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Allowing fascist newspapers and fascist speech to fester out in the open, rather than shutting it doen, is letting it grow. I'm not at all "trapped in idealism" by saying that fascist speech should be censored by the working classes.
"The free press is the ubiquitous vigilant eye of a people's soul, the embodiment of a people's faith in itself, the eloquent link that connects the individual with the state and the world... It is the mind of the state that can be delivered into every cottage more cheaply than material gas." Karl Marx
Yes, what context was he writing about here? Do you think he was also in favor of asking the bourgeoisie nicely to give up their power? Here's Marx talking about putting "right" over the level of development of society:
A genuine free press can only happen in communist society after class struggle has ended.
No, he was in favor of giving the power to the working class, not to some elite that limits what the working class can do, learn about or be exposed to.
“The emancipation of the working classes must be conquered by the working classes themselves.”
Yes, so the working classes censoring the speech of liberals and fascists to prevent the restoration of bourgeois rule is absolutely in the rights of the working classes to do. A socialist state thetefore should be able to crack down on liberals and fascists, and not let their ideas fester freely.
"The censored press has a demoralizing effect. ... The government hears only its own voice, it knows that it hears only its own voice, yet it harbors the illusion that it hears the voice of the people." Karl Marx
You say it's the "working classes" the ones censoring the speech, but you are falling into a "who watches the watchmen?" problem
Marx argued that the only way to truly defeat speech is to prove it wrong in the "light of day"
"If you do not believe in the victory of truth, you are committing a crime against truth."
"Truth is as little modest as light... Truth is universal, it does not belong to me, it belongs to all; it owns me, I do not own it."
Truth that requires a policeman to protect it from being challenged isn't actually truth at all.. but just some idealistic subjective point.
Again, you're talking about Marx arguing for freedom of speech in the context of capitalist states censoring communists, and trying to apply it to socialist states censoring liberals and fascists. The "marketplace of ideas" is liberal bullshit, the one that controls the press controls which class's point of view is espoused in society. Debate and critique happen all the time in socialist countries, just not in ways that platform liberals and fascists (and even then, sometimes that still does happen).
You're treating Marx like a religious figure, trying to take a quote out of its necessary context and dogmatically applying it to circumstances that only arose after Marx died. Truth isn't what "wins in debate," it's objective reality, and allowing the bourgeoisie as a class to dominate the press and make their point of view dominant from a misguided idea that this will "expose their flaws" shows that you've learned nothing from the real experience of a century of existing socialism.
Are you implying that Marx was not making general claims about the nature of truth and the state, but that instead he was being opportunistic, like a tactician only interested in defending objective truth under the particular context of the state being openly capitalistic?
Truth IS objective reality. Again, you are conflating idealist ideas of truth with material truth.
If a socialist theory is true and scientific, it should be able to dismantle a fascist argument in front of a crowd of workers. If you have to put the fascist in jail to stop the workers from believing him, you are admitting that your "truth" isn't convincing enough to win on its own.
Marx was a scientific socialist, and developed dialectical materialism. One of the key advances of dialectical materialism, as opposed to vulgar materialism or metaphysical materialism, is that everything must be considered in its necessary context. In the context of the press and the state, Marx is advocating for the "free press" as it can only exist in the hands of the working classes, in other words as collectively owned. Marx is not arguing for everyone to be able to own the press, including capitalists and fascists, but instead the working classes.
What you are doing is erasing Marx's class analysis from his arguments to argue for letting fascists own and run their own press and spread their ideas. The reasoning you claim to be doing so is because "truth will win in the argument," but that's not how debates work or are "won." People already have their minds made up before debates happen, and are inclined to side with their percieved class interest. What you are advocating for is making it easier for fascists to organize and more difficult to stop that from happening.
The last century has proven the danger of not addressing the class nature of culture and the press. You're using Marx as though he were a prophet and not a scientific socialist, and are throwing away his dialectical method in favor of metaphysics, in order to support fascists undermining socialism.
I think you are the one misinterpreting Marx's context and rejecting scientific methods to truth. If you believed in the scientific method you should support open study of truth like scientific socialism does, with the will of scientifically testing the paradigm, instead of supporting the establishment of dogmatic truths through control and coercion.
Marx’s scientific socialism defends that the state -any state- is a 'parasite' on society (he even believed the phrase "Communist State" was a contradiction).
I agree with open study of truth, what I disagree with is giving fascists the tools to manipulate public opinion and undermine socialism.
Secondly, yes, communism is stateless. Socialism is not, though, socialism is the dictatorship of the proletariat over the bourgeoisie. This is where the proletariat strips the bourgeoisie of all political power using the state, so that class may be abolished through collectivization of all production and distribution. See Marx responding to Bakunin:
Socialism is not "big government," nor is it antagonistic to the state. Socialism is the transition between capitalism and communism, when the proletariat has control of the state and uses forcible means to end class society. Socialism is a mode of production by which public ownership is the principal aspect of the economy and the working classes control the state, using it to oppress the former ruling classes and abolish class in general alongside collectivization of production and distribution.
What have you read of Marx that leads you to believe he supported free speech for fascists and was against the dictatorship of the proletariat? This is a deeply confused understanding of Marxism you have.
I agree with Marx there. But there is a massive difference between forcibly suppressing the economic power of the bourgeoisie (collectivizing their land) and suppressing the expression of ideas.
If you have already stripped the bourgeoisie of their factories and banks (or say.. gone as far as to kill them), their "speech" loses its power. If a state is still terrified of "fascist manipulation" after the revolution, then the state hasn't actually solved the material problems of the people.
A lot of socialists states failed because they were just a wolf in sheep's clothing and didn't actually solve the issues.
You can't focus entirely on the base and utterly ignore the superstructure of society, otherwise you leave society open to reverting to capitalism and the disaster that becomes. Further, you cannot simply abolish class overnight, and the process of collectivization itself takes time, in both cases you must still employ forcible means to oppress the bourgeoisie while supporting proletarian science and culture.
Allowing fascist press does not weaken fascism, it strengthens it, and allows for manipulation that kicks off counter-revolution as was seen in history provoked by outlets like Radio Free Europe and Radio Free Asia (which you also linked). What this amounts to is you not taking fascism seriously at all.
Again, what have you read of Marx that leads you to believe these ideas that Marx would have supported fascist speech? Is it just that one article advocating for less censorship under capitalism, so that the working classes may more freely spread their ideas?
Censorship is a structural failure of the superstructure itself. I provided earlier a list of reasons of why I think this.
When we 'oppress' the bourgeoisie by silencing them, the censor’s hand is eventually covering the worker’s mouth & ears.
I’m not relying in just one specific article like it's a bible... I’m applying a scientific approach and relying on Marx’s belief that the dictatorship of the proletariat is the self-government of the producers. You cannot govern yourself if you are wearing a blindfold.
You explained your reasoning, I just disagree with it entirely for reasons I have given. You depend on a false understanding of how ideas are spread in society in order to defend the presence of fascist press in socialism. The bourgeoisie need to be silenced because otherwise they use the press to spread misinformation and disinformation to incite counter-revolution, again, see how Radio Free Europe and Radio Free Asia are used historically.
You aren't applying a scientific approach, you're erasing concrete reality in order to appeal to how you want society to function, ie you want for open debate of fascist ideas to prevent their spread, but that's not how ideas work and that's not how debate works. You're proceding from a false premise and trying to justify it by erasing the context of a single article by Marx.
The working classes know well why fascist ideas should be shut down, rather than legitimized, that's why the working classes have shut down fascist press in socialist societies using the state. That's the dictatorship of the proletariat in action.
You are misunderstanding me and it has become clear that I'm not gonna get through you. We are talking in circles.
I don't believe I'm misunderstanding you at all, though I agree we are speaking in circles. I think that adds to my point, the marketplace of ideas is a fantasy.
Science is not a fantasy, and wanting to call it a "marketplace" is proof of the misunderstanding. We have historic proof of the damage to the power of the workers that dogmatic censorship, "political correctness" (ie. hiding truth) and manipulation of public perception causes, we are seeing it right now first person in the west. Doing the same thing (and more overtly) is fighting dogma with dogma, even if the ideals from one of them were fully benevolent and made people happy.
Political correctness isn't "hiding the truth," you're implying that racism, homophobia, etc. are "the truth." You're caping for fascism and bigotry.
What? it's hard to tell what did you interpret this time ...but I hope you are not implying that politically correct language like "military operation" shows the whole truth, that "pacification" is the whole truth, that "terrorism" is the whole truth, that "re-education camps" are the whole truth, that "voluntary relocation" is the whole truth, that "austerity measures" are the whole truth.
"Political correctness" has often been a dogwhistle for censoring bigotry:
You're referring to instead how political figures massage words.
Since its inception the term has been about adherence to party lines and enforcing ideological purity. The right wants to pretend they don't do it, so they want to attribute it to particular instances from the left, but they do the same thing all the time.
See the next paragraph on that same article you quote (Wikipedia, btw):
Sure, but considering this entire speech you've been talking about how you want to protect the rights of fascists to spew fascist bullshit, talking negatively about political correctness is almost assuredly about the modern usage. You can't fault me for reading this as you yet again arguing for fascist speech to be protected.
I agree that your previous misunderstandings lead you to this one.
Fascist speech is to be exposed and criticised scientifically, not dogmatically. Your use of "protected" here implies something I do not defend.
I want to attack fascist speech, you want to hide it.. from my point of view I could also say you are the one protecting it.
You can expose the problems of fascist speech without legally protecting the right of fascists to spread disinformation and misinformation, which you've been arguing for. I don't want to "hide" it, I want to eliminate it from public discourse and study it academically so as to prevent it from rising.