
On Iran and the Islamic Upsurge…
We denounce First World attempts to destroy anti-imperialist movements by turning Third World females against Third World males. When First Worldists and their lackeys hold marches against the Islamic Republic of Iran and the Islamic upsurge against imperialism, they are doing the bidding of the imperialists. They pretend to criticize both Islam and imperialism. (1) In reality, all they end up doing is undermining anti-interventionist sentiment within imperialist nations. They are simply spreading anti-Islamic chauvinism and malaise within the anti-war movement. Their implication is that First World so-called feminism is the answer to problem of patriarchy in the Third World. Theirs is the same old “civilizing” rhetoric that the colonizer and their lackeys have always directed at the colonized.
To make matters worse, these forces go even further. In Iran, by declaring the Islamic Republic to be “the main enemy,” they have embarked on a strategy of encouraging imperialist war against Iran as a catalyst for catapulting themselves to power as compradors. These comprador forces have also echoed imperialist propaganda against the Iranian nuclear program. To attack the Third world is to attack the majority of the world’s females. These forces are anti-Women. There should be no mistaking their true nature. Good riddance to the rotting hulk known as the RIM.
What Third World movements need to understand…
1. The contradiction between First World females and First World males is not antagonistic. First World females, for the most part, are freed from traditional forms of patriarchal oppression. Like First World males, First World females enjoy a high degree of autonomy, a wide range of life options to pursue in their leisure time, access to imperial privileges, etc. First World males and First World females largely share the same culture and psychology. Whereas there are still differences between First World males and First World females, these differences are insignificant in the global scheme of things. First World males and First World females benefit from the global system of gender oppression.
2. The First World as a whole is your enemy. First World males and First World females are your enemy. Contradictions in individual First World nations are made less and less antagonistic due to the influx of super-profits. Contradictions that once seemed antagonistic have faded away within individual First World nations.
3. At present, we should not seek to undermine counter-hegemonic, anti-imperialist, bourgeois nationalist regimes in Iran, northern Korea, Venezuela, Cuba, etc. These states are not socialist and are not on the path to communism. However, the existence of these counter-hegemonic, anti-imperialist states helps open up the possibility of proletarian breakthroughs in other parts of the world. When Maoist-Third Worldist, proletarian forces take state power, they will be isolated internationally unless such a counter-hegemonic block exists. At present, to undermine counter-hegemonic, anti-imperialist states undermines the success of proletarian revolution.
4. Build a Maoist-Third Worldist, proletarian alternative without undermining the counter-hegemonic, anti-imperialist block. The imperialists have shown that they are more than willing to support so-called revolutionary and so-called Maoist organizations in order to undermine anti-imperialist, counter-hegemonic forces and states in the Third World. Imperialists are more than willing to support comprador forces under Mao’s banner. Maoist-Third Worldists need to establish a solid, proletarian alternative globally without undermining the anti-imperialist united front.
5. Scientific clarity is needed within the International Communist Movement. The fan club approach must be smashed. The fan club approach has led to a situation where movements unite on the basis of their favorite historic icons. The fan club approach has led to a situation where organizations are so mired in dogma and so ideologically moribund that they are unable to do any real analysis of political economy or historical analysis.
6. Who are our enemies? Who are our friends? Global class analysis is key to successful communist revolution. Revolutionary science does not tolerate opportunism and fence sitting on the question of first importance.
Celebrate…
Celebrate International Women’s Day by decisively breaking with First Worldism. Embrace Maoism-Third Worldism! Denounce First World so-called feminism! Denounce White so-called feminism! Stand for proletarian feminism! Women of the Third World, stand against imperialism, especially U$ imperialism!
Notes.1. http://rwor.org/a/122/march-8-statement-en.html
Also see: Stand-in gender line, Policy on alternative gender spellings, David Horowitz, Bob Avakian wrangle over copyright, Book Review: Female Chauvinist Pigs, Interview with Ganapathy with comments by IRTR, Sunrise Document, Iron Five video and on the United Front, Disband the RIM by IRTR, Allegory of the Playground, Shubel Morgan Video: Long Live the Victory of People’s War!, Shubel Morgan: Hate Amerikkka triple feature , Shubel Morgan video: On the Theory of Productive Forces (论唯生产力论 in Chinese) (click here for English)
