From Engels to Lenin to Mao, all have expressed their sheer repulsion towards dogmatism. Mao has even written one text after another and spoken in multiple meetings about battling this problem in the party. He, along with other materialists, has made it clear that the Markets are a historical category that have existed since before capitalism. Capitalism =/= Commerce.

Then how is it some Marxists who claim to have read theory call China capitalist and label its supporters as ‘Dengists’? Socialists created the fastest growing economy ever observed in human history that lifted hundreds of millions of people out of absolute poverty. And now these dogmatists wanna give its credit to capitalism!?

Their entire prejudice is based on the misconception that Deng Xioping did not follow on Mao’s thoughts. Deng literally heeded Maoist ideas such as “Let a hundred flowers bloom, let a hundred schools of thought contend” and “The masses are the real heroes, while we ourselves are often childish and ignorant”. He built the productive forces for the Chinese people based on—not in spite of—the continuing influence of Mao Zedong’s ideology. Now Xi Jingping is continuing both of their legacies.

So people who make such non-materialist and often times liberal critique of the Chinese economy have either not read theory or did not develop any dialectical and historical materialism to understand the theory!

As Marxists and materialists, it is our responsibility to confront these reductionist elements in our movement and bring back the pendulum at its correct course when it swings too much to either sides; right-wing revisionism or left-wing dogmatism.

“No investigation, no right to speak.” - Mao Zedong

      • RedWizard [he/him, comrade/them]@hexbear.net
        22·
        4 days ago

        It’s funny because I definitely used that dudes audio book for WITBD. What part of

        What we have to deal with here is a communist society, not as it has developed on its own foundations, but, on the contrary, just as it emerges from capitalist society; which is thus in every respect, economically, morally, and intellectually, still stamped with the birthmarks of the old society from whose womb it emerges.

        Do these people not fully understand? Do they think Feudalism was destroyed in a matter of years and not decades and centuries? One thing we have to accept NOW is that this version of socialism that isn’t “stamped with the birthmarks of the old society” is something our grandchildren might experience, and that’s if we started TODAY.

          • RedWizard [he/him, comrade/them]@hexbear.netEnglish
            11·
            4 days ago

            Yeah, we’re definitely not starting today, heh. May my great great grandkids rest in the shade of the trees we plant. Or something like that, you get what I mean. I should add, too, that Lenin acknowledges this in his own writings post revolution:

            Our state apparatus is so deplorable, not to say wretched, that we must first think very carefully how to combat its defects, bearing in mind that these defects are rooted in the past, which, although it has been overthrown, has not yet been overcome, has not yet reached the stage of a culture, that has receded into the distant past.

            From Better Fewer, But Better. The second part of Lenin’s letter to the 12th Congres “How we Should Reorganise The Workers’ and Peasants’ Inspection”.

            I’m not sure how he can look at Lenin, and then also the NED, and somehow not see the through line from the Lenin, the NED, and the Deng reforms. As socialists, are we supposed to believe that our state exists in a vacuum, unbothered by the global economy and global capitalist dominance? How is a socialist state supposed to maintain a command economy fully surrounded by capitalist economic schemes? The deal the Chinese made regarding technology sharing during the reform and opening up is what allowed them to own their productive capacity, instead of it being owned by the west.

            I could go on and on, but to deny China’s path, is to deny Dialectical Materialism, to deny the Laws of Uneven and Combined Development. It’s dogmatic, plain and simple.

            • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmygrad.ml
              6·
              4 days ago

              That’s an excellent excerpt, comrade, hadn’t read that before! I agree, there’s no one true socialism, and China’s choice to take advantage of market forces for developing themselves while retaining the principle aspects of the economy in the public sphere is fully in line with Marxism-Leninism. Fantastically well-said.

    • DonLongSchlong@lemmygrad.ml
      16·
      4 days ago

      Yeah i am trying to figure out where exactly he mentioned those takes so i can link it, but it’s an audiobook that i have listened to at work and i don’t even know the specific videos lmao. Will report back when i find it

      Edit: never mind, he has a full on video on it haha https://youtu.be/Zt9k8SymAcA