- Capitalism and Alternatives -

Waiting For Godot's return.

Posted by: Red Deathy ( Socialist Party, UK ) on August 02, 1999 at 12:01:15:


Reformist and Possiblist stand on a bleak existential wasteland.

Reformist:Lets build socialism.
Possiblist:Yes, lets.

They go no-where, and instead try to reform capitalism.

I'd leave possiblism by teh wayside, but I cannot help but attack it- as can be seen above, the Godot example is more of an indictment of Possiblism than impossiblism- it is possiblism that goes no-where, and instead tries to work within a rotten system. To work within the system means to accept its logic (Government by the Minority, Minority ownership, etc.) and means that inevitably it will be found that the system cannot be made to work for the majority- minimum wages, maximum hours, union rights, are all of no-avail.

Did the Abolitionists call for less whipping, better beds and shorter working hours for slaves? then why should we call for the like for wage-slaves? To do so accepts the right of teh wage-slave to be thus- we cannot accept that.

I was once a possiblist, a Labourite (libertarian socialist), but I realised, eventually, that all these running battles are pointless, unless we rid oursaelves of teh main cause.

Green Values aren't worth a damn unless they have a decent system to enact them- and if teh greens are serious about their values, they should only have one policy- instead of a battery of legal reforms to be made via the state, they should simply enact direct local and full democracy- a revolutionary platform. As it is they are dooming themselves to failure.

Possiblism isn't just a mistake, or being too cool headed, it is *actively* and directly a hinderance to socialism- it is a self-fulfilling prophecy- one that makes socialism impossible.

There is another self-fulfilling prophecy, one that makes socilaism possible itself, and that is to renounce reform, and campiagn and vote solely for socialism.


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